In the afternoon of the following day Willie set off to the City in
quest of Mr Thomas Tippet. Having to pass the King Street fire
station, he resolved to look in on his brother.
The folding-doors of the engine-house were wide open, and the engine
itself, clean and business-like, with its brass-work polished bright,
stood ready for instant action. Two of the firemen were conversing at
the open door, while several others could be seen lounging about inside.
In one of the former Willie recognised the strong man who had collared
him on a well-remembered occasion.
"Please, sir," said Willie, going up to him, "is Frank Willders inside?"
"Why, youngster," said Dale, laying his hand on Willie's head, "ain't
you the boy that pulled our bell for a lark the other night?"
"Yes, sir, I am; but you let me off, you know, so I hope you won't bear
me ill-will _now_."
"That depends on how you behave in future," said Dale with a laugh; "but
what d'you want with Frank Willders?"
"I want to see him. He's my brother."
"Oh, indeed! You'll find him inside."
Willie entered the place with feelings of interest, for his respect for
firemen had increased greatly since he had witnessed their recent doings
at the Beverly Square fire.
He found his brother writing at the little desk that stood in the
window, while five or six of his comrades were chatting by the fire, and
a group in a corner were playing draughts, and spinning yarns of their
old experiences. All assisted in loading the air with tobacco-smoke.
The round cloth caps worn by the men gave them a much more sailor-like
and much less fireman-like appearance than the helmets, which, with
their respective hatchets, hung on the walls, rendering the apartment
somewhat like a cavalry guard-room. This change in the head-piece, and
the removal of the hatchet, was the only alteration in their costume in
what may be styled "times of peace." In other respects they were at all
times accoutred, and in readiness to commence instant battle with the
flames.
"Hallo, Blazes! how are ye?" said Willie, touching his brother on the
shoulder.
"That you, Willie?" said Frank, without looking up from his work.
"Where away now?"
"Come to tell ye there's a _fire_," said Willie, with a serious look.
"Eh? what d'ye mean?" asked Frank, looking at his brother, as if he half
believed he was in earnest.
"I mean what I say--a fire here," said Willie, solemnly striking his
breast with his clenched fist, "here in Heart Street, Buzzum Square,
ragin' like fury, and all the ingins o' the fire brigade, includin' the
float, couldn't put it out, no, nor even so much as squeanch it!"
"Then it's of no use our turning out, I suppose?" said Frank with a
smile, as he wiped his pen; "what set it alight, lad?"
"A wax doll with flaxen hair and blue eyes," answered Willie; "them's
the things as has all along done for me. When I was a boy I falled in
love with a noo wax doll every other day. Not that I ever owned one
myself; I only took a squint at 'em in toy-shop winders, and they always
had flaxen hair and blue peepers. Now that I've become a man, I've bin
an' falled in love with a livin' wax doll, an' she's got flaxen hair an'
blue eyes; moreover, she draws."
"Draws--boy! what does she draw--corks?" inquires Frank.
"_No_!" replied Willie, with a look of supreme contempt; "nothin' so
low; she draws faces an' pictures like--like--a schoolmaster, and,"
added Willie, with a sigh, "she's bin an' drawed all the spirit out o'
this here buzzum."
"She must have left a good lot o' combustible matter behind, however, if
there's such a fire raging in it. Who may this pretty fire-raiser be?"
"Her name is Emma Ward, and she b'longs to a Miss Tippet, to whom she's
related somehow, but I don't know where she got her, nor who's her
parents. This same Miss Tippet is some sort of a relation o' Mr
Auberly, who sent me to her with a note, and she has sent me with
another note to her brother near London Bridge, who, I s'pose, will send
me with another note to somebody else, so I'm on my way down to see him.
I thought I'd look in to ask after you in passin', and cheer you on to
dooty."
A violent fit of somewhat noisy coughing from one of the men at the
fireplace attracted Willie's attention at this point in the
conversation.
"Wot a noisy feller you are, Corney," remarked one of the men.
