One reason, perhaps, why there is such a general average in the number of conflagrations throughout the year, is, that the vast majority occur in factories and workshops where fire is used in summer as well as winter. This supposition appears at first sight to be contradicted by the fact, that nearly as many fires occur on Sunday as on any other day of the week. But when it is remembered that in numerous establishments it is necessary to keep in the fires throughout that day, and as in the majority of cases a very inadequate watch is kept, it is at once apparent why there is no immunity from the scourge. Indeed, some of the most destructive fires have broken out on a Sunday night or on a Monday morning—no doubt because a large body of fire had formed before it was detected. A certain number of accidents occur in summer in private houses from persons on hot nights opening the window behind the toilet glass in their bedrooms, when the draught blows the blind against the candle. Swallows do not more certainly appear in June, than such mishaps are found reported at the sultry season.

If we watch still more narrowly the habits of fires, we find that they are active or dormant according to the time of the day. Thus, during a period of nine years, the percentage regularly increased from 1.96 at 9 o'clock A.M., the hour at which all households might be considered to be about, to 3.34 at 1 P.M., 3.55 at 5 P.M., and 8.15 per cent at 10 P.M., which is just the time at which a fire left to itself by the departure of the workmen, would have had swing enough to become visible.

The origin of fires is now so narrowly inquired into by the officers of the Brigade, an by means of inquests, that we have been made acquainted with a vast number of curious causes, which would never have been suspected. From an analysis of fires which have occurred since the establishment of the Brigade, we have constructed the following Tables:—

Curtains 2,511
Candle 1,178
Flues 1,555
Stoves 494
Gas 932
Light dropped down Area 13
Lighted Tobacco falling down do. 7
Dust falling on horizontal Flue 1
Doubtful 76
Incendiarism 89
Carelessness 100
Intoxication 80
Dog 6
Cat 19
Hunting Bugs 15
Clotheshorse upset by Monkey 1
Lucifers 80
Children playing with do. 45
Rat gnawing do. 1
Jackdaw playing with do. 1
Rat gnawing gaspipe 1
Boys letting of Fireworks 14
Fireworks going off 63
Children playing with Fire 45
Spark from Fire 243
Spark from Railway 4
Smoking Tobacco 166
Smoking Ants 1
Smoking in Bed 2
Reading in do. 22
Sewing in do. 4
Sewing by Candle 1
Lime overheating 44
Waste do. 43
Cargo of Lime do. 2
Rain Slacking do. 5
High Tide 1
Explosion 6
Spontaneous Combustion 43
Heat from Sun 8
Lightning 8
Carboy of Acid bursting 2
Drying Linen 1
Shirts falling into fire 6
Lighting and Upsetting Naphtha Lamp 58
Fire from Iron Kettle 1
Sealing Letter 1
Charcoal Fire of a Suicide 1
Insanity 5
Bleaching Nuts 7
Unknown 1,323

Among the more common causes of fire (such as gas, candle, curtains taking fire, children playing with fire, stoves, &c.), it is remarkable how uniformly the same numbers occur under each head from year to year. General laws obtain as much in small as in great events. We are informed by the Post-Office authorities that about eight persons daily drop their letters into the post without directing them–we know that there is an unvarying percentage of broken heads and limbs received into the hospitals–and here we see that a regular number of houses take fire, year by year, from the leaping out of a spark, or the dropping of a smouldering pipe of tobacco. It may indeed be a long time before another conflagration will arise from "a monkey upsetting a clotheshorse," but we have no doubt such an accident will recur in its appointed cycle.

Although gas figures so largely as a cause of fire, it does not appear that its rapid introduction of late years into private houses has been attended with danger. There is another kind of light, however, which the insurance offices look upon with terror, especially those who make it their business to insure farm property. The assistant secretary of one of the largest fire-offices, speaking broadly, informed us that the introduction of the lucifer match caused them an annual loss of ten thousand pounds! In the foregoing list we see in how many ways they have given rise to fires.

