“FromToJames Smith,S. R. Brown,London,Exchange,Liverpool.“I will meet you at Birmingham to-morrow, 3P.M.Don’t fail me.”
“FromToJames Smith,S. R. Brown,London,Exchange,Liverpool.
“I will meet you at Birmingham to-morrow, 3P.M.Don’t fail me.”
Now, the London charge for the above, if forwarded to Liverpool, would be 2s. 6d.; but the American tariff for the same, on the Louisville and Pittsburgh rail, would be only one cent a word, or sixpence halfpenny English. On very long distances our friends on the other side of the steam ferry have a still greater advantage over us: for instance, a message of ten words can be sent on O’Reilly’s line, from New York to New Orleans, a distance of 2,000 miles, for sixty cents, or two and sixpence—not half the sum it would cost to send the same message from London to Edinburgh, about 500 miles. We give, as a curiosity, the scale of prices on this line:[40]—
These charges, it is true, are unusually low; but if they will pay one Company, why should they not another? There are as many as twenty Telegraph Companies in America, and consequently there is great competition, three or four competing lines in many cases running between the same towns. Great confusion has arisen from this competition, as we have before stated; but it cannot be doubted that prices have materially fallen in consequence. It is common to send a message 1,000 miles in the United States without its being read and repeatedat intermediate stations; and brother Jonathan boasts that he can communicate in fine weather instantaneously between New York and New Orleans. This, if done at all, must be at the expense of enormous battery power, as 2,000 miles of No. 8 wire would expose a conducting surface of no less than 450,000 square feet to the air. The wires in America are all suspended upon poles, and those passing through the southern pine forests are in consequence particularly liable to injury from the falling of trees, and watchers are posted at every twenty miles’ distance to patrol the line. The telegraph is rarely seen in America running beside the railway, for what reason we do not know; the consequence, however, is, that locomotion in the United States is vastly more dangerous than with us. A comparison of the casualties occurring on railroads in the two countries, in the year 1852, will show this at a glance; for in the State of New York alone, during that year, 228 persons were killed out of 7,440,053 travellers, whilst during the same period only 216 people perished in Great Britain out of a total number of 89,135,729 passengers: thus the average in America was 1 killed in 286,179, and in Great Britain 1 in 2,785,491! Of course property suffers in an equal degree with life on the American lines. The people of Boston, on the recommendation of Dr. Channing, have constructed a municipal telegraph, the many uses of which will be obvious. Mr. Alexander Jones, in his historical sketch of the electric telegraph in America, gives the following account of the application of the electric wire in cases of fire:—
“A central office or station is fixed upon, at which the main battery, with other instruments, is placed. From this two circuit-wires proceed, like those of the common telegraph wires, fastened to housetops or ingeniously insulated supports. One of the wires communicates from the main fire bell-tower to all the others, and connects each with machinery, which puts in motion the largest-sized hammer, and causes it to strike a large fire-bell the desired number of blows; the other wire proceeds on a still more circuitous route, and from one local street or ward signal-station to another. Each station is provided with a strong box and hinged door and lock. Inside of this box there is a connecting electro-magnet and connecting lever, an axle with a number of pins in it to correspond to the number of the station. The axle is turned by a short crank, and in its revolutions the pins break and close the circuit, by moving the end of the lever as often as there are pins or cogs, the result of which is communicatedto the central station. If the alarm indicates a fire in the local district No. 3, the alarm can be instantly rung on all the bells in the city. If it is a subject requiring the speedy and efficient attention of the police, information by alarms can be given at each police-station, or the despatches can be recorded by instruments at each place. The local street alarm-boxes are placed in the charge of a person whose duty it is to give the alarm from the local to the central station, when called upon, or circumstances require him to do so.”
“A central office or station is fixed upon, at which the main battery, with other instruments, is placed. From this two circuit-wires proceed, like those of the common telegraph wires, fastened to housetops or ingeniously insulated supports. One of the wires communicates from the main fire bell-tower to all the others, and connects each with machinery, which puts in motion the largest-sized hammer, and causes it to strike a large fire-bell the desired number of blows; the other wire proceeds on a still more circuitous route, and from one local street or ward signal-station to another. Each station is provided with a strong box and hinged door and lock. Inside of this box there is a connecting electro-magnet and connecting lever, an axle with a number of pins in it to correspond to the number of the station. The axle is turned by a short crank, and in its revolutions the pins break and close the circuit, by moving the end of the lever as often as there are pins or cogs, the result of which is communicatedto the central station. If the alarm indicates a fire in the local district No. 3, the alarm can be instantly rung on all the bells in the city. If it is a subject requiring the speedy and efficient attention of the police, information by alarms can be given at each police-station, or the despatches can be recorded by instruments at each place. The local street alarm-boxes are placed in the charge of a person whose duty it is to give the alarm from the local to the central station, when called upon, or circumstances require him to do so.”
