THE PORTLAND TRANSCRIPT, December 14, 1850

                                        
                                                            EDITORIAL STRAWS

          Cheney's Pail Factory, at Kendall's Mills, Me., turns out sixty thousand pails
     per annum!-Where's Hingham!
           A contemporary says that W. W. Story, son of Judge Story, is rising in
     eminence as a sculptor and is placed, by some, in the same rank with Powers,
     Crawford and Greenough.
          Judson Hutchinson is now entirely recovered.
          Park Benjamin delivered a rhyming lecture in  Saco last week, on the Age of
     Gold. We should like to hear the gentleman before our lyceum.
          Returned Californians. Messer's A. L. Fox, Alford Dyer, Asa Bailey and Oliver
     Waterman all of this city, returned from California in the last steamer. News has been
     received of the death of Mr. Deering Johnson, of this city and also of Charles Haskell,
     of Saccarappa.
          We have received a letter from O. C. Nelson, of Upper Gloucester, now at
     Nevada City, California, who writes-The friends here from Portland and vicinity
     are well and doing first rate. Diggings good. His letter is dated Oct. 1. He sends us
     a remittance of  "mint drops" to the amount of $3.00 to pay for two years subscription
     to the Transcript.-The specimens are very fine.
          The Governor of California has sent a requisition for a man by the name of
     Johnson, of  Bangor, who recently returned from California with $5,000 in gold. He
    is charged with the robbery and murder of a man in California, for which crime two
    innocent persons have been hanged.
          The rum sellers of Augusta are at  their dark and dirty work again. One night last
     week they attacked the house of Mr. Whitney, daubed it with oil and paint, and then
     breaking a window defiled his parlor furniture in the same manner. We hope the
     temperance men of Augusta will ferret out the perpetrators of this vile deed.
          
                                         BURNING OF THE INSANE HOSPITAL
               This event, which we had barely time to announce last week proves to be a
     very serious  calamity. It is supposed the fire was caused by a defective funnel.
     There was no night watch. The north wing is saved entire, and part of the main
     building, but the building cannot be repaired at a less cost than $30,000 or $50.000.
             The loss of life is truly deplorable. The scene when the poor mad wretches were  
     dragged from the burning building, rushing back into the flames and perishing there,
     as some of the did, must have been horrible in the extreme. All the females patients
     were saved, but 28 male patients are missing most of whom probably perished in the
     flames. of the patients from this city, five, viz. Eben  L. Blake, Franklin Dennison,
     Nathaniel Flint, John Makey and James Barry perished; while Captain S. Dunham,
     Charles Coffin, Bridget Devine, Aaron Lewis, and Mary Doherty were saved. All
     these except Eben L. Blake, were supported at public expense. There were also a
     number of  private patients from Portland supported at private expense, who were
     saved.
          Mr. Thomas Jones, an assistant, lost his life while nobly striving to save the poor
     inmates. Much praise is due to many of the attendants, indeed for their courageous
     effects in behalf of the sufferers.
          The following is a list of the dead or missing-Linscott, of Bangor; Armstrong,
     of  Gardiner,* Wyman, of Readfield;* Richards, Willis, McLelan, Pineo, Hodson,
     Harlow, Dennison, McKay, Payson, Norwood, Fuller, Barry, Blake, Atkinson,
     Wilson, Piece, Kinsel, Dennet, Heath, Carriel, Flint, Foster, Green, Jacobs,
     McKenzie,"-28.
      * Supposed remains found.
     The remains of eight bodies only have as yet been taken out, although there can
    be but little doubt that as many as 20 patients perished by suffocation.