A VOLCANIC AND SEISMIC YEAR.
[From the Chicago Tribune, Dec. 29, 1902.] The year 1902 bids fair to be known in the records of time as the volcanic and earthquake year, and this continent has had its full share of the disastrous results of these convulsions. The disturbances began last May, and from that time to this there has not been a month in which they have not been active. In South America, Central America, the islands of the Caribbean Sea, Guatemala, Mexico, and Alaska there have been violent eruptions of volcanoes, involving large loss of life and widespread destruction of property, while many volcanoes, long supposed to be extinct, have made sympathetic efforts sufficiently threatening to cause general alarm in their vicinity. The eruption of Mont Pelée and Mont Suffrière were the most violent, burying the country for miles around in ashes, and destroying 45,600 lives. To these must be added 7,625 more lost at other places, making a total of 53,225 victims of volcanic fury. Volcanic eruptions have been accompanied by seismic disturbances in various parts of the world. Upon this continent, Mexico and Guatemala have been the chief sufferers, 1,300 lives having been lost in those two countries. Few disasters from this cause have occurred in Europe, but Turkestan, in western Asia, has been shaken up three times. In February 5,000 lives were lost at Shamakar, in the Caucasus region; in September, 1,100 in the same region; and in December, 5,000 at Andijan, which is in the eastern part of Turkestan. In addition to these last, ten times their number have been left homeless. The entire number of lives lost from this cause is 12,437. Not satisfied with volcanic disturbances and earthquakes, nature has been busy with its storms in the shape of cyclones, typhoons, and hurricanes every month in the year. They count 4,592 victims. Nature has also let loose floods, sweeping away 8,032 victims; China, as usual, being the principal sufferer. Fire, that other element of nature, claims a long list of victims, tho it is hardly fair to charge to nature what clearly is attributable to human negligence and carelessness, as was shown, for instance, three times in this city when the St. Luke's hospital, the glucose works, and the Lincoln Hotel burned, involving the loss of thirty-seven lives. This year 1,593 persons have been reported as having lost their lives in this country by fire, but the real number must have been greater. In large fires in Europe 1,007 lives have been reported as lost. The number of casualties of this kind in Europe is much smaller than in this country, as they build more securely over there, and consequently have fewer destructive fires. The general trend of fire waste in this country is in the direction of increase, and the saddest feature of it all is that the loss of life by fire also increases every year. From all other causes a little more than 80,000 persons have perished in 1902. While this is not as large a number of fatalities as have occurred in some other years, the destruction is phenomenal, in that nearly two-thirds of it has been occasioned by volcanic and seismic disturbances.