This was the first hotel in St. John. It was here that Governor-General Poulet Thompson and Lord Elgin stopped, and all the notables who from time to time visited the city. In 1840, Mr. Stockwell retired, and Messrs. W. & J. Scammell succeeded him in the management of the hotel. These enterprising gentlemen set to work at once to remodel the building, and they soon had it in splendid working order. The same energy which the present firm of Scammell Bros. throw into their business, was characteristic of the old firm of Scammell Bros. in 1840. In 1851, W. & J. Scammell left the St. John Hotel, and took up their quarters in the Waverley House, nearly opposite. The picture which accompanies this sketch of the old hotel represents the building as it appeared in 1837. It is taken from an old picture, and as but two or three copies were known to exist before the late fire, it is a question now if more then one copy was saved. The old St. John Hotel is full of associations, pleasurable in every case, to travellers who used to come to St. John thirty and forty years ago. Even in 1858, when Messrs. Whitney & Adams kept it, it was still a home for the stranger. There was a freedom about its old rooms, and a positive luxuriance which one looks for in vain in the hotels of our later days. About 1861-62, people used to sit in Ned Sharland's book-store, which was on the ground-flat, and sketch the Bell-tower, which was then certainly "a thing of beauty," even if Mr. Warner found it the reverse in 1874, when he climbed up to the triumphal arch and found it was made of wood, painted and sanded, instead of solid stone, as he thought it was. This bell-tower was erected in 1851, and the large bell which for years tolled out that fire was at hand, was made in 1852, and came from Meneely's, West Troy, New York. Before that day, men struck a gong from a scaffold whenever there was a fire. The tower was useful even in its latter days, if its beauty had departed three years ago. The cut which we supply will give the reader at a distance some idea of the old tower, as it appeared in its lusty young days. When the city comes to be built up again, the site of the late hotel must not be forgotten. It is eminently adapted for an hotel. It is centrally located, and has a frontage of 120 feet on King Street, by 100 feet on Charlotte Street. King Square did much to stay the onward march of the fire. It was a haven of rest for those weary ones who were flying from the flames, with the few things they had saved from the burning. It was the camping ground of the soldiery, and the hospital bed of the sick and wounded, who were borne to the fresh grass, and laid there until help was brought to them. The Square, the first few days of the fire, was filled with furniture, and books, and household utensils. It was in this square that half-famished women, that night, hugged their little ones to their hearts, and rocked them, hungry and