different portions of the engine until its
mechanism is thoroughly familiar, and goes
through a proscribed course of practical
lectures on pneumatics, hydraulics, mechanics, and
on the import of the mechanism he has learnt
to handle, and his drill. " The captain is very
particular as to the character and behaviour of
the force, sir, and we all take a kind o' pride in
having no black sheep among us. When a
man's once joined, the captain always advances
money out of his own pocket to the foreman
on that man's account. This is to let any
of 'em have a trifle in advance if they want
necessaries, and to prevent them having to run
into debt outside. Yes, it works well, and does
a deal o' good, and it says something for the
force. I think you'll say, sir, that every penny
that's been borrowed in this way has been
repaid. When we go up to Watling-street, I'll
show you the office returns made twice a day,
and you'll see that we can tell where every one of
our hands is at any moment, and how he is
employed."

"At home," "Out duty," "On leave,"
"Sick," " Total," were the headings of these
returns, which are made up at seven in the
morning and seven in the evening of every day, and
despatched to the head office, so that Captain
Shaw can redistribute his staff or call portions
of it out for special work at any moment.

The other statistics of the Fire Brigade are
suggestive and curious. Fifty years ago there
was an abortive attempt at combined action by
a very few insurance offices, but it was not.
until 1832 that seven of these companies agreed
to work together for the common good; and on
the 1st of January, 1833, "The London Fire-
engine Establishment" started into life. Year
after year, as fresh insurance companies were
formed,*additions were made to the proprietary
of this preventive organisation, until it
represented, in 1865, no less than thirty companies.
On the 1st of January, 1866, it was handed
over, as we have seen, to the Board of Works;
and its thirty-three years of existence show the
following results: The brigade books show thirty-
five thousand one hundred and forty-five calls
to fires, of which two thousand seven hundred
and sixty-nine were false alarms, three thousand
three hundred and seven merely chimney alarms,
nine thousand six hundred and thirty-five fires
resulting in serious damage, and nineteen
thousand four hundred and thirty-four fires which
resulted in slight damage. Twelve firemen have
been killed in this time, and a rough calculation
gives one thousand three hundred as the
number of accidents, exclusive of the men
who have become disabled or have died from
diseases engendered by the hardships and
exposure of the calling. Six hundred men have
been in the service of the establishment, and of
these one hundred and twenty-nine remained
and went over to the Board of Works at the
commencement of the year. Tingle goes a
little bell to the right of the ground-floor room
in which these particulars are furnished us, and
our guide, having read off a telegraphic message
enters it as a " stop" one in the journal
for the day. " Our first duty, when we hear of
a fire, is to telegraph the news to all the district
Stations, and to ask for or stop their sending help.
' Not wanted' is the rule, you see : and if we
didn't do this, we should often have half the
plant of the brigade blocking up a narrow
thoroughfare hours after a fire had been put out.
Directly a chimney smokes, or there's as much
flame seen as might be put out by one of the
old parish squirts, busybodies rush off in cabs
or run for their lives to distant stations to tell
of the awful fire in Blank-street, and to beg
there may be no delay in sending help. Scarcely
a day passes that we have not such messages
now, but, thanks to the telegraph, which every
man about the place can work — for it is a
simple alphabet, and no codes or abbreviations
are allowed — we can always answer we know
all about it, and that it's being seen to."
A sharp-eyed chirpy sort of man, tall and gaunt,
and who, in his snuff-coloured tourist suit,
looked something between a prosperous cabman
and a broken-down stockbroker, chimed in
here. I have since had reason to believe that
he had, strictly speaking, no business in the
place. A good-tempered, harmless busybody,
whose passion is attending fires, and who has
rendered good service as a swift messenger in
time of need, he had just made his twelfth
fruitless application for a post in the brigade,
averring with perfect truth that wages were no
object to him, as he enjoyed an annuity
sufficient for his wants, and only wished for
recognition as a professional instead of an amateur
helper at fires. Taking advantage of the mo-
mentary absence of my guide, he went off at
full pressure, and with a strong sense of personal
injury, thus :

"I don't suppose they'll have a proper head
office for years, judging by the rate we've gone
on at since the Board of Works took the
brigade in hand; and there ain't a doubt either
that London isn't safe now, or that it might be
made so in a few months if they were to set
about it with a will. When are they going
to have the other new offices? Well, sir, that's
more than I can tell. Ever since the
beginning of the year, when the brigade was
handed over to the Board of Works, it's been
settled that the number o' stations should be
increased, but there's been very little actually
done towards it; and at this time, out of the
sixty brigade stations they show on paper,
they've only forty open. The rest ain't taken
yet, though nearly a year's gone by; and if a
great fire came 'like that of London-bridge
wharves a few years ago, there ain't much doubt
but that hundreds of thousands of pounds'
worth of property might be wasted for want of
bringing men and engines properly into play.
They've got the hands, and they're getting the
gear and material fast enough, but they'll have
to be stowed away in store-rooms and such like,
until stations are found for them. I often
think if those who find the money knew how
the brigade's humbugged about, and how