“_Familiar in their Mouths as HOUSEHOLD WORDS._”—SHAKESPEARE.
HOUSEHOLD WORDS.
A WEEKLY JOURNAL.
CONDUCTED BY CHARLES DICKENS.
N^{o.} 7.] SATURDAY, MAY 11, 1850. [PRICE 2_d._
THE FIRE BRIGADE OF LONDON.
Earth, Air, and Water are necessary conditions of human life; but Fire
is the first great element of civilisation. Fire, the first medium
between the ‘cooking animal’ and the wild root and raw-flesh-devouring
savage; fire, the best, because the most useful of servants, and,
according to the old proverb, the worst, because the most tyrannical of
masters; fire, the chief friend of man in creations of nature and of
industrial art, yet the most potent of all enemies in destruction; fire,
the most brilliant and magnificent object on the earth, yet the most
frightful and appalling when once it obtains dominion over man and man’s
abodes;—to subdue, and render docile to all needs, this devouring
dragon, and bend his splendid crests, not only to ‘boil the pot’ but to
lick the dust before the feet of Science, this is one of the greatest
triumphs of mankind, the results of which are every year more and more
stupendous.
But, amidst all our mastery, we are never permitted to forget that this
illustrious slave has neither abandoned nor abated one jot of his
original nature. Of this we are but too constantly reminded. Not to
speak of lightning and volcanic eruptions, the weekly record of colliery
and other mine explosions, of steamboat explosions, the burning of
ships, and the dismal transformation to a heap of ashes of valuable
warehouses, costly public edifices, or private houses, with ‘dreadful
loss of life,’ need but the slightest mention to excite a thrill of
alarm, or some passing thought of caution in the mind of every person
holding the smallest stake in the social community.
To meet this sudden emergency, therefore, and to restore the balance of
power, or, rather, to put down the mutiny of this powerful slave, and
reduce him to his habitual subserviency, we have the Fire Brigade,
divided into four sections, and having nineteen stations in the most
central quarters of the metropolis. This includes two ‘mighty engines’
floating on the Thames.
‘Of all the rallying words,’ says a writer in Charles Knight’s
“London,” ‘whereby multitudes are gathered together, and their
energies impelled forcibly to one point, that of “_Fire!_” is,
perhaps, the most startling and the most irresistible. It levels all
distinctions; it sets at nought sleep, and meals, and occupations, and
amusements; it turns night into day, and Sunday into a “working-day;”
it gives double strength to those who are blessed with any energy, and
paralyses those who have none; it brings into prominent notice, and
converts into objects of sympathy, those who were before little
thought of, or who were, perhaps, despised; it gives to the dwellers
in a whole huge neighbourhood the unity of one family.’
But even while we are trimming our midnight lamp to write this paper,
the cry of ‘Fire!’ suddenly resounds from a distant street. The heavy
boots of a policeman clatter along beneath our window. The cry is
repeated by several voices, and more feet are heard hurrying along. The
fire is in a squalid court, leading into a mews which runs close to the
backs of the houses of one side of a great square. We hastily struggle
into an overcoat, snatch up a hat, and issue forth to follow the
alarming cry.
The tumult sounds in the court; the cry of ‘Fire!’ is wildly repeated in
a woman’s voice from one of the windows of the mews; now from another
window!—now from several. ‘Fire! fire!’ cry voices of many passengers in
streets, and away scamper the policemen to the nearest stations of the
Fire Brigade, passing the word to other policemen as they run, till all
the police force in the neighbourhood are clattering along the pavement,
some towards the scene of the fire, but most of them either towards an
engine-station, to one of the Fire-escapes of the Royal Society, or to
pass the word to the policeman whose duty it will be to run to the
engine-station next beyond. By this means of passing the word, somebody
arrives at the gates of the Chief Office of the Fire Brigade, in Watling
Street, and, seizing the handle of the night-bell, pulls away at it with
the vigour which such events always call forth.
The fireman on duty for the night, immediately opens the gate, and
receives the intelligence, cutting short all loquacity as much as
possible, and eliciting the spot where the fire has broken out, and the
extent to which it was raging when the person left. The fireman then
runs to a bell-handle, which he pulls; and applying his ear to the
mouth-piece of a pipe, hears a voice ask, ‘What is it?’ (The fireman
hears his own voice sound as if at a great distance; while the voice
actually remote sounds close in the mouth-piece, with a strange
preternatural effect.) The bell-wire reaches up to the Superintendent’s
bedside; and the bell being rung, Mr. Braidwood raises himself on one
elbow, and applying his mouth to the other end of the tube, answers, and
gives orders. A few words of dialogue conducted in this way, suffice. Up
jumps Mr. Braidwood—crosses the passage to his dressing-room (armoury,
we ought rather to call it), and in three minutes is attired in the
thick cloth frock-coat, boots, and helmet of the Fire Brigade, fixing
buttons and straps as he descends the stairs.
Meanwhile all the men have been equally active below. No sooner has the
fireman aroused Mr. Braidwood, than he rings the bell of the foreman,
the engineer, and the ‘singlemen’s bell’—which means the bell of the
division where the four unmarried men sleep. He then runs out to the
stables, calling the ‘charioteer’ by the way, and two other firemen
lodging close by; after which he returns to assist in harnessing the
horses.
