But long before we reached the end of our journey we were appalled by news of a dreadful nature. Chicago was in flames. At every stage the intelligence became more alarming. The flames were spreading, not from house to house, but from street to street; the entire city was on fire. And the Brigg's House and my father? God forgive me! So selfish are we in our troubles and in our joys, that I thought of no other house but the Brigg's House, of no other human being but my father. The news travelled so fast towards us, as we travelled towards the conflagration, that I soon learned that the street in which Brigg's House was situated had caught, and that every building in it was burnt to the ground. "Any lives lost?" "Thousands!" An exaggeration, as we afterwards found, but we did not stop to doubt; instead of lessening the extent of the calamity, our fears exaggerated it. O, how I prayed and prayed! It was a dreadful time, and it was almost a relief when the evidence of our own senses was enlisted in confirmation of the news. The skies in the distance were lurid red, and imagination added to the terror of the knowledge that families were being ruined, hopes destroyed, ambitions blasted, and hearts tortured in the flames reflected in the clouds. Our train stopped, and miles of fire lay within our sight. [Decoration] CHAPTER XXIX. FREDERICK HOLDFAST'S STATEMENT (CONCLUDED). Under these circumstances the obstacles before me became almost insurmountable. The residents of the burning city were in a state of the wildest confusion, and my anxious inquiries for my father were fruitless; I could obtain no news of him; not a person to whom I spoke, not even those connected with the hotel, could inform me whether a gentleman named Holdfast, or one answering to my description of him, had stopped at the Briggs' House. I was perplexed how to act, but an idea that it would be well for me to remain upon the spot, on the chance that I might yet learn something of my father, caused me to resolve not to leave Chicago for awhile. To this resolution I was pledged by my necessities. I was penniless, and to return immediately to New York was a matter of impossibility.