Just then Rollo heard a very loud and hoarse voice calling out, “Hold on, No. 10! Hold on, No. 10!”
“That’s a man with a speaking-trumpet,” said Jonas.
“He means _stop_,” replied Jonas. “He wants No. 10 engine to stop here.”
The cry of the engineer, “Hold on, No. 10!” was repeated and reechoed by a great many other voices in the crowd, though it was mingled and confounded with many other noises, such as the rumbling of the wheels upon the pavement, the _dinging_ of the engine bells, and shouts and outcries from a hundred voices. At last, however, the men and boys attached to No. 10 seemed to understand that they were to “_hold on_;” and, accordingly, the engine gradually came to a stand, while the other, which was No. 6, as Rollo learned from a bright figure 6 which he saw tossing about in the air over the heads of those who were drawing it, moved on.
The men about No. 10 took out some long handles, which were secured by the side of the engine, and passed them through some iron rings, fitted to receive them; and then they all took hold, ten or fifteen men on each side ready to work the engine. Presently the order was given in the same hoarse and hollow voice from the speaking-trumpet, “Play away, No. 10!” and immediately the men began to work the long handles up and down, with quick and heavy strokes.
“Why, Jonas,” said Rollo, “what are they doing?”
“They are working this engine,” said Jonas.
“What for?” said Rollo; “they are not near the fire.”
“I suppose there is a reservoir near here,” said Jonas, “and they are driving the water from it along towards some engine that is near the fire.”
“It is a long leather pipe or tube. Come out this way, and we shall find it, I suppose, lying along the street.”
So the boys pushed their way along beyond the engine, and presently the fire itself burst upon their view in all its glory. It was a store,—one of the stores of a block which extended along the whole street. The front was of brick, and the walls between the different stores of the block were also of brick, so that nothing but the inside and the roof could burn. But the whole interior of the building was on fire, the flames issuing from the windows, and rising in a great, bright, roaring pyramid above the roof, far up into the dark sky. The whole street, except exactly opposite to the fire, where it was too hot for persons to stand, was filled with men whose faces, which were all turned towards the fire, were so brightly illuminated by the light, that Rollo could see them more distinctly than if it had been day. From the midst of a dense crowd just beyond the fire, Rollo saw a slender white thread of water mounting up in a beautiful curve, and falling over upon the flames. It was the jet from an engine; but it seemed to produce no effect upon the flame whatever.