The Sun.
London, England, 1858-10-18 00:00:00

TALLOW.

A fair average business is doing in our market, and
prices are well supported. P.Y.C., on the spot, is selling
at 50s ed per cwt. Town tallow 5s nett cash. Rough
fat 2s 9id per 8 lbs.

THE GREAT FIRE AT AUCKLAND.

(Abridged from the New Zealander, July 10.)
This calamity occurred early on Wednesday
morning the ith of July, and more than one cir-
cumstance has transpired to give rise to the sus-
picion that the origin of the fire, if not an act of
positive incendiarism, is attributable to careless-
ness almost as criminal.

From careful inquiry amongst those who were
first on the spot, and from personal observation, we
may confidently state that the fire originated very
shortly before two o'clock in the morning, in the
back premises of the Osprey Inn, Mr. J. H. King,
High-street. It thence extended to the theatre or
music-room of the Osprey, and immediately caught
the building, workshop, and timber of Mr. Finlay's
(carpenter) establishment. The north-east gale
was blowing furiously, and the flames soon
swept before the wind towards the Mecha-
nics Institute, and, with an eddy, round towards
Shortland-street, to the rear of the Bee Hive, Mr.
Keesing's store.
The bugles of the 58th Regiment were sounding
the call as soon as the flames appeared above the
roof, and the fire bells rang out simultaneously. A
large force of the 58th Regiment, under the per-
sonal orders of Colonel Wynyard, were soon on the
spot with the military engine ' • and the several
companies of the volunteer fire brigades, with their
engines, were quickly working. But such was the
intensity of the fire that, driven as it was before
the storm amongst the low and crowded buildings
of O'Connell-street and High-street, all attempts to
arrest its course were for a time futile.
The occupants of the houses around the fire—
most of them hard-working people of moderate
means—were now seen leaving, for the last time,
their homes. Men half-dressed, and women and
children in their night clothing, were seen creeping
from burning houses, carrying nothing away with
them but the scant clothing in which they had
barely time to rush into the street. In these close
thoroughfares, the smoke and heat were almost un-
endurable, but the officers of the regiment organised
their men in working parties—well disciplined and
effective—and attacked the flames wherever there
appeared a chance of doing so successfully-.
The fire was now burning furiously around the
Police Barracks, and consuming them and Mr.
Gorrie's old schoolhouse. The Mechanics' Institute
new hall appeared for a time exactly in the
drift of the fire, and it was thought that nothing
could save it ; but the exertions of Mr. Dalby
and others, who deluged the front and roof with
water, aided by a slight shift of wind, saved this
handsome building.
In a more westerly direction, about Mr. M'Caul's,
in High•street, the fire was now storming along—
house after house falling before it, occasional brick
walls, though strongly built, forming no barrier to
its fury. The street was here too narrow for the
opposite houses even to be saved, and all the build-
ings from Mr. MTwan's yard to Vulcan-lane were
ignited, and although many of the townspeople
here made the most strenuous exertions to save pro-
perty, very little could be secured ere the fearful
heat rendered all approach to the burning houses
impossible.
While the buildings from Mr. Marks' to Mr.
Dunning's were burning on the north side of High-
street, the buildings across Vulcan-lane caught, and
Messrs. Marston and George's law offices and the
Auckland Dispensary—only just established—were
enveloped in the flames. This thoroughfare was
now a street of fire.

A woman whom Dr. Philson, the coroner, was
attending, was conveyed from a burning house to
the fine new brick building, the Auckland Hotel
(Mr. B. Newell's), where it was thought she would
be secure. Ix a"short time she gave birth to a
child, but this, the house of refuge in which she
was lying, was almost directly after in the midst of
the flames, and she had again to be carried away
with her new born infant to the Wesleyan chapel,
which afforded her safety.
The fire was now at its heighth ! It had curled
round to the Shortland-street houses, and the whole
block between Chancery-street, High-street, Short-
land-street, and O'Connell-street, was a heaving
mass of fire. The crash of falling buildings, the
roar of the fire, and the storm—which had become

more furious still—was awfully grand and fearful.
The fire from the Police-Barracks' block (old Post-
office) now extended across High-street, and caught
the woodwork of Newell's Inn, which was soon

entirely in a blaze ; the fire thence spreading to
the houses occupied by Mr. Thompson and Mr.
Leech, carver and gilder, which fell before it. The
newly-erected stables of the Auckland Hotel were
soon burning. A valuable horse just imported from
England in the Bride, however, was led out in