"Dear me! you amaze me, fireman; I had supposed there were not so many fires in London in a year." "A year!" exclaimed Joe. "Why, there's nearly three fires, on the average, every twinty-four hours in London, an' that's about a thousand fires in the year, ma'am." "Are you sure of what you say, fireman?" "Quite sure, ma'am; ye can ax Mr Braidwood if ye don't b'lieve me." Mrs Denman, still in a state of blank amazement, said that she did not doubt him, and bade him go on. "Well, then," resumed Joe, "look well arter yer matches, an' niver read in bed; that's the way hundreds o' houses get a light. When you light a candle with a bit o' paper, ma'am, don't throw it on the floor an' tramp on it an' think it's out, for many a time there's a small spark left, an' the wind as always blows along the floor sets it up an' it kitches somethin', and there you are--blazes an' hollerin' an' ingins goin' full swing in no time. Then, ma'am, never go for to blow out yer gas, an' if there's an escape don't rest till ye get a gasfitter and find it out. But more particularly don't try to find it yerself with a candle. Och! if ye'd only seen the blows up as I've seen from gas, ye'd look better arter it. Not more nor two weeks gone by, ma'am, we was called to attend a fire which was caused by an escape o' gas. W'en we got there the fire was out, but sitch a mess you niver did see. It was a house, ma'am, in the West End, with the most illigant painted walls and cornices and gimcracks, idged all with goold. The family had just got into it--noo done up for 'em, only, by good luck, there wasn't much o' the furnitur' in. They had smelled a horrid smell o' gas for a good while, but couldn't find it. At last the missis, she goes with a workman an a _candle_ to look for it, an' sure enough they found it in a bathroom. It had been escapin' in a small closet at the end o' the bath, and not bein' able to git out, for the door was a tight fit, it had gone away an' filled all the space between the ceilin's an' floors, an' between the lath, and plaster, and the walls. The moment the door in the bath-room was opened all this gas took light an' blowed up like gunpowder. The whole inner skin o' the beautiful drawing-room, ma'am, was blowed into the middle of the room. The cook, who was in the drawin'-room passage, she was blow'd down stairs; the workman as opened the little door, he was blow'd flat on his back; an' the missis, as was standin' with her back to a door, she was lifted off her legs and blow'd right through the doorway into a bedroom." "Gracious!" exclaimed the horrified Mrs Denman, "was she killed?" "No, ma'am, she warn't killed. Be good luck they was only stunned an' dreadful skeared, but no bones was broken." Mrs Denman found relief in a sigh.