Taormina was full of rumors. For a week the only news had been supplied by wounded refugees, distraught with fear and misery; in their description the earthquake had become almost a supernatural event. Strange lights had blazed in the sky; a comet had struck the earth and raised the waters of the deep. Luckily the wires to Catania and Syracuse, and from Catania to Palermo, were open. By telegraphing to all of these cities and by searching the hotel registers of Taormina, we were able to find nearly all the names on our lists. There were many Americans still in Taormina and many English. All of them were working together, distributing relief and caring for the sick. A hundred and fifty refugees were in the hospital of Taormina and three hundred and eighty in the little fishing village of Giardini at the foot of the cliff. Our countrymen were working night and day to help them, giving them food and clothing; and instead of complaining of the heavy burden of so many patients, they begged us to send more. One or two of them met every train from Messina, to distribute bread to the hungry passengers. The ladies devoted themselves chiefly to the hospitals, where they worked with unremitting energy. BACK TO MESSINA. Our brief glance at the efficient relief of Taormina made the conditions at Messina, upon our return, seem even more desperate than before. Here the problem was vastly complicated by the dispersion of the population and the lack of any registers of inhabitants. The scarcity of houses had driven the population to take refuge, so far as possible, in the hill villages surrounding the town. Here most of the families were installed, not only the able-bodied, but the sick and wounded as well. One of each family would spend the days in Messina, trying to procure enough food to keep his relatives alive. The complete lack of transport animals and the absorption of the soldiers in the work of rescue, made relief expeditions to the villages impossible. For food distributions in Messina the rule had been adopted; one man, one loaf. The absence of registers made it possible for a strong man to push repeatedly to the head of the line, and to get bread at all the distributing places in succession. The result was a more or less disorderly rush for bread at all the distributing points, and the exclusion of all but the strongest, while many worthy families suffered from hunger in the midst of comparative plenty.