ghr airtropolig.

The annual report of Mr. Simon, the Medical Officer of the City of London, to the Commissioners of Sewers, which has been published this week, is an interesting and valuable contribution to sanatory literature. Our space will not allow more than an abridged notice of its leading facts and suggestions.

The rate of mortality for the City population of 125,000 has been just be- low 22 deaths (21-92) out of every 1000 living persons, in the year ending

Se • receding year it had been 30 in 1000. Some large share

of en due to circumstances beyond human control, but the causes of disease has been efficted by the Com- ., _ , le portion of the improvement may be ascribed to .

er its auspioes. Over the country under the sur- 74111,044-. isy.r1.-- !..c,f, 1, the extreme rates of mortality arc 14 per 1000

as the highest ; the low average belonging to "k" d, and the high one to Liverpool. For the whole

W'crO gland the rate is 19 per 1000. Mr. Simon makes t 'few competent persons will doubt that the mor- tality of London might kpeedily be reduced toll's level of any district =or- et reined& by tkestegistrar-Gessas1" "and he clenches his-reasons far belitff'llyithe stet( limit thatcarizing dhe present year "there was

one satib-distriet dof thesCity,of LoncluifUnion--,one comprising from 12,000

to 00 inhabitants—a:Lamb*, after iineandinge. due proportion of deaths whit% had occurred in thellUnIon Waft/rinse -at 'Mile-end, the mortality stood at only 15 in the thourand ; one in which, if those extramural deaths had been excluded, the local death-rate for the year would have been only 13-32."

A detailed consideration of the sickness and mortality of his reports dis- closes some points of-interest in respect to the ages at which death occurs, the-particular causes of death, and the very important local differences of death-rate. The City of London appears to be peculiarly fatal to infant life. Of the whole -3799 deaths lest-year, 131$ occurred under -the age of five years ; of the whole 2752 deaths this year, 1032 occurred under the age of .five years. In the City of London Union, the deaths of infants under five years old was 1-2-66 of the whole deaths, though their class numbers only 1-11-09 of the whole population ; so that they died at more than four times (4-17) the rate which should have befallen them as participators in the average mortality of their district. This rate is not caused by inappropriate diet, for it is highest during the first year of birth, while the child depends for nourishment on its mother. Inasmuch as the few days of these wretched children are passed mainly within doors, their high mortality gives the least fallacious index of the unwholesomeness of the dwellings in which they the —affords the corrected material to judge the sanatory condition of a district. Upwards of 1200 of the deaths in the past two years have been due to cholera and epidemic causes which were avoidable ; a large number beyond were referrible to local and removeable causes. It is notable that " the pro- portionate mortality from scarlatina, measles, and hooping-cough, is greatest where the general death-rate is greatest." Among infants, too, under aims- hr circumstances, other diseases not commonly accounted specific assume a frequency and fatality warranting the belief that they are of endemic and avoidable origin. The hydrocephalus, convulsions, diarrhcca, bronchitis, and pneumonia, often referred to the irritation of teething, " prevail in district localities, with so marked a proportion to the causes of other endemic disease, that we may be sure a their partial and considerable dependence on those local causes." The local differences of death-rate are strikingly exemplified by comparison of the healthiest with the unhealthiest wards of the City. In Cordwamer's ward not a single death, and in Cornhill ward only two deaths, occurred from epidemic, endemic, or infectious diseases ; in the ward of Cripple- gate-without there were 299, of Bishopsgate-without 329, of Farringdon- without 845. The local predilections of cholera are marked and obstinate : they are not identical-with those of fever; many of the worst fever-nests were unaffected by it, while it visited spacious and airy houses along the main thoroughfare of the City, and inhabited by opulent tradesmen, members of the professions, and officers of assurance companies,—as along the lines of Fleet Street, Ludgate Hill, Farringclon Street, and New Bridge Street. The conditions of its local preference stern to be these. "A peculiar condition of soil, of which dampness is one sure and invariable character, and organic decomposition (promoted by dampness) probably another. Its local affinities have much analogy to those of ague, and often appear identical in their range with the sphere of malarious infection." These conditions are ex- actly supplied by Farringdon and New Bridge Street—the line of the Old- bourne (whence Holborn) or river Fleet, now converted into a great sewer, and by the districts on the other side of London Wall from Bishopsgate to Aldersgate—a district described by Stow as in olden times " moorish rotten ground, impassable but for cawswaies purposely made to that intent "—"a knne or moore, made maine and hard ground by divers sluices." In a second division of his report Mr. Simon offers suggestions under the head of drainage, water-supply, offensive and injurious trades, burial-grounds, and the habitations and social condition of the poor. "With respect to drainage, Mr. Simon, upon the authority of Stow, supported by professional observation of the nature of the prevalent diseases in those localities, thinks it highly probable that some of the sanatory defects of Cripplegate and Biah- opsgate "depend less on defective house-drainage than on a still marshy un- drained condition of the ground itself; and that these defects, including the liability to cholera, would be removed by an efficient application of subsoil drainage." He therefore recommends the adoption of measures to relieve the parts where the subsoil drainage is imperfect, and for protecting the house.foundations, and sewers, and subsoil adjacent to the river, from being soaked or flooded by the tide. He con,iders how far the offensive exhala- tions from sewers, which are not and cannot be entirely prevented by the best sorts of stench-traps, can be nullified by chemical means : he believes chemical means are not available to abolish the annoyance, but that the ob- servance of some good cardinal principles would greatly abate it. The third and last division of his report gives a connected series of suggestions for em- bodiment in the act of Parliament under which the Commission has its powers. I. clause which would give you control over the supply and distributi m of water, would enable you in your corporate capacity to contract with any person or any company for the total senice of the City, and would authorize you to defray the expenses of such contract by certain specified rates. •

