On the evening of Tuesday, the 10th of April 1878, as at the close of many a previous day, the hundreds of industrious workers in the Hope Park establishment welcomed the return of the hour of rest. The whirr of the busy machinery was stilled, and the buildings were left untenanted till the toilers with brain and hand should resume the work of a new day. The site to which the works had been transferred from the Castle Hill thirty-five years before was now crowded to its utmost limits with the warehouses, engine and work rooms of the prosperous firm. Everything seemed to give assurance of continuous success. Yet the workers were then leaving for the last time. Within a few hours the building was a pile of smoking ruins. The circumstances of this calamitous event were thus concisely narrated by William Nelson in response to a letter of sympathy: “In reference to the destruction of our printing and publishing works at Hope Park, never did fire do its work more speedily or more thoroughly. It broke out about three o’clock on the morning of Wednesday, the 10th inst., and in little more than an hour the whole building was in flames. I was aroused about a quarter past four, and I hurried as fast as I could to the scene; but I found when I arrived that the roof all round had fallen in, and that flames were bursting forth from all the windows in the very front of the building. The fire broke out somewhere in the back part of it; there was a strong east wind blowing at the time, and this fanned the flames and made them rush along the various flats as they successively caught fire with extraordinary rapidity. Not a book or sheet of printed paper was saved!” The calamity seemed to be overwhelming. The splendid results of intelligent industry and rare aptitude for business had vanished, like the gourd of Jonah, in a night. The insurance on the buildings was trifling compared with the amount of property destroyed. But his brother’s comment on being shown the above letter reveals a characteristic trait of William’s sympathetic and unselfish nature. “Willie’s letter about the fire recalls very distinctly that terrible morning. Poor fellow! it was most touching to see him come up to me before all the people and hold out his hand and say, ‘O Tom, I am so sorry for you.’ He did not speak or seem to think of himself at all.”