"Faix," retorted Corney, "it's noisy you'd be too av ye had the cowld in
yer chist that I have. Sure, if ye had bin out five times in wan night
as I wos on Widsenday last, wid the branch to howld in a smoke as 'ud
choke Baxmore hisself (an' it's well known _he_ can stand a'most
anything), not to spake o' the hose bu'stin' right betune me two feet."
"Come, come, Paddy," said Dale, interrupting; "don't try to choke us,
now; you know very well that one of the fires was only a cut-away
affair; two were chimneys, and one was a false alarm."
"True for ye!" cried Corney, who had a tendency to become irascible in
argument, or while defending himself; "true for ye, Mister Dale, but
they _was_ alarms for all that, false or thrue, was they not now?
Anyhow they alarmed me out o' me bed five times in a night as cowld as
the polar ragions, and the last time was a raale case o' two flats burnt
out, an' four hours' work in iced wather."
There was a general laugh at this point, followed by several coughs and
sneezes, for the men were all more or less afflicted with colds, owing
to the severity of the weather and the frequency of the fires that had
occurred at that time.
"There's some of us can sing chorus to Corney," observed one of the
group. "I never saw such weather; and it seems to me that the worse the
weather the more the fires, as if they got 'em up a purpose to kill us."
"Bill Moxey!" cried another, "you're _always_ givin' out some truism
with a face like Solomon."
"Well, Jack Williams," retorted Moxey, "it's more than I can say of you,
for you never say anything worth listenin' to, and you couldn't look
like Solomon if you was to try ever so much.--You're too stoopid for
that."
"I say, lads," cried Frank Willders, "what d'ye say to send along to the
doctor for another bottle o' cough mixture, same as the first?"
This proposal was received with a general laugh.
"He'll not send us more o' _that_ tipple, you may depend," said
Williams.
"No, not av we wos dyin'," said Corney, with a grin.
"What was it?" asked Williams.
"Didn't you hear about it?" inquired Moxey. "Oh, to be sure not; you
were in hospital after you got run over by the Baker Street engine.
Tell him about it, Corney. It was you that asked the doctor, wasn't it,
for another bottle?"
Corney was about to speak, when a young fireman entered the room with
his helmet hanging on his arm.
"Is it go on?" he inquired, looking round.
"No, it's go back, young Rags," replied Baxmore, as he refilled his
pipe; "it was only a chimney, so you're not wanted."
"Can any o' you fellers lend me a bit o' baccy?" asked Rags. "I've
forgot to fetch mine."
"Here you are," said Dale, offering him a piece of twist.
"Han't ye got a bit o' hard baccy for the tooth?" said Rags.
"Will that do?" asked Frank Willders, cutting off a piece from a plug of
cavendish.
"Thank'ee. Good afternoon."
Young Rags put the quid in his cheek, and went away humming a tune.
In explanation of the above incident, it is necessary to tell the reader
that when a fire occurred in any part of London at the time of which we
write, the fire-station nearest to it at once sent out its engines and
men, and telegraphed to the then head or centre station at Watling
Street. London was divided into four districts, each district
containing several fire stations, and being presided over by a foreman.
From Watling Street the news was telegraphed to the foremen's stations,
whence it was transmitted to the stations of their respective districts,
so that in a few minutes after the breaking out of a fire the fact was
known to the firemen _all over London_.
As we have said, the stations nearest to the scene of conflagration
turned out engines and men; but the other stations furnished a man each.
Thus machinery was set in motion which moved, as it were, the whole
metropolis; and while the engines were going to the fire at full speed,
single men were setting out from every point of the compass to walk to
it, with their sailors' caps on their heads and their helmets on their
arms.
And this took place in the case of every alarm of fire, because fire is
an element that will not brook delay, and it does not do to wait to
ascertain whether it is worth while to turn out such a force of men for
it or not.
