distance, were flitting to and fro across what seemed the mouth of
the fire.

"The flames increased, multiplied at one point after another, till by
ten o'clock that night one seemed to be looking down upon Dante's
Inferno, and to hear the multitudinous moan and wail of the lost
spirits, surging to and fro amid the sea of fire.

"Right behind Brandon Hill rose the central mass of fire, till the
little mound seemed converted into a volcano, from the peak of which the
flame streamed up, not red above, but delicately green and blue, pale
rose, and pearly white, while crimson sparks leapt and fell again in the
midst of that rainbow, not of hope, but of despair; and dull explosions
down below mingled with the roar of the mob, and the infernal hiss and
crackle of the flames.

"Higher and higher the fog was scorched upward by the fierce heat below,
glowing through and through with red, reflected glare, till it arched
itself into one vast dome of red-hot iron, fit roof for all the madness
below; and beneath it, miles away, I could see the lonely tower of
Dundry Church shining red--the symbol of the old Faith--looking down in
stately wonder and sorrow upon the fearful birth-throes of a new age."

* * * * *

When morning dawned on Monday, help really seemed at hand, and five
thousand men obeyed the call for the _posse comitatus_, and, furnished
with a short staff and a strip of white linen round their arm as a
badge, did good service for the restoration of order. Shops were all
closed, business suspended, and the soldiers, and the naval and military
pensioners, under Captain Cook, cleared the streets, and peace seemed in
a fair way of being restored.

Peace, and at what a price! Wreck and ruin everywhere; Queen's Square, a
mass of burning rubbish, strewn, too, with the charred bodies of those
who had fallen in the fray. At night, by order of the Mayor, the
churches and houses were lighted up, and the soldiers guarded the
streets.

Transcriber's note: The footnote was placed, without an anchor,
at this point in the original.

[Footnote: _Vide_ "Charles Kingsley's Life," vol. i., p. 21.]

But it was not till after the fifth of November, when an outburst of
Protestant and Anti-Reform zeal was expected, that the law-abiding
people of Bristol and its surrounding neighbourhood felt safe. During
the whole of that week watch and ward was kept, and all demonstrations
were repressed.

Th