ircumstances like that. A few words will
give an outline. First the ground must be overlooked and conditions
learned. This is not easy when it is remembered that broken houses,
cars, wagons, church steeples, and grand pianos were liable to be
encountered in the middle of the leading streets, themselves buried
three feet in the coarse black sand, brought in by the great tidal wave.

Nevertheless, a building must be found in which to store and distribute
the supplies that would immediately come. How needful these supplies
would be can be inferred when it is recalled that scores of persons came
alive out of that wreck, with simply the band of a shirt or a
night-dress held by its button about the neck as the only reminder that
ever a cover of clothing had been theirs.

A little meeting of my assistants early held assigned each to his duty
and his place. A warehouse, fortunately still intact, was generously
supplied by Mr. John Sealy. Major James A. McDowell, with the
experience of this branch of Red Cross work from Johnstown down, and the
record of twenty-six battles in the old civil war, was placed in charge.
Here is one of the scenes given by a casual eye-witness:

A poor feeble-looking man, with scant clothing, enters the warehouse and
waits. "Hello there," calls the observant major--with his Grand Army
button--overhauling clothes for the visitor. "But, major, I was a
Confederate soldier." "Lord bless your poor suffering soul, what
difference does that make? Here, this will suit you."

It was thought advisable by some of the party to establish an orphanage,
which was done and carried through, regardless of the common-sense idea
that few children would survive, when the parents were drowned. And so
it proved, although the work was faithfully administered.

Homes must be made, lumber obtained, and houses built. The Red Cross
sent out the appeal for lumber and aided in the work of shelter.

Mrs. Fannie B. Ward was placed in charge of a special clothing
department. Need I remind thoughtful readers that in a disaster like
that, where people of affluence, culture, and position are in a night
bereft of all, one of the cruelest features might be to go to the open
boxes of a relief station for clothing, such as never before worn, and
could not be asked for through the choking tears. In all humanity these
cases must be properly, respectfully, and discreetly met, as one lady
could meet another in distress.

No more vivid pic