Securities against Fire, fyc. 303 



% 



But I leave the subject of conflagration by land, to say secondly, 

 a parting word as to the dreadful destruction of life and property,, 

 consequent upon the use of badly managed Steam boats j in which 

 species of calamity, we seem to surpass all nations in the world* 

 Mr. Webster's motion on this subject, it is hoped, will produce 

 some effect before the present session of Congress shall expire; and 

 that something may be done to save the public from these disas- 

 ters, but yet not all (I am sure,) that Mr. Webster would wish. A 

 regards myself, 1 may be allowed here to take my leave of these 

 topics. 



By way of return, however, to those who have followed the wan- 

 derings of the writer of these pages, his piece will conclude with an 

 interesting and authentic anecdote, respecting a conflagration, which 

 was the origin of the present Cathedral of St. PauVs in London j 

 which is certainly the most splendid building, not in a Gothic style, 

 known in the christian world among the seceders from the church of 

 Rome. The anecdote which I have to furnish, is extracted from 

 Mr. Evelyn's dedication to Sir Christopher Wren, of his account of 

 architects and architecture; and is as follows; being prefaced by a 

 well known and not unmerited compliment. " If the whole art of 

 building (in the Greek and Roman style,) were lost, (says Mr. Eve- 

 lyn,) it might be recovered and found again in St. Paul's, the Histor- 

 ical Pillar,* and other monuments of your happy talent and extraor- 

 dinary genius. I have named St. Paul's, and truly not without ad- 

 miration, as oft I recal to mind * * * the sad and deplorable 



situation it was in, when (after it had been made a stable for horses 



consult his amusing epigram ; (Epig. CO, book 7,) the concluding line of his last 



couplet beio 



or 



Nunc Roma est : nuper magna taberna fuit. 



Even Nero, however, is said to have issued proper orders for the construction of 

 the new buildings, expected to appear in the restoration of Rome. 



Evelyn, in his dedication of his translation of Freart's parallel of ancient and 

 modern architecture, to Sir John Denhara, (the poet and a knight of the Bath,) when 

 Denham was superintendent and surveyor of buildings and works, to Charles II, re- 

 lates, that the first orders for paving the streets of London, were issued by Sir John 

 Denham, only two years before the great fire of London in 1666. 



Boston is an American city, in which the most resolute and fundamental changes 

 have lately been made, on principles introduced by its late spirited Mayor, Mr. Quin- 

 cy» now President of Harvard College ; but still the great rule of Dr Franklin, bor- 

 rowed from what the Dr. observed in France, is probably to this moment, unknown 

 even in Boston. 



* The " Monument," so called, on Fish street Hill, London. 