Canada has also sketched out a plan of telegraphs, which every year will see filled up. Already she has lines connecting all her principal towns, and extending over nearly two thousand miles of country, all of which lock in with the American system.
In India, Dr. O’Shaughnessy has for some time been engaged in carrying out a telegraphic system proposed by Lord Dalhousie, and approved by the East India Company, which has already put all the important towns of the peninsula in communication with the seat of government and with each other. The fine No. 8 galvanized iron wire, which in Europe runs along from pole to pole, like a delicate harp-string, is discarded in this country for rods of iron three-eighths of an inch in thickness. The nature of the climate, and the character of its animal life, has caused this departure from the far more economical European plan. Clouds of kites and troops of monkeys would speedily take such liberties with the fine wires as to place themhors-de-combat. Again, the deluges of rain which occur in the wet season would render the insulation of a small wire so imperfect that a message could not be sent through it to any distance. The larger mass of metal, on the contrary, is capable of affording passage for the electric fluid through any amount of rain, without danger of “leakage;” and as for the kites and other large birds of the country, they may perch on these rods by thousands without stopping the messages, which will fly harmlessly through their claws; and the weight of the heaviest monkey is not sufficient to injure them. These rods are planted, without any insulation, upon the tops of bamboo poles (coated with tar and pitch), at such a height that loaded elephants can pass beneath without displacing them; and even if by chance they should be thrown down, bullock-carts or buffaloes and elephants may trample them under foot without doing them injury. Insome places the rods, if we are rightly informed, run through rice-swamps, buried in the ground, and even here the only insulating material used is a kind of cement made of rosin and sand. The telegraph, like a swift messenger, goes forward and prepares the way for the railroad, which is planned to follow in its footsteps. When these two systems are completed, the real consolidation of England’s power in the East will have commenced, and the countless resources of the Indian peninsula will be called forth for the benefit of the conquered as well as of the conquering race.
The restless spirit of English engineers, having provided for the internal telegraphic communication of Great Britain and her principal dependencies, seems bent upon stretching out her lines to the East and to the West, so as ultimately to clasp the entire globe. The project of connecting, telegraphically, England with America is at the present moment seriously engaging the attention of scientific and commercial men. The more daring engineers are still sanguine of the practicability of laying a submarine cable directly across the Atlantic, from Galway to Cape Race in Newfoundland. Now that we have Lieutenant Maury’s authentic determination of the existence of a shelf across the North Atlantic, the soundings on which are nowhere more than 1,500 fathoms, the feasibility of the project is tolerably certain. The principal question is, whether if a line were laid an electric current can be worked to commercial advantage through 3,000 miles of cable. No doubt, by the expenditure of enormous battery power, this might be accomplished through wires suspended in the air, but it is a question whether it can be done along a vast length of gutta-percha coated wire, passing through salt-water. There is such a thing astoo great an insulation. Professor Faraday has shown that in such circumstances the wire becomes a Leyden jar, and may be so charged with electricity that a current cannot, without the greatest difficulty, move through it. This is the objection to a direct cable between the two continents: if, however, it can be overcome, doubtless the ocean path would in all possible cases be adopted wherecommunications had to be made between civilized countries having intermediate, barbarous, or ungenial lands. To escape this at present dubious ocean path, it is proposed to carry the cable from the northernmost point of the Highlands of Scotland to Iceland, by way of the Orkney, Shetland, and Ferroe islands—to lay it from Iceland across to the nearest point in Greenland, thence down the coast to Cape Farewell, where the cable would again take to the water, span Davis’s Straits, and make right away across Labrador and Upper Canada to Quebec. Here it would lock in with the North American meshwork of wires, which hold themselves out like an open hand for the European grasp. This plan seems quite feasible, for in no part of the journey would the cable require to be more than 900 miles long; and as it seems pretty certain that a sandbank ex-tends, with good soundings, all the way to Cape Farewell, there would be little difficulty in mooring the cable to a level and soft bottom. The only obstacle that we see is the strong partiality of the Esquimaux for old iron, and it would perhaps be tempting them too much to hang their coasts with this material, just ready to their hands. The want of settlements along this inhospitable arctic coast to protect the wire is, we confess, a great drawback to the scheme; but, we fancy, posts might be organized at comparatively a small cost, considering the magnitude and importance of the undertaking. The mere expense of making and laying the cable would not be much more than double that of building the new Westminster-bridge across the Thames.