"2. A clause empowering you to require that every trade or manufacture practised within the City shall be carried on with such precautions, and with such available improvements from time to time, as shall reduce to the lowest practicable amount, whatever nuisance or inconvenience to the neighbourhood is apt to arise therefrom.

"3. Such change in the definition affixed in your 91st clause as would render this operative for the regulation and improvement of a larger number of houses ; said such addition to the clause as would enable you, on the joint certificate of your Officer of Health and Surveyor, to enforce the opening of additional windows where requisite for the proper ventilation of houses. "4. A clause permitting and empowering you, on sufficient medical testimony, to remove, or to call upon the Board of Guardians to remove, from any lodging-house within the new definition of your act, any person diseased with fever or other in- fectious malady, whose continuance there would endanger the lives of other in- mates.

"5. A clause prohibiting the occupation of under-ground cellars for the pm poses of dwelling. "6. A clause prohibiting the keeping of cattle in or under dwelling-houses.

" 7. A clause vesting in the Commission a right to purchase houses by jury valua- tion, in any case where they shall determine that such houses are permanently un- wholesome and unfit for human habitation, or that their alteration or removal is ne- cessary for the public health.

" 8. A clause enabling the Commission to control all further encroachments on spaces which are now open within the City; so that on ground now (within a

"9. A clause to protect the purity and wholesomeness of human food, as sold within the City, by affixing penalties to its exposure for sale in any adulterated, de- cayed, or corrupted condition, which may impair its fitness for consumption."

A deputation from the Metropolitan Sanitary Association last week had an interview with Lord Seymour, the first Commissioner of Woods and Forests, at his official residence, to urge on him the distress and disap- pointment of the public that nothing has been done towards improving the very defective means of removing public and private nuisances and pre- venting contagious diseases. A memorial WAS presented which strongly embodied the principal defects of the Nuisances Removal and Contagious Diseases Prevention Act. "The maohinery and modes of procedure indicated for the removal Of nui- sances in the present act have been proved to be inaomplete and unne- cessarily complex ; so troublesome, indeed, and imperfect, that the act rem- niouly called Michael Angelo Taylor's Act (an act in itself found insufficient) is now employed in many places in lieu of the 'Nuisances Removal Act. In .greater nuisances the act has.been inoperative, or attended with so much trouble, expense, and uncertainty, that -boards.of g,uardiansand parishes have felt themselves ju.stified in throwing every obstacle, in the place of every facility, in the way of its application. • * • Plague, yellow fever, and cholera, are the only diseases against which 'the act appears to 'have been framed; yet plague has been unknown in this country for centuries, and yellow fever never prevails in this Latitude. It is true, as has been eminently shown, that cholera may become epidemic ; but even against it the powers of the sot have proved quite inefficient. While the legisla- tive enactment provides against diseases which do not prevail in this coun- try, and imperfectly against cholera, it entirely neglects the ordinary epi- demics which inflict the real suffering and loss on the community. Against typhus, scarlatina, smallpox, &c. it affords no means of protection; while it is distinctly proved that the sum of mortality and subsequent wretched- ness which they produce is, on the aggregate, infinitely greater than that which results from the occasional prevalence-of a pestilence -as severe as even cholera itself."

