A ghastly accident, one of the worst, if not the
worst, of our time, occurred in Paris on Monday. A train on the Metro- politan Underground Electric Railway caught fire near the station of Couronnes, but the conductor drove on hoping to reach Menilmontant. While still in the tunnel, however, the motor took fire, and eight carriages were instantly wrapped in flames. Since the ttinnel is lighted by the electric light, the burning of the wires plunged it in darkness, and the gases generated filled the tunnel and asphrriated the wretched passengers, of whom a number, officially recorded as eighty. four, but probably nearer a hundred and fifty, perished on the spot. The beat alone, which rose. to 200 deg. Fahrenheit, would kill all but a few specially Constituted persons. It is hoped, and indeed affirmed by experts, that death in most cases was painless; but as this railway is the great artery of communication for working Paris, the social misery caused by such an accident is most pitiful, and the panic is mg- venal, the Underground being almost deserted by passer:Ord.
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