Whilst England would thus grasp the West with one hand, her active children have plotted the seizure of the East with the other. A cable runs from Genoa to Corsica, and from thence to Sardinia. From the southernmost point of the latter island, Cape Spartivento, to the gulf of Tunis, another cable can easily be carried. The direction thence (after giving off a coast branch to Algeria) will be along the African shore, by Tripoli to Alexandria, and eventually across Arabia, along the coasts of Persia and Beloochistan until it enters Scinde, and finally joins the wire at Hydrabad, which in allprobability by that time will have advanced from Burmah, across the Indian peninsula, to welcome it. America will shortly carry her line of telegraph to the Pacific shore, and run it up the coast as far as San Francisco. Can there be any reasonable doubt that, before the end of the century, the one line advancing towards the West and the other towards the East—through China and Siberia—will gradually approach each other so closely that a short cable stretched across Behring Straits will bring the four quarters of the globe within speaking distance of each other, and enable the electric fire to “put a girdle round the world in forty minutes?”
Among the more salient features of the metropolis which instantly strike the attention of the stranger are the stations of the Fire Brigade. Whenever he happens to pass them, he finds the sentinel on duty, he sees the “red artillery” of the force; and the polished axle, the gleaming branch, and the shining chain, testify to the beautiful condition of the instrument, ready for active service at a moment’s notice. Ensconced in the shadow of the station, the liveried watchmen look like hunters waiting for their prey—nor does the hunter move quicker to his quarry at the rustle of a leaf, than the Firemen dash for the first ruddy glow in the sky. No sooner comes the alarm, than one sees with a shudder the rush of one of these engines through the crowded streets, the tearing horses covered with foam, the heavy vehicle swerving from side to side, and the black helmeted attendants swaying to and fro. The wonder is that horses or men ever get safely to their destination: the wonder is still greater that no one is ridden over in their furious drive.
Arrived at the place of action, the hunter’s spirit which animates the fireman, and makes him attack an element as determinedly as he would a wild beast, becomes evident to the spectator. The scene which a London fire presents can never be forgotten: the shouts of the crowd as it opens to let the engines dart through it, the foaming head of water springing out of the ground, and spreading over the road until it becomes a broad mirror reflecting the glowing blaze—the black, snake-like coils of the leather hose rising and falling like things oflife, whilst a hundred arms work at the pump, their central heart, the applause that rings out clear above the roaring flame as the adventurous band throw the first hissing jet; cheer following cheer, as stream after stream shoots against the burning mass, now flying into the socket-holes of fire, set in the black face of the house-front, now dashing with a loud shir-r against the window-frame and wall, and falling off in broken showers. Suddenly there is a loud shrill cry, and the bank of human faces is upturned to where a shrieking wretch hangs frantically to an upper window-sill. A deafening shout goes forth, as the huge fire-escape comes full swing upon the scene: a moment’s pause, and all is still, save the beat, beat, of the great water pulses, whilst every eye is strained towards the fluttering garments flapping against the wall. Will the ladder reach, and not dislodge those weary hands clutching so convulsively to the hot stone! Will the nimble figure gain the topmost rung ere nature fails? The blood in a thousand hearts runs cold, and then again break forth a thousand cheers to celebrate a daring rescue. Such scenes as this are of almost nightly occurrence in the great metropolis. A still more imposing yet dreadful sight is often exhibited in the conflagrations of those vast piles of buildings in the City filled with inflammable merchandise. Here the most powerful engines seem reduced to mere squirts; and the efforts of the adventurous brigade men are confined to keeping the mischief within its own bounds.
When we recollect that London presents an area of thirty-six square miles, covered with 21,600 square acres of bricks and mortar, and numbers more than 380,600 houses; that all the riches it contains are nightly threatened in every direction by an ever-present enemy; that the secret match, the spontaneous fire, and the hand of the drunkard, are busily at work; it is evident that nothing but a force the most disciplined, and implements the most effective, can be competent to cope with so sudden and persevering a foe.
