The Camp Fire Girls on the March | Page 8

they can do to protect themselves--before a fire starts, I mean?"
"That's the time to protect themselves. When people wait until the fire has actually begun to burn, it's almost impossible for them to check it. It would have been this time, if the wind had blown for a few hours longer the way it was doing when the fire started."
"But what can they do?"
"They can have a cleared space between the town and the forest, for one thing, with a lot of brush growing there, if they want to keep that. Then, if a fire starts, they can set the brush afire, and make a back fire, so that the big fire will be checked by the little one. The fire has to have something to feed on, you see, and if it comes to a cleared space that's fairly wide, it can't get any further.
"Oh, a cleared space like that doesn't mean that the village could go to sleep and feel safe! But it's a lot easier to fight the fire then. All the men in town could line up, with beaters and plenty of water, and as soon as sparks started a fire on their side of the clearing, they could put it out before it could get beyond control."
"Oh, I see! And being able to see the fire as soon as it started, they wouldn't have half so much trouble fighting it as if they had to be after the really big blaze."
"Yes. The fire problem in places like this seems very dreadful, but when the conditions are as good as they are here, with plenty of water, all that's needed is a little forethought. It's different in some of the lumber towns out west, because there the fires get such a terrific start that they would jump any sort of a clearing, and the only thing to do when a fire gets within a certain distance of a town is for the people who live in the town to run."
Soon the road began to pass between desolate stretches of woods, where the fire had raged at its hottest. Here the ground on each side of the road was covered with smoking ashes, and blackened stumps stood up from the barren, burnt ground.
"It looks like a big graveyard, with those stumps for headstones," said Dolly, with a shudder.
"It is a little like that," said Eleanor, with a sigh. "But if you came here next year you wouldn't know the place. All that ash will fertilize the ground, and it will all be green. The stumps will still be there, but a great new growth will be beginning to push out. Of course it will be years and years before it's real forest again, but nature isn't dead, though it looks so. There's life underneath all that waste and desolation, and it will soon spring up again."
"I hope we'll get out of this burned country soon," said Dolly. "I think it's as gloomy and depressing as it can be. I'd like to have seen this road before the fire--it must have been beautiful."
"It certainly was, Dolly. And all this won't last for many miles. We really ought to stop pretty soon to eat our dinner. What do you say, girls? Would you like to wait, and press on until we come to a more cheerful spot, where the trees aren't all burnt!"
"Yes, oh, yes!" cried Margery Burton. "I think that would be ever so much nicer! Suppose we are a little hungry before we get our dinner? We can stand that for once."
"I think we'll enjoy our meal more. So we'll keep on, then, if the rest of you feel the same way."
Not a voice dissented from that proposition, either. Dolly was not the only one who was saddened by the picture of desolation through which they were passing. The road, of course, was deep in dust and ashes, and the air, still filled with the smoke that rose from the smouldering woods, was heavy and pungent, so that eyes were watery, and there was a good deal of coughing and sneezing.
"It's a lucky thing there weren't any houses along here, isn't it?" said Margery. "I don't see how they could possibly have been saved, do you, Miss Eleanor?"
"There's no way that they could have saved them, unless, perhaps, by having a lot of city fire engines, and keeping them completely covered with water on all sides while the fire was burning. They call that a water blanket, but of course there's no way that they could manage that up here."
"What do you suppose started this fire, Miss Eleanor?"
"No one will ever know. Perhaps someone was walking in the woods, and threw a lighted cigar or cigarette in a pile of dry leaves. Perhaps some party of campers