Home as Found - James Fenimore Cooper (ebook reader wifi txt) 📗

sincere regard for his

late fellow-traveller, cordially inviting him to visit him in the

mountains in June.

 

As Sir George took his leave, the bells began to ring for a fire. In

New-York one gets so accustomed to these alarms, that near an hour

had passed before any of the Effingham family began to reflect on the

long continuance of the cries. A servant was then sent out to

ascertain the reason, and his report made the matter more serious

than usual.

 

We believe that, in the frequency of these calamities, the question

lies between Constantinople and New-York. It is a common occurrence

for twenty or thirty buildings to be burnt down, in the latter place,

and for the residents of the same ward to remain in ignorance of the

circumstance, until enlightened on the fact by the daily prints; the

constant repetition of the alarms hardening the ear and the feelings

against the appeal. A fire of greater extent than common, had

occurred only a night or two previously to this; and a rumour now

prevailed, that the severity of the weather, and the condition of the

hoses and engines, rendered the present danger double. On hearing

this intelligence, the Messrs. Effinghams wrapped themselves up in

their over-coats, and went together into the streets.

 

"This seems something more than usual, Ned," said John Effingham,

glancing his eye upward at the lurid vault, athwart which gleams of

fiery light began to shine; "the danger is not distant, and it seems

serious."

 

Following the direction of the current, they soon found the scene of

the conflagration, which was in the very heart of those masses of

warehouses, or stores, that John Effingham had commented on, so

lately. A short street of high buildings was already completely in

flames, and the danger of approaching the enemy, added to the frozen

condition of the apparatus, the exhaustion of the firemen from their

previous efforts, and the intense coldness of the night, conspired to

make the aspect of things in the highest degree alarming.

 

The firemen of New-York have that superiority over those of other

places, that the veteran soldier obtains over the recruit. But the

best troops can be appalled, and, on this memorable occasion, these

celebrated firemen, from a variety of causes, became for a time,

little more than passive spectators of the terrible scene.

 

There was an hour or two when all attempts at checking the

conflagration seemed really hopeless, and even the boldest and the

most persevering scarcely knew which way to turn, to be useful. A

failure of water, the numerous points that required resistance, the

conflagration extending in all directions from a common centre, by

means of numberless irregular and narrow streets, and the

impossibility of withstanding the intense heat, in the choked

passages, soon added despair to the other horrors of the scene.

 

They who stood the fiery masses, were freezing on one side with the

Greenland cold of the night, while their bodies were almost blistered

with the fierce flames on the other. There was something frightful in

this contest of the elements, nature appearing to condense the heat

within its narrowest possible limits, as if purposely to increase its

fierceness. The effects were awful; for entire buildings would seem

to dissolve at their touch, as the forked flames enveloped them in

sheets of fire.

 

Every one being afoot, within sound of the alarm, though all the more

vulgar cries had ceased, as men would deem it mockery to cry murder

in a battle, Sir George Templemore met his friends, on the margin of

this sea of fire. It was now drawing towards morning, and the

conflagration was at its height, having already laid waste a nucleus

of _blocks_, and it was extending by many lines, in every possible

direction.

 

"Here is a fearful admonition for those who set their hearts on

riches," observed Sir George Templemore, recalling the conversation

of the previous day. "What, indeed, are the designs of man, as

compared with the will of Providence!"

 

"I foresee that this is _le commencement de la fin_," returned John

Effingham. "The destruction is already so great, as to threaten to

bring down with it the usual safe-guards against such losses, and one

pin knocked out of so frail and delicate a fabric, the whole will

become loose, and fall to pieces."

 

"Will nothing be done to arrest the flames?"

 

"As men recover from the panic, their plans will improve and their

energies will revive. The wider streets are already reducing the fire

within more certain limits, and they speak of a favourable change of

wind. It is thought five hundred buildings have already been

consumed, in scarcely half a dozen hours."

 

That Exchange, which had so lately resembled a bustling temple of

Mammon, was already a dark and sheeted ruin, its marble walls being

cracked, defaced, tottering, or fallen. It lay on the confines of the

ruin, and our party was enabled to take their position near it, to

observe the scene. All in their immediate vicinity was assuming the

stillness of desolation, while the flushes of fierce light in the

distance marked the progress of the conflagration. Those who knew the

localities, now began to speak of the natural or accidental barriers,

such as the water, the slips, and the broader streets, as the only

probable means of arresting the destruction. The crackling of the

flames grew distant fast, and the cries of the firemen were now

scarcely audible.

 

At this period in the frightful scene, a party of seamen arrived,

bearing powder, in readiness to blow up various buildings, in the

streets that possessed of themselves, no sufficient barriers to the

advance of the flame. Led by their officers, these gallant fellows,

carrying in their arms the means of destruction, moved up steadily to

the verge of the torrents of fire, and planted their kegs; laying

their trains with the hardy indifference that practice can alone

create, and with an intelligence that did infinite credit to their

coolness. This deliberate courage was rewarded with complete success,

and house crumbled to pieces after house under the dull explosions,

happily without an accident.