As late as twenty-two years ago there was no proper fire police to protect the metropolis against what is commonlycalled the “all-devouring element.” There was, it is true, a force of 300 parochial engines set on foot by acts which were passed between the years 1768-74, acts which are still in existence; but these engines are under the superintendence of the beadles and parish engineers, who are not the most active of men or nimble of risers. It may easily be imagined, therefore, that the machines arrived a little too late; and, when brought into service, were often found to be out of working order. Hence their employment did not supersede the private engines kept by some of the insurance offices long prior to their existence. On the contrary, owing to the increase of business which took place about this time, the different companies thought it worth their while to strengthen their former establishments, and this process continued while the parochial engines, with a few honourable exceptions, were dropping into disuse.
About the year 1833 it became evident that much was lost, both to the public and to the insurance companies, by every engine acting on its own responsibility—a folly which is the cause of such jealousy among the firemen at Boston (United States), that rival engines have been known to stop on their way to a fire to exchange shots from revolvers. It was, therefore, determined to incorporate the divided force, and place it under the management of one superintendent, each office contributing towards its support, according to the amount of its business. All the old-established companies, with one exception,[41]shortly came into the arrangement, and Mr. Braidwood, the master of the fire-engines of Edinburgh, being invited to take the command, organized the now celebratedLondon Fire Brigade.
At the present moment, then, the protection against fire in London consists, firstly, in the three hundred and odd parish-engines (two to each parish), which are paid for out of the rates. The majority of these are very inefficient, not havingany persons appointed to work them who possess a competent knowledge of the service. Even women used now and then to fill the arduous post of director; and it is not long since a certain Mrs. Smith, a widow, might be seen at conflagrations, hurrying about in her pattens, directing the firemen of her engine, which belonged to the united parishes of St. Michael Royal and St. Martin Vintry, in the city. We question, indeed, if at the present moment any of the parish-engines are much better officered than in the days of widow Smith, with the exception of those of Hackney, Whitechapel, Islington, and perhaps two or three others. Secondly, there are an unknown number of private engines kept in public buildings and large manufactories, which sometimes do good service when they arrive early at small fires in their neighbourhood, although, singularly enough, when called upon to extinguish a conflagration in their own establishments, they generally “lose their heads,” as the brigade men express it; and very many instances have occurred where even the parish-engines have arrived and set to work before the one on the premises could be brought to bear upon the fire. The cause is clear. The requisite coolness and method which every one can exercise so philosophically in other people’s misfortunes utterly fail them when in trouble themselves. The doctor is wiser in his generation, and is never so foolish as to prescribe for himself or to attend his own family.
Thirdly, we have, in contrast to the immense rabble of Bumble engines and the Bashi-Bazouks of private establishments, the small complement of men and material of the fire brigade. It consists of twenty-seven large horse-engines, capable of throwing eighty-eight gallons a minute to the height of from fifty to seventy feet, and nine smaller ones drawn by hand. To work them there are twelve engineers, seven sub-engineers, thirty-two senior firemen, thirty-nine junior firemen, and fourteen drivers, or 104 men and 31 horses. In addition to these persons, who form the main establishment, and live at the different stations, there is an extra staff of four firemen, four drivers, and eight horses. The members of this supplementaryforce are also lodged at the stations,[42]as well as clothed, but are only paid when their services are required, and pursue in the daytime their ordinary occupations. This not very formidable army of 104 men and 31 horses, with its reserve of eight men and eight horses, is distributed throughout the metropolis, which is divided into four districts as follows:—On the north side of the river—1st, From the eastward to Paul’s Chain, St. Paul’s Churchyard, Aldersgate Street, and Goswell Street Road; 2nd, From St. Paul’s, &c., to Tottenham Court Road, Crown Street, and St. Martin’s Lane; 3rd, From Tottenham Court Road, &c., westward; 4th, The entire south side of the river. At the head of each district is a foreman, who never leaves it unless acting under the superior orders of Mr. Braidwood, the superintendent or general-in-chief, whose head-quarters are in Watling Street.
