few
yards away, now that it had risen to the bottom of the second bank.
This was altogether too slow a way of working, however, and the fire was
visibly gaining on the boys. But, slow as this process was, it served to
teach Tom a lesson or rather to remind him of one he had learned and
forgotten. He found that a hatful of water thrown on the bottom of the
fire did more good than two hatfuls thrown on top, and he remembered
that when the soot in the chimney at home caught fire once, his father
would not allow anybody to pour water down the chimney, but stood
himself by the fireplace throwing a little water, not up the chimney
but, on the blazing fire below. This water, turned into steam, went up
the chimney and soon extinguished the fire there. In the same way Tom
now discovered that when he threw a hatful of water on a burning log at
the bottom of the pile it had a perceptible effect all the way to the
top. Thinking of the chimney fire he remembered also that his father had
said at the time that a plank laid over the top of a burning chimney, or
a screen fastened over the fireplace would stop the burning of the soot
by stopping the air, and so smothering the fire. This suggested a new
plan of operations for present use. The long gray moss grew in great
abundance all around the place, and gathering this he dipped it in the
river and then threw it on top of the fire. A bunch of the moss held
greatly more water than his hat, and it served also to smother the fire.
He and Joe repeated the operation, putting some of the moss on top and
some against the sides of the burning pile of timber. The steam from
these perceptibly checked the burning, and an hour's work covered the
fire almost entirely up, so far at least as the exposed side of the
drift-pile was concerned. But just as they were disposed to congratulate
themselves upon their success in subduing the flames, they discovered
that while they had been smothering the fire on one side it had been
burning freely further in. The openness of the hammock gave free access
to the air from the other side, and just beyond the line of moss they
saw a blaze licking its tongue out from below. They were tired out,
already, and this added discouragement to weariness. Little Judie,
although the boys had urged her to remain quiet, had been hard at work
bringing moss to them, insisting upon her right to work as well as
they. She had discovered too that the sand, just below the surface was
w