body into a cart, and the sight of the head, hanging helplessly like that
of a dead bird, was one I never forgot. All that day the fires burned
fiercely, and it was not until the third day that they were really
subdued. Indeed, on the Gateshead side the ruined warehouses smoked and
smouldered for more than a week. In all, the value of the property
destroyed was something like a million sterling.

Never shall I forget my morning at school on the day on which the fire
first broke out. Boylike, it was the wonder rather than the horror of the
thing which was uppermost in my mind, and I and my schoolfellows, before
the morning bell sounded, eagerly related to each other all that we had
seen; those who, like myself, had been early on the ground having much to
tell to eager listeners. It was only when we had trooped excitedly into
our class-rooms, and found ourselves face to face with our masters, that
we began to realise the actual solemnity of a catastrophe the like of
which had never before befallen an English provincial town. In the Latin
room, where I was due at the opening of the school, I was unfeignedly
surprised to see Mr. Garven, our old classical tutor, sitting in tears at
his desk, and I can still hear the broken whispers in which he attempted
to speak to us of the terrible event.

It came home, I ought to say, very closely to "Bruce's school." More than
one of those killed had been pupils, and the son of Mr. Bertram, upon
whom already an excited public opinion was seeking to fasten the
responsibility for the explosion, was one of our schoolfellows, and had
but the day before joined us in our lessons. Suddenly as, in a
half-hearted way, we began our usual tasks, Dr. Bruce entered, pale and
agitated. "Boys," he said, "a dreadful thing has happened to our good old
town. God knows how far the mischief may extend, and what ruin may be
wrought; but we know already that more than one old pupil here have lost