In comparison with the great continental cities, such a force seems truly insignificant. Paris, which does not cover a fifth part of the ground of London, and is not much more than a third as populous, boasts 800sapeurs-pompiers: we make up, however, for want of numbers by activity. Again, our look-out is admirable: the 6,000 police of the metropolis, patrolling every alley and lane throughout its length and breadth, watch for a fire as terriers watch at rat-holes, and every man is stimulated by the knowledge, that if he is the first to give notice ofit at any of the stations it is half a sovereign in his pocket. In addition to the police, there are the thousand eager eyes of the night cabmen, and the houseless poor. It is not at all uncommon for a cabman to earn four or five shillings of a night by driving fast to the different stations and giving the alarm, receiving a shilling from each for the “call.”
In most continental cities a watchman takes his stand during the night on the topmost point of some high building, and gives notice by either blowing a horn, firing a gun, or ringing a bell. In Germany the quarter is indicated by holding out towards it a flag by day, and a lantern at night. It immediately suggests itself that a sentinel placed in the upper gallery of St. Paul’s would have under his eye the whole metropolis, and could make known instantly, by means of an electric wire, the position of a fire, to the head-station at Watling Street, in the same manner as the Americans do in Boston. This plan is, however, open to the objection, that London is intersected by a sinuous river, which renders it difficult to tell on which bank the conflagration is raging. Nevertheless, we imagine that the northern part of the town could be advantageously superintended from such a height, whilst the southern half might rest under the surveillance of one of the tall shot-towers on that bank of the Thames. The bridges themselves have long been posts of observation, from which a large portion of the river-side property is watched. Not long ago there was a pieman on London Bridge, who eked out a precarious existence by keeping a good look-out up and down the stream.
Watling Street was chosen as the head-quarters of the Fire Brigade for a double reason: it is very nearly the centre of the City, being close to the far-famed London Stone, and it is in the very midst of what may be termed, speaking igneously, the most dangerous part of the metropolis—the Manchester warehouses. As the Fire Brigade is only a portion of a vast commercial operation—Fire Insurance—its actions are regulated by strictly commercial considerations. Where the largest amount ofinsuredproperty lies, there its chief force is planted. It will, it is true, go any reasonable distance to put out a fire; but of course it pays most attention to property which its proprietors haveguaranteed. The central station receives the greatest number of “calls;” but as a commander-in-chief does not turn out for a skirmish of outposts, so Mr. Braidwood keeps himself ready for affairs of a more serious nature. When the summons is at night—there are sometimes as many as half a dozen—the fireman on duty below apprises the superintendent by means of a gutta percha speaking-tube, which comes up to his bedside. By the light of the ever-burning gas, he rapidly consults the “London Directory,” and if the call should be to what is called “a greengrocer’s street,” or any of the small thoroughfares in by-parts of the town, he leaves the matter to the foreman in whose district it is, and goes to sleep again. If, however, the fire should be in the City, or in any of the great west-end thoroughfares, he hurries off on the first engine. Five minutes is considered a fair time for an engine “to horse and away,” but it is often done in three. Celerity in bringing up aid is the great essential, as the first half hour generally determines the extent to which a conflagration will proceed. Hence the rewards of thirty shillings for the first, twenty for the second, and ten for the third engine that arrives, which premiums are paid by the parish. All the engines travel with as few hands as possible: the larger ones having an engineer, four firemen and a driver, and the following furniture:—
“Several lengths of scaling-ladder, each 6½ feet long, all of which may be readily connected, forming in a short space of time a ladder of any required length; a canvas sheet, with ten or twelve handles of rope round the edge of it for the purpose of a fire-escape; one 10-fathom and one 14-fathom piece of 2½-inch rope; six lengths of hose, each 40 feet long; two branch-pipes, one 2½ feet, and the other from 4 to 6 feet long, with one spare nose-pipe; two 6-feet lengths of suction-pipe, a flat rose, stand-cock, goose-neck, dam-board, boat-hook, saw, shovel, mattock, pole-axe, screw-wrench, crow-bar, portable cistern, two dog-tails, two balls of strips of sheepskin, two balls of small cord, instruments for opening the fire-plugs, and keys for turning the stop-cocks of the water-mains.”
“Several lengths of scaling-ladder, each 6½ feet long, all of which may be readily connected, forming in a short space of time a ladder of any required length; a canvas sheet, with ten or twelve handles of rope round the edge of it for the purpose of a fire-escape; one 10-fathom and one 14-fathom piece of 2½-inch rope; six lengths of hose, each 40 feet long; two branch-pipes, one 2½ feet, and the other from 4 to 6 feet long, with one spare nose-pipe; two 6-feet lengths of suction-pipe, a flat rose, stand-cock, goose-neck, dam-board, boat-hook, saw, shovel, mattock, pole-axe, screw-wrench, crow-bar, portable cistern, two dog-tails, two balls of strips of sheepskin, two balls of small cord, instruments for opening the fire-plugs, and keys for turning the stop-cocks of the water-mains.”
