Among the events for which the past year will for ever remain a marked
twelvemonth on the page of history, is the Great Fire of London, which
broke out, for a considerable period, three nights every week, as a
public prediction had declared it should, regularly, till further
notice.
We are fortunately enabled to give the particulars of this great
conflagration on the occasion of one of its grandest eruptions. It
commenced a little after dusk, and there can now exist no doubt that it
was the work of more than one incendiary.
Flames were distinctly seen to issue from one of the windows of Old St.
Paul's (which seemed to have been renovated only to be re-consumed).
They evidently proceeded from a torch, which, we are assured, was
applied by a man in a seal-skin cap.
No less than three individuals were observed, busy in assisting the
progress of the flames, by tossing ignited straw, &c., about with
pitchforks. The glare distinctly revealed their shirt sleeves, thus
proving them to be without coats: but, owing to the confusion, their
faces were not identified.
The devouring element was brought, by a lad in a short jacket (said to
have been out at elbows), with aid of a lighted stick, into contact with
the touch-hole of a howitzer, which exploded with a loud noise. This
proceeding was frequently repeated during the evening,—it is believed
out of mere wantonness. The same heartless principle induced others to
throw squibs, crackers, and other fireworks into the blazing ruins.
Neither the crowd nor the attendant policemen offered in the smallest
degree to interfere. The cries and shouting of the multitude were
tremendous, but seemed to partake of an exulting character.
By a little past ten o'clock the flames got under, apparently of their
own accord; and, though several towers and steeples had been seen to
fall with a tremendous crash, which was heightened by the frequent
tocsin of gongs and the explosion of artillery, little damage is
imagined to have been done, the destruction having principally extended
to the fireworks and other combustibles already mentioned.
The motive assigned for this act of incendiarism is sheer self-interest
on the part of the perpetrators, who received a shilling a head from
people who came to witness it. The fiendish project, we fear, was
crowned with the most complete success.