FIRE! FIRE! 331 



angles as well as carelessly constructed balconies that mean stained 

 ceilings and falling plaster. 



If your house is on a side hill, it's just the house for a generous 

 billiard room in the basement, where an immovable cement founda- 

 tion makes possible a permanently spirit-leveled billiard table. Here 

 you can also build a huge stone fireplace, and install a lavatory with 

 shower for the golf and tennis devotee, but fight dampness and ground 

 air strenuously. 



Don't forget to heavily tar and also ditch-drain the outside 

 walls where they are buried in the earth, and after the usual cement 

 floor is laid and well dried out, fur up the floor to have at least 

 that inch air space between the cement and the wooden floor. A 

 copious coating of tar prevents its use as an insect lair. Flooring if 

 laid on scantlings directly over stone, gravel, or earth, even if air- 

 spaced will swell and tear asunder. Failure to thus checkmate all 

 warring forces will transform your attractive billiard room into a 

 first class rheumatism breeder, if not an assassin. 



FIRE! FIRE! 



Five times in twenty-five years in Hillcrest Manor, that weird, 

 uncanny cry which in an instant transforms some types of humanity 

 into frenzied beasts, trampling their fellow mortals under foot in the 

 mad effort to escape an agonizing death, echoed back from the hollow 

 square of our farm buildings and across hillside and meadow. Thrice 

 the fire was smothered before the leaping flames had risen breast 

 high, but twice the fire king was victorious. Gables, with its dozen 

 hanging balconies and verdure-canopied verandas, in two hours was 

 a smouldering heap of ashes, the occupants barely escaping with 

 their lives. Again, the highest tiled tower of Buena Vista was 

 struck by lightning but the heavy downpour quