lustration: LUD-GATE ON FIRE.]

When the fire stopped the people sat down to consider the losses they
had sustained and the best way out of them.

St. Paul's Cathedral, that ancient and venerable edifice, with its thick
walls and roof so lofty, that it seemed as if no fire but the fire from
heaven could reach it, was a pile of ruins, the walls of the nave and
transept standing, the choir fallen into the crypt below. The Parish
churches to the number of 88 were burned: the Royal Exchange--Gresham's
Exchange--was down and all the statues turned into lime, with the
exception of Gresham's alone: nearly all the great houses left in the
City, the great nobles' houses, such as Baynard's Castle, Coldharbour,
Bridewell Palace, Derby House, were in ashes: all the Companies' Halls
were gone: warehouses, shops, private residences, palaces and
hovels--everything was levelled with the ground and burned to ashes.
Five-sixths of the City were destroyed: an area of 436 acres was covered
with the ruins: 13,200 houses were burned: it is said that 200,000
persons were rendered homeless--an estimate which would give an average
of 15 residents to each house. Probably this is an exaggeration. The
houseless people, however, formed a kind of camp in Moorfields just
outside the wall, where they lived in tents, and cottages hastily run
up. The place now called Finsbury Square stands on the site of this
curious camp.

[Illustration: PAUL PINDAR'S HOUSE.]

We ask ourselves in wonder how life was resumed after so great a
calamity. The title deeds to houses and estates were burned--who would
claim and prove the right to property? The account books were all
lost--who could claim or prove a debt? The warehouses and shops with
their contents were gone--who could carry on business? The craftsmen had
lost their employment--how were they to live?

Of debts and rents and mortgages and all such things, little could be
said. It was not a time to speak of the past. They must think of the
future: they must all begin the world anew.

53. THE TERROR OF FIRE.

PART II.

They must begin the world anew. For most of the merchants nothing was
left to them but their credit--their good name: try to imagine the havoc
caused by burning all the docks, warehouses, wharves, quays, and shops
in London at the present day with nothing at all insured!

[Illustration: LONDON, AS REBUILT AFTER THE FIRE.]

But the citizens of London were not the kind of people t