house." In the midst of it all the
gong strikes a familiar signal. The horses' hoofs thunder on the
planks; with a leap the men go down the shining pole to the main
floor, all else forgotten; and with crash and clatter and bang the
heavy engine swings into the street, and races away on a wild gallop,
leaving a trail of fire behind.

Presently the crowd sees rubber-coated, helmeted men with pipe and
hose go through a window from which such dense smoke pours forth that
it seems incredible that a human being could breathe it for a second
and live. The hose is dragged squirming over the sill, where shortly a
red-eyed face with dishevelled hair appears, to shout something
hoarsely to those below, which they understand. Then, unless some
emergency arise, the spectacular part is over. Could the citizen whose
heart beat as he watched them enter see them now, he would see grimy
shapes, very unlike the fine-looking men who but just now had roused
his admiration, crawling on hands and knees, with their noses close to
the floor if the smoke be very dense, ever pointing the "pipe" in the
direction where the enemy is expected to appear. The fire is the
enemy; but he can fight that, once he reaches it, with something of a
chance. The smoke kills without giving him a show to fight back. Long
practice toughens him against it, until he learns the trick of "eating
the smoke." He can breathe where a candle goes out for want of oxygen.
By holding his mouth close to the nozzle, he gets what little air the
stream of water brings with it and sets free; and within a few inches
of the floor there is nearly always a current of air. In the last
emergency, there is the hose that he can follow out. The smoke always
is his worst enemy. It lays ambushes for him which he can suspect, but
not ward off. He tries to, by opening vents in the roof as soon as the
pipemen are in place and ready; but in spite of all precautions, he is
often surprised by the dreaded back-draught.

I remember standing in front of a burning Broadway store, one night,
when the back-draught blew out the whole front without warning. It is
simply an explosion of gases generated by the heat, which must have
vent, and go upon the line of least resistance, up, or down, or in a
circle--it does not much matter, so that they go. It swept shutters,
windows, and all, across Broadway, in this instance, like so much
chaff, littering the street with heavy rolls of cloth. The crash was
like a