How true it is that it requires great events to bring out latent properties in the minds of the every-day people one meets. Especially is this true of woman.
“Oh, woman, in our hours of ease,
Inconstant, shy, and hard to please;
When pain and anguish wring the brow
A ministering angel, thou.”
Another of the many instances of such devotion as Scott hints at in these lines was witnessed on that terrible night. While the fire was in progress, a fireman near the entrance on Washington street saw a strange sight. An undersized, delicate-looking woman came staggering out, carrying literally on her back and shoulders a man weighing apparently a hundred and fifty pounds. Thinking the man was hurt, assistance was offered. It appeared, however, that the man (who was the father of the girl) was paralyzed on one side, and that, fearing he would be unable to make his way out, his daughter had lifted him up bodily and carried him from the parquet to the front entrance. She desired no further help than the placing of him on a car, and left the scene before his name could be ascertained.
A Terrible Moment of Suspense.
In one of those graphic narratives of her experience on the eventful night that proved such a trying ordeal to her, and was yet borne with such high-souled self-possession, Miss Kate Claxton relates one incident of intense interest. * * * “The back entrance was by this time a perfect hell of fire. Miss Harrison, on my call, rushed from her room and darted by me into a little subterranean passage, which led from the stage under the floor to the box office in front of the house. No such passage exists in other theatres. It was designed by Mrs. Conway when the theatre was built, so that she could readily communicate with her treasurer. I rapidly followed Miss Harrison, and it seemed as if the fire, swept by the draught, almost licked the clothes from our backs as we entered the passage. As we fled through it I remembered that it was closed at the other end by a door with a spring lock, and was usually kept closed, one of the ushers carrying the key. As I reached the flight of three or four steps leading up to the door my heart stood still, and I hesitated to try it. I thought,
‘My God, if it is locked!’
Outside of the door we could hear the roaring of the maddened multitude struggling through the passage without. We must really have hesitated only a flash, but it seemed to me that we stood there for hours. The door fortunately was open, and we were in a second inside the box office. With the strength of despair we burst the door open against the struggling throng, and in an instant were in their midst. We had yet some distance to go; the fire followed us fast, and there was still a crowd of excited people to pass through. We got into the crowd and dashed along, heedless that now and again we felt that we had trod upon a human being. Once I looked down and saw a human face, horribly distorted and burned. Oh, my God! it was a fearful sight. I shall never forget it. Afterward I saw the injured man taken out. He was horribly injured, and I think, must be dead. As soon as we got into the street we dashed into the police station. There a gentleman loaned me his overcoat, and after a short stay in the station we walked around home.”
Escaping through the Grating.
William Kerr, of Hamden street, Brooklyn, says that he was in front of the theatre when the fire broke out. He attempted to enter the theatre, but was prevented, and stepping back to the street he heard a noise beneath the sidewalk. The iron plate over the coal-hole was pushed up, and the head and shoulders of a man appeared. He pulled the man to the sidewalk, and he was followed by another man. He was then ordered off by the police. The police clapped the plate back, and nothing is known of the fate of the men who went back.