THE RECENT FLOODS.


During the past ten days Melbourne, in common with other parts of the colony, has been visited by rains that have almost been tropical in their violence, and though no fatal accident has followed, enough minor damage has been done to give them more than a passing interest. One of the main avenues of the city, Elizabeth-street, suffers most when a heavy shower falls, as it conveys the whole of the water that falls within a very large area to the Yarra; consequently its water channels are miniature rivers, down which the water rushes at an extraordinary rate, and pedestrians find it exceedingly difficult to cross the street. Our artist has shown some of the incidents of the heavy rainfall, one of them being a scene illustrative in a remarkable manner of the courage and sagacity of a dog. A man was attempting to cross Swanston-street, when he was caught in the rush of water and washed down the channel, the water being so strong that he was quite unable to help himself. A Newfoundland dog, the property of Mr. Higginbotham, seeing the man in the stream, rushed in and held him by the clothes till some bystanders rescued him from his perilous position and brought him to dry land. But for the dog, the man would inevitably have been drowned, as he was within a few feet of a culvert when the dog seized him, and it would appear as if the noble brute was a worthy candidate for the Humane Society's medal.