d shingled housetops, while
a fire column shot up fifty feet in the air and began its fierce feeding
on the broken tanks. And out of this fire fountain came a smoking fire
river, that rolled down the hill toward the village.

At this moment, Joe Snyder, who had not gone to the dance the night
before, and was doomed now to the early worm's fate, had just put his
key in the door of the butcher-shop. He never turned the key, nor saw it
again, nor saw the butcher-shop again. What he did see was a roaring
torrent of oil sweeping down the street and blazing fifteen feet high as
it came. And the picture next presented when Snyder, white as a ghost,
raced down the sidewalk ahead of the fire, will stay long in the memory
of those who saw it from their windows.

But this was no time for looking at pictures out of windows; there were
other things to be done, and done quickly. Never did fire descend so
swiftly upon a village. Even as the startled sleepers stared in fright,
houses all about them burst into flames like candles on a Christmas
tree. Now the warehouse is burning, and the sheds across the tracks; and
there goes the hardware store; and there goes the carpenter's shop; and
now the fire-stream rolls through Main Street, and licks up the Reeves
house on one corner and Vliet's store on the other. Then the drug-store
goes, and Carling's store and Rinehart's restaurant. Trees are burning,
fences are burning, the very streets are burning, and men see fire
rolling across their front yards like drifting snow.

[Illustration: "THE VERY STREETS ARE BURNING."]

I do not purpose to follow the incidents of this fire and the several
explosions, nor show how the village fought against it vainly, damming
up fiery oil-streams and turning their courses, toiling at bucket-lines,
and spreading blistering walls with soaked carpets. The point is that
these efforts alone would never have availed, and Glen Gardner would
speedily have lain in ashes, had not fire-engines from Sommerville and
Washington been hurried to the spot. And even as it was, a section of
the village was wiped away in clean-licked ruins, which stood for many a
day as a grim reminder that the only safety against fires in these times
lies in being able to fight fires well.

Which brings me, of course, to the modern fire department and the men
who risk their lives as a matter of daily routine to protect their
fellow-men. I will begin with some incidents of one particular fire