By ten-thirty the water depth had lessened about two feet. All stores and factories in the main part of the town were flooded to a depth of from eight to ten feet. Numerous residences and smaller buildings collapsed, but any estimate of the property loss was impossible. A morgue was established on the west side of the city, and efforts to recover the bodies and aid the suffering were pushed as rapidly as conditions permitted. Relief trains began to arrive in the stricken towns. Adjutant-General Speaks, with a small detachment of troops and a squad of linemen and operators, left Columbus early Wednesday in an effort to reach Dayton. The attempt was made by means of motor boats and automobiles in the hope to establish adequate telegraph or telephone communication with Dayton. MARTIAL LAW ESTABLISHED A message from Governor Cox ordered the entire Ohio National Guard to hold itself in readiness to proceed to Dayton as soon as it was possible to enter the city. "I understand the importance of having the militia there," he telegraphed. Soon afterward notice was posted in headquarters of the emergency committee announcing that the city was under martial law, and several companies of soldiers arrived from neighboring Ohio cities. The soldiers were employed to patrol edges of the burned district, and prevent looting of homes freed from the floods. The hundreds of refugees in the Y. M. C. A. building and in the Algonquin Hotel were facing possible short rations. Their food supplies were becoming limited and drinking water was at a premium. Forty boats were requisitioned by the city authorities and were patroling the city in an effort to save life and property. These craft were manned by volunteers. In front of the Central Union Telegraph office the water was still running so swiftly that horses could not go through it without swimming. One boat went by with two men in it, rowing desperately, trying to keep the bow to the waves. The boat overturned, but both men escaped drowning by swimming to a lamp post. They clung to the post for half an hour before a rope could be thrown to them. After repeated casts the line fell near enough to them to be caught, and the men were drawn into the second story window of the building. The telephone employees in the building fished chairs, dry goods boxes and a quantity of other floating property from the flood. The debris swept down the main business street with such force that every plate glass window was smashed. Only one sizable building had collapsed up to noon so far as the watchers in the telephone office could learn. This structure, an old one, was a three-story affair, near Ludlow Street, occupied by a harness manufacturing concern. 70,000 IMPRISONED BY THE WATER More than 70,000 persons either were unable to reach their homes or, held in their waterlocked houses, were unable to reach land.