The weight of the whole, with the men, is not less than from 27 to 30 cwt., a load which in the excitement of the ride is carried by a couple of horses at the gallop.
The hands to work the pumps are always forthcoming on the spot at any hour of the night, not alone for goodwill, as every man—and there have been as many as five hundred employedat a time—receives one shilling for the first hour and sixpence for every succeeding one, together with refreshments. In France the law empowers the firemen to seize upon the bystanders, and compel them to give their services, without fee or reward. An Englishman at Bordeaux, whilst looking on, some few years since, was forced, in spite of his remonstrances, to roll wine-casks for seven hours out of the vicinity of a conflagration. We need not say which plan answers best. A Frenchman runs away, as soon as thesapeurs-pompiersmake their appearance upon the scene, to avoid being impressed. Still such is the excitement, that there are some gentlemen with us who pursue the occupation of firemen as amateurs; providing themselves with the regulation-dress of dark-green turned up with red, and with the accoutrements of the Brigade, and working, under the orders of Mr. Braidwood, as energetically as if they were earning their daily bread.
The fascination of fires even extends to the brute creation. Who has not heard of the dog “Chance,” who first formed his acquaintance with the Brigade by following a fireman from a conflagration in Shoreditch to the central station at Watling Street? Here, after he had been petted for some little time by the men, his master came for him, and took him home; but he escaped on the first opportunity, and returned to the station. After he had been carried back for the third time, his master—like a mother whose sonwillgo to sea—allowed him to have his own way, and for years he invariably accompanied the engine, now upon the machine, now under the horses’ legs, and always, when going up-hill, running in advance, and announcing the welcome advent of the extinguisher by his bark. At the fire he used to amuse himself with pulling burning logs of wood out of the flames with his mouth. Although he had his legs broken half a dozen times, he remained faithful to his pursuit; till at last, having received a severer hurt than usual, he was being nursed by the fireman beside the hearth, when a “call” came, and at the well-known sound of the engine turning out, the poor brute made a last effort to climb upon it, and fell back dead in the attempt. He was stuffed and preserved at the station, and was doomed, even in death, to prove the fireman’sfriend: for one of the engineers having committed suicide, the Brigade determined to raffle him for the benefit of the widow,and such was his renown, that he realized123l.10s.9d.
The most interesting and practical part of our subject is the inquiry into the various causes of fires. Mr. Braidwood comes here to our aid with his invaluable yearly reports—the only materials we have, in fact, on which fire insurance can be built up into a science, a feat which we have not accomplished to nearly the same extent as with life assurance, although the Hand-in-Hand office was founded so far back as 1696. Thus we have the experience of upwards of 150 years, if we could only get at it, to enable the actuary to ascertain the doctrine of chances in this momentous subject, which at present is little better than a speculation. An analysis of the reports, from the organization of the Fire Brigade in 1833 to the close of 1853, a period extending over 21 years, affords the following result:
Abstract of List of Fires and Alarms for Twenty Years, ending 1853.
If we examine this table, we find ample evidence that the organization of the Fire Brigade has resulted in an abatement of loss and labour. Taking the average of the last twenty-one years, there has been a decrease of 5·7 in the last year under the head of “totally destroyed.” This is the best test of the activity of the Brigade, and really means much more than is obvious at first sight. Within these twenty-one years many tens of thousands of houses have been added to the metropolis; our periphery has been continually enlarging; like a tree, we grow year by year by adding a fresh ring of bricks and mortar. Whilst this increase is going on externally, the central part is growing too. We can afford no dead wood in our very heart: if it cannot expand one way it must another. Accordingly, we find the crowded city extending towards the sky; and if we take into account the immense mass of material added to that which existed, all of which is equally liable to the inroads of fire, we can understand why the total number of conflagrations has increased from 458 in 1833 to 900 in 1853. With such an augmentation of conflagrations, thedecreaseof houses totally destroyed in 1853 is the highest testimony to the ability and zeal of Mr. Braidwood.
