LAST NIGHT BLACKENED RUINS A COSTLY LESSON.

Evening Post, Volume LXXV, Issue 32, 7 February 1908, Page 7

LAST NIGHT BLACKENED RUINS A COSTLY LESSON.

" ' ' Later. At mjdnight the block involved was like a huge inferno, the flames rising high over, the buildings and jl spreading in strange,' weird rays from tho contra of the conflagration. Hopes were) entertained for some time of saving tho 1 D.1.C., but were soon dispelled. Tho ' fire leaped like a fiend, and 'the "internal portion was burned like 1 tissue paper. Only a short half-hour sufficed to see tho fine business establishment a, mass of smouldering ruins. The, D.I.C. in its ordinary lifelinio was an industry well appointed- and heavily etoclcoti, employing quito an nrxay of handa v .Today only a few iron girderf— Mackmied and 'twisted — with threds of woodwork panging from them at long inteivalsaie all that is left of a splendid' establishment. ' , A SCENE OF DESOLATION. v The Scene to-day along Lichfield-stj'eet is desolate in the extreme. Warahouso after warehouse shows gloomy window holes,- through which tho emptiness ■within is only too painfully seen. The White Hart, Hotel in High-street was ono of the finest bujldines of tho kind in the city. It is now a blackened ruin; nothing is left but the bare wails. Tho same can ba said of all the buildings gutted. * It was fortunate tho brigade succeeded in mastoring the fire at Boath's draEery, otherwise tho adjacent buildings, eing wooden, the fire would have leaped to Colombo-street and attacked tho other largo and valuibio block opposite, in which are Ballantyne'S drapery and Recce's and Congreve's ironmongeries. A PALTRY WATER SUPPLY. The fire has taught a gr«at leswn oft tho water supply. There were only a few insignificant water tanks in the city to deal with possible fira, and now that ono of groat magnitude occurred, the insufficiency of these has been abundantly shown. It is true that the Avon rirer runs windingly through th» town, but in this case it was no&fly half a mile away, and when the tanks gave out the engines had to go to tho rh-er with all speed Tho delay occasioned by this was fatal Men's mouths to-day are full of 'the lesson, showing the need o? a high pmsure water supply, which Woujd \q (,» tft obtain.