PARIS FLOODS

Evening Star, Issue 14307, 4 March 1910, Page 2

PARIS FLOODS

AY.T.-INSFI lUNO SI'ECTAG'LK. THRILLING INCIDENTS. STARVIXU .MUJ/L'iTLTIKS. By the 1: M.S. Otrivdo, from London, tho' following graphic description of the Paris floods "bra; been received from thy 'ArgtusV London correspondent: ['aria his bsen suffering fiom a Hood of. linparalleled magnitude, and is still in the throes of it. 'Can you imagine the gay city isolated from its outer suburbs, and ruthlessly cut off on two sides from the rest of the world? How shall I describe its picturesque quays, and many of the oldest of the adjacent .streets transformed by tho irresistible How of the Seine into a tawny imitation of Venice; how portray its hundreds of thousands of citizens watching with bated breath the ever-swelling, ever-expanding waste of waters which threaten to sap the city's foundations; its 30.CG0 homeless, its scores of blind, sick, and paralytic hurriedly removed from .submerged quarters to places of comfort and shelter, the police beats and relief bargee carrying food and succor to hungry and distressed, or the terror of the wealthier reeitlenU of fashionable and now inundated Faubourg, Saint tiermain, hastouing to take up their temporary abode in tha leading hotels? j These are but a few of the hundred-arid-1 one salient facis ami incident.-, which for j years will vividly recall the present calamitoes visitation. That this flood i'g nothing less than a national disaster is shown by the otlicial estimate of looses, amounting in Paris and the provinces to £'10,000,000 sterling. It ha*; been announced, indeed, that the inundations now cover in widelydivergent sections one-half of Fiance, the ilood in Paris having beaten all records within living memory, surpassing the disastrous delude of 1576, and reaching the high-water level of 1802. Haiti storms, melting fiiow, and intermittent sleet in tho high lands of the Cots> i d'Or, whore, tho issually cJiiggish Seine takw j its rise, had for many days combined to i ewell its great tributaries, the Maine, the j Yvonne, and the (Irand Morin, until the > volume of water riowing through Pans ' treated a feeiiug of excitement and alarm. | Mut even when the flood reached its height t there war no panic. The Parisians, moved ; by light-hearted curiosity nral wonder j rather than downright anxiety, had. j watched the impressive spectacle as the ; vising stream overflowed its banks, and, j hourly gatbeiing up itti strength, threatened to demolish the Pont d'AusterliU. its tirst obstacle. Thence it sped higher and higher to the wine quays at Mercy, sweeping; away hundred,-, of empty casks, dashing tL.-in Liter, with logs, hioken furniture, larcusises of ar.ined.-, and other flotsam and jetsam against flic saiid wall.-, of He de la Cite and lie St. Loiii.*., Next the swirling forces there subdivided, and passed aggres- |

sively against I'nnt liemi Qmitvo ami Pent | c!<> l.i Touniellr, which held the. previous hi/h-water record in 1658—namely. 29ft. Soon the quays and landings oil cither aide of the Seine were submerged. Tlie bathini;houiicc ami washing CKtahlishiiienta vrero almost on a. ievel with the hut-sea. Th-: river doubled its width, the water crept through every opening, until the celium r,f the l.ouvre were Hooded and the rooms of the Museum could no lon-rer he heated. —Light Cut Oil'.— On tho oppa-ite <side. the Quai D'Or.-ay station hail to bo evacuated, the llood bmstiiv_r into th.' i-ntiuudied tinuielri of the metropolitan railway under Boulevard St. llemiain. Nothing apparently could tsteie. an invasion ihmiti'idng the whole o!' thiis well-known quarter. l'u;:n the l'lme do i.l Concord;! to the Boulevard Maleshorbef. The new Noid Slid railway tu"i;r| war; foo;: Hooded, while the undeimound inundation, mi tiie left, hunk extended to Boulevard Montpartui.vie, All the public clock.; were slapped by the flooding of the coili]ires~c»l air chamber. Gradually the uiichained tei rents of the foaming river wovkul <\.!V.'.iVaVie.r\ vibove •jvovuul, i:\tevruptmg telephones and telegraphs, paralysing train and omnibus services throughout

