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'FIRE! FIRE!'

It was two o'clock in the morning when this cry was heard in Union Street, Borough, London, and the people who ran to the spot saw an oil shop in flames, and at a window above it a servant girl, Alice Ayres, screaming for help. Some rushed off to summon the fire-brigade, but those who remained feared that before it could arrive the place would be gutted.

'Jump! jump!' they shouted, and stretched out their coats to break her fall. But instead of jumping Alice Ayres disappeared from the window. There were other people in the house, and she was determined not to seek safety for herself until she had made an attempt to save their lives.

Hurrying to the room where her master, mistress, and one child slept, she battered at the door, and awakening them warned them of their danger. Then through smoke and flames she sped back to her own room, where three children slept in her charge. She gave one look out of the window, but the firemen were not yet on the scene.

'Jump! jump!' the crowd shouted.

But Alice Ayres ignored the entreaties, for she had determined to save the children or die in the attempt. Her first idea was to tie two sheets together and lower the children one by one; but, finding that the sheets would not bear their weight, she dragged a feather bed to the window and dropped it into the street. Willing hands seized it and held it out, expecting her to jump; but she disappeared again, returning, however, a moment or two later, with a little white-robed child in her arms. Holding her at arms' length out of the window, she glanced down at the bed, and seeing that it was ready, dropped her. A tremendous cheer from the crowd told her that the little one was safe.

Then she snatched up the second little girl, but the poor mite was terrified, and throwing her arms around Alice's neck cried piteously, 'Don't throw me out of window!' So tightly did the child cling to her that Alice had great difficulty in getting her into a proper position to drop her on to the bed, but she succeeded at last, and another loud cheer from the crowd announced that she had saved two lives.

Scarcely five minutes had elapsed since the fire broke out, but the contents of the shop were such that the flames spread at a fearful rate, and the onlookers knew that if Alice Ayres did not jump quickly she would be burned to death.

'Jump! jump!' they shouted excitedly.

But there was a baby lying in the cot, and back Alice Ayres went, brought it safely through fire and smoke to the window, and dropped it out. She had saved three lives!

Weakened by the heat and the smoke, Alice Ayres now decided to leap from the window, and the anxious people in the street watched her in silence as she climbed to the window sill. She jumped, but her body struck one of the large dummy jars above the front of the shop and caused her to fall head foremost on the bed, and then topple over on to the pavement with a sickening thud. Quickly and tenderly she was lifted on to a shutter and carried into a neighbouring shop, where medical aid was soon at hand.

In the meanwhile the firemen had arrived. They had come as soon as they were called, but they arrived too late to save the other three inmates of the house from perishing in the flames.

But the interest of the crowd was centred in the condition of Alice Ayres, and as she was being removed to Guy's Hospital there was scarcely a man or a woman present whose eyes were not filled with tears. Many followed on to the hospital, in the hope of hearing the medical opinion of her condition, and before long it became known that she had fractured and dislocated her spine, and that there was no hope of her recovery.

Alice Ayres died at Guy's Hospital on Sunday, April 26, 1885, aged 25, and at the inquest, when her coffin was covered with beautiful flowers sent from all parts of the land, the coroner declared that he should not be doing justice to the jury or the public, did he not give expression to the general feeling of admiration which her noble conduct had aroused. In the hurry and excitement of a fire there were few who had the presence of mind to act as she had done, or who would run the risks she had for the sake of saving others. He deeply regretted that so valuable a life, offered so generously, had been sacrificed.

In the Postmen's Park, which adjoins the General Post Office, there is a cloister bearing the inscription, 'In Commemoration of Heroic Self-Sacrifice.' Within it are tablets to the memory of heroes of humble life, and one of the most interesting of these is that on which is inscribed:—'Alice Ayres, daughter of a bricklayer's labourer, who by intrepid conduct saved three children from a burning house in Union Street, Borough, at the cost of her own young life. April 24, 1885.'