The item “totally destroyed” is mainly made up of houses and factories in which are stored very combustible materials, such as carpenters’ and cabinet-makers’ shops, oilmen’s warehouses, sawmills, &c., where the fire gains such a hold in a few minutes as to preclude the possibility of putting it out. The number is also swelled by houses which are situated many miles from the nearest station; for there are no stations in the outskirts of the town, and very few in the crowded suburbs. We have seen complaints of this want of help in thickly-populated localities; but the companies only plant an establishment where the insurances are sufficient to cover the expense, and people who do not contribute have no more right to expect private individuals to take care of their property than tradesmen in the Strand would have to expect the private watchman outside Messrs. Coutts’ bank to look after their shutters. Indeed, it seems to us that the Brigade act very liberally. The firemennever stop to ask whether the house is insured or not; nor are they deterred by distance; and in many cases they have gone as far as Brentford, Putney, Croydon, Barnet, Uxbridge, Cranfordbridge, Windsor Castle, and once to Dover by an express engine. The only difference made by the Brigade between insured and uninsured property is, that after putting out a fire they take charge of the salvage of the former, and leave that of the latter to its owner. The force is, however, very careful to repair immediately any damage they may have done to adjoining property—damage which they commit in the most deliberate manner, regardless of pains and penalties. For instance,housebreakingis almost a nightly crime with the firemen whilst in search of water, who never let a wall or a door stand between them and a supply of this element. It is a proof of the good feeling which prevails on such occasions that, although they are technically guilty of an offence which renders them liable to punishment, no one murmurs, much less threatens proceedings. If the authorities in the great fire of London had acted in a similar manner for the public good, they would have saved the half of the Inner Temple, which was destroyed because, according to Clarendon’s account, all the lawyers were absent on circuit, and the constables did not dare to take the responsibility of breaking open their chamber doors!
It is a question whether government ought not to relieve the parish authorities from a duty which they cannot separately perform, and combine their engines into a metropolitan brigade; thus guarding the town from fire as they do from robbery by the police. If people will not protect themselves by insuring, the state should protect them, and make them pay for it. An excellent system prevails in most parts of Germany of levying a rate at the close of the year upon all the inhabitants, sufficient to cover the loss from fires during the past twelvemonth. As every householder has a pecuniary interest in the result, he keeps a bucket and belt, and sallies out to extinguish the conflagration in his neighbour’s premises. If the rate were adopted in London, and the present enormous duty on insurances reduced, thecost to each person would be hardly more pence than it is pounds at present to the provident few.
Mr. Samuel Brown, of the Institute of Actuaries, after analyzing the returns of Mr. Braidwood, as well as the reports in theMechanics’ Magazineby Mr. Baddeley, who has devoted much attention to the subject, drew up some tables of the times of the year and hours of the day at which fires are most frequent. It would naturally be supposed that the winter would show a vast preponderance over the summer months; but the difference is not so great as might be expected. December and January are very prolific of fires, as in these months large public buildings are heated by flues, stoves, and boilers; but the other months share mishaps of the kind pretty equally, with the exception that the hot and dry periods of summer and autumn are marked by the most destructive class of conflagrations, owing to the greater inflammability of the materials, than in the damper portions of the year. This, from the desiccating nature of the climate, is especially the case in Canada and the United States, and, coupled with the extensive use of wood in building, has a large influence in many parts of the continent. The following list of all the great fires which have taken place for the last hundred years will bear out our statement:—
(Extracted from the Royal Insurance Company’s Almanack, 1854.)
One reason, perhaps, why there is such a general average in the number of conflagrations throughout the year is, that the vast majority occur in factories and workshops where fire is used in summer as well as winter. This supposition appears at first sight to be contradicted by the fact that nearly as many fires occur on Sunday as on any other day of the week. But when it is remembered that in numerous establishments it is necessary to keep in the fires throughout that day, and as in the majority of cases a very inadequate watch is kept, it is at once apparent why there is no immunity from the scourge. Indeed, some of the most destructive fires have broken out on a Sunday night or on a Sunday morning; no doubt because a large body of fire had formed before it was detected. A certain number of accidents occur in summer in private houses from persons on hot nights opening the window behind the toilet-glass in their bedrooms, when the draught blows the blind against the candle. Swallows do not more certainly appear in June, than such mishaps are found reported at the sultry season.
If we watch still more narrowly the habits of fires, we find that they are active or dormant according to the time of day. Thus, during a period of nine years, the per-centage regularly increased from 1·96 at 9 o’clockA.M., the hour at which allhouseholds might be considered to be about, to 3·34 at 1P.M., 3·55 at 5P.M., and 8·15 per cent. at 10P.M., which is just the time at which a fire left to itself by the departure of the workmen would have had swing enough to become visible.