Owing to this simultaneous action, each according to his special and
general duties, by the time Mr. Braidwood reaches the bottom of the
stairs, the engine has been got out, and put in working order. All its
usual furniture, implements, and tools are placed within, or packed
about it. Short scaling-ladders, made to fit into each other, are
attached to the sides; six lengths of hose; branch-pipes,
director-pipes, spare nozzle, suction-pipes, goose-neck, dogs’-tails
(the first to deliver water into the engine; the second are iron
wrenches), canvas sheet, with rope handles round the edge (to catch
people who will boldly jump out of window), dam-board (to prevent water
from plug flowing madly away), portable cistern, strips of sheep-skin
(to mend bursting hose), balls of cord, flat hose, escape-chain,
escape-ropes, mattock, saw, shovel, pole-axe, boat-hook, crow-bar
(_such_ a fellow!) to burst through doors or walls, or break up
pavement; instruments for opening fire-plugs, and keys for turning
stop-cocks of water-mains, &c.
All being ready, the Superintendent mounts the engine to the right of
the driver, and the engineer, foreman, and firemen mount also, and range
themselves on each side of the long red chest at the top, which contains
the multifarious articles just enumerated. Off they start—brisk
trot—canter—gallop! A bright red gleam overspreads the sky to the
westward. The Superintendent knows that the fire in the court has
reached the mews, and the stables are in flames. Full gallop!
Along the midnight streets, which are now all alive with excited
people—some having left the theatres, others wending homeward from
supper at a friend’s, from dances, or perhaps late hours of business in
various trades,—all are running in the direction of the fire! As the
engine thunders by them, the gas-lamps gleaming on the helmets of the
firemen and the eager heads of the horses, the people send up a loud
shout of ‘Fi-ire!’ and follow pell-mell in its wake.
Arriving at the mews, the Superintendent sees exactly all that has
happened—all that must happen—all that may happen—and all that may be
prevented. The court is doomed to utter ruin and ashes; so is the mews.
Two of the larger stables are on fire, and the flames are now devouring
a loft full of hay and straw. But in doing this, their luminous tongues
stretch far beyond, seeking fresh food when this is gone. The wind
too!—the fatal wind, sets in the direction of the square! The flames are
struggling, and leaping, and striving with all their might to reach the
back premises of the houses on this side of the square; and reach it
they will, if this wind continues!
Meanwhile, two of the Fire Brigade engines from stations nearer at hand
than that of the Chief Office, are already here, and hard at work. A
fourth engine arrives from the Chief Office close upon the wheels of the
first—and now a fifth comes thundering up the mews. The Superintendent
taking command of the whole, and having ascertained that all the inmates
of the court and mews have been got out, gives orders for three of the
engines to continue their efforts to overcome the fire, and at any rate
to prevent it spreading to the houses in the square on each side of the
one which is now so imminently threatened. He then directs his own
engine and one other to be driven round to the front of the house in the
square, so as to attack the enemy both in front and rear at the same
time. The flames have just reached it—not a moment is to be lost! As he
drives off, innumerable cries and exhortations seek to arrest his
progress, and to make him alter his intentions. Several voices, louder
and more excited than all the rest,—vociferating something about ‘saving
her life’—cause him to pause, and prepare to turn, till, amidst the
confusion, he contrives to elicit the fact that a stable cat has been
unable to escape, and has darted out upon the burning roof of a
loft—and, also, that Mrs. Jessikin’s laundry—but he listens no further,
and gallops his engine round to the front of the house in the square,
followed by shouts of excitement and several yells.
The Fire-escape ladders of the Royal Society have already arrived here
in front. All the inmates have been got out by the door—at least it is
_said_ that all are out, by those white figures with faces as white,
who, looking round them, really see nothing distinctly and know nothing
as it is—having been awoke by the cries of ‘Fire,’ and not being quite
sure if all this mad hubbub of people, flames, voices, and water-spouts,
may not be some horrible nightmare vision.
The water-plugs have been drawn, and the gutters are all flooded. The
gully-hole is covered—a dam-board arrests the stream and gives depth—the
portable cistern is quickly filled—the suction-pipes of the engines,
being placed in it, both of them are got into position. The flames have
reached the back of the house; their points are just seen rising above
the roof! A rush of people seize on the long pump-levers, all mad to
work the engines. The foreman rapidly selects ten for each side—sets
them to work—and then, one at a time, takes down their names in a book
for the purpose, so that they may be paid a shilling an hour—those who
choose to accept it. But a hundred volunteer to work—they don’t want the
shilling—they want to pump. ‘Let _me_ pump!’ ‘_I’m_ the one to pump!’
‘Do you want any more to pump?’ resound on all sides from men of all
classes, while the crowd press forward, and can scarcely be got to leave
room enough for the engines to be worked—and they would not, but for the
man with the director-pipe, who soon makes a watery circle around him.
The fortunate volunteers at the levers now begin to pump away with a
fury that seems perfectly frantic. The Superintendent, who has had many
a fine-engine disabled during the first five minutes of this popular
furor, insists upon their ardour being restrained; and with no little
difficulty succeeds in getting his pumping done a degree less madly.
