Bertram had, in direct breach of the law, warehoused a large quantity of
gunpowder; but scientific witnesses who were subsequently examined showed
that it was possible that certain chemicals stored in the warehouse, when
suddenly combined, as by the falling of the floors, would be quite as
explosive as gunpowder itself.

Be this as it may, after one or two slight explosions--those which in my
dream were transformed into the cannonade of a Russian force--the whole
warehouse with all its contents was suddenly blown into the air by the
force of an explosion seldom equalled in its terrible violence. That
explosion not only carried the burning materials across the river to
Newcastle, where they quickly produced another conflagration as serious
in its character as that which was raging in Gateshead, but inflicted
terrible injury both to life and property. The persons in the
neighbourhood of the burning building, including soldiers, firemen,
police, and Mr. Bertram, the owner of the warehouse, were instantly
killed; and in many cases not a trace of their remains could afterwards
be found. On the bridges and on Newcastle quay the great crowds of
onlookers were thrown to the ground by the shock, and several were killed
outright; whilst, far and wide, buildings were partially unroofed,
windows broken, and a great and populous district reduced to the state in
which one might have expected to see it after a bombardment. The exact
number of those killed was never ascertained, but I believe that between
thirty and forty persons lost their lives.

As I came away with my father and brother from the scene of the fire, my
young nerves received the shock which invariably follows the first sight
of death. In the Sandhill--the scene of Lord Eldon's elopement with the
beautiful Bessie Surtees--a man was lying on the pavement who had been
killed by the force of the explosion. As I passed, they were lifting the