We will suppose the present call has come from a big City fire. The chief has to decide at once upon his mode of action. No two fires are exactly alike, and saving goods from the flames is something like warfare with savages--you never know what is likely to happen; so he has to take in the circumstances of the case at a glance, and shape his course accordingly. Should the occasion require a stronger force, he sends back a message by the coachman of the car; and in his evidence concerning the great Cripplegate fire, Major Charles J. Fox, the chief officer of the salvage corps, stated that he had seventy men at work at that memorable conflagration. But see, here is the fire! Streams of water are being poured on to the flames, and the policemen have hard work to keep back the excited crowd. They give way for the scarlet car, and the salvage men have arrived at the scene of action. Entrance may have to be forced to parts of the burning building, and doors and windows broken open for this purpose. Crash! crash! The axes are at work. And a minute more the men step within amid the smoke. The firemen may be at work on another floor, and the water to quench the fire may be pouring downstairs in a stream. The noises are often extraordinary. There is not only the rush and roar of the flames, the splashing and gurgling of the water, but the falling of goods, furniture, and may be even parts of the structure itself. Walls, girders, ceilings may fall, ruins clatter about your ears, clouds of smoke suffocate you, tongues of flame scorch your face; but if you are a salvage man, in and out of the building you go, while with your brave brethren of the corps you spread out the strong rubber tarpaulins you have brought with you in your trap, and cover up such goods as you find, to preserve them from damage. Under these stout coverlets, heaps of commodities may lie quite safe from injury from water and smoke. Overhead you still hear terrible noises. Safes and tanks tumble and clatter with dreadful din; part of the structure itself, or some heavy piece of furniture, falls to the ground; dense volumes of water poured into the windows rain through on to your devoted head. But you stick to your post, preserving such goods as you can in the manner that the chief may direct. May be you have to assist in conveying goods out of reach of the hungry fire, and your training has taught you how to handle efficiently certain classes of goods. Sometimes quantities of water collect in the basement, doing much damage; and down there, splash, splash, you go, to open drains, or find some means of setting the water free. On occasion, the men of the salvage corps find themselves in desperate straits. At the Cripplegate fire, one of the corps discovered the staircase in flames, and his retreat quite cut off. With praiseworthy promptitude, he knotted some ladies' mantles together into a rope, and by this means escaped from a second-story window to the road below.