She came down, the men said, like a singed turkey.  The flames illuminated her as she descended.  There was a great deal of laughter in the crowd, but I was shocked.  Temple shared the painful impression produced on me.  I cannot express my relief when the old woman was wrapped in the blanket which had broken her descent, and stood like a blot instead of a figure.  I handed a sovereign to the three men, complimenting them on the humanity of their dispositions.  They cheered us, and the crowd echoed the cheer, and Temple and I made our way back to the two girls:  both of us lost our pocket-handkerchiefs, and Temple a penknife as well.  Then the engines arrived and soused the burning houses.  We were all in a crimson mist, boys smoking, girls laughing and staring, men hallooing, hats and caps flying about, fights going on, people throwing their furniture out of the windows.  The great wall of the Bench was awful in its reflection of the labouring flames—­it rose out of sight like the flame-tops till the columns of water brought them down.  I thought of my father, and of my watch.  The two girls were not visible.  ‘A glorious life a fireman’s!’ said Temple.

The firemen were on the roofs of the houses, handsome as Greek heroes, and it really did look as if they were engaged in slaying an enormous dragon, that hissed and tongued at them, and writhed its tail, paddling its broken big red wings in the pit of wreck and smoke, twisting and darkening-something fine to conquer, I felt with Temple.

A mutual disgust at the inconvenience created by the appropriation of our pocket-handkerchiefs by members of the crowd, induced us to disentangle ourselves from it without confiding to any one our perplexity for supper and a bed.  We were now extremely thirsty.  I had visions of my majority bottles of Burgundy, lying under John Thresher’s care at Dipwell, and would have abandoned them all for one on the spot.  After ranging about the outskirts of the crowd, seeking the two girls, we walked away, not so melancholy but that a draught of porter would have cheered us.  Temple punned on the loss of my watch, and excused himself for a joke neither of us had spirit to laugh at.  Just as I was saying, with a last glance at the fire, ‘Anyhow, it would have gone in that crowd,’ the nice good girl ran up behind us, crying, ‘There!’ as she put the watch-chain over my head.

‘There, Temple,’ said I, ‘didn’t I tell you so?’ and Temple kindly supposed so.

The girl said, ’I was afraid I’d missed you, little fellow, and you’d take me for a thief, and thank God, I’m no thief yet.  I rushed into the crowd to meet you after you caught that old creature, and I could have kissed you both, you’re so brave.’

‘We always go in for it together,’ said Temple.

I made an offer to the girl of a piece of gold.  ‘Oh, I’m poor,’ she cried, yet kept her hand off it like a bird alighting on ground, not on prey.  When I compelled her to feel the money tight, she sighed, ’If I wasn’t so poor!  I don’t want your gold.  Why are you out so late?’