But I should first tell you that our town has enjoyed a long immunity from fires; and although we possess a Volunteer Fire Brigade, at once efficient and obliging, and commanded by Mr. Patrick Sullivan (an Irishman), the men have had little or no opportunity of combating their sworn foe. The Brigade was founded in the early autumn of 1873, and presented by public subscription with a handsome manual engine and a wooden house to contain it. This house, painted a bright vermilion, is a conspicuous object at the top of the hill above the town, as you turn off towards the Rope-walk. The firemen, of course, wear an appropriate uniform, with brazen helmets and shoulder-straps and a neat axe apiece, suspended in a leathern case from the waistband. But the spirit of make-believe has of necessity animated all their public exercise, if I except the 13th of April, 1879, when a fire broke out in the back premises of Mr. Tippett, carpenter. His shop was (and is) situated in the middle of the town, and in those days a narrow gatehouse gave, or rather prevented, access to the town on either side. These houses stood, one at the extremity of North
