The guests of the hotel were in the corridors ready for any emergency. Had there been any wind in our direction, the hotel was doomed. The night was calm and wet. As soon as we became aware that no lives were lost or in danger in the burning building, and that it would only be a question of insurance money to be paid by some companies, we betook ourselves to admire the magnificent sight. For it was a magnificent sight, this whole large building, the prey of flames coming in torrents out of every window, the dogged perseverance of the firemen streaming floods of water over the roof and through the windows, the salvage corps men penetrating through the flames into the building in the hope of receiving the next day a commission on all the goods and valuables saved. A fierce battle it was between a brute element and man. By three o'clock the element was conquered, but only the four walls of the building remained, which proved to me that, with all their wonderful promptitude and gallantry, all firemen can do when flames have got firm hold on a building is to save the adjoining property. [Illustration: A FIRE YARN.] I listened to the different groups of people in the hotel. Some gave advice as to how the firemen should set about their work, or criticised. Others related the big fires they had witnessed, a few indulging in the recital of the exploits they performed thereat. There are a good many Gascons among the Americans. At four o'clock all danger was over, and we all retired. [Illustration: AS WE SAW IT.] * * * * * [Illustration: AS THE REPORTERS SAW IT.] I was longing to read the descriptions of the fire in this morning's papers. I have now read them and am not at all disappointed. On the contrary, they are beyond my most sanguine expectations. Wonderful; simply perfectly wonderful! I am now trying to persuade myself that I really saw all that the reporters saw, and that I really ran great danger last night. For, "at every turn," it appears, "the noble hotel seemed as if it must become the prey of the fierce element, and could only be saved by a miracle." Columns and columns of details most graphically given, sensational, blood-curdling. But all that is nothing. You should read about the panic, and the scenes of wild confusion in the Burnet House, when all the good folks, who had all dressed and were looking quietly at the fire from the windows, are described as a crowd of people in despair: women disheveled, in their night-dresses, running wild, and throwing themselves in the arms of men to seek protection, and all shrieking and panic-stricken. Such a scene of confusion and terror you can hardly imagine. Wonderful! [Illustration: THE FIREMAN.] [Illustration] CHAPTER XXXIV. A JOURNEY IF YOU LIKE--TERRIBLE ENCOUNTER WITH AN AMERICAN INTERVIEWER. _In the train to Brushville, March 11._