And still from the lower quarters of Galata, from the arsenals of Tersane and Topkhâneh, from barrack, mosque, and imperial palace, there swarmed fresh battalions of _nizam_, crews of robbers, bands of firemen, shouting “_Yanghen Vahr_” or “_Allah_,” advancing as to an attack, scaling the hills under the steady rain of sparks and cinders and burning brands, and through streets filled with smouldering débris, and with them generals, dervishes, messengers from the court, families who had turned back to search for missing members, blackguards and heroes, misery, crime, and charity,--all mingled together in a confused, inextricable torrent which swept through the narrow streets with a roar like that of the ocean in a storm, its surface lighted up with the crimson glare of that mighty furnace. And just across from this region of torment lay Stambul, peaceful, smiling, and serene as ever, while on the other side the tranquil beauties of the Asiatic shore were mirrored in the waters of the Bosphorus, on whose unmoved bosom the ships rode peacefully at anchor. Enormous crowds of people, blackening the banks for miles, stood silent and impassive witnesses of the horrible sight; the sing-song voice of the muezzin was heard as usual announcing from every minaret the setting of the sun; flocks of birds soared lazily above the mosques on the Seven Hills; and venerable Turks, seated in the shade of plane trees on the verdant heights of Skutari, murmured placidly to themselves, “And so the final hour of the City of the Sultans has sounded? That day which was foretold has come: let Allah’s will be done.--So be it, so be it!” Happily, with nightfall came the beginning of the end. At seven o’clock the last building took fire--the English embassy--and just after that, the wind suddenly dying down, the fire was either extinguished or went out of its own accord. It had been burning six hours, and in that time two-thirds of Pera were reduced to ashes, nine thousand houses destroyed, and two thousand lives lost. Next to the famous fire of 1756, which demolished, in the reign of Osman III. eighty thousand houses and wiped out two-thirds of Stambul, no such disaster as this has ever visited the city, nor from the time Constantinople was conquered up to the present day has any one fire been the cause of so much loss of life.