The origin of fires is now so narrowly inquired into by the officers of the Brigade, and by means of inquests, that we have been made acquainted with a vast number of curious causes which would never have been suspected. From an analysis of fires which have occurred since the establishment of the Brigade we have constructed the following tables:—
Among the more common causes of fire (such as gas, candle, curtains taking fire, children playing with stoves, &c.) it is remarkable how uniformly the same numbers occur under each head from year to year. General laws obtain as much in small as in great events. We are informed by the Post Office authorities that about eight persons daily drop their letters into the post without directing them; we know that there is an unvaryingpercentage of broken heads and limbs received into the hospitals; and here we see that a regular number of houses take fire, year by year, from the leaping out of a spark or the dropping of a smouldering pipe of tobacco. It may indeed be a long time before another conflagration will arise from “a monkey upsetting a clothes-horse,” but we have no doubt such an accident will recur in its appointed cycle.
Although gas figures so largely as a cause of fire, it does not appear that its rapid introduction of late years into private houses has been attended with danger. There is another kind of light, however, which the insurance offices look upon with terror, especially those who make it their business to insure farm property. The assistant-secretary of one of the largest fire-offices, speaking broadly, informed us that the introduction of the lucifer-matchcaused them an annual loss of ten thousand pounds! In the foregoing list we see in how many ways they have given rise to fires.
One hundred and twenty-seven known fires thus arise from this single cause; and no doubt many of the twenty-five fires ascribed to the agency of cats and dogs were owing to their having thrown down boxes of matches at night, which they frequently do, and which is almost certain to produce combustion. The item “rat gnawing lucifer,” reminds us to give a warning against leaving about wax lucifers where there are either rats or mice, for these vermin constantly run away with them to their holes behind the inflammable canvas, and eat the wax until they reach the phosphorus, which is ignited by the friction of their teeth. Many fires are believed to have been produced by this singular circumstance. How much, again, must lucifers have contributed to swell the large class of conflagrations whose causes are unknown! Another cause of fire, which is of recent date, is the use of naphtha in lamps,—a mostignitible fluid when mixed in certain proportions with common air. “A delightful novel” figures as a proximate, if not an immediate, cause of twenty-two fires. This might be expected; but what can be the meaning of a fire caused by a high tide? When we asked Mr. Braidwood the question, he answered, “Oh, we always look out for fires when there is a high tide. They arise from the heating of lime upon the addition of water.” Thus rain, we see, has caused four conflagrations, and simple over-heating forty-four. The lime does no harm so long as it is merely in contact with wood; but if iron happens to be in juxtaposition with the two, it speedily becomes red-hot, and barges on the river have been sunk, by reason of their bolts and iron knees burning holes in their bottoms. Of the singular entry, “rat gnawing a gaspipe,” the firemen state that it is common for rats to gnaw leaden service-pipes, for the purpose, it is supposed, of getting at the water, and in this instance the grey rodent laboured under a mistake, and let out the raw material of the opposite element. Intoxication is a fruitful cause of fires, especially in public-houses and inns.
It is commonly imagined that the introduction of hot water, hot air, and steam-pipes, as a means of heating buildings, cuts off one avenue of danger from fire. This is an error. Iron pipes, often heated up to 400°, are placed in close contact with floors and skirting-boards, supported by slight diagonal props of wood, which a much lower degree of heat will suffice to ignite. The circular rim supporting a still at the Apothecaries’ Hall, which was used in the preparation of some medicament that required a temperature of only 300°, was found, not long ago, to have charred a circle, at least a quarter of an inch deep, in the wood beneath it, in less than six months. Mr. Braidwood, in his evidence before a Committee of the House of Lords, in 1846, stated that it was his belief that by long exposure to heat, not much exceeding that of boiling water, or 212°, timber is brought into such a condition that it will fire without the application of a light. The time during which this process of desiccation goes on, until it ends in spontaneous combustion, is, he thinks, from eight to ten years;so that afire might be hatching in a man’s premises during the whole of his lease, without making any sign!
Mr. Hosking, in his very useful and sensible little “Guide to the proper Regulation of Buildings in Towns,” quotes the following case, which completely confirms Mr. Braidwood’s opinion, and explodes the idea that heat applied through the medium of pipes must be safe.