A Whole Family Immolated

[From tbe St. Loiíí-í Ucpublican ] About three iniles east of Kicker's Prairie, Mo., livod John Leoaard, with bis wife, married daughter, and iivc younger childron. The house was a substantial log structurc, with au attic overhead, and a summerkitchea on thosouth side, the roof beiüg so made as to conncot the house with the kitchen, which stood the wiath of a hallway dislant f rom the main house. A pair of stairs in this hallway led up to the attic, l'roni whieh there was uo other egress. Friday night the five chüdren went to eleep in the attic, the older people sleeping in the room below. During the night, from some unexplained cause, the kitchen caught üre, and, bufore the dangor wns discovered, the staircase leading to tlie attic was in flamea. The people on the first floor had littlo difficulty in escaping, for, tkongh tij e only door was exposed to the intense heat, there was a window from which thoy easily gained places of safety. But, for the children in the attic, there scemed to be no hope. The oldest was a boy 16 ycars old, and, when the alarm reached him, his youth and inexperience were not proof igainst the exciteinent of such an occasion. The solid walls of logs ïmprisoned the children, and the fieree flames raged and roared at the doorway. There was a window in the north. end of the attic, barely lnrgo enough for a person to crawl tlirough, and, it would seem tb at, with proper management, thie might have become the means of saving all. But the father, in his frantic effortn to reaoh the attic by the stairs, had got his clothing on ñre, and been so badly burned that ho was entirely disabled. There was no one to direct or nianago for the childrcn, and, flnally, the oldest boy, having torn the sash from the window, tkrew himsclf out, leaving the for.r children to their miserablo f ate. Their four corpses wero found the cext morning ctaired to eindere. But, as though tuis was not enongh of horror, still another tragedy has to be ehronicled in connection with the aftair. When the boy jumped from the window he had only a short twelve feet to fall, and might easily havo expected to get off with a few bruises; but, as it happened, a picket fenco ran aloug under the window, about two feet distant from the house. The paiings were of hard wood, split thin, and sharpened to long, tapering points. In his terror, the boy had blindly cast himself upoa this bristling feiicc. The sharp points pierced his unprotected sides, and impaled him. The mother and sister lifted him from his fixed position, hut Hfe had forsaken him. The father's injuries are so severe that there is little expectationof hisiecovery. The calamity is one of the most extraoruinary and appaüing that it is possible to conceive as happening lo a family living in a small, low building. In the cify, in lofty tenemen's, there is of ten (langer that families will be cut off, but it is almost an unparalleled occurrence under circumstauees like this.