On the 12th of July, 1876, Congress passed a bill authorizing the President to appoint a Commission of three civilians to investigate the subject and make report upon it. Mr. Fox was one of the appointees, his colleagues being selected from other States. The Commission, in the exercise of its functions, visited every section of the country, embracing a distance of travel of over twenty-eight thousand miles. Sessions were held in all the principal cities, much testimony taken, and when its labors were completed a report of great value was prepared and presented, which went far towards a satisfactory settlement of the controversy. [From The History of the Philadelphia Police.] One of the most important occurrences during Mr. Fox’s term as Mayor was the abolition of the old Volunteer Fire Department. The ordinance for the erection of a Paid Fire department was passed December 29, 1870, after a series of hot debates. The old volunteers were a power in politics, but their acts of violence and incendiarism made it imperative in the opinion of a majority of citizens that they should be superseded. The passage of the ordinance caused a sensation because it was not believed that Councils would dare to abolish the volunteers. Feeling ran high. The firemen held meeting after meeting in their engine-houses. All attention was directed towards the Mayor. Would he sign the ordinance and make it a law? He had ten days in which to consider the bill. He was known to favor it; but day after day passed and he took no action. Meanwhile he was not asleep. He had perfected police arrangements whereby the whole force could be called out at once on the outbreak of any violence, and the excitement was so great that the rowdy element and the firemen were expected to sally forth at any moment. There were two or three isolated outrages, but no general riot. The ten days drew towards a close and the excitement became less intense every day. It was with this object in view that the Mayor delayed signing the ordinance. He waited until the last day before putting his signature to the bill. The volunteers had become in a degree reconciled to the measure, and some of them hoped to resume work with engine and hook-and-ladder under the new system. The old volunteer firemen now hold Mr. Fox in high esteem. At the great fire in Newhall, Borie & Co.’s sugar refinery, which stood at the corner of Race and Crown streets, the lives of a number of the volunteers were endangered through their own stubbornness, and only saved through determined action on the part of the Mayor. The engine-house of the refinery was a single story building facing on Crown street; over it was a projection five or six stories in height containing the hoisting apparatus and other machinery of great weight. HIS WATCHFUL CARE SAVES MANY LIVES.