The meincrial therefore prayed the Chief Commissioner to introduce at the earliest possible period of the session an amending bill, and to take other proper steps to change a state of things "proved on overwhelming testimony to be to great extent remediable by wise and efficient measures of prevention." Some very general suggestions having been made by Dr. Gavin and others, Lord Seymour observed- " At the close of last session, the communication I had from you was simply one requesting alterations in the Nuisances Removal Act. At that time, from the lateness of the session, it was impossible to do anything. I believe we are all agreed upon the general principles; and what I want now is practical suggestions, and to know how you mean to proceed. The only suggestion yet made is that the act should be made permanent ; but as the functions of the Board of Health will cease in a few years, it would be ne- cessary to alter that act also."

Mr. Rogers—" The act could he made coexistent with it." Lord Seymour—" But that would not be apermanent arrangement. What I particularly want to know is, what amendments you propose in the act. I shall be very glad to consider these amendments; but I cannot undertake to bring in any act and present it for the sanction of the House, unless I am aware of the precise nature of the amendments, and have time to consider them."

It was understood that written suggestions should be laid before Lord Seymour, and he engaged that they should be carefully considered.

The strong case in favour of remitting the duty on paper, has brought the advocates of that case before the public as the beginners of an agi-

tation intended to bear upon the intentions of the full-pursed Chancellor of the Exchequer when Parliament reassembles. A numerous meeting on the subject was held at the London Tavern on Thursday evening. Mr. Cowan, M.P., the paper-manufacturer, presided—unwillingly, he said, and because some wealthy manufacturers oppose a movement which will bring competing capital into their trade. Mr. Milner Gibson, 31.P., and Mr. Peter Borthwick, made speeches ; and a letter was read from Mr. Joseph Hume, declaring that the "entire repeal must be ob- tained." In his opening speech, Mr. Cowan forcibly sketched the op- pressive limitations which clog the manufacturer— "-At the beginning of the century there were twenty-seven exciseable articles ; of which there remain but six or seven at the present time. Of

these there is but one article which bears on the face of it prima facie evi- dence of the duty having been charged by means of the label fastened on it : that article is paper. The absence of this label subjects the manufacturer to

a tax of 101.; it used to be 100/. There is but one article subject to deten-

tion for a single moment after the duty has been charged : that article is paper. Yet one would think that it should be the other way, in consequence of paper bearing the label on the face of it. But the contrary is the fact, for the Excise obliges the manufacturer to keep his paper twenty-four hours before he can send it out ; and this time is calculated from the period when the officer visits his work. The process of charging the paper is also a pecu- liar one, for the paper label which is pasted on must be dry before the duty is charged. When this has to be done with regard to every description of paper and on every ream, and wheninoreover it has to be weighed and wrapped up by the officer, it imposes an amount of labour and consumes a quantity of time, which is very singular in this so-called free-trade country. If so much time were uselessly expended in the manufacture of any other articles—such as gloves, for instance—it would not be allowed to continue a week, for the voice of the country would be instantly raised against it. It is because the paper-manufacturers are a small body scattered over the country, and are not concentrated in a particular locality li e the manufacturers of Birming- ham and Sheffield, that these unfair restrictions are allowed to continue. Mr. Cowan showed the meeting some paper made in Gloucestershire from wheat- straw ; the cost of the raw material was 2s. a hundredweight, and the tax on the manufactured result is 14s. 9d. per hundredweight. Sir Robert Peel took off a duty on cotton which was only five-sixteenths or rather less than a third of a penny per pound ; but here the tax is more than a penny-half- penny per pound; the tax is 700 or 800 per cent on the original value of the article ; it is therefore a tax on labour. In Paris, 30,000 females find em- ployment in making paper boxes ; so that in that metropolis small purchases are presented, not in white-brown paper, but in elegant little boxes; those boxes come into this rountry at ten per cent on their value, but if they were made in this country they would be taxed 200 per cent on the value of the material.

