"Let him then animate the picture, by scattering countless tribes of wild animals, and hundreds of domestic ones, and even thousands of men in the interior. Having done all this, he will have before him a feeble outline of the extent, features, and general circumstances of the country, which, in the course of a few hours, was suddenly enveloped in fire. A more ghastly or a more revolting picture of human misery can not well be imagined. The whole district of cultivated land was shrouded in the agonizing memorials of some dreadful deforming havoc. The songs of gladness that formerly resounded through it were no longer heard, for the voice of misery had hushed them. Nothing broke upon the ear but the accents of distress; the eye saw nothing but ruin, and desolation, and death. New Castle, yesterday a flourishing town, full of trade and spirit, and containing nearly one thousand inhabitants, was now a heap of smoking ruins; and Douglasstown, nearly one-third of its size, was reduced to the same miserable condition. Of the two hundred and sixty houses and storehouses, that composed the former, but twelve remained; and of the seventy that comprised the latter, but six were left. The confusion on board of one hundred and fifty large vessels, then lying in the Mirimachi, and exposed to imminent danger, was terrible--some burned to the water's edge, others burning, and the remainder occasionally on fire.
"Dispersed groups of half-famished, half-naked, and houseless creatures, all more or less injured in their persons, many lamenting the loss of some property, or children, or relations and friends, were wandering through the country. Of the human bodies, some were seen with their bowels protruding, others with the flesh all consumed, and the blackened skeletons smoking; some with headless trunks, and severed extremities; some bodies were burned to cinders, others reduced to ashes; many bloated and swollen by suffocation, and several lying in the last distorted position of convulsing torture; brief and violent was their passage from life to death, and rude and melancholy was their sepulchre--'unknelled, uncoffined, and unknown.' The immediate loss of life was upward of five hundred beings! Thousands of wild beasts, too, had perished in the woods, and from their putrescent carcasses issued streams of effluvium and stench that formed contagious domes over the dismantled settlements. Domestic animals of all kinds lay dead and dying in different parts of the country. Myriads of salmon, trout, bass, and other fish, which, poisoned by the alkali formed by the ashes precipitated into the river, now lay dead or floundering and gasping on the scorched shores and beaches, and the countless variety of wild fowl and reptiles shared a similar fate.
"Such was the violence of the hurricane, that large bodies of ignited timber, and portions of the trunks of trees, and severed limbs, and also parts of flaming buildings, shingles, boards, &c., were hurried along through the frowning heavens with terrible velocity, outstripping the fleetest horses, spreading destruction far in the advance, thus cutting off retreat. The shrieks of the affrighted inhabitants, mingling with the discordant bellowing of cattle, the neighing of horses, the howling of dogs, and the strange notes of distress and fright from other domestic animals, strangely blending with the roar of the flames and the thunder of the tornado, beggars description.
"Their only means of safety was the river, to which there was a simultaneous rush, seizing whatever was buoyant, however inadequate; many attempted to effect a crossing; some succeeded; others failed, and were drowned. One woman actually seized a bull by the tail, just as he plunged into the river, and was safely towed to the opposite shore. Those who were unable to make their escape across plunged into the water to their necks, and, by a constant application of water to the head, while in this submerged condition, escaped a dreadful burning. In some portions of the country, the cattle were nearly all destroyed. Whole crews of men, camping in the interior, and engaged in timber-making, were consumed.
"Such was the awful conflagration of 1825, on the Mirimachi."
PIRATES OF THE RED SEA.
The commerce of the Red Sea has, almost from time immemorial, greatly suffered from the depredations of Arab pirates, who infest the entire coasts. The exploits of one individual is dwelt upon by his late confreres with particular enthusiasm; and his career and deeds were of so extraordinary a character, that we feel justified in giving the following brief detail of them, as furnished by an English traveler:
This dreadful man, Ramah ibn Java, the beau ideal of his order, the personation of an Arab sea robber, was a native of a small village near Jiddah. At an early period he commenced a mode of life congenial to his disposition and nature. Purchasing a boat, he, with a band of about twelve companions, commenced his career as a pirate, and in the course of a few months he had been so successful that he became the owner of a vessel of three hundred tons, and manned with a lawless crew. It was a part of his system to leave British vessels unmolested, and he even affected to be on good terms with them. We have heard an old officer describe his appearance. He was then about forty-five years of age, short in stature, but with a figure compact and square, a constitution vigorous, and the characteristic qualities of his countrymen--frugality, and patience of fatigue. Several scars already seamed his face, and the bone of his arm had been shattered by a matchlock ball when boarding a vessel. It is a remarkable fact that the intermediate bones sloughed away, and the arm, connected only by flesh and muscle, was still, by means of a silver tube affixed around it, capable of exertion.
Ramah was born to be the leader of the wild spirits around him. With a sternness of purpose that awed those who were near him into a degree of dread, which totally astonished those who had been accustomed to view the terms of equality in which the Arab chiefs appear with their followers, he exacted the most implicit obedience to his will; and the manner in which he acted toward his son exhibits the length he was disposed to go with those who thwarted, or did not act up to, the spirit of his views. The young man, then a mere stripling, had been dispatched to attack some boats, but he was unsuccessful. "This, dastard, and son of a dog!" said the enraged father, who had been watching the progress of the affair, "you return unharmed to tell me! Fling him over the side!" The chief was obeyed; and but for a boat, which by some chance was passing some miles astern, he would have been drowned. Of his existence the father for many months was wholly unconscious, and how he was reconciled we never heard; but during the interval he was never known to utter his name. No cause, it appears, existed for a repetition of the punishment; for while yet a youth, he met the death his father would have most coveted for him. He fell at the head of a party that was bravely storming a fort.