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GENERAL NEWS NOTES OF THE DAY The terrible toll of the blast in the harbor at Halifax is clearly indicated in the following summary: Killed. 2,000; injured, 2,000; is latest estimate. Laid half of city in ruins. Destroyed or damaged buildings J-overing more than two miles. Sank vessels at anchor in the harbor. Killed hundreds by th terrific shock. Destroyed vast supplies of war munitions and stores. Killed telegraph operators at the keys four miles away. Crashed windows sixty miles away from Halifax. Hurled loaded freight cars olt the tracks. Threw pedestrians against buildings with such terrific force that they were killed. Destroyed great stores of food stocks, so that residents had to appeal to other cities for food. Fired millions of dollars worth of property and stocks. Halted all street car traltic. AVrecked miles and miles of wharves and docks Put all telegraph, telephone and cable lines out of commission! Destroyed grain elevators and scattered thcirf contents for miles. TIi declaration of war on Austria was passed by both houses of Congress yesterday witli brief debate. The House accepted the Senate resolution. In the Senate the vote was 74 to 0. Senator La Fol-lette withdrawing and not voting. The vote in the House was 3;: to 1, Representative London, tho Socialist, casting the only negative vote. President Wilson later in the afternoon signed the declaration of war on Austria-Hungary. The big operation which the enemy is attempting in tho north is virtually a repetition of the turning I movement he executed six weeks ago in the great olTei.sive above Gorizia. At that time he broke through the upper end or the line and thus endangered tho lower end. This is exactly the situation being repeated today, says a dispatch from f Italian headquarters in northern Italy. It has been decided that the Roumanian troops shall associate themselves with the Russians in the armistice, though the Roumanians have resisted all fraternization with the enemy. Hostilities have been suspended along the whole, front, says a report from Jassy, Roumania. A dispatch from Rome says: Fifteen thousand Teutonic guns concentrated over a front of fifty miles ami enormous movements of enemy troops ail gave indication yesterday that the Austro-Gcrman army was .preparing its biggest push against the Piave line. Fire which originated in the pattern shop of the Poison Iron AVorks in Toronto, Ont., Thursday night destroyed the building and a number of sheds and badly damaged a large freight boat and trawler. The total loss was estimated at from 50,000 to 00,000. The British army expects Germans ulggest and perhaps its final effort of the war shortly. General Byngs retirement from Bourlon was regarded yesterday as the first prime precautionary measure for the British to withstand such a shock. Two attempts were made by the Germans to attack the French lines east of 4Jie Mouse in the Aer-duu region Thursday night after it heavy bombardment. The attacking forces, the. French war office announced, were driven off by the French fire. Four thousand more Italians have been captured in the Asiago offensive, making the total 15,000, according to a statement from Berlin. Monte Sise-mol was captured by storm, the report says. Engineer organizations in the American army hereafter, it was recommended yesterday, shall be armed and ready for battle on all occasions when they are anywhere near the fighting line. American army airmen, fighting the German planes on the western front, have suffered their first casualties. Two men, a corporal and a private, were yesterday reported wounded. In the arrest of two Germans. Otto, Merkle and Hans von Stengel in New York, "the government has in custody two of the brainest and most important propagandists in this country. Willi less than :ui hours debate tho Senate yesterday passed the resolution declaring war on Austria -Hungary. Designs for tho third Liberty Loan posters are now being chosen. - -