Mr. Cassell, a cheap publisher, gave statements having another sort of interest—

He was publishing a history of England for the working classes, which was brought out in sixpenny volumes ; and when the work was completed the tax paid to the Government would not be less than 2001. If the tax

were repealed, it would enable the publishers of cheap literature to employ and pay the first authors of the day, said to issue the publications in a neat

and handsome garb that would adorn the shelves of the working classes.

He could tell them that there was nearly 300/. of taxation upon every im- pression of the Working Man's Friend. It had been alleged that if the tax

were taken off the country would be flooded with the vilest publications : but his opinion'was precisely the reverse, for he believed if the tax were taken off that the people of England would not be bamboozled with cant and bal-

derdash; they would demand good and sound literature, and if it -were given to them they would -understand it. As it is they prefer the translation of French literature to our own bad and trashy writing. In his own case, he had given in the Werkinf Man's _Friend an opportunity to the working classes to write in that periodical for themselves; and the result had been, that 596 articles had been furnished by the working men of England in the -course of ten months. Be had not been able to insert the whole of thaw articles, but he had printed and published 130 of them all of which had been contributed by blacksmiths, colliers, and almost all 'sorts of working men. To those men he had awarded prizes and 130 books in payment of their writing, and 130 volumes had been given away. In no ease had he been salted upon in the distribution for a low class of literature, but on the con- trary for the very highest 'that could be commanded. 'It was evident, there- fore, that if the working classes possessed a cheap and healthy literature they would buytheir magazine or newspaper-to read at homeinstead °fagging into all sorts of plaoes to spend their money."

Mr. Torthwiek said, the object of the meeting was, to appeal:to her Majesty's Government in the ensuing session, as to whether they meant to pay the debt of honour they had incurred when Sir Henry Parnell's -Committee -reported— That Committee sat for the purpose of inquiring from which cif all the excise-duties the people had the most urgent claim upon the Govenutient for relief. The Committee specified three of those duties—the first was glass, the second leather, the third paper. The Goveniment of that day., like certain wise persona, thought that there was nothing like leather, and accordingly they began with loather. That was always the way with governments : they were tolerably sure to begin at the wrong end, and so they had in the cases of leather, glass, and paper. But they now Stood on the ground of paper, and he appealed from Downing Street to the master of Downing Street—the public.

Mr. Holyoake, a loader of the Chartists, moved an addition by way of amendment to the original resolution with the object of comprehending the newspaper-stamp and the advertisement-duty, within the scope of the agitation for repeal — "The resolution, with the amendment attached, was more likely to enlist the general sympathy of the people. It would prevent this from being eon- considered a class movement, and would elevate it to the digidty of one re- posing on public principle. The gentlemen on the platform well knew that the poor man could not now obtain a newspaper : only the rich man could -have a new spaper; and was the working man, when he was condemned to feed upon garbage, to be blamed for the depravity of his taste ? Mr. 'Milner Gibson would put the whole question before the Government and the House of Commons, and it would be shown presently that there was a chance of all three of these propositions being earned." Mr. Milner Gibson willingly spoke in favour of the enlarged propo- sition— In Parliament, be bad thus brought forward the question as a whole, be- cause he saw something like a principle in it. He did not put it its qestion of surplus or no surplus; but he said that the imposition of a tax on }mow- ledge was not sound in policy, and that therefore, whether there was a sur- plus or no surplus, it was the duty of those who had the conduct of public affuirs to make such financial arrangements as would enable Parliament to dispense with a description of taxes which were unfit to remain a permanent source of revenue. Statesmen might put off' the question on financial grounds, but the fact was not to be disguised, that there was amongst many of them a latent fear of the spread of the knowledge of faces amongst the working classes.

The Chairman declared his belief that Mr. Holyoake's amendment ex- pressed the real desires of all the meeting. The resolution was put as amended, and carried by acclamation.

The committee of the Association for Promoting the Belief of Dsrai- tution in the Metropolis, and for improving the condition of the poor by means of parochial and district visiting, under the eapenin- tendence of the Bishop of London and clergy, have made a report of the progress of the various provident societies in connexion with the association. During the past year the deposits of the poor so aided were, 36 societies, 28,552 depositors, and the amount 13,8664 In 1845 there were only 12 societies, 3744 depositors, and the amount 1451/.

