The military men say there was no conflict of authority, and it was deemed proper that the civil authorities should still control the pass there. The sheriff came near getting shot in Cambria City this morning during a clash with one of his deputies over a buggy. Yet he looked calm and serene. Some beg him for passes to hunt for their dead. One man cried: "I've just gotten here, and my wife and children are in that town;" another said, "I belong in Conemaugh and was carried off by the flood," while an aged, trembling man behind him whispered, "Sheriff, I just wanted to look where the old home stood." When four peaceful faced sisters in convent garb, on their mission of mercy, came that way the sentinels stood back a pace and no voice ordered "Halt!"
At noon the crane belonging to the Pennsylvania Railroad was taken away from the débris at the bridge, and Mr. Kirk had to depend on dynamite alone. Later it was ordered back, and after that the work went on rapidly. An opening 400 feet long, which runs back in some places fifty feet, was made during the afternoon. A relief party yesterday found a ladies' hand satchel containing $91 in cash, deeds for $26,000 in property and about $10,000 in insurance policies. Mrs. Lizzie Dignom was the owner, and both she and her husband perished in the flood.
Remembering the Orphans.
Miss H.W. Hinckley and Miss E. Hanover, agent of the Children's Aid Society and Bureau of Information of Philadelphia, arrived here this morning, and in twenty minutes had established a transfer agency. Miss Hinckley said:
"There are hundreds of children here who are apparently without parents. We want all of them given to us, and we will send them to the various homes and orphanages of the State, where they shall be maintained for several months to await the possibility of the reappearance of their parents when they will be returned to them. If after the lapse of a month they do not reclaim their little ones, we shall do more than we ordinarily do in the way of providing good homes for children in their cases. Think of it, in the house adjoining us are seven orphans, all of one family. We have been here only a half hour, but we have already found scores. We shall stay right here till every child has been provided for."
There is no denying that a great deal of ill-feeling is breeding here between the survivors of the flood over the distribution of the relief supplies. The supplies are spread along the railroad track down as far as Morrellville in great stacks; provisions, clothing, shoes, and everything else. The people come for them in swarms with baskets and other means of conveyance. Lines are drawn, which are kept in trim by the pickets, and in this way they pass along in turn to the point where the stock is distributed.
It was not unusual yesterday to hear women's tongues lashing each other and complaining that the real sufferers were being robbed and turned away, while those who had not fared badly by flood or fire were getting lots of everything from the committee. One woman made this complaint to a corporal.
"Prove it; prove it," he said, and walked away. She cried after him, "The pretty women are getting more than they can carry."
Twice the line of basket-carriers was broken by the guard to put out wranglers, and all through the streets of Cambria City could be heard murmurs of dissension. There is no doubt but that a strong guard will be kept in the town day and night, for in their deplorable condition the husbands may take up the quarrel of their wives.