One of them
was so badly frightened that he was afterward useless and we turned him
out to pasture and he grew lean and absolutely worthless. Things were
considerably disturbed, but the engines were apparently uninjured. The
watchman was not injured, although surrounded by falling bricks and
mortar. I was told that the water supply was stopped, and later learned
that it was because the earthquake had broken the water-mains.
I then started on foot down-town, this was about 7 A. M.; no cars were
running on any line. The sidewalks in many places were heaved up,
chimneys thrown down, and walls cracked by the earthquake. St. Mary's
Cathedral and Grace Church gave no outward sign of being injured;
neither did the Fairmont Hotel. I went on California Street, over Nob
Hill, and as I got in sight of the business part of the city, I saw as
many as ten or twelve fires in the lower part of the city. The wind was
light from the northwest, and the smoke ascended in great columns, and
the sun through it looked like a large copper disk. When I arrived at
California and Montgomery streets the lower part of both sides of
California Street seemed to be all on fire. I did not realize that the
whole city would be burned. I had a vague idea that it would stop, or be
stopped, as fires had been hundreds of times before in this city. I went
along Sansome Street to Pine and down Pine towards Market.
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