Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1872-11-15

lIbul Ntls DuIIiil 10 let US pass liiN lihS'
with our party during the day or night,
we returned to the burnt district by way Of
MIX street, where we stopped a few minutes to
admire and study the venerable proportions OF
the Old South and watch the unusual spectacle
of armed soldiers standing about the doors and
looking out through the empty window panes.
The pavement of Milk street had been cleared,
so that walking there was easy; but what
vision of desolation met our eyes! As far as
we could see, looking southeasterly, stretched
wilderness Of rounded granite bouders, heaps
of brick and mortar, jagged fragments OF stand
ing walls. broken and twisted pieces of iron pipes
and machinery and almost every conceivable
kind of incombustible rubbish. In many places
flames rose to the height OF few feet and in
others the mass of rubbish which filled the eel
lars glowed with 4 fierce heat from the burning
of some mass of combustibles below. Fire en-.
gines stationed here and there were throwing
great streams of water into some of these fiery
abysses, which sent up volumes of steam with
out any apparent diminution of their intense
heat, while in other places you only learned of
the fire below by the waveriug outlines of OBJ
jects seen through the uuequally heated cur
rents of air.
Remembering that only three days before, this
space had been filled with solid piles of granite,
skilfully arranged and carved into all manner
of beautiful shapes, the sudden desolatiOn be-
comes appalling. Macaulay's New Zealander,
sitting on broken arch of London bridge
sketchng the ruins of ST. Paul's came into our
thoughts; but we agreed that thar hypothetical
sight in some respects less depressing than
that which we beheld. There would he at least
some traces of beauty, some evidence of skill
and taste in the forgotten builders of the de-
serted city; but here nothing remained but
rude aud lormleSs masses Of material, repu-
sye in their disorder aud apparent I'M
fitness for any future use, and without anything
to suggest that they ever made part of struc-
lures more elaborate than plain walls and
mounds. Not line of carving, not even fiat
hammered surface, can be found among all
those numberless heavy blocks Of granite which
cucumber to the hight of five or ten feet what
once were the roadways Of Federal, Franklin,
Pearl, Congress, Deyonshire and other Streets
The fire has Clipped ana crumbed them until
all their angles have disappeared, and they are
only rounded, boulder-like masses From one
of them, by picking at it with a small fragment,
we detached several shelly layers which peeled off
SUCCESSFULLY like the coats of an onion, until less
than half its original bulk was left. We no.
tced with some surprise that while ali other
granite structures suffered from this disintegra-
ton, Hoyey's store which resisted successfully
the flames which attacked it from three sides,
and Trinity church, of which the outer walls
only remain, escaped this effect of the flames al
together. The granite walls of both buildings
are as free from anything like chipping or
crumbling as when they were first laid. The
stone in these buildings is said to have been
brought from the Quincy quarries. 1t is GER
tainly darker in color aud finer in grain than the
granite most frequently met with in the burned
area. Whether its quality or other circum-
stances saved it from the common fate, we can
not venture to decide.
Some hundreds of la5orers apparently were
busy in clearing the streets and throwing the
rubbish from them into the cellars. 1t is slow
heavy work, and will occupy many days. No
body else is at work here except few men tear
ing down threatening walls, buned-out mer-
chants searching for and opening their safes, an
artist or two sketching the ruins probably for
an Illustrated paper, and photographers taking
views. The safe openings have an iuesisti-
Bile attraction for the loiterers, of whom
there are not very many, passes being issued
it is said, somewhat sparingly. Keys have no
| part 10 play in these openings; their place is
supplied by hammers, bars and picks. As a
| general thing the safes yield readily to these
arguments, applied, so far as we could see, with
no special skill. We saw one opened in which
the varnish on the wooden lining was not bis
tered, and the books and papers it contained
were as sound and free from spot or stain of
fire as when they came from the stationers.
Another which held we were told, the effects of
firm dealing in kid gloves, had proved less
efficient The contents were charred almost to
perfect blackness and smoked ominously as
they were exposed to the air.
Themerchants, young men were working stead
lily and calmly at this dismal business dipping the
charred books in water to prevent their bursting
into flame, as they seemed iuclined to do, and
arranging them for thorough inspection in a
more convenient place. They looked sometimes
rueluly at each other as the work went on, and
spoke in low tones. They behaved like men at
funeral, and well they might, for that uncoulh
heap of bricks and stone was the grave OF hopes
and fortune; but they seemed sobered, not
crushed, and as if there was plenty OF hard
work, courage and enterprise in them yet.
One merchant, as we passed, was taking from
his iron-lined brick vault roll after roll OF broad.
| cloths, beavers, and other bgh-priced wooden
goods. We asked him how they came to be in
| such place, and learned that ON the night of
| the fire he had time enough TO remove his books
from the vault to a safer place, but not TO save
| his goods; he therefore filed the vault with the
| best Of them, and now he found them, damp and
smoked, but not scorched. The cloths thus saved
must be worth some thousands Of dollars. Ia
the cellar Of what had been a china and glass
store, several persons were cropping for "relcs'
One man hadiound number Of glass salt cellars
apparently uniniured which he proposed to sell as
mementoes Of the fire for several times the price
set on them by their original owner Others were
content with fragments Of glass and china melt.
ed together into fantastic shapes One of the
most curious effects Of the fire upon granite is
TO be seen on the east side Of Pearl street. where
the lower part of the front of building still
stands. Its stones are so wasted and worn by
the fierce assaults Of the flames, that one might
think they had stood at the edge of the sea,
while the tides Of centuries swelled and ebbed
through their openings; or in the desert, to be
| cut by the sharp sand blast of the sirocco. An
| appearance specifically resembling that of
| these ruins is sometimes noticed in the masses
Of coarse sandstone standing in the prairies of
western Nebraska or Kansas, and worn into all
| sorts of fantastic shapes by the winds of ages.
| Political Notes.
The total wpiug out of the "relormers" at the
late election reminds one forcbly of abe line
| from Hans Breitmann: CLANS Breitmann gaYn