a 
180 BEFORE AND AFTER ITS FALL 
that covered the surface of all things visible could be traced the 
footprints of the looters and of the rescuing parties who had tra- 
versed the ground before. Save for these the only evidences of 
life in the stricken town were the footprints of the sea-birds along 
the strand. 
“Here on the left is heard at last a sound. In the deathlike 
stillness it strikes upon the ear strangely. It is the ripple of gurg- 
ling water. Tracing it to its source, we find a water pipe, the nozzle 
of which projects through the shattered wall of a private dwelling. 
From it the water, in pure, crystal plenty, is pouring down and 
welding the masses of ashes and cement beneath like powder into a 
sticky paste. St. Pierre’s streets, with their trickling rivulets of 
mountain water, had been the pride of her citizens. Through all 
the blast of fire at least this remnant of her water system had 
survived.” 
“One of the party approached the trickling water to lave 
from hands and face the choking accumulation of dust. As he did 
so he stepped back and paused. Directly below where the water 
fell lay huddled the grizzled remnants of a dead family. 
“From this point the party, with difficulties increasing at every 
step, pushed further up the slope toward the heart of the town and 
into Victor Hugo Street. Progress here was made rather by climb- 
ing than by walking. At every step bent and twisted iron girders, 
pieces of steel shafting, tons of tumbled masonry and piles of half 
burned corpses barred the way. One sought instinctively to turn 
his steps so as not to desecrate the dead, but try as he might, at 
every footstep his feet scuffed up the dust that uncovered the ashes 
of another corpse. 
“ Through Victor Hugo Street we penetrated to what had been 
the Cathedral de Moullace. Had it been hammered for a fortnight