"Let us seek the roof. Have you any rope at hand?" "Yes," returned Mr. Newton. Silently and rapidly they flew rather than ran up the stairs, Newton leading the way to where a quantity of stout hempen rope, of a quarter of an inch diameter, was lying in a corner of a room devoted to empty packages and waste. The surveyor's experienced eye measured the extent and capacity of this medium of escape with considerable accuracy, and saw that it would suffice for the purpose of liberating them, if they had the discretion to wisely use the means at their disposal. Scarcely a word was exchanged between the two men. In almost total silence Mr. Phillimore drew out the first piece of rope and fastened it adroitly round the waist and under the arms of the proprietor of the establishment, and then fastened another length of the cord to the one which encircled his terrified companion. The third end was joined in the same manner. "That will, I think, serve our purpose," were the first words uttered, and these were spoken by the surveyor. Mr. Newton may be excused for the selfishness which allowed him to avail himself of this means of escape, without much thought about his saviour. Few men under the like circumstances would have acted otherwise than he did. It is only in such cases as a ship on fire at sea that heroism, which is ordinarily slow in its manifestations, rises to the height of that generosity which seeks the preservation of another rather than oneself. Trade does not, perhaps, tend to bring out the finest qualities of our nature. Domestic affections are the most rapid in generating a spirit of self-denial or self-sacrifice. Brother may yield the boon or privilege of life to his brother, the husband to his wife, or the mother to her child; but strangers, or casual acquaintances, are not given to the manifestation of those sublime virtues, self-abnegation and self-sacrifice. Perhaps, however, Mr. Phillimore might not have parted with the first chance of extrication from the now rapidly consuming flames, if he had not been enabled, by professional sagacity and long training, to ascertain that his own best means of self-preservation really lie through the preservation, in the first instance, of his companion. He had a better chance of extrication when Mr. Newton had reached the cool earth below, than while he remained in the upper story dreading every moment that most horrible of all fates--death by fire. When the one man most liable to panic had been removed from peril, the other would have entire command, as he saw, of such agencies as were then within the equal control of both. Mr. Phillimore converted one of the sashes into a sort of windlass, or made it at least serve the purpose of a pulley, and by a process that requires no description he lowered the frightened man to within a yard or two of the ground, the rope being not quite long enough to permit of his feet touching.