"'We've shot about 300 people for one thing or another,' he said. 'Now,
dodge trouble. Git!' That ended the expedition."

THE LOSS IN WEALTH.

If we pass now from the record of the loss of lives to that of the
destruction of wealth, the estimates exceed by far any fire losses
recorded in history.

The truth is that when flames eat out the heart of a great city, devour
its vast business establishments, storehouses and warehouses, sweep
through its centres of opulence, destroy its wharves with their
accumulation of goods, spread ruin and havoc everywhere, it is
impossible at first to estimate the loss. Only gradually, as time goes
on, is the true loss discovered, and never perhaps very accurately,
since the owners and the records of riches often disappear with the
wealth itself. In regard to San Francisco, the early estimate was that
three-fourths of the city, valued at $500,000,000, was destroyed.

But early estimates are apt to be exaggerated, and on Friday, two days
after the disaster, we find this estimate reduced to $250,000,000. A few
more days passed and these figures shrunk still further, though it was
still largely conjectural, the means of making a trustworthy estimate
being very restricted. Later on the pendulum swung upward again, and two
weeks after the fire the closest estimates that could be made fixed the
property loss at close to $350,000,000, or double that of the Chicago
fire. But as the actual loss in the latter case proved considerably
below the early estimates, the same may prove to be the case with San
Francisco.

Special personal losses were in many cases great. Thus the Palace Hotel
was built at a cost of $6,000,000, and the St. Francis, which originally
cost $4,000,000, was being enlarged at great expense. Several of the
great mansions on Nob's Hill cost a million or more, the City Hall was
built at a cost of $7,000,000, the new Post Office was injured to the
extent of half a million, while a large number of other buildings might
be named whose value, with their contents, was measured in the millions.

It was not until May 3d that news came over the wires of another serious
item of loss. The merchants had waited until then for their fire-proof
safes and vaults to cool off before attempting to open them. When this
was at length done the results proved disheartening. Out of 576 vaults
and safes opened in the district east of Powell and north of Market
Street, where the flames had rage