BIG BEN.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 846, 18 June 1910, Page 4

BIG BEN.

— (. _ THE DAYS OP THE FIRE-BELL. If bells could speak an intelligible! language, the one ' which has been lowered from the tower at the end of the Queen's Wharf could tell an interesting story of the history and progress of Wellington. Over a quarter of a century ago this bell—then known - as "Big Ben"—was suspended from a small tower at the northern end of the late Mr.- John Plimmer's > mid-city garden, immediately at the rear of The Dominion office, from which elevation it would, clang an alarm that aroused every, resident in tho city. When dismantled, "Big Ben" was hung in the tower at the end of the Queen's Wharf, and foi some years its deep boom was the causa of apprehension to property-owners.-The days of fire-bells in up-to-date cities are now at an end, thanks to the excellent system of electric fire-alarmi and permanent fire brigades. In the days of "Big Ben's ,, usefulness the fire brigades-men were volunteers, and in the case of an alarm, the bells had to be rung to rouse them to a sense of their responsibilities. ■. Incidentally, it aroused the city, and the crowds not infrequent-' ly hampered the operations of the bii< gade. ,