Who, that did not know them, would believe that these outrageous pumpers
were the very same people who stood with lack-lustre eyes at some
tedious operation in trade or workshop, all day long; or, who sat
stolidly opposite each other in an omnibus, without a word to say, and
seeming too dull for either thought or action? Look at them now!
The wind still blows strongly from the blazing stables—the flames are
rapidly eating their way through the house from the back! The two upper
stories are already on fire. A figure appears at one of the windows, and
makes signs. All the inmates had NOT been got out! An aged woman—a very
old and faithful servant of the family—had lingered behind, vainly
endeavouring to pack up some of her dear young mistress’s clothes and
trinkets. A prolonged cry bursts from the crowd, followed with
innumerable pieces of advice—bawled, hoarsely shouted, or rapidly
screamed to the Superintendent, and the firemen directing the nozzle of
the hose.
‘Point the nozzle up to the _window_!’
‘Up to the _roof_ of that room!’
‘_Smash_ the windows!’
‘The _Fire-escape_, Mr. Braidwood!’
‘Bring the ropes for her!—_throw up_ the ropes to her!’
‘Don’t smash the windows; you’ll _cut_ her!’
‘She’s gone to _jump out_ at the back!’
‘She is lying on the _floor_!’
‘She’s _suffocated_, Mr. Braidwood!’
‘Send up the _water_, to bring her to her senses!’
‘She’s burnt to _ashes_, Mr. Braidwood—I see her lying _all of a red
tinder_!’
Amidst these vociferations, the Superintendent, having a well-practised
deaf ear for such pieces of advice, has despatched two firemen to ascend
the stairs (no fireman is allowed to enter a burning house alone) while
two others enter below, and a lengthened hose is handed up to them with
a boat-hook through the front drawing-room window, in order to combat
the fire at close quarters, each one being accompanied by another
fireman, in case of one fainting from heat or smoke, and meantime to
assist in getting out furniture from the rooms not yet touched by the
flames.
The two foremost firemen have now ascended the stairs. One remains on
the second-floor landing, to watch, and give notice if their retreat is
likely to be cut off, while the other ascends to the upper room where
the poor old servant had been last seen. The room is quite full of
smoke. He therefore drops down directly with his face almost touching
the floor (because, as the smoke ascends, he thus gets ten or twelve
inches of clear space and air), and in this way creeps and drags himself
along till he sees a bundle of something struggling about, which he at
once recognises, seizes, and drags off as quickly as possible. Almost
exhausted, he meets his comrade on the stairs, who instantly giving aid,
they bring down a little white, smutty, huddled-up bundle, with a
nightcap and arms to it; and as they emerge from the door, are greeted
with shouts of applause, and roars and screams of ‘Bravo! Bravo! God
bless ’em! Bravo!’ from voices of men, and women, and boys.
The old woman presently comes to herself. She holds something in one
hand, which she had never loosed throughout, though she really does not
know what it is. ‘At all events,’ says she, ‘I’ve saved _this_!’
It is a hearth-broom.
The two firemen, each bearing a hose, have now got a position inside the
house—one standing on the landing-place of the second-floor within ten
or twelve feet of the flames, the other planted in the back
drawing-room. The first directs his nozzle so that the water strikes
with the utmost force upon the fire, almost in a straight line, dashing
it out into black spots, and flaws, and steam, as much by the violence
of the concussion as the antagonistic element. The other fireman directs
his jet of water to oppose the advances of the flames from the rafters
of the stables behind, and the wood-work of the back premises. Both the
men are enveloped in a cloud of hot steam, so hot as scarcely to be
endurable, and causing the perspiration to pour down their faces as fast
as the water runs down the walls from the vigorous ‘playing of their
pipes.’
But next door—to the right—what a long succession of drawing-room and
dining-room chairs issue forth, varied now and then with a dripping
hamper of choice wine, and the sound of cracking bottles; now, with a
flattened cradle, now a tea-tray of richly-bound books; now, a
turbot-kettle, and then more chairs!
In the door-way of the house on the left, there is a dreadful jam. An
abominable, huge mahogany table has fixed one of its corners into the
wall, on one side, and the brass castor of one leg into a broken plank
of the flooring, on the other, just as a Broadwood horizontal-grand was
coming down the stairs in the most massive manner (like a piano
conscious of Beethoven), with its five bearers. These five men with the
piano-forte, receiving a check in the passage from three men bearing
boxes and a large clothes-horse, who had themselves received a check by
the jam of the huge mahogany and its eight or nine excited blockheads,
the stoppage became perfect, and the confusion sheer madness. Some of
the inmates of this house, who had been wildly helping and handing down
all sorts of things, observing that a stoppage had occurred below, and
believing they had no more time to spare before the flames would
penetrate their walls, brought baskets to the window, and with great
energy threw out a quantity of beautiful china, glass, and choice
chimney ornaments down upon the stones below, to be taken care of; also
an empty hat-box.
Above all the tumult, and adding in no small degree to the wildness and
abrupt energies of the scene, a violent knocking at doors in the square
is frequently heard, sometimes by policemen, at other times by excited
relations suddenly arriving, desperate to give their advice, and see it
attended to. The bedroom windows, in rows on either side, are alive with
heads, many of them in night-caps, while the upper windows of several,
apparently ‘the nurseries,’ are crowded with white dolls, whose round
white nobs are eagerly thrust forth. In the windows of the houses,
lights are seen to move about rapidly from room to room, and windows are
continually thrown up; a figure looks out wildly—then suddenly
disappears.
