The man with the mask :: :: University of Virginia Library

“A fight! A fight!” resounded from the opposite
side of the street, and in a moment the
engines ceased to play, while the glare of the
burning house revealed the faces of a dense
crowd, tossed to and fro, in inextricable confusion.

It was a Fireman's fight.

Before we gaze upon the features of this
exciting scene, let us lightly sketch a few
prominent characteristics of the Philadelphia
Fireman.

A mysterious character is the Fireman of
the Quaker City. At the sound of the Bell,
he starts from his slumber, and hurries forth
but half clad, eager to battle with the flames,
and save the property of the rich man from
destruction. He calls no hour of the twenty-four
his own. He has no hearing but for the
sound of the fire-bell. His only idea ef motion
is an engine or hose carriage, hurled along
the streets, by the impulse of vigorous arms.
Music to him is only found in the brass horn,
through which the voice of the engineer rings in
hoarse emphasis, exclaiming “Give way!”
“Let her drive!” or “Wake up Snappers!”
or “Here we are Hornets!” or some expression
of similar eloquence and rough Saxon
energy. Happy is the Fireman who “carries
the horn!” The Horn is the climax of your
incipient fireman's idea of glory. “To carry
the Horn” in the thought of the Fireman, is
as important and as glorious, as twenty-five
per cent in good paper, is to the Third Street
Broker.

The Engine or Hose Carriage is the centre
of all the fireman's thoughts. He lives in the
life of “the machine” — a new-fangled term
lately introduced from New York, and not recognized
by Orthodox Firemen. Her frontis-piece,
the amount of polish of which her brass is
capable, the height which she plays, and the
speed with which she runs — these are the
only topics which occupy the attention of the
true Fireman.

The soldier goes to battle in a gay uniform,
and faces death for pay or for glory. The
Fireman battles with flames, with falling
rafters, with the chances of disease, and very
often the certainty of an untimely death, and
battles always without pay, very often without
a word of thanks. His only glory is in action;
he seems to be possessed with a monomania
that forces him to devote time, health, strength
— very often life — to the good of other people,
who too often call him a ruffian and
a blackguard, by way of recompense.

The Knights of old were divided into
classes, ranks, and orders. So are the Modern
Knights: the Firemen of the Quaker City.

There is the Fireman Dandy who sports
white kids on Chesnut street, and yet is always
ready to tear them off at the first tap of the
State House Bell. This Fireman belongs to
an aristocratic company, composed of staid
citizens and gentlemen of the counting-house.
They have a great supper once a year, and
rather pride themselves upon their elegant

equipments, the long established name of their
company, the respectable standing of their
members, to say nothing of the neat little back
room in their Engine House, where no cigar
is smoked that does not breathe Havana in
every puff.

Then there is the Fireman Hero who delights
in the poetry of epithet, and always has
a feud on hand, with some rival company.
The very manner in which he dresses has
something formidable to the unsuspecting.
Hair very short behind the ears, and very long
and shiny before them; hat with wide round
rim, pitched significantly on one side of the
head, and brought down very sharply upon
one eyebrow; shirt of red flannel, adorned
with a broach of the size of a dollar, representing
some event in the Fireman's life, or
perchance the figure of a horn done in silver,
or yet again merely the initials of his company's
name.

Like the Knights of old, the Fireman Hero
affects the poetry of epithet. True he does
not call himself the Knight of the Burning
Brand, or the Knight of the Silver Fountain,
nor even the Knight of the Golden Horn.
His titles have a vigorous old-fashioned Saxon
significancy. He is a Snapper, or a Hornet,
or a Tartar — or in his more dangerous moods
— a Fairy. A Fairy six feet high, in a white
overcoat trimmed with horn buttons, and with
corduroy pantaloons inserted into the tops of
unpolished boots, would be something of a
novelty to the minds of those ignorant persons,
who have derived their ideas of Fairies, and
Fairy life, from books. There are also the
Rancheroes of the great Firemen army, who
skulking on the outskirts of the camp, take to
themselves such fearful names as Bouncers,
Rats, Killers, Screw-Drivers and Blue Injins.
These do not belong to the army of Firemen
any more than the camp followers belong to
an army of disciplined soldiers. They are
the real guerrilereroes of the Fire Department.
Terrible are they with brick-bats on a Sunday
afternoon: formidable are they, with paving
stones, on a dark night, when the number of
the enemy, is as one to twenty. Fearful are
they in noises — noises of all kinds — very
hoarse always — and sometimes very drunken.
They practice the Indian war-whoop in their
leisure hours. They prepare themselves for
the arduous work of battle, by a severe training
around piles of brick, and heaps of paving
stones. They are eloquent swearers. The
number of times, when they confirm their
statement, by invoking fierce condemnation,
upon their eyes and livers, cannot be estimated
by any known Arithmetic.

The true Firemen looks upon these Rancheroes
with especial disfavour. As the Newfoundland
Dog endures much from an ill-grained
Cur, with defective eyes and scanty tail, so
the real Firemen suffers much and suffers in
silence, from the annoyances of the Ranchero.
But as the Newfoundland dog sometimes drops
his senerity, and seizes the cur by the neck,
and shakes him at first gently, and then with
justifiable violence, so the real Firemen, at
times, is tempted to tap the Ranchero with his
closed hand, and even to adorn the Ranchero's
eyes with touches of a rich mezzotinto shadow.

