Small Fire Guts Pangloss's Cellar

A fire started by the careless toss of a lit match damaged the cellar of the Pangloss Book Shop yesterday.

At about 5:15 p.m. the Cambridge Fire Department responded to a report of smoke at Pangloss and arrived at the building across from Widener Library with two aerial towers, four engines and one rescue unit.

The firemen, by pumping water into the cellar, extinguished the flames within half an hour.

Deputy Fire Chief Thomas Scott said yesterday that "someone carelessly discarded a smoking material" to start the fire.

"The fire destroyed many of the books stored in the cellar of Pangloss," Faith Mattison, manager of the shop, said yesterday, "but we don't as yet know the extent of the damage."