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The sea ran black against a whitish and in some places bare-swept beach. The ragged clouds chased each other across the sky. We were afraid a storm was coming on. Then one of the parsonage chimneys caught on fire, and most of the soldiers came rushing up to offer help. The great fire-ladder was brought from under the storehouse.
Alarms of fire in the neighborhood frequently disturbed the quiet of the early colonial services; for the combustible catted chimneys were a constant source of conflagration, especially on Sundays, when the fireplaces with their roaring fires were left unwatched; and all the men rushed out of the meeting at sound of the alarm to aid in quenching the flames, which could however be ill-fought with the scanty supply of water that could be brought in a few leathern fire-buckets and milk-pails, though at a very early date as an aid in extinguishing fires each New England family was ordered by law to own a fire-ladder.
But an instant later the cold night air smote her in the face, from hundreds of hoarse throats a yell of welcome greeted her, and she found herself on the roof, dazed and breathless, and free. At the same moment the lifting fire-ladder reached the sill of the third-story window, and a fireman, shielding his face from the flames, peered into the blazing room.
Nobody, it appeared, was alert enough to espy that fugacious shadow on the fire-ladder. And in less than a brace of minutes P. Sybarite, at the top, was pulling himself gingerly over the lip of a stone coping.
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