The New Hampshire Gazette

INUNDATION IN CHINA

The late overland dispatch brought recent accounts from Canton, stating: that an uncommon succession of rain had laid entire districts in China under water. The great river Hoang-ho had been swollen to such excess, as totally to wash from its banks many of the villages which adorned them, and inundate all the adjacent country. Such of the inhabitants as escaped this awful visitation, had fled with the remains of their property to the hills.

The beautiful and level plains: which lately exhibited all the rich variety of cultivation, were, at the date of these accounts, covered with boats employed in collecting the wreck of the country floating on the waters.

The overflowing of the Tay had occasioned like calamity in the province of Quecheu, where several magazines of grain had been swept away, and in many places the inhabitants, with their herds, had shared the same fate.

The rice alone remained secure, unless continued rains should prolong the inundation beyond the time of collecting it, in which event the consequences must be dreadful; for although even the mountains in China are under culture, yet these, to which the people are retiring, cannot long afford subsistence to so great a multitude; neither, from their limited intercourse with other nations, can they expect efficient assistance from abroad.

The Emperor has resolved to remit the collection of the revenues, for one season, in the provinces that have suffered most materially, and has adopted every measure that policy and humanity could suggest for the relief of the sufferers.