Calamities by flood and tempest have fallen upon the northern
part of England, and our eastern coast. There have been inundations in Yorkshire and Durham, and a severe gale, foretold by the meteorolo- Ms from observation, on Saturday and Sunday strewed the coast of the German Ocean with wrecks. Near Hartlepool above fifty lives were lost : terrible proof of the strength ofithe tempest. At Whitby there was a sad scene. It is thus described by the curate of that town:—" We have had a fearful storm to-day at Whitby; half a mile of our strand is already strewed with seven wrecks. Our new life-boat was but launched a few months ago and was manned with the old crew of the finest picked seamen in Whitby. Five tunes during the day had they braved the furious sea and five times re- turned with crews saved from vessels in distress. A sixth ship was driven in behind the pier. The men, all exhausted though they were, again pulled out, but before they had gone fifty yards a wave capsized the boat. Then was beheld by several thousand persons—within almost a stones throw, but unable to assist—the fearful agonies of those powerful Men, buffeting with the fury of the breakers, till one by one twelve out of thirteen sank, and only one is saved." Eleven of the twelve were ;parried men. They have died at their posts, and something should be done for their families.
A similar calamity occurred at Dublin. Captain Boyd, of the Ajax man-of-war, seeing several ships driving ashore in the gale, manned his boats to rescue the crews of three which were drifting on the rocks. His men and himself lauded, and risked their lives in the surf in vain efforts to fling. or carry ropes to the ship. Suddenly a li%,0.e wave, during a treacherous lull, swept round the front of the breakwater where Captain Boyd and his men were standing, and in an instant they disappeared. Some civilians were also carried away. The Lord-Lieutenant hastened to the spot, but no aid was of any avail.
It is calculated that the damage done to shipping on the cast coast of England between Berwick and Flamborough Head is enor- mous. At Hartlepool alone ships worth 100,000/. have been des- troyed. In a space of two miles t here were fifty wrecks I. Science now foretel the approach of tempests, and had the "stone signals" been attended to where dis dayed, much loss would halm beeu prevented.
Four men have perished in a sewer running into the old Fleet ditch. An inquiry has been instituted. The sewer is twelve feet high mid six feet wide. It was examined in January, and the men were sent down to clear away the refuse there discovered. The men not coming up, a foreman went down. The smell was "very bad ;" some rats were dead, "which is very unusual." Two of the bodies were found with a candle burning over them. The cause of death has not been explained.
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