the company’s treasure and effects, as it was easy to foresee that no distance was a protection against the rage of such a fire, where so little was done to put a stop to it; for all this time the Chinese contented themselves with viewing it, and now and then holding one of their idols near it, which they seemed to expect should check its progress:  However, at last, a mandarine came out of the city, attended by four or five hundred firemen:  These made some feeble efforts to pull down the neighbouring houses; but by this time the fire had greatly extended itself, and was got amongst the merchants’ warehouses; and the Chinese firemen, wanting both skill and spirit, were incapable of checking its violence; so that its fury increased upon them, and it was feared the whole city would be destroyed, in this general confusion the viceroy himself came thither, and the commodore was sent to, and was entreated to afford his assistance, being told that he might take any measures he should think most prudent in the present emergency.  And now he went thither a second time, carrying with him about forty of his people; who, upon this occasion, exerted themselves in such a manner, as in that country was altogether without example:  For they were rather animated than deterred by the flames and falling buildings, amongst which they wrought; so that it was not uncommon to see the most forward of them tumble to the ground on the roofs, and amidst the ruins of houses, which their own efforts brought down with them.  By their boldness and activity the fire was soon extinguished, to the amazement of the Chinese; and the building being all on one floor, and the materials slight, the seamen, notwithstanding their daring behaviour, happily escaped with no other injuries, than some considerable bruises.  The fire, though at last thus luckily extinguished, did great mischief during the time it continued; for it consumed an hundred shops and eleven streets full of warehouses, so that the damage amounted to an immense sum; and one of the Chinese merchants, well known to the English, whose name was Succoy, was supposed, for his own share, to have lost near two hundred thousand pounds sterling.  It raged indeed with unusual violence, for in many of the warehouses, there were large quantities of camphor, which greatly added to its fury, and produced a column of exceeding white flame, which shot up into the air to such a prodigious height that it was plainly seen on board the Centurion, though she was thirty miles distant.

Whilst the commodore and his people were labouring at the fire, and the terror of its becoming general still possessed the whole city, several of the most considerable Chinese merchants came to Mr Anson, to desire that he would let each of them have one of his soldiers (for such they styled his boat’s crew from the uniformity, of their dress) to guard their warehouses and dwellings-houses, which, from the known dishonesty of the populace, they feared would be pillaged in the tumult.  Mr Anson granted them this request; and all the men that he thus furnished to the Chinese behaved greatly to the satisfaction of their employers, who afterwards highly applauded their great diligence and fidelity.