"And yet it cannot be.
This is no season for rejoicing." "It has been supposed that the lighting of many thousand fires at once will purify the air," replied Solomon Eagle; "and therefore the Lord Mayor has given orders that heaps of fuel shall be placed before every house in every street in the city, and that all these heaps shall be kindled at a certain hour.

But it will be of no avail.

The weather is now fine and settled, and the sky cloudless.

But the offended Deity will cause the heaviest rain to descend, and extinguish their fires.

No--the way to avert the pestilence is not by fire, but by prayer and penitence, by humiliation and fasting.