The Sun.
London, England, 1866-09-13 00:00:00

The Great Fire in the Minories.

Yesterday when daylight revealed the havoc
caused by the recent fire at the goods station of the
London and North-Western Railway Company in
the Minories the scene was remarkable. Spacious
warehouses, most of them seven stories high, aro
completely gutted. The roofs and floors are en-
tirely destroyed, and of the buildings themselves
only the bare walls remain, and here and there a
charred rafter. As the floors gave way from time
to time during the fire the materials—princi-
pally wool—with which they were laden fell with
them in a burning mass, and now lie soaked with
water and in the greatest confusion below. The
whole damage done is estimated at a fabulous sum,
but for the present it has not been ascertained with
any approach to accuracy, and may never transpire
publicly. Messrs. Gooch and Cousens, wool mer-
chants, in whose premises the fire is said to have
originated, are reported to hold policies on the ma-
terials and property destroyed to the amount of
£BO,OOO, but that sum affords only a faint notion
of the loss to the fire offices, for other merchants
besides these bad large quantities of wool stored
there, and were insured more or less in respect of
them. Throughout the whole of yesterday gangs
of men were engaged in digging such of the wool
as was only partially burnt from among the ruins,
where it lies smoking in enormous masses, and re-
moving it to an adjacent warehouse. It was a pe-
rilous occupation, for they could never be sure that
some of the roofless walls might not at any time
topple over. The salvage is expected to be consider-
able, especially in wool which is a material that burns
slowly, or which rather smoulders than burns, and the
fibre is more injured by heat than by water. Messrs.
Jacomb, wool brokers, were superintending the sal-
vage operations yesterday with a view to a sale of the
saved materials to-day. For the extent of the pro-
perty and commodities destroyed there has been no
fire at all so destructive in the metropolis since that
at the St. Katherine docks. The flames were im-
mensely fed when the whisky in the bonded.store
belonging to the railway company caught fire, and
there being a high wind the whole establishment,
covering two or three acres of ground, seemed for a
time doomed to destruction. It is hemmed in on all
sides by dwelling houses, and during the night the
inhabitants of the immediate neighbourhood were in
a state of consternation. Fortunately, however,
there was an abundant supply of water, and at high
pressure, and the engines, especially the steamers:
played with irresistible effect. The services of nearly
100 of the fire brigade were brought into requisition
on the occasion—those of Capt. Shaw, their ener-
getic chief, who happened to be on leave of absence,
being alone wanting. At one time the horses used
on the establishment werein some jeopardy, but they
were at length all safely removed. The fire has left
its mark on the place in the huge blanks which it
has made, and in bare, roofless walls standing some
70 or 80 feet from the ground, to say nothing of the
valuable commodities which have perished.

—There are eighty-six thou-
erarernstfqArntro
ETERNAL ROTATe
Domini. if it requires hundred edda yt
hoof u stahned years
ce of the earth's more sluggish rotation)
day (in consequence
to increase by the eighty-six thousand and four hundredth
sand four hundredsi:oollniilshninn
•
part of its length, it will take eight thousand six hundred
and forty millions of years to cause that rotation to ceaso
altogether, supposing the slackening of its speed to con-
tinuo under the same conditions. Will it ever cease ? Will
the earth ever comp to a standstill, as far as her rotation is
concerned ? No ; she will not. Her rate of spinning is
gradually slackened, because she spins faster than the moon,
who thereby raises the waters into a heap, converting
them into a brake or drag. But when once the earth spins
no faster than the moon, she will always have tho samo
hemisphere turned towards her satellite ; the liquid protu-
berance will be no longer carried forwards, and the moon
will have no further hold whereby to check the earth's
rotation. The period of the earth's rotation would then
coincide with that of the moon's revolution round the
earth. In short, the earth, at last would constantly turn
the same face to the moon, exactly as the moon turns the
same to us. It is only natural to suppose that the
very same cause has produced the singularity which ivso
observe in the movements of the moon. If she alts.ovarm
turns the same face to the earth, the cause. ought
But things may not even go so far as thatt.o
realisoi the
cjPr-
analogous to that now submitted to your cAeusstidme7tsirs
away (end it requires a great many
cumstances alluded to), the earth'stetkinoi ocean
may
be con-
gradually to drop. The waters of age,,srature is expected
of the rotatory move-
tides; the cause of the slaekexe
gearth will thenceforth
ment will disappear, and
constant velocity. 'The exact
with a
continue to turn
is not yet known it is assort
into ice ; with no more i.vnater there rota
bo no more
amount of the slackenoinnlgy
by the indications afforded by
twined app
Meanwhile, ladies and gentlemen, it was
A of time.
r°xi.inateltYs accurate determination must be a
you should be apprised of its existence.—
' right that
' All the Year Round."
Dickens s
awnocrike nt eclipses-