Weekly Trinity journal., 1870-08-06
sam Francisco Gossip.

Our correspondent, writing under date OF July
23d, discourscs thus about fires and the dry
goods business in the metropolis
Nothing so completely proves the truth Of the
adage that 80 Misiortunes are blessings in dis
guise, as the fact that the more our merchants
suffer from fire and flood the more they flourish,
for they apparently wax fat on disaster and
plethorze their purses by calamity.
In walk yesterday from Stockton street to
Third street via Market counted two "Alarm-
ing Sacrifices " four 1" Fire Fire Fire one
" Bankruptcy Bankruptcy !" one " Damaged
by Water " and one " Fire and Water "
The only dry goods store that had no an
nouncement Of an elementary nfiction Will, no
doubt, have an imaginary fire Tonight, and be
ready for business tomorrow with flaming pos
ters and large stock Of damaged goods Proyi-
dence is considerably down on the dry goods
business, or there never could be such a c0ncat-
euatiou Of catastrophe
The strangest thing about these fires is the
secrecy with which they are conducted. There
are no alarms, no engines, no streets in an up
roar, no hali-burned buildings, no excitement Of
any kind, but the proprietor quietly closes his
store at night, goes to bed, sleeps the sleep Of
the honest traGesman, comes down town to busi-
ness next morning, astonishes the neighborhood
by the Placarded information that his stocl, has
been ruined by the deyouring flames, and pro-
ceeds 10 lose fifty per cent on every cash trans
action, with an Indifference approaching absolute
recklessness.
Another remarkable feature is the disregard,
almost amounting TO a defiance Of the principles
laid down in the first four rules Of arithmetic.
For instance, the ordinary price OF a pair Of
gloves is 81 TO- but when % sold at half price in
consequence Of fire, 81 IS thus iguoring the
just rights Of addition, subtraction, muitiplica-
ton and division, and proving incontest.biy that
the half IS sometimes greater than the whole.
writing seriously, the transparency Of these de-
ceptiye devices, in addition to the poverty Of iu-
yentiVe talent shown in lying, ought to be as Sc
Fercly reprehcnded as the low commercial moral
ity that induces the announcements.
have just been through the Fire Marshal
report for the year ending June 30lh, ia order to
ascertain the actual loss sustained by our dry
goods dealers during the past twclyemonth, and
was really astonshed TO find that there bad only
been two sufferers, involving loss in the first
instance of S5l, ard in the other Of 5000.
From July ], 1869, to June 80, 1870, TWO hum
dred and cighty-one alarms were turned ia, Of
which fifteen were false, eight boufres and five
attempts. The total loss reached $llG,9l3, and
the amount paid for insurance $258,Cl2. July
IS most prolific in fires, ascrlb3bic, no doubt, to
the glorious Fourth and It's accompaniment OF
gunpOwdcr. The largest loss at any one fire was
$5l ,2G9, and the smallest S.. The number Of
buildings in the city is computed at l9 0J0, an
increase of ,0JO during the twc,yomCu,h, and
the proportion Of fires to buildings is os one to
eghty-one, which is reduction, especially on
loG7-8, when the chance Of being burned out
was one in forty-Gye. Incendimism was the
cause Of thirty-une fires, occasioniug II loss Of
557, ,948, on which the insurance companies paid
1925. Twenty-one persons were arrested on
the charge OF arson, and five convicted Of that
crime. The number Of lives lost by fire, includ-
ing lamp explosions, ETC., was ten Of whom
four were women.