At the chief’s command two firemen carried him at once to the window, where the fresh air soon revived him, and he was lowered by means of a life-line, tied under his arms, to the ground below. By the same method several other guests were saved, though others, including the two woman already named, positively refused to go down in such an undignified manner.
While this was going on, Bruce, carrying his hook, and still following the members of his company, descended to the floor below, and then, hearing voices below him, went down one more flight of stairs, and encountered Captain Murphy’s men, who had made their way up from the lower entrance. At the chief’s command, Bruce and two other men went into one of the bedrooms, threw open a window, and, lowering a long line, called upon the men below to attach their hose to it, so that they might draw it up.
Chief Trask had often told Bruce that in the work of fighting a fire the most important thing is to discover the location of the flames, and not only subdue them but prevent them from spreading to other parts of the building. In order to do this, it is necessary to cover all exposed parts, and to saturate with water everything of an inflammable nature that lies near the seat of the conflagration. In this particular case, the snow which covered the roofs of the adjacent buildings prevented anything like danger from flying sparks and cinders, but had the fire taken place during dry, summer weather, one of the first duties of the firemen would have been to throw water on every roof and wall that lay within possible reach of the longest tongue of flame.
Working in the interior of the hotel, the firemen, under Chief Trask’s direction, bent their energies toward arresting the possible spread of the flames, which had already gained such headway by means of the elevator shaft that it seemed to an inexperienced young fire-lad, like Bruce, an almost hopeless task to attack them. But with the aid of the hose which had been hauled up through the window, all the partitions, floors and ceilings were speedily saturated with water, while the men tore down with their hooks a number of frame partitions, in order to prevent the spread of fire through the lath and plaster.