The Fire Fiend Stalks Washington

Spokane! For a fourth time in the short space of two months has the fire fiend broken out and raged in many of the cities of Washington territory—Seattle, Vancouver, Ellensburg and Spokane Falls, the latter place being visited with a destructive fire on Sunday evening. About forty blocks of the centre of the city is in ruins, and over fifteen millions of dollars gone up in smoke, besides several lives lost. As in the cases of Seattle and Ellensburg, the stores and business houses were all destroyed, and the people depend upon the contributions from other cities to keep them in food until the rustling business men can rise from the ashes with new stocks of goods. It looks decidedly as though this work was organized incendiarism, and no one can tell when it will stop. Numerous attempts, and not later than Saturday, have been made to burn Walla Walla, and every city and town in the territory should look after its facilities to cope with fire, improve them as fully as possible, and guard well until the dry season is past. What about the water system in Shelton? Don't forget that it will be much easier to build up a city at this point with the foundation we now have, than to begin at the bottom again. A little money in water facilities may be worth many thousands to Shelton yet.