The crowd was quickly and largely augmented by the anxious throng of sight-seers, and to keep them within the proper limits required the efforts of nearly the entire reserved police force of the city. The Police Commissioners and Superintendent Campbell, and Inspector Waddy; the Chief of the Fire Department, Thomas F. Nevins, and Fire Marshal Keady, had been telegraphed for and came promptly to the scene of the conflagration, and did everything in their power to provide for the sufferers, for many had been brought out bruised and burned. The firemen had not fairly begun their labors before it became evident that it was impossible to save the theatre or any part of it; the entire attention of the force was therefore directed to the surrounding buildings, which meanwhile were seriously threatened. Several small buildings on the opposite side of Flood's alley were partially destroyed, and at one time the First Precinct Station-House was in imminent danger. The fire was, however, confined to the theatre by the united exertions of the entire fire department. The interior decorations of the theatre were of such light and inflammable material that the fire was quite beyond their control, so far as the theatre was concerned, and the roof being equally light and inflammable, it required constant exertion to keep the fire from spreading. [Illustration: CLAUDE BURROUGHS. H. S. MURDOCH.] At about three o'clock in the morning the fire had been nearly extinguished, and the major part of the throng of sight-seers had gone to their homes, ignorant of the fatal consequences of the conflagration. The flames had subsided sufficiently to permit the firemen to make an investigation near the main entrance of the theatre. Chief Nevins passed over the trembling floor of the hallway toward the inner doorway. Inside the doors the flooring had fallen in, leaving a deep pit of fire and flame, from which a dense smoke and steam ascended. Here a sickening spectacle met his horrified gaze. Close up to the flaming furnace, and clinging to the splintered verge of the demolished flooring, was the body of a woman. Her hands clasped the frame-work of the door in a desperate grasp. She had fought hard for life. Evidently she would have escaped had not the flooring given way beneath her. All the clothing was burnt off, and the features were so blackened that she was unrecognizable, and the body was removed to the Morgue.