The escape of Rev. L. P. Davis, his wife and his five young children on Bolivar Peninsula and their seven days of suffering before they reached here is of a kind rarely to be equaled in the annals of disasters. This has already been detailed in these pages. Mr. Davis started to drive his family away from his home at Patton Beach when the water began to rise high. He saw a neighbor’s family washed out of their wagon and rescued them. The party made their way to a grove, where the adults tied the children and themselves in the branches of trees. They spent a fearful night. On Sunday, when the waters went down, they made their way past many corpses till they found a farmhouse not entirely destroyed. There they got a little food and then set out on foot, living on the raw flesh of a steer till they found an overturned sailboat and managed to reach Galveston. From here they went to Houston, where they will be cared for. CHAPTER XVII. Governor Sayres Revises His Estimate of Those Lost and Makes it 12,000—A Multitude of the Destitute—Abundant Supplies and Vast Work of Distribution. Governor Sayres issued a statement September 19th, in which he said in part: “The loss of life occasioned by the storm in Galveston and elsewhere on the southern coast cannot be less than 12,000 lives, while the loss of property will probably aggregate $20,000,000. Notwithstanding this severe affliction, I have every confidence that the stricken districts will rapidly revive, and that Galveston will, from her present desolation and sorrow, arise with renewed strength and vigor.” Speaking further of the situation at Galveston, the Governor said: “I look for the rebuilding of Galveston to be well under way by the latter part of this week. The work of cleaning the city of unhealthful refuse and burying the dead will have been completed by that time, and all the available labor in the city can be applied to the rebuilding. “If the laboring people of Galveston will only get to work in earnest, prosperity will soon again smile on the city. Arrangements have been made to pay all the laborers working under the direction of the military authorities $1.50 and rations for every day they have worked or will work. An account has been kept of all work done, and no laborer will lose one day’s pay. “The money and food contributions coming from a generous people have been a great help to the people of Galveston, as it has relieved them of the necessity of spending their money to support the needy, and it can now be applied to the improvement of their own property and putting again on foot their business enterprises. “Five dollars a day is being offered to the mechanics who will come to Galveston, and with the assurance from reputable physicians that there is no extraordinary danger of sickness, outside laborers will flock to Galveston, and before many days a new city will rise on the storm-swept island.