"Sha'n't I help you?" asked Bog, who always proffered his services on
these occasions.
"Pooh! no. It's baby play for me." By this time Uncle Ith had evoked the
second gruff note from the deep throat of the imprisoned monster below.
Then came a third in quicker succession, and louder, as if the bell had
warmed up to the work, and then other notes, until the district had been
struck; and then the bell, as if rejoicing in its strength to resist
blows, murmured plaintively for a repetition of them. Long before this
sad sound had died away, the deep bass of the City Hall bell, the shrill
tenor of the Post Office bell, and the intermediate pitches of the bells
all over the city, had taken up the chorus of alarm. There was a rattle
of engines, hose carriages, and hook-and-ladder trucks through the
streets. There was a frantic rush of men and boys, some with cumbrous
fire-caps on their heads, and putting on their coats as they ran. How
they knew the location of the fire, none could guess, for it had not yet
streamed out against the sky; but know it they did; and the dove goes to
its cote not more directly than they centred from all parts of the
district upon the exact spot of the fire.
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