We flung on our clothes and ran down the Grande Rue de Pera as fast as our legs could carry us, but, happily, our curiosity was not to be gratified on this occasion. By the time we reached the Galata Tower the fire had been pretty nearly extinguished; only two small houses were actually burned; the people were dispersing and the streets were flooded with water from the pumps, and cluttered up with furniture and bedding; men and women, shivering with fright and cold, were going about in their night-clothes, talking and lamenting in a dozen different languages, nothing being distinguishable through the noise and confusion but that shrill note of terror and excitement which marks the near escape from some great danger. Finding that we were too late to see anything, we walked off toward the bridge to console ourselves for our unrighteous disappointment by watching the sun rise, and before long we were rewarded by a sight which went far beyond any fire. The sky was just beginning to grow light beyond the Asiatic hills; Stambul, momentarily disturbed by the report of fire, had sunk back into the solemn stillness of night, and banks and bridges were alike deserted. The entire Golden Horn seemed buried in slumber beneath a covering of light fog. Not a boat moved, not a bird fluttered, not a tree rustled, not a breath of wind could be heard. That huge city, blue, hazy, silent, veiled, seemed to be an atmospheric effect--a sudden cry, a burst of sunlight,--and it would tremble and vanish. Never had it appeared so aërial, so mysterious, so entirely to correspond to the magic city of the Eastern fairy-tale which the traveller comes upon unexpectedly, and on entering finds every one turned to stone, just as they were in the midst of their gay, busy lives when the spell of a wicked genie fell upon them. As we leaned over the bridge, gazing on the scene before us, the fire completely forgotten, we heard all at once, from across the water, a faint, uncertain noise as of persons calling aloud for help; then, as it drew nearer, shrill cries of “Allah! Allah! Allah!” echoing throughout the great empty space around us, and in a moment we beheld a noisy, evil-looking throng pouring toward us across the bridge.