The two firemen who had gained positions inside the house, each with his
long hose supplied from the engine below, had hitherto maintained their
posts; the one on the second-floor landing having very successfully
repelled the advance of the fire, the other in the back drawing-room
having fairly obtained a mastery. But a strong gust of wind rising
again, sets all their previous success at nought. The flames again
advance; and all their work has to be done over again.
By this time the two men are nearly exhausted; two other firemen are,
however, close at hand to relieve them. They take their places. As the
flames advance, the engines below are worked with redoubled energy by
the people, who also relieve each other; but no one will relinquish his
place at the pump-lever, so long as he is able to stand, or have one
heave up, or one bang down, more. Still the flames advance!—they enter
the house!—the front drawing-room is suddenly illuminated!—a glare of
light is reflected from a great looking-glass on one of the walls! A
loud shout of excitement resounds from the crowd—while bang! bang! go
the engine-pumps.
The fireman, who is surrounded by so strong a glare of light that he
appears all on fire, is seen to retreat a few paces towards the door. He
is presently joined by another fireman, who runs to the front
drawing-room window, out of which he suspends an iron chain to secure
their escape, in case of need, and then returns to his comrade. They
rally, and each with his brass director-pipe advances again within
half-a-dozen paces of the blazing walls. They are, foot by foot, driven
back into the front drawing-room. The flames follow them, and soon are
very close to the or molu frame-work of the great looking-glass.
Bang! bang! go the engines.
‘Save the glass!’ shout numbers of voices.
‘The ceiling! the ceiling’s bursting down!’ cry others.
Bang! bang! go the engines.
‘Save the pieces!’
‘The door-post’s on fire!’
‘Look behind you!’
‘The glass!—the glass!’
‘Save yourselves!’
Bang! bang! go the engines.
The Superintendent has sent orders to the firemen to give no more
attention to the interior of this house, except with a view to prevent
the fire spreading to the adjoining houses. Consequently, the streams of
water are now directed to drenching the walls, and beating back the
flames on either side. The great looking-glass, no longer an object of
special protection, is presently reached by the flames; they coil and
cluster round the frame-work, which, breaking out into jets of coloured
fire, gives a splendid magnificence to the design of the carving. The
crowd jump up and down to see, and also from excitement. The flames flap
about, and point their long luminous tongues across the broad plate of
the glass, which for a moment reflects every object in the room,—the
falling ceiling—the firemen in their helmets—the blazing ruin
around;—and then, crack!—clash! clash!—the whole falls, a wreck of sharp
angles.
Again a loud shout from the crowd below!—not so much of regret as a kind
of wild purposeless joy, which causes them again to leap up and down,
expecting and (without knowing it) hoping the same thing will happen to
some other glass in the room. Melted lead from the roof now runs
gleaming down—spurting upon the helmet of one of the firemen, and then
running in straggling lines down his thick coat; while a slate falling,
as usual, edgeways, sticks across the centre-piece of his comrade’s
helmet. Now, with a rattling and loud rumble, falls the partition
between the front and back drawing-rooms, and with it a great part of
the ceiling! A terrific shout of alarm bursts from the crowd. The two
firemen are buried in the ruins. The whole space is filled with the
dense smoke and with piles of lath and plaster, and brick and blazing
wood.
But see!—a helmet, white with mortar, rises from the floor near the
window-sill—and now another! One after the other, the exhausted firemen
descend the iron chain, and are caught in the arms of the Superintendent
and two of their comrades below, while loud shouts and vociferations of
applause burst from the crowd.
The stable cat, too, from the mews! See! she has crossed between the
burning rafters, and leaped into the balcony of the next house, with
smoking tail and ears.
The flames have been smothered for a time by this fall of the ceiling
and partition-wall; the Superintendent has now got seven engines round
to the front; he takes advantage of the fortunate accident; the wind,
too, has shifted; the seven engines pour torrents of water upon the
smoking mass and against the walls, and thus continue till the most
frightful of all enemies is thoroughly subdued and reduced to blackness
and quietude. Most dismal is the scene of devastation; but the enemy is
at all events laid prostrate and rendered incapable of further mischief.
Drenched to the skin with cold water, and reeking at the same time with
perspiration, the gallant men of the Fire Brigade return to their
several quarters. Two of them, however, remain on watch with an engine
all night, a change of clothes and ‘a dram’ being sent them from the
station.
The present efficient condition of fire-engines, as may easily be
supposed, has only been the result of many years of skilful experiment
and practical experience. Our ancestors (notwithstanding their wisdom)
were by no means furnished with such means of extinguishing fire,
although, from the great number of wooden buildings, and greater
quantity of wooden materials employed, to say nothing of thatch, they
had greater need of them. On the other hand, they had not so many
scientific combustibles among them. Still, the want of a proper engine
is manifest from what we know of their attempts in that way. They used
squirts,—actually nothing but squirts. Every alderman was obliged to
provide one. It will be understood that the squirt was not of schoolboy
dimensions, but so large as to require two men, holding it in their arms
between them, like a sort of mummy, to dip its nose into a bucket, and
then, raising it to the proper angle, discharge the contents at the
building on fire.