the central districts, hikl stupping the elec-tric-light plant supplying sections of the Champs Klysees and other tlietricts, T!il' flooding of the power-houses on thi.' left bank cut off the light in the quarter Iretwecn the lUmlevurd St. CL'rmnin unci the Seine, iiiul the tiuyiil Hood wrts washed over jutfry acres <if the streets. A; Iviy, v.-Jiicli i<- the worst sufferer, , 50,000 people have been -thrown out of tvurk. Many ure even now being forcibly ■rescued from th.iir tenement.-) by the police. Ihe removal of the sick in some districts . jave vtise to many iouching scenes. At ivry. in the nud.-t of t!ie Hood, there v.a.s in outbreak of scarlet fever, and the juitieids were conveyed in motor cuts to lh" I Paris hospitals. Tho wine cellars at lietvy i were early .inundated, a great lake foaming 1 over them, ami the- shopf> in tho vicinity hj were Hooded. Day by day, heedless of ! - the pouring rain, hundreds of thousand hj | • thronged the approaches to the river, thi-ir I ' even fixed on the swollen stream as it sueU ( and .spread. ' | Tin.' water at Alfortviile. above Paris, is ( 14Ft dt/q-i, and many of the low-lyiiifc f-trerU i ;.t Auteuil, the extreme westeni limit of ] Paris, are seriously inundated. Four hundred people had to be removed from a | siugta hTnall street, in which the houses ( tlireat:-ned to collapse. Along the left J bank tratlic was impossible, and the hou,%\; ,« by the fiver ate nearly up tq the first storey t ill water. The He de Jatte, with its trees t and little restaurant*, lias varii.dn-d, except for the tops of the poplars and Ihe highest 1 stones of the houses. N'mncroiis villas at i •Unieres, where many Knglish families vet side, are also .-urronmlcd with water, which t his risen to the liiut floor windows. Of tlu J eight bridges between font Xeuf and Pout J de Passy, only three are open to trallie. ] —Thieve* l.iioy.— ' Severe measures were tuken ngaitt.it J! thieves, who went about in boats endeavoring to .gain access to the buildings, on the L pretest of being engaged in life-saving, the troops working day ami night under dilficttlties and discomforh; of all kinds. They hatl been reinforced by pontoon section,} from the provincial garrioous and naval detachments with Uerthou boats from Itrri.t, Cherbourg, and other ports. A naval captain arrived on Wednesday with 120 men li and 74 boats drawn from the Channel tor- n pedo boats' division. The city itrelf has n been divided into live military" districts. i:

"Ahncfit the entire Jaidin ties Plantcs U under a sheet of water," .-ays the Paris edition 'of. the 'New Yurie Herald'), "the monkey-house rocking with dampness. Only the crocodiles arc lively. The serpents' room in iloodc<!. and an evil-looking pylhon is wriiiglitii; about, very thin and wa.shedout. The serpents should he fed to-day. but their caterer, it appears, is protecting Jik island liome at Choky Le ltoi from an invasion of rats. ' The' honied cattle are dying,' says a keeper. ' What about tho bears,' he was asked. 'Well,' he replied. 1 we got them out of one well. Now they are over there,' pointing to a speck on a newly-formed ocean. It is a worse predicament still. Ultimately a shelter raised on piles was provided for them.' At Ivry there was a blinding Hash, followed by a deafening report, which shook the windows of Paris—the more terrifving as it had been reported that tho authorities proposed to "blow up the Austeilitz bridgo. The was that of some enormous stores of'acetic acid. Every hour brought tidings,or another stretch of railway abandoned, another lino of tnumyays suspended, another quarter of the city submerged. From Charenton to Auteuil devastation marked the course of the Seine. Ten of the twenty argndh'nernents, or city districts, of Paris'are, affected. The Paris correspondent of the ' Daily Mail'.says: the means of transport, communication, and lighting in many charters have tnlirely ceased- l'.vcn food b becoming scarce. Carts and boats to succor those cut oil in their dwellings are lacking. Where boat" fail the engineers construct rafts of packing cases, gates, and even chairs and tables to aid the sufferers. At various points in the suburbs at night soldiers distributed by torchlight straw and bcillina for the hoiueittfe. The municipal boat serviws'have been busyi There l was a heart-breaking sptctacle in front of tho Town Hall at Ivry. Two hundred housewives, many of them accompanied by their children, clamored for bread, which Uiey mum' Ua luuc .Ifonnilu jw. nrniriri.tiv

service wit* .soon organised, and then* needs were satisfied \vitl'nu|t much delay. Over

30ft of wilier was registered ;it the Font T'cyal VvTiterday, and more than 32ft to-day. It 'wiirt pointed out that one minister conse-qu-me of the prwent Hoods may bo all epidemic of typhoid fever, since t'c'til water from the dra'ii s. which now liils so many

of tin.' Paris cellars, is bound to leave a deposit of sewage. The sewers are no longer working, and the water of the Seineis driving back into the sowers all the tilth which is nonuallv carrixl far beyond tin; area of the 'capital. The matter thus departed with the mud in the cot law may easily constitute a, source of infection. As carlv as Wednesday the Hue Knyale