The last day of the Old Year was to have seen the Crystal Palace closed in, and in a fit date for the reception of the contributions of ex- hibitors. The accomplishment of so rreat an undertaking within the time allotted was scarcely to be expected, and the difficulty is said to have been increased by an enlargement of the building beyond the dimensions at first stipulated, in order to give additional space to the superabundant articles that claim the privilege of admission. The representations of the state of progress which have appeared in the daily papers, however, sus- tained the hope that all would be finished by the 1st of January 1851; and the numerous visitors who had been invited on Tuesday last, in the anticipation of witnessing the consummation of the work, wore dis- appointed at seeing the very unfinished state of the building. In fact, a considerable portion was not yet covered in, the whole of the transept was unglazed, the flooring was laid down on only a very small part, and none of the staircases to the galleries were erected. Instead of beholding a palace ready for the reception of works of art and manufacture, a busy scene of unfinished operations was presented, and we should suppose that a month's hard work is still required to make the shell and flooring of the structure complete. "With respect to the internal appearance of the building," a correspondent apprehends, "much disappointment will be felt by those who have placed reliance on the glowing accounts and pretty pictures of the Crystal Palace which have appeared. The exterior is far - more imposing than is the view within. The height is not sufficient, in proportion to the extent of the area enclosed, to produce a grand effect : even in its present state, with the galleries only partially erected, the glass roof seLms low, especially when viewed frorn end to end, and it conveys the notion of an immense glass shed, rather than realizes the idea of a fair/ palace constructed by the genius of Aladdin's lamp. The row of trees within the transept is (in our correspondent's opinion) a great disfigurement of the interior. They seem to fill up almost the entire space, and even in their leafless state to darken the ground below. Their extraordinary appearance from the South entrance of the building will spoil the effect of what would otherwise have been the best because the loftiest part of the structure. The impression produced by the interior, in its empty condition, is not certainly one of beauty or of grandeur, but merely of vastness • and however excellent as a work of engineering skill, its merits are not of a kind to excite general admiration as a work of architectural design."

Parliament Street is still closed and barricaded against the public traffic ; and the great sewer, though closed along the greater part of its route, continues nevertheless an insufferable nuisance. A few days ago, the deep and dangerous sewer, which was open in Parliament Street, and flanked on either side by mountains of stinking mud and other pestiferous materials, was closed up except a small portion of it at the West end of

the street, and the mountains were removed, when the inhabitants and the public were congratulating themselves on being about to be relieved of the nuisance and the inconvenience ; but they were disappointed. Fresh cuttings have been made on each side, and the prospect of a cessa- tion from this labour of annoyance appears distant and uncertain. A large wall of bricks forbids any encroachment on Parliament Street from the West, and a formidable combination of planks, barrows, bricks, and -other materials, prevents intrusion from the East ; while uncovered cess- spools warn the traveller, who is courageous enough to thread the laby- rinths of Parliament Street, that he is in a dangerous locality. At the -entrance to Whitehall Gardens a deep hole gapes with open mouth to de- vour the incautious traveller who approaches it ; and behind the Chapel _Royal a steam-engine continues to puff and pant and take up sewage-water, to the great annoyance of the inhabitants and the passers by. Behind the United Service Museum men are at work digging away, with might and main, throwing up mud and pulling down some fine old trees. In 'Scotland Yard the sewer has been closed in and nearly paved over, and that at all times crowded and inconvenient thoroughfare is again open to the public. At the mouth of the sewer, the scene of the late fatal acci- , dent, the works are still in progress, but how near completion we could ,not aseertain.—Globe, January 2.

Mr. Sloane was reaamined at Guildhall on Monday, on the charge of -.cruelty to his servant, Jane Wilbred ; and was fully committed for trial. He was liberated on bail to the amount of 500/. and his own recognizances for a further sum of 500/. Mrs. Sloane continues in concealment. The Guardians of the Poor of the West London Union have offered a reward of 201. for her discovery and apprehension. Mr. Sloane's solicitor has stated 'that she will surrender without hesitation when the day, of trial arrives. Jane Wilbred, under kind treatment, has lost her emaciated appearance, and isresuming her natural aspect of a very well-grown and pleasingly-featured :girl; her face is described as "beaming with animation."

