orse, the world was all before, and
he must ride and ride. He shouted as he rode under the towering pines,
raced across a clearing with a whoop that roused the echoes, and yelled
for sheer delight in the mad ride through the untraveled forest, where,
as the knights of old, he rode forth to conquer and to do.

But a sudden, sharp, acrid whiff of vapor in his nostrils checked his
riotous impulses. It was one thing to ride out to meet the foe, it was
another matter when the foe was known to be near. A half mile nearer and
the acrid taste in the air turned to a defined veil of smoke, intangible
and unreal, at first, which merely seemed to hang about the trunks of
the mighty trees and make them seem dim and far away. Nearer yet, and
the air grew hard to breathe, the smoke was billowing through the
foliage of the pines, which sighed wearily and moaned in a vague fear of
the enemy they dreaded most.

A curving gully, too wide to leap, too deep to cross readily, had
deflected the boy in his ride until he found himself to the lee of the
fire, and the heat of it, oppressive and menacing, assailed him.

Remembering the lay of the land, as he had seen it from his lookout
point, Wilbur recalled the fact that no peak or rise was in the vicinity
up which he could ride to gain a nearer view of the fire, and he did not
dare to ride on and find himself on the windward side of the fire, for
then his efforts to hold it back would be unavailing. He rode slowly
till he came to the highest tree near. Then, dismounting, Wilbur tied
his horse to the foot of the tree, tied him as securely as he knew how,
for the animal was snorting in fear at being thus fastened up when the
smoke was over his head and the smell of the fire was in his nostrils.
Then, buckling on his climbing irons, which he had carried with him that
morning because he had thought, if he had time, he might do a little
repairing to his telephone line, he started up the side of the great
tree. Up and up he went, fifty, sixty, one hundred feet, and still he
was not at the top; another twenty feet, and there far above the ground,
he rested at last upon a branch whence he could command an outlook upon
the forest below.

The fire was near, much nearer than he had imagined, and had he ridden
on another ten or fifteen minutes, he might have taken his horse in
danger. The blaze was larger than he thought. For half a mile's length,
at least, the smoke was rising, and what was beyond he c