 

From this time the flames became less ungovernable, though the day

dawned and advanced, and another night succeeded, before they could

be said to be got fairly under. Weeks, and even months passed,

however, ere the smouldering ruins ceased to send up smoke, the

fierce element continuing to burn, like a slumbering volcano, as it

might be in the bowels of the earth.

 

The day that succeeded this disaster, was memorable for the rebuke it

gave the rapacious longing for wealth. Men who had set their hearts

on gold, and who prided themselves on their possession, and on that

only, were made to feel its insanity; and they who had walked abroad

as gods, so lately, began to experience how utterly insignificant are

the merely rich, when stripped of their possessions. Eight hundred

buildings containing fabrics of every kind, and the raw material in

various forms, had been destroyed, as it were in the twinkling of an

eye.

 

A faint voice was heard from the pulpit, and there was a moment when

those who remembered a better state of things, began to fancy that

principles would once more assert their ascendency, and that the

community would, in a measure, be purified. But this expectation

ended in disappointment, the infatuation being too wide-spread and

corrupting, to be stopped by even this check, and the rebuke was

reserved for a form that seems to depend on a law of nature, that of

causing a vice to bring with it its own infallible punishment.

Chapter VIII. ("First, tell me, have you ever been at Pisa.") SHAKSPEARE.

 

The conflagration alluded to, rather than described, in the

proceeding chapter, threw a gloom over the gaieties of New-York, if

that ever could be properly called gay, which was little more than a

strife in prodigality and parade, and leaves us little more to say of

the events of the winter. Eve regretted very little the interruption

to scenes in which she had found no pleasure, however much she

lamented the cause; and she and Grace passed the remainder of the

season quietly, cultivating the friendship of such women as Mrs.

Hawker and Mrs. Bloomfield, and devoting hours to the improvement of

their minds and tastes, without ever again venturing however, within

the hallowed precincts of such rooms as those of Mrs. Legend.

 

One consequence of a state of rapacious infatuation, like that which

we have just related, is the intensity of selfishness which smothers

all recollection of the past, and all just anticipations of the

future, by condensing life, with its motives and enjoyments, into the

present moment. Captain Truck, therefore, was soon forgotten, and the

literati, as that worthy seaman had termed the associates of Mrs.

Legend, remained just as vapid, as conceited, as ignorant, as

imitative, as dependent, and as provincial as ever.

 

As the season advanced, our heroine began to look with longings

towards the country. The town life of an American offers little to

one accustomed to a town life in older and more permanently regulated

communities; and Eve was already heartily weary of crowded and noisy

balls, (for a few were still given;) _belles_, the struggles of an

uninstructed taste, and a representation in which extravagance was so

seldom relieved by the elegance and convenience of a condition of

society, in which more attention is paid to the fitness of things.

 

The American spring is the least pleasant of its four seasons, its

character being truly that of "winter lingering in the lap of May."

Mr. Effingham, who the reader will probably suspect, by this time, to

be a descendant of a family of the same name, that we have had

occasion to introduce into another work, had sent orders to have his

country residence prepared for the reception of our party; and it was

with a feeling of delight that Eve stepped on board a steam-boat to

escape from a town that, while it contains so much that is worthy of

any capital, contains so much more that is unfit for any place, in

order to breathe the pure air, and to enjoy the tranquil pleasare of

the country. Sir George Templemore had returned from his southern

journey, and made one of the party, by express arrangement.

 

"Now, Eve," said Grace Van Cortlandt, as the boat glided along the

wharves, "if it were any person but you, I should feel confident of

having something to show that _would_ extort admiration."

 

"You are safe enough, in that respect, for a more imposing object in

its way, than this very vessel, eye of mine, never beheld. It is

positively the only thing that deserves the name of magnificent I

have yet seen, since our return,--unless, indeed, it may be

magnificent projects."

 

"I am glad, dear coz, there is this one magnificent object, then, to

satisfy a taste so fastidious."

 

As Grace's little foot moved, and her voice betrayed vexation, the

whole party smiled; for the whole party, while it felt the justice of

Eve's observation, saw the real feeling that was at the bottom of her

cousin's remark. Sir George, however, though he could not conceal

from himself the truth of what had been said by the one party, and

the weakness betrayed by the other had too much sympathy for the

provincial patriotism of one so young and beautiful, not to come to

the rescue.

 

"You should remember, Miss Van Cortlandt," he said, "that Miss

Effingham has not had the advantage yet of seeing the Delaware,

Philadelphia, the noble bays of the south, nor so much that is to be

found out of the single town of New-York."

 

"Very true, and I hope yet to see her a sincere penitent for all her

unpatriotic admissions against her own country. _You_ have seen the

Capitol, Sir George Templemore; is it not, truly, one of the finest

edifices of the world?"

 

"You will except St. Peter's, surely, my child," observed Mr.

Effingham, smiling, for he saw that the baronet was embarrassed to

give a ready answer.

 

"And the Cathedral at Milan," said Eve, laughing.

 

"_Et le Louvre_!" cried Mademoiselle Viefville, who had some such

admiration for every thing Parisian, as Eve had for every thing

American.

 

"And, most especially, the north-east corner of the