The first construction of the fire engine, properly so called, is
attributable to a German named Hautsch, in 1657, which was afterwards
improved by the brothers Van der Heyden, in 1672. But, though the merit
of the invention confers all due honour on the engineering mind of
Germans, it may be questioned whether the character of the people was
ever of a kind to induce the working of them with promptitude or
efficiency. So recently as a few years ago, when the writer was staying
in the town of Bonn, intelligence was brought of a fire at Popplesdorf,
a village about a mile and a quarter distant. The town engine was got
out by a couple of men, with pipes in their mouths, and the horse—one
horse—being put to, it was trotted off in the most deliberate manner.
Outside the town gates we overtook a number of students and other
gentlemen, all leisurely sauntering with their pipes towards
Popplesdorf, never doubting but they would be in ample time before the
engine had extinguished the fire. And so they were, for it was burning
nearly half the day. Nevertheless, the Prussian Government have been the
first to purchase the invention of the Steam Fire Engine. Their theories
in the matter seem perfect; but to put out a fire with promptitude
cannot be done even by a Steam Fire Engine without a little human
activity.
The contrast of our vivacity in these matters is very striking, and in
no case more so than when some mischievous idiot gives a false alarm (an
atrocity which we believe is not often committed), or when some
extraordinary meteorological phenomenon induces the mistake. We find two
extraordinary instances of this recorded in Knight’s ‘London.’
‘On the first of these, _twelve_ engines and _seventy-four_ brigade
men were kept in constant motion from _eleven in the evening till six
the next morning_, in endeavouring to search out what appeared to be a
large conflagration; some of the engines reached Hampstead, and others
Kilburn, before it was found that the glare was the effect of the
“northern lights.” On the other occasion, a crimson glare of light
arose at the north-east part of the horizon, at about eight o’clock in
the evening, seemingly caused by a fierce conflagration; and the
resemblance was increased by what appeared to be clouds of smoke
rising up after the glare, and breaking and rolling away beneath it.
_Thirteen_ engines and a large body of men went in search of the
supposed fire, and did not detect their error till they had proceeded
far to the north-east.’
The statistics of London fires are very interesting, and much may be
learned from them, not only as matter of anxious information, but of
salutary warning.
The total number of fires in London in the past year, was 838. Of these,
28 were utterly destructive fires; the number of lives lost being 26.
Seriously damaged, 228; slightly damaged, 582.
Of chimneys on fire there were 89; and there were 76 false alarms—not
mischievous, but from error or panic.
The number of calls on the fire-office and other aids amounted to 1003.
In the above 838 fires, the number of insurances (ascertained) were 368;
those which insured on the building only, were 163; those which insured
on the contents only, were 72; and the number of uninsured was 235.
Of the 26 lives lost, 13 were from the ignition of bed-furniture or
wearing apparel; explosion of fire-works, 5; and 8 from inability to
escape out of burning houses.
An examination of the statistics of fires in the Metropolis during
sixteen years, _i.e._ from 1833 to 1848 (which document was obligingly
laid before us by Mr. Braidwood), has put us in possession of a great
mass of very curious and instructive information, from which we extract
the following:——
Apothecaries and dealers in drugs 36
Bakers 244
Booksellers, binders, and stationers 137
Of these latter, 96 burnt gas; and the fires caused by gas amounted to
28.
Cabinet-makers 156
Carpenters and workers in wood 434
Churches 33
Of these last-named, 3 were totally destroyed, and 10 much damaged; the
rest slightly, or mere alarms. Of the cause of the fires, 8 were from
the stoves, flues, &c., and 2 from lightning.
Drapers, woollen and linen 254
Of these, 105 were much damaged; 239 burnt gas; and the cause of 140 of
these fires was carelessness or accident with the gas.
Fire-Preventive Company 1
The cause of this was an experiment with some ‘fire-proof plaster,’
which ignited in a most unexpected and insubordinate manner, and caused
great damage.
Fire-work Makers 49
The cause of these fires, all of which did great damage, was from the
nature of the trade; from the smoking of tobacco; from boys playing with
fire; and from the reckless trick of a lighted squib or cracker being
thrown into the shop-window.
Gas-works 37
From the great care taken, and ready means of prevention, only 9 of
these were much injured, and none totally destroyed.
Grocers 120
Of these, 109 burnt gas; and 26 of the fires are attributable to
carelessness or accident with the gas.
Gunpowder-sellers 1
Notice the result of a full consciousness of the danger, and
proportionate care. Only one fire!
Lodgings 868
Of the above number, 368 were found to have been caused by the taking
fire of curtains, linen airing, &c. Some of the rest were caused by
hunting fleas, &c.
Lucifer-match-makers 101
Lunatic asylums 2
Observe the great care in these asylums. All the asylums for lunatics
furnishing only two fires in sixteen years!
Printers and Engravers 72
Private houses 3352
Of the above, the immense number of 1302 were discovered to have been
caused by the taking fire of curtains, dresses, airing linen, &c.
Sale-shops and offices 526
Of these, 379 burnt gas; and the fires caused by gas were 129.
Ships 82
Caused by stores, flues, cooking, igniting of cargo, smoking tobacco,
&c.