In order, however, to prevent this unnecessary assembling of men when
the fire was found to be trifling, or when, as was sometimes the case,
it was a false alarm, the fireman in charge of the engine that arrived
first, at once sent a man back to the station with a "stop," that is,
with an order to telegraph to the central station that the fire turns
out to be only a chimney or a false alarm, and that all hands who have
started from the distant stations may be "stopped." The "stop" was at
once telegraphed to the foremen, from whom it was passed (just as the
"call" had been) to the outlying stations, and this second telegram
might arrive within quarter of an hour of the first.
Of course the man from each station had set out before that time, and
the "stop" was too late for _him_, but it was his duty to call at the
various fire stations he happened to pass on the way, where he soon
found out whether he was to "go on" or to "go back."
If no telegram had been received, he went on to the fire; sometimes
walking four or five miles to it, "at not less than four miles an hour."
On coming up to the scene of conflagration, he put on his helmet,
thrust his cap into the breast of his coat, and reported himself to the
chief of the fire brigade (who was usually on the spot), or to the
foreman in command, and found, probably, that he had arrived just in
time to be of great service in the way of relieving the men who first
attacked the flames.
If, on the other hand, he found that the "stop" had been telegraphed, he
turned back before having gone much more than a mile from his own
station, and so went quietly home to bed. In the days of which we write
the effective and beautiful system of telegraphy which now exists had
not been applied to the fire stations of London, and the system of
"stops" and "calls," although in operation, was carried out much less
promptly and effectively by means of messengers.
Some time before the entrance of Willie Willders into the King Street
station the engine had been turned out to a fire close at hand, which
proved to be only a chimney on fire, and which was put out by means of a
hand-pump and a bucket of water, while Moxey was sent back with the
"stop" to the station. The affair was over and almost forgotten, and
the men had resumed their pipes, as we have seen, when young Rags
entered and was told to go back.
Apologising for this necessary digression, we return to Joe Corney.
"The fact was," said he, "that we had had a fearful time of it that
winter--blowin' great guns an' snow nearly every night, an' what wi'
heat at the fires an' cowld i' the streets, an' hot wather pourin' on us
at wan minnit an' freezin' on us the nixt, a'most every man Jack of us
was coughin' an' sneezin', and watherin' so bad at our eyes an' noses,
that I do belave if we'd held 'em over the suction-pipes we might ha'
filled the ingins without throublin' the mains at all. So the doctor he
said, says he, `Lads, I'll send ye a bottle o' stuff as'll put ye
right.' An' sure enough down comes the bottle that night when we was
smokin' our pipes just afther roll-call. It turned out to be the best
midcine ever was. `Musha!' says I, `here's the top o' the marnin' to
ye, boys!' Baxmore he smacks his lips when he tastes it, opens his
eyes, tosses off the glass, and holds it out for another. `Howld on;
fair play!' cried Jack Williams, so we all had a glass round. It was
just like lemonade or ginger-beer, it was. So we sat down an' smoked
our pipes over it, an' spun yarns an' sung songs; in fact we made a
jollification of it, an' when we got up to turn in there warn't a dhrop
left i' the bottle.
"`You'd better go to the doctor for another bottle,' says Moxey, as he
wint out.
"`I will,' says I; `I'll go i' the marnin'.'
"Sure enough away I goes i' the marnin' to Doctor Offley. `Doctor,'
says I, howldin' out the bottle, `we all think our colds are much the
better o' this here midcine, an' I comed, av ye plaze, for another o'
the same.'
"Musha! but ye should ha' seen the rage he goes off into. `Finished it
all?' says he. `Ivery dhrop, doctor,' says I, `at wan sittin'.' At
that he stamped an' swore at me, an' ordered me away as if I'd bin a
poor relation; an' says he, `I'll sind ye a bottle to-night as'll cure
ye!' Sure so he did. The second bottle would have poison'd a rat. It
lasted us all six months, an' I do belave ye'll find the most of it in
the cupboard at this minnit av ye look."
"Come, Willie," said Frank, while the men were laughing at the
remembrance of this incident. "I'm going down your way and will give
you a convoy. We can take a look in at the gymnastics as we pass, if
you choose."
"All right, Blazes, come along." So saying they left the station, and
set off at a brisk pace in the direction of the City.