but it helped protect the
west side of Van Ness. At 12 o'clock on the beginning of the 20th I saw
smoke coming out of the chimney of the Spreckels mansion. I went out and
spoke to a fireman, and he said he had been into the house and that it
was full of smoke and on fire. At 1 o'clock the house was on fire in the
upper rooms, at 1:30 it was blazing out of the upper windows, and in a
short time afterwards was wholly on fire. The fire caught the house from
the rear windows by the blaze from the Gorovan cottages. I feel quite
sure that if any one had been on guard inside with a bucket of water the
fire could have been put out.

When the Spreckels house was well on fire I knew, from its having an
iron frame, hollow tile partitions, and stone outside walls, there would
be no danger from the heat to my house. As I was quite tired, I told the
man Ferguson that I would go into my house and take a nap. He asked me
what room I would sleep in, and he promised if they were about to
dynamite my house, or any other danger threatened, he would knock on my
window to give me warning to get out. I went in and lay down on a lounge
in the library at 2 A. M. and slept until 5 A. M.. When I awoke and
looked out the flames were pouring from every window of the Spreckels
mansion. At 10 A. M. the house was thoroughly burned out. (The general
appearance of the house from a distance is the same as formerly, the
walls and roof remaining the same as before the fire.)

In the morning I went over to the California-Street engine-house, and
found it in ruins. Beams, pipes, iron columns, tie-rods, car-trucks, and
a tangled mass of iron-work; all that was not consumed of 32 cars,
bricks, mortar, ashes, and debris of every description filled the place.
The engine-room was hot, but I crawled into it through what was left of
the front stairway, which was nearly filled with loose bricks, and the
stone facings of the Hyde-Street front. It was a sad sight to me, for I
had something to do with it from its earliest existence. The form of
everything was there, but rods, cranks, beams, and pipes were bent and
burned, whether beyond hope of restoration I could not tell. No one was
there or on the street, and I came away with uncertain feelings. I had
hope, but whether the loss would be total or partial I could not say. A
further examination showed much damage--one shaft fourteen inches in
diameter was bent out of line one and one-quarter inches; one eight
inches i