J and Hue "St. Ttonore had been closed to \ traffic, as had also the Faubourg .St. Oet- ' main. M. Pichon and his staff abanj cloned one wing at the .Ministry of Foreign ; Affairs, and ariaiigcmeutii had been ( made [ for turning fho .Seminary of .St. Sulpicc and the Pantheon into dormitories for refugees from the inundated districts. Pub- ' lie service utilities gradually succumbed to ! the flood. Only two of the great trunk railways were iii di»ert communication with ' Paris—namely, the Hallway and i Northern Railway—in the course of yrv>ter- ] day afternoon. ■ After a slight pause in the rise of the ! waters there was a fresh and most menacing increase ju tho current. The Seine is running 153 miles an hoar. —One Vast Lagoon.--The Paris correspondent of 'The Times' '. telegraphed last night: "111 tho ease of the streets and equares of Paris it is probably true to say that one-half is under water, while the other half has got water under them. Street after street is hourly being closed either in whole or in pait, owing to the eitbsidence of the roadway. In tho flooded eastern districts of the city the water is rising almost visibly, and in many narrow lanes is rushing in a torrent or in cascades down areas and basements. The (tare do Lyon main line .station is isolated, and the Austerlitz railway station is inundated. Thy whole, quarter of Mercy forms one vast lagoon, and at several points furj ther down the river, notably in the Quai I de la Toumnle district, the water is pouri ing over the embankment walls. The Ho | .Sunt Louis is menaced. Iktween tho lie '. dt} la Cite and the western extremity of I the city a number of sections of the water ' front are level with the river, and have [ been closed to all traffic. The whole of ■ Saint La/are quarter is anxiously awaiting j the almost inevitable moment when the | pressure of water will become too great j for the drains and sewage pipe.--. The ! ("jure- St. hazare is closed, as the founda- j tions of the structure are believed to be undermined." I 'The Times' says: "01)0 of the most! striking aspects of'the flood is that -which , is visible fiom the quays along the Foreign • OfJiee and the neighboring railway station, ] Des fnvalides. down to the Kit Tel Tower. 1 The latter, though standing 16ft below the j Seine, is not considered endangered. Tho railway station itself lies 50ft below tlu; level of the road, and is inundated up to j the skylights. From the fnvalides station ; the Tail way line to Versailles runs between ! two massive stone walls dose to the Seine. ! It has been inundated up to the level of the roadway, and, looking over the parapet, one sees a great torrent of water od't or 40ft deep, and about 20ft broad, racing under the railway arches, with which it is r.ow nearly level, and almost submerging tho signal-posts. Only the tops of the telegraph posts are visible, with all the mass of_ telegraph wires submerged. This mighty current on the railway to some extent relieves the pressure on the bridges below the Quai IVOrsny. although all the arches of Pont De I.alma, except the eential one, are invisible, and in tho centre one there is only a gap of some 13in, which seems to be' due solely to tho downward swirl of the enormous 'mass of water that is sweeping under it. Troops of soldiers are busy with spades shovelling up cmeigency earth-dykes where the wafer is invading the roadway." I As the correspondent of 'The Times' re- ' marks, it is us if the Thames were Japping over the wall of the Rmkmkiuent and also emerging in swirling eddies from the skylights and doors of tho ('luring Cross, ■ Temple, and JMackfriars underground railway stations, the whole underground lino being flooded to the brim. On the Quai irOrfevies, in the lit fill light of gas-flairs, gangs of men are pulling up paving-stones and Hint-sets in the roadway, and piling them up in a cemented barrier against tho threatened wall. The river at that point almost reached the top of the embankment wall and nearly 3ft above the level of the xmdway. The portals of tho Louvre along the river front were defended by bags of sand and cement, and the Museum "stalf was on duty throughout the night. I In many other parts of (he city the road- J way has been torn up by the Engineer I Corps at (lire-itened points." in order to fur- j iiisb material for the construction of a j barrier against the Hood. The Cathedral of Xotre 'Dame is perfectly secure, but the ' water has invaded the basement of the structuic. The cellars of the Hotel Do Ville are under water, and pumping pro- j duces little or no effect. Chapelle is : Hooded. Tho lower portions of the f'oueietgerie are under water, anil the administration of justice in the courts is completely disorganised. Owing to the interruption of railway transport, as well as the ruin to many crops, the price of vegetables has risen by 25 and 30 per cent. Hutchet's meat t's : scarce, but the supplies of flour arc expected j to prove adequate. Kggs and butler are i dearer. ' j A national relief fund and a fund started j by the syndicate of the Paris Press, are I rapidly growing. Independent subxerip- j turn lists have been opened by journals like i the •Temps.' which has received over j £IO,OOO, and ' Figaro,' which has received i £3.000. The members of the Chamber of j. Deputies opened a special fund among themselves, and the mayors of the various city divisions are inviting money and kind. The lied Cross Society is organising a . distribution of relief. j