HAMLYN'S MENAGERIE MAGAZINE. 
vanguard of what soon was to> become a general 
exodus appeared, the fleeing householders retreat- 
ing in sullen reluctance before the advancing 
flames. In the midst of thet ragedy there appeared 
ever and anon a phase of comedy. 
The smoke-begrimmed, fire-scorched, nerve- 
wrecked cavalcade was a sad sight. The nature 
student could not, however, fail to note the com- 
plications of bird life which strangely intermixed. 
Canaries in cages, parrots on broom-handles, 
cockatoos in gilded cages from the wealthy homes, 
already claimed space amongst the piles of sal- 
vage — hastily located in the wider streets and 
parks. 
When, however, the stream of humbler folk 
blended with the main current, many novel demon- 
strations of sad eperiences became evident. Pets 
of all types were lugged along with a devotion 
that was at once piteous and comic. 
One dear old lady, whose white hair hung un- 
kempt upon her pallid face, carried a coal-scuttle 
in one hand and in the other a breeding cage with 
nests, seed boxes and two terror stricken canaries. 
The sanitary condition of the cage was proof posi- 
tive that avian housekeeping, amongst the cotter- 
folk was not by any means up to the municipal 
standard of healthy homes. Next came a little 
Italian boy, with a stump-tailed parakeet hanging 
by beak and claws to his coat-collar, while he 
trailed along a demijohn of wine. 
Later we met with a Scotchman, not yet fully 
forgetful of his home instincts, probably the here- 
ditary reflex of many generations, for in a paper- 
protected, red-stained wooden cage, carried be- 
neath his right arm, both hands being fully bur- 
dened with bundles, we saw crouching in abject 
terror a British "lintie," the poor, little foreigner 
probably even then homesick for the banks and 
braes of the land of the gorse and heather. By 
noon the flames had already devastated an area 
one mile long by one and one-half miles in width. 
In the seething blast-furnace conflagration many 
of the refugees had been overtaken, and in the 
urgent and relentless retreat had surrendered to 
a fiery death many of the belongings and pets they 
had so bravely striven in the earlier morn to secure 
and rescue. 
On the opposite side of the leading thorough- 
fare stood the famous Call Building, a magnificent 
stone structure capped by a restaurant, the loftiest 
in the world, and the resort of all tounsts, who 
enjoyed from its windows an unrivaled panorama 
of the city, bay and distant foothills. Alongside 
this building was a number of smaller ones, one 
of which was the famous " Old Crow" saloon. The 
window of this saloon had been placed at the 
entire disposal of two crows — Corvus Americanus 
— two fated trademark specimens which always 
had a large audience outside as they disported 
themselves on a ten-foot tree stump and ate raw 
meat. 
One was an especially bad character, known 
to the police. He could talk, whistle and on occa- 
sions would outrival in loguacity and gesture a 
star comedian. This specimen had a crippled 
wing. The fire was very intense. The big build- 
ing was already smouldering inside while furtive 
tongues of flame told only too> surely that it was 
being eaten through and through. At this time 
I was in my office diagonally across the street, 
and was astonished in the midst of the disaster 
by the appearance of a large bird, which at first I 
took for a pigeon flying out of the fire-zone and 
lighting upon the window sill scarce an arm's 
length from where I was standing. On closer in- 
spection I recognized the sound specimen of the 
two crows from the saloon opposite. The poor 
thing was terror-stricken and hung to the heated 
window for only a moment, and then fiew over 
the corner of the building to an adjacent house, 
simply to experience, lam afraid, but a temporary 
respite from the fiery fate which befell its notorious 
companion. The bird had evidently escaped when 
the heated air had broken the plate-glass window 
of the saloon. 
One of the most extraordinary bird escapes 
which came under my personal observation was 
that of a canary. Its cage, which had been crushed 
by the falling of a building, was absolutely flat- 
tened out, except at one corner, in which the bird 
was imprisoned. The bird stil Hives, like the soli- 
tary escaped prisoner of Pelee, a sole survivor, and 
sings, perhaps, a Te Neum of gratitude to the 
great nature god which saved it, a veritable brand 
from the burning. Many moe instances might be 
recorded, but space forbids. 
It is pleasant to record that the strong wes- 
tern spirit of determination, pluck and manhood 
has triumphed and the relics and experiences of 
the great disaster are already memories, simply 
event's in the stirring life of men and things which 
are blended in the evolution of the new city of 
San Francisco. 
This spirit is not inaptly described by the ex- 
pression of an old man. A few dacs before the 
calamity I visited a veteran cobler, a veritable 
character and a "natural" bird fancier. His store, 
a large, big-windowed room; window and room 
rich in tapestry of cob-webs, dust and grime; a 
dozen or more cages, piled high with seed husks 
and droppings, and tenanted by canaries, native 
linnets, California goldfinches and some unclassi- 
fied specimens hanging upon the wall — such was 
the picture presented. It is hardly necessary to 
state his nationality, he was neither a scientist nor 
an ornithologist, but his observations and mother- 
wit afforded a not altogether unsuccessful substi- 
tute. In a little grimy cage, sadly forbidding in 