Lucifers going off probably from heat 80 Children playing with lucifers 45 Rat gnawing lucifers 1 Jackdaw playing with lucifers 1 —- 127

One hundred and twenty-seven known fires thus arise from this single cause; and no doubt many of the twenty-five fires ascribed to the agency of cats and dogs were owing to their having thrown down boxes of matches at night—which they frequently do, and which is almost certain to produce combustion. The item "rat gnawing lucifer" reminds us to give a warning against leaving about wax lucifers where there are either rats or mice, for these vermin constantly run away with them to their holes behind the inflammable canvas, and eat the wax until they reach the phosphorus, which is ignited by the friction of their teeth. Many fires are believed to have been produced by this singular circumstance. How much, again, must lucifers have contributed to swell the large class of conflagrations whose causes are unknown! Another cause of fire, which is of recent date, is the use of naphtha in lamps—a most ignitable fluid when mixed in certain proportions with common air. "A delightful novel" figures as a proximate, if not an immediate, cause of twenty-two fires. This might be expected, but what can be the meaning of a fire caused by a high tide? When we asked Mr. Braidwood the question, he answered, "Oh! we always look out for fires when there is a high tide. They arise from the heating of lime upon the addition of water." Thus rain, we see, has caused four conflagrations, and simple overheating forty-four. The lime does no harm as long as it is merely in contact with wood, but if iron happens to be in juxtaposition with the two, it speedily becomes red-hot, and barges on the river have been sunk, by reason of their bolts and iron knees burning holes in their bottoms. Of the singular entry, "rat gnawing a gaspipe," the firemen state that it is common for rats to gnaw leaden service pipes, for the purpose, it is supposed, of getting at the water, and in this instance the gray rodent labored under a mistake, and let out the raw material of the opposite element. Intoxication is a fruitful cause of fires, especially in public houses and inns.

It is commonly imagined that the introduction of hot water, hot air, and steam pipes, as a means of heating buildings, cuts off one avenue of danger from fire. This is an error. Iron pipes, often heated up to 400°, are placed in close contact with floors and skirting-boards, supported by slight diagonal props of wood, which a much lower degree of heat will suffice to ignite. The circular rim supporting a still at the Apothecaries' Hall, which was used in the preparation of some medicament that required a temperature of 300°, was found not long ago to have charred a circle at least a quarter of an inch deep in the wood beneath it, in less than six months. Mr. Braidwood, in his evidence before a Committee of the House of Lords in 1846, stated that it was his belief that by long exposure to heat, not much exceeding that of boiling, water, or 212°, timber is brought into such a condition that it will fire without the application of a light. The time during which this process of desiccation goes on, until it ends in spontaneous combustion, is, he thinks, from eight to ten years—so that a fire might be hatching in a man's premises during the whole of his lease without making any sign!

Under the heads "Incendiarism," "Doubtful," and "Unknown," are included all the cases of wilful firing. The return Incendiarism is never made unless there has been a conviction, which rarely takes place, as the offices are only anxious to protect themselves against fraud, and do not like the trouble or bad odor of being prosecutors on public grounds. If the evidence of wilful firing, however, is conclusive, the insured, when he applies for his money, is significantly informed by the secretary, that unless he leaves the office, he will hang him. Though arson is no longer punished by death, the hint is usually taken. Now and then such flagrant offenders are met with, that the office can not avoid pursuing them with the utmost rigor of the law. Such, in 1851, was the case of a "respectable" solicitor, living in Lime Street, Watling Street, who had insured his house and furniture for a sum much larger than they were worth. The means he adopted for the commission of his crime without discovery were apparently sure; but it was the very pains he took to accomplish his end which led to his detection. He had special]y made to order a deep tray of iron, in the centre of which was placed a socket, the tray he filled with naphtha, and in the socket he put a candle, the light of which was shaded by a funnel. The candle was one of the kind which he used for his gig-lamp, for he kept a gig, and was calculated to last a stated time before it reached the naphtha. He furtively deposited the whole machine in the cellar, within eight inches of the wooden floor, in a place constructed to conceal it. The attorney went out, and on coming back again found, as he expected, that his house was on fire. Unfortunately, however, for him—if it is ever a misfortune to a scoundrel to be detected—it was put out at a very ear]y stage; and the firemen, whilst in the act of extinguishing it discovered this infernal machine. The order to make it was traced to the delinquent; a female servant, irritated at the idea of his having left her in the house to be burned to death, gave evidence against him; he was tried and convicted, and is now expiating his crime at Norfolk Island. Plans for rebuilding this villain's house, and estimates of the expense, were found afterwards among his papers.