exclaiming--"Hold on, sir!" He thought the staircase was about to fall. "Bolt now, sir," he added, releasing me. I bolted, and was out in the street in a moment, where I found that some of the firemen who had first arrived, and were much exhausted, were being served with a glass of brandy. If there were any case in which a teetotaller might be justified in taking spirits, it would be, I think, when exhausted by toiling for hours amid the heat and smoke and danger of a fire-- nevertheless I found that several of the firemen there were teetotallers. There was a shout of laughter at this moment, occasioned by one of the firemen having accidentally turned the _branch_ or delivery pipe full on the faces of the crowd and drenched some of them. This was followed by a loud cheer when another fireman was seen to have clambered to the roof whence he could apply the water with better effect. At last their efforts were crowned with success. Before midnight the fire was extinguished, and we drove back to the Paddington Station at a more leisurely pace. Thus ended my first experience of a London fire. Accidents, as may be easily believed, are of frequent occurrence. Accidents. There were between forty to fifty a year. In 1865 they were as follows:-- +=========================+==+ |Cuts and Lacerated Wounds|12| +-------------------------+--+ |Contusions |15| +-------------------------+--+ |Fractures | 2| +-------------------------+--+ |Sprains | 9| +-------------------------+--+ |Burns and Scalds | 3| +-------------------------+--+ |Injury to Eyes | 5| +-------------------------+--+ | |46| +=========================+==+ My friend Flaxmore himself met with an accident not long afterwards. He slipped off the roof of a house and fell on his back from a height of about fifteen feet. Being a heavy man, the fall told severely on him.