Stables 192
Caused by candles, lucifers, smoking tobacco, intoxication, &c.
Tailors 81
Seventeen of the above were caused by gas; 13 by candles; and some by
smoking tobacco.
Theatres 20
Of the above number, 8 were caused by gas; some others by smoking
tobacco, and the taking fire of curtains, dresses, &c.
Tobacconists 43
Of the above, 6 were caused by gas; 6 by lucifer-matches; others by
curtains, smoking tobacco, by a _cat_, and by _rats_. A word more of
these incendiaries presently.
Victuallers 542
Of the above, there were 21 totally destroyed; 167 much damaged, and 354
slightly. Of the causes, 83 were from the flues; 73, curtains, dresses,
&c.; 65, gas; 36, smoking tobacco; 35, a candle. The remainder comes
under the various heads of lucifers, hot cinders, intoxication, children
playing with fire, a spark, and a monkey.
Besides this ‘monkey,’ we have had occasion to mention several other
‘sparks,’ concerning whom some passing explanation may be needed. Having
noticed the word ‘cat,’ occurring several times in the list of annual
causes of fire,—‘Yes,’ replied Mr. Braidwood, ‘we often have a cat.’ It
appears that the cat sometimes upsets the clothes-horse with things
airing; or, perhaps, in creeping under the clothes to get inside the
fender, drags some of them with her on her back. The fire caused by the
monkey was attributable to some prank of his—meaning no harm, perhaps,
but not much caring about that. The incendiarism of the rats was
undoubtedly effected innocently by their investigation of a box of
lucifers, which included a trial if the matches were good to eat. Their
teeth exploded them—a feat very easily performed.
Of carelessness with gas in shops and warehouses, or with candles near
bedroom curtains, muslin dresses, or linen airing before the fire, we
need not speak, as the dangers are too obvious by the results; nor of
carelessness with lucifer-matches; nor the very common practice of
raking out the fire at night from the grate (where it would be safe)
down upon the hearth, and leaving the hot embers, which perhaps ignite
by the air of the closing door, as the careful person retires to bed.
Carelessness with a cigar or pipe is also an obvious cause. Working men
often put their pipes, half-extinguished, or alive at the bottom of the
bowl, into their jacket-pocket at night; and then hang up the jacket,
and go to bed. Children, also, being left alone, near a fire, may
generally be expected to play with fire, either because it is beautiful,
or because the play is interdicted.
With respect to ‘sparks,’ that a house should take fire, had always been
regarded by us with no small degree of scepticism. A gentleman of our
acquaintance carried his disbelief much further. Sitting with a party of
sporting friends round a winter’s fire, and these dangers being the
subject of conversation, he offered to empty the whole contents of the
grate on the carpet in the middle of the room—_he_ to pay all expenses
if the house took fire; his opponent simply to pay for the carpet and
the charred floor. They were all to sit round, and watch the result. It
was agreed. ‘Now,’ said a friend, ‘I will bet you _ten_ to one this
house will take fire, provided we all go out of the room, lock the door,
and leave the house.’ The other would not venture on this.
Mr. Braidwood’s speculation on the question of sparks, in reply to our
doubts, is very curious and practical. He estimated the number of houses
in London at 300,000. Allowing two _domestic_ fires to each house, we
have 600,000 in the day; and these multiplied by 7, give 4,200,000 in a
week. That one spark, therefore, from 4,200,000 fires should fly out
upon some materials easy to ignite, once in a week, is far from
difficult to credit; and this would fully bear out the number on the
list that are declared to have occurred from this cause.
The number of fires and alarms of fire that occurred in London during
the fifteen years ending in 1847, present a continual _increase_. In
1833 they amounted to 458; in 1834, to 482; and so on, down to 1847,
when they amounted to 836. This gives a total of 9662 fires during the
fifteen years. The average of this is 644. We next find that in 1848 the
number of fires amounted to 805; showing an _increase_ beyond the
previous year of 161. In 1849 the number amounted to 838, being an
increase of 33 beyond the previous year.
How are we to reconcile this increase with the extraordinary efficiency
of the Fire Brigade, and the improvements in measures of precaution?
Partly by the regular increase in the numbers of houses. But Mr.
Braidwood frankly declares that this does not meet the increase of fires
and alarms of fire that reach the Office. We can only account for it,
therefore, by the great increase of scientific combustibles, not merely
in our shops, but in our domestic arrangements—especially gas, and
lucifer-matches—and yet more to the fact that, in former years, many
slight fires caused no alarm to be given, while now the arrangements are
so complete, that probably almost every slight alarm of fire that occurs
is carried to the Office, and duly recorded.
With respect to Fire-Escapes; precautions against fire, that should be
adopted in houses; arrangements to meet the accident; and the best means
of extinguishing fires (particularly with reference to Mr. Phillips’
Fire-Annihilator, which possesses an undoubted power over _flames_), we
cannot now afford the space their importance merits; but we shall bear
them in mind for a future number.
POETRY IN THE BYE-WAYS.
Every book-hunter, whose connection with paper and print has more of
individuality than of fashion in it—must in his time have met with
scores of small volumes of rhyme forced out with a care and pains of
which the heart aches to think, prefaced with the bad taste of
immoderate deprecation on the part of the author,—or with the worse
appeal of extravagant commendation on the part of the patron—none of
which shall merit a place on the shelf by the side of Crabbe, or
Wordsworth, or Burns—none of which can be denied the possession of some
sparks and breathings of true poetry.