At Marylebone Police Office, on Saturday, William Reed was charged with uttering atrocious threats against Mr. Potter, one of the Guardians of the parish. Reed went to Mr. Potter, and demanded relief; threatened to put a Imife 171 him," when he referred Reed to the proper officers. Before the Magistrate, he avowed that he still intended to murder Mr. Potter. He was slithered to find sureties to keep the peace for six months, and sent to prison for that term in default.

Five boys, the eldest only fourteen, have been committed by the Clerken- well Magistrate for a burglary at Bing,sland. While one of them held a ser- vant in talk at the front-door, the others entered at the back of the house _and carried off divers articles, which were afterwards found secreted in an .unfinished building. Mr. 'I'yrwhitt said it was very distressing to see child- ren of so tender an age in such a serious situation. Sergeant Judd said that, young as they were they were well-known thieves, and "struck terror to the minds of old and weakminded housekeepers."

James Hofield was brought up again before the Stratford Magistrates on "Monday, charged with negligently driving his engine—that of the Enfield eapress train—into the slow Hertford train, on the Eastern Counties Rail- way, on the foggy day of the 23d December. Solicitors appeared for him in defence, and for the Company in prosecution. The evidence taken was that of Blake the guard, Barnes the driver, and Feitch the fireman of the Hert- tool train, Murray the station-master, with Annett, Moore, and Randal, subordinate officers at the Stratford station. The first three witnesses proved that the Hertford train started from London at 4-213p. In., eight minutes late, proceeded slowly, and yet overtook the Brentwood train, and was obliged on account of that train to stop at Bow, where otherwise it had no call to stop ; its engine touched the buffers of the last carriage of the Brent- wood train in pulling up at Bow. Thus slow in starting and proceeding, -directions were left at Bow to look out for and stop for ten minutes the En- field express-train, which was following in the wake of the slow trains, and had become due at Bow while they were still staying there. The slow trains estarted at intervals, and arrived at Stratford ; and just as the hindmost one was leaving Stratford, the Enfield express-train ran up at twenty miles an lour, smashed the rear carriages, and caused the serious mutilation of many passengers. It seems that the Bow station-master did not stop the Enfield express-train ; only one fog-signal was exploded before that trans,—a notice which only enjoined caution ; two signals were at first put down, which enjoin stoppage, but the pointsman having learned by tele- graph that the line was clear up to a particular spot, he removed the second eignal ; Hofield therefore had only checked his engine at the first signal, and on finding no second signal had resumed his full pace. With regard to pace, it was proved to be a "rule," that in fog no train should pass a station at a ssreater rate than three miles an hour ; and another "rule," that between

whopsgate and Stratford trains must travel at such a reduced speed as to enable the enginemen to stop almost instantaneously" ; but it was equally proved to be the " practice," that the trains went at rates solely in the dis- cretion of the drivers; that rates from fifteen to thirty miles an hour were habitual in passing stations, while any remonstrance against such habit was unknown ; and that stopping " instantly " was an absurdity—" I never heard of such a thing," said Barnes, an old driver ; "if I were going at eight miles an hour, I might by some great effort pull up in thirty yards." -It appears that fifty-two trains stop at Stratford in the course of the day.

In defence of Hofield, Mr. Rawlins strongly urged the impossibility of fol- lowing out the rules as to pace, and the absence of protective accuracy in the starting of the trains. " First, there was the Brentwood train at twenty minutes past four, which was started late ; then there was the Hertford train at half-past four, which was also late ; then the Enfield express, at a quarter to fire, and again the Norwich express at five." Then, what were the precautions on the journey ? "The line was telegraphed for him all right; and he did what he was bound to do, to save his train, passengers, and his own life, from being run into by the Norwich express—he went on." The Magistrates consulted privately on their judgment for a quarter of an /hour. Mr. Cotton, the Chairman, then gave their judgment for the dis-

advantage. He had the honour of knowing several of the Directors, and he felt sure that they would be as anxious as they were to adopt every pos- sible precaution. They would not consider the question of despatching slow trains after express-trains, but how far they were justified in sending express. trains immediately after slow ones, and how far their efficient arrangements would permit such a traffic."

A range of premises used as stables and farm buildings on the residential property of Mr. Jacob Bell, the newly-elected Member for St. Alban's, at Wandsworth, was burnt down on Thursday night. The fire is attributed "without doubt" to some incendiary.