Lake, between Spruce Fork and Bear Pass 

 Trail, close to O'Brien's Spring." In less than 

 an hour a ranger leaps from his panting pony 

 and with shovel and axe hastily digs a narrow 

 trench through the vegetable mould in a circle 

 around the fire. Then a few shovelfuls of sand 

 go upon the liveliest blaze and the fire is under 

 control. As soon as there lives a good, sympa- 

 thetic public sentiment concerning the forest, 

 it will be comparatively easy to prevent most 

 forest fires from starting and to extinguish those 

 that do start. 



With the snow over, I started for the scene of 

 the first fire, and on the way noticed how much 

 more rapidly the snow melted in the open than 

 in a forest. The autumn sun was warm, and at 

 the end of the first day most of the snow in open 

 or fireswept places was gone, though on the 

 forest floor the slushy, compacted snow still 

 retained the greater portion of its original mois- 

 ture. On the flame-cleared slopes there was 

 heavy erosion; the fire had destroyed the root- 

 anchorage of the surface and consumed the 

 trash that would ordinarily have absorbed and 



165 