Sometimes, however, it must be owned, that the difficulties under which
the rhymester has laboured, are the best—nay the sole—evidences of his
genius. In the verses of Phillis Wheatly, the negro girl, for instance,
there is not a line that is not the stalest of the stale—not an image
that is not the most second-hand of the second-hand. Yet, that sixty
years since, a woman of her condemned colour and oppressed race—in
America, too,—should find spirits to sing, and power to attract an
audience,—in that fact was a poem of no common order.
Years ago, there passed through the writer’s hand a small collection of
verse—if verse it might be called—in quality, the most dreary and
antipathetic, possible—sectarian hymns, full of phrases, the intimate
sense of which can never have pierced to the mind of their maker. This
was a poor creature in a hospital, who had been found on a harsh January
night, frozen into the kennel where she had fallen, and who paid for
that night’s lodging with a lingering death of cruelly long duration.
Her vital powers gradually retired one by one. For many years she was
unable to move a limb; latterly could scarcely speak audibly, or take
barely sufficient food to keep life in the half-dead body. But these
dismal hymns were her receipt for occupation and cheerfulness. ‘When I
cannot sleep,’ she would say, in a dialect of her own peculiar pattern,
‘I _mew_.’—There was poetry in the origin of these ‘_mewings_,’ though
none in the dark and narrow stanzas themselves.
From the above illustrations it may be gathered that much of the bye-way
poetry with which we shall deal, has never been promoted to the honours
and heartaches of paper and print—nor even taken the manuscript forms of
‘longs and shorts’ as decidedly as did the imaginative instincts of
Black Phillis, or the long-tried patience of the sufferer in the ——
Ward. We may—and shall—have to do with authorship in humble life,—but
less, perchance, than those will expect, who have considered our subject
merely from the outside of the bookseller’s window, or from the sum
total of a rhymester’s subscription list—drawing thence the charming
inference that A., B. or C. is a poet, because he has found a publisher
and extorted a public!—Too seldom has a Capel Lofft, or a Southey, or a
More, while trying to bring forward a Bloomfield, or a Mary Colling, or
an ungrateful Bristol Milkwoman, whose facility in versifying has
arrested them,—considered how wide is the distance betwixt what may be
called the unconscious Poetry of the People—and that meagre and
second-hand manufacture, produced with a desire for fame, or under hopes
of gain, which challenges competition with the efforts of men more
favourably circumstanced, and which goes forth as virtually a
solicitation for alms.—On the one side (to take the first instance which
occurs) we shall find something like the Gondolier songs of Venice,
patched up—St. Mark and the Moon know how!—out of bits of plays and bits
of verses and bits of opera-tunes, by old men and girls and boys, while
a sprightly people ply their picturesque trade under an Italian sky,
with every image round them to inspire and encourage a sense of
tune,—and which, after a while, get so rubbed into shape—so rounded and
changed,—so decked with canal-wit,—so filled with local names and local
words,—that a College of Anatomists should be puzzled to ‘resolve them
into their primary elements.’—On the other side, we may cite as example
any of the myriad verses anxiously strung together by the hectic and
over-wrought operative, by the light of his candle, whose very burning
would be reprehensible as an extravagance, could not the ware fabricated
at midnight find an immediate market. The first is an utterance—the
second a manufacture. The first speaks with the breath of a peculiar
life, and wears the colour of a peculiar scenery—the second is an
exercise produced under circumstances, which, however stimulating to
energy, are but discouraging to Fancy. We may be told, it is true, that
many of our dearest ‘household words’ have been wrung from our greatest
men, by the pressure of the cruellest exigency. One poet, to pay for his
mother’s funeral, must needs write a ‘Rasselas’—another, under
constraint less instant, but perhaps not less harassing, shall gladden
England for ever, by calling up _Olivia_ and _Sophia_ in the hayfield,
and _Farmer Flamborough’s_ Christmas party, and the Vicar slyly making
an end of ‘the wash for the face,’ which his innocently-worldly
daughters were brewing. But evidence like this does nothing to
contradict our wisdom. Had Johnson been compelled to compose his superb
style, at a moment’s warning by the coffin-side; had Goldsmith possessed
no treasury of adventure and experience to draw upon, no power to handle
the pen already learned—neither _Imlac_ nor _Mrs. Primrose_ would have
been alive at this day. Without preparation, training, craftsmanship,
there is little literature—there is no art. Ballads may grow up—but not
epics be produced, nor five-act plays be constructed, nor tales be
woven, nor even a complete lyric be finished. It has fallen to the lot
of every one of us too often and again, to see hearts fevered, hopes
wrecked, life embittered, and Death (or Madness) courted, because men
cannot—and their friends _will not_—sufficiently fix their minds on this
plain truth; because inclinations are perpetually mistaken for powers;
because, bewildered by some faëry dream that the world in which a Scott
is king or a Siddons is queen, is paved with gold—every boy who can cut
paragraphs into lengths fancies that he is a Scott—and every girl with a
strong voice who loves playgoing, that she is a _Lady Macbeth_, a
_Cleopatra_, a _Queen Constance_, who can shake ‘the playhouse down.’