To do the real Firemen the most scanty
justice, we must record the fact, that he does
more work for less pay, braves death oftener
for less glory, than any other member of the
the community. Your shrewd money-making
citizen, who never does a favor without a
direct return in the shape of coin, looks upon
the Fireman with an overflowing fullness of
contempt. Very often he rewards the Fireman
by insinuating in conversation or in the papers,
that he only extinguishes flames which he
himself has created. He rewards the Fireman
for his thankless sacrifice of self by calling him
an Incendiary. A just man and a grateful, is
your sagacious citizen.

Battles have often been described, that is
battles fought with cannon and bayonet, but
what pen shall dare attempt the description of
a Fireman's Fight?

The time midnight, or very often the small
hours, near the break of day. The combatants
some six hundred men, blocked up amid a mass
of spectators, whose faces are reddened by the
light of a blazing house. The weapons, fists,
horns, spanners, bricks, clubs, and paving
stones. The cause — a hose has been discourteously
trodden upon, or a plug has been
taken away, or a Snapper in the heat of debate
has spoken irreverently of a Hornet.
Then the war-cry resounds along the crowded
street. Then, over dripping paving stones,
and around glittering engines, and along sidewalks

slippery with mire, swells the tide of
war. You see a mass of heads, arms, fists,
horns, feet and bodies, wind into a knot, and
unwind again, to the sound of “Go it Snappers!”
and “Ha-a! Ha-a! Tartars!” The
air, by turns, darkened with cinders and red
with the glare of blazing roofs, grows thick
with brick-bats and paving stones, all on the
wing, and doing fierce work, on eyes and
crowns. The wounded fall, only to rise in
more savage wrath. The fight grows miscellaneous:
anybody can procure a broken head,
without the least trouble. All along the curbstones,
droop weary warriors with bended heads
and bleeding noses. The uninitiated who desire
a definite idea of a scene like this, have
only to remember that fine old Legend of the
Cats of Kilkenny, or to imagine the Halls
of Congress on the last night of the session.
A faint idea may be obtained in this way.

A battle like this, was now in progress, in
front of the burning mansion. How this fight
originated, after a careful search into the most
recondite branches of history, we are unable
distinctly to relate. But certain it is, that just
as the fire was beginning to yield to the combined
attacks of half a dozen engines, in front
of the mansion, and four in the rear, that the
war-cry rose, and the combat began. In a
moment hose and engine pipes were dropped.
The crowd began to roll and toss, in a huge
wave of heads and arms. Little knots of firemen
were fighting along the curbstone, while in
the centre of the street, swelled the concentrated
fury of the war. Then through the uproar
might be heard the war-shouts of the rival
clans. Wake her up Snappers! was answered
by Hey! Hornets! hey! Go it Fairies!
was mingled with Now's your time Tartars!
and Let 'em have it Injins! was greeted by
the stern response, To your duty Rats!

Horns were freely used. Brick-bats began
to hurtle through the stormy air. Along the
extent of an entire square, rolled the tide of
battle, mingling the combatants and spectators,
into one inextricable mass of heads and fists,
over which distinctly rose the figures of the
engines, glittering in the flame, like islands in
a stormy sea.

Stewel Pydgeon, Charles Lester and the
giant Peter, collected in a group, in front of
the burning house, surveyed the field of battle,
with various emotions.

“Gen'elmen respect the law,” cried Stewel,
in a voice of thunder — but alas! a blow from
some unknown fist, which shot suddenly
around the corner of the tree-box, brought
Stewel to his knees. And a second blow, administered
freely on the back of the neck,
made Stewel kiss the bricks. Thus was the
Law, brought to shame, in the person of
one of its most respectable Ministers.

Peter, in his red coat, surveyed the scene,
not precisely with eyes like saucers, but
with eyes very large, and very full of vague
astonishment.

“What air they fightin' about? How they
rap one another! They're they go! Why
don't they stand up two by two and fight it
out like men, instead o' mixin' 'emselves up
like a basket o' black cats?”

“Come — let us make our way through
the crowd,” cried Lester seizing Peter's arm:
“The Preacher disappeared in this direction.
Come, I say. Unless we pursue him now,
he will escape us altogether.”

Peter did not remark the pallid cheek and
flashing eye of his young friend.

Peter, gazing into the centre of the combat,
beheld a solitary man, fighting alone,
against a crowd of twenty. Dressed in a red
shirt, with the blood flowing freely from his
battered face, this lonely warrior, was attempting
to defend his engine, from the assault of
twenty foes. His brothers in arms were fighting
in another part of the contest. By the
chance of war, he was left alone, near the Engine
of his company, which the twenty had
resolved to deface if not destroy. But he kept
up the fight right heartily.

“Tell yer I'm one of de Fairy boys,” he
shouted as he fought through his foes — “Yer
don't smash dis engine. No yer don't. I
keeps a graveyard of my own, jist to bury
my dead. I keeps two Coroners and a depitty
busy all the year round. Go it Fairy! You
never know'd I was brought up to the business
—did yer?”

Tossing into the crowd of his enemies, the
Fairy distributed his blows with a high-toned
impartiality, that soon littered the paving stones,
with wounded and bleeding warriors. Five of
the enemy measured their length upon the

ground. But others rallied. Adding new fire
to their fury, by frequent shouts, they rushed
upon the solitary Fairy, and bore him upon
his knees. He, fighting as he fell, continued
to converse with his tongue and fists.

“I'm a Fairy — I am!” he shouted gallantly
as a hail-storm of fists, descended upon his unprotected
head.

At this crisis Peter beheld the scene. And
Peter, with a bound reached the centre of the
fray, and interposed his giant form, arrayed in
the scarlet overcoat, between the Fairy and his
ensanguined foes.

“You mus'nt crowd. It ain't perlite. Besides
I never like to see twenty wolves upon
one dog.”