The Morning News

MAGNETIC WIND.
A Remarkable Subterranean Bellows
Near a Texas Town.
From the Galveston News,

About one hundred miles east of El Paso,
near Sierra Blanco, on the line of the Texas
and Pacific railway, there is a strange
phenomenon that has just come to notice.
The authority for the statements about to
be made is Ex-Gov. John C. Brown, of
Tennessee, Receiver of the Texas Pacific,
who visited this city a few days ago,
accompanied by several officials of the road,
including Division Superintendent Judy.
in whose jurisdiction the phenomenon is
located. Gov. Brown and Supt. Judy told
the story to one or two persons here, and
it has just come out

About three years ago the Texas and
Pacific Railway Company undertook to
sink an artesian well a few miles east of
Sierra Blanco, which is a little hamlet
ninety-five miles east of El Paso. The work-
men put the pipe down about 600 feet, when
suddenly an underground cavern was struck.
the drill dropped about 6 feet and a current
of air rushed up the pipe. Drilling ceased
and the well was abandoned, the 600 feet of
pipe remaining in the ground and giving a
connection between the surface of the earth
and the subterranean cavity a quarter of a
mile beneath.

The phenomenon did not at that time at-
tract the attention of any one sufficiently
interested to investigate. Recently, how-
ever, Supt. Judy's attention was called to
it, and his personal examination and in-
quiries have developed peculiar facts and
testimony about the wonderful well Gov.
Brown stopped to see it on his way here.
Not many people live near the well, but
those who do reside in the neighborhood of
it are thoroughly acquainted with it. Ever
since it was abandoned, three years ago, the
people near by have been in the habit of
going and sitting about the well in summer
to enjoy the cool and invigorating air that
rushes up the pipe. One of the strangest
things is the fact that the current of air
ebbs and flows like the ocean tides. From
10:15 a. m. to 10:15 p. m. a current of air
rushes out of the pipe with a sound that
resembles the noise made by a locomotive
blowing off steam, so loud that it can be
heard forty or fifty yards. At 10:15 p. m. the
overflow of air ceases and a strong suction
sets in, which lasts for the next twenty-four
hours, this ebb and flow continuing day
after day. It has been observed by horse-
men that whenever they get in the neighbor-
hood of the well strong magnetic forces are
felt and sparks are given off if the horse's
mane is touched.

Recently a man from Sierra Blanco was
sitting close to the well, and on taking out
his pocket-knife found a nail which he had
in his pocket clinging to the knife. He
held the knife in the current of air, and
found the magnetic property was greatly
increased.

Several weeks ago Supt. Judy held his
pocket-knife in the current of air for four
minutes, and the knife is still strongly
magnetized from the effect. The outflow-
ing current of air is believed to possess
remarkable curative properties.
Its
efficacy is to be tested by experiments upon
cases of paralysis and other diseases. The
people who live near the wonderful well call
it the "fountain of youth."