At all events, in such mistakes as the above, followed by their sure
consequence of misery, lives not the Poetry which we are seeking. In its
place we too often encounter a dismal wax-work show—a creature with
glassy eyes and hot red cheeks, and a stiff arm, in a noble attitude
perhaps, but always beckoning in one and the same direction,—not the
living, breathing, hoping, fearing being, human like ourselves, yet
better than ourselves, with whom we can sit down at meat, and kneel down
at prayer—not the fragment of Heaven upon Earth to encounter and make
acquaintance with, which redeems us from utter heartlessness or
discomfort. The Poetry of appreciation when creation is impossible—the
Poetry of daily life, as sung in deeds of unselfishness, delicacy,
triumph over temptations—consideration of the weak (let the brute-force
theorists ‘sound their trumpets and beat their drums’ as loudly as if
upon themselves devolved the whole orchestral and choral noise of ‘Judas
Maccabeus’) and companionship with the humble—the Poetry of a healthy,
not a maudlin love for Nature—these are to be sought out and gathered
up. In turn we may sit on the bleak hill-sides of Scotland with the
shepherd-rhymesters of the north—or wander down the alleys of English
manufacturing towns, to see what fairly-patterned verse may have been
woven there. Or in a green lane we may open such a book as good Mr.
Barnes has published in the Dorsetshire dialect, to show how ingeniously
music may be got out of a corrupt local English phraseology. Or we may
cross the Channel to hear Jasmin, the Provençal hairdresser, recite; or
to see Reboul, the Nismes baker, bring out an ode hot from his oven.—But
our business will be more with deeds than with words, more with genuine
thoughts and impulses in action, than with second-hand fancies, faded as
the coarse artificial flowers of a milliner’s shop in Leicester Square,
when the season is over, which no passer-by, ‘gentle or simple,’ can
think of taking home.
We may have to do, moreover, with the poetry of association as conveyed
in those festivals of joy or of sorrow which mark the progress of life
and the peculiarity of manners. The nasal, droning burial psalm that may
still be heard in remote places of England, winding up a hollow lane or
across the corner of a moor,—as some little congregation of friends or
neighbours bears a dead body home,—the twilight vesper service
(intrinsically tuneless and unmusical) of the Sisters of Charity, who
come back to their _Beguinage_ after a long day of hard work, hard
prayers, hard consolation, and hard gossip among the poor;—do these
things say nothing to us? Is nothing told us by the cry of sailors as
they warp the ship into dock at the close of a wild and wintry voyage?
by the serenade-music with which the impulsive people of a German town
welcome some favourite poet or artist?—Are these not all, more or less,
poems conveying to us something of feeling, and life, and youth, be we
ever so soured, ever so seared by perpetual contact with coarser and
harsher contemplations and employments? May we not call up such
pictures,—may we not soothe ourselves with such harmonies,—may we not
lay them to our souls as evidences? We must not use them by way of
unction flattering us into the sentimental Waiting Gentlewoman’s notion
that crime is to disappear like a scene in a pantomime, and thieves all
of a sudden to grow as orderly as beadles; but we may apply them as
alteratives when we are in danger of being wearied into doggedness, by
the man who enacts fits at the street corner—or by the begging-letter
Impostor who wrings crowns out of kind-hearted and economical souls, who
must for their credulity’s sake forego their holiday—or by the Pole with
his anti-Russian pamphlet, who makes his way in, to abase himself by
fawning and genteel mendicity, under pretext of being a friend’s
friend—or by the sight of such a pillar of stone as the woman who went
into the confectioner’s shop to buy gingerbread, ‘because they were
going to see our Sally hanged, and should be hungry!’
Yes: if sights and provocations and discouragements like these—of the
earth, earthy—force themselves into our highways, all the more need is
it that all celestial appearances and sounds in our bye-ways, be they
ever so few, faint, and far, should be collected, and set down. Be they
ever so rich, they will not be rich enough to justify an over-complacent
or supine spirit—still less to tempt the healthily-minded to confound
dross with pure gold: be they ever so meagre, they ought to keep alive
in us the faith, that no portion of the earth is so barren, that Truth
or Beauty, and Love, and Patience, and Honour, cannot grow therein.
THE MINER’S DAUGHTERS.—A TALE OF THE PEAK.
IN THREE CHAPTERS.
CHAPTER II.—MILL LIFE.
We must pass over the painful and dreadful particulars of that night,
and of a long time to come; the maniacal rage of the father, the
shattered heart and feelings of the mother, the dreadful state of the
two remaining children, to whom their brother was one of the most
precious objects in a world which, like theirs, contained so few. One
moment to have seen him full of life, and fun, and bravado, and almost
the next a lifeless and battered corpse, was something too strange and
terrible to be soon surmounted. But this was wofully aggravated by the
cruel anger of their father, who continued to regard them as guilty of
the death of his favourite boy. He seemed to take no pleasure in them.
He never spoke to them but to scold them. He drank more deeply than
ever, and came home later; and when there, was sullen and morose. When
their mother, who suffered severely, but still plodded on with all her
duties, said, ‘David, they are thy children too;’ he would reply
savagely, ‘Hod thy tongue! What’s a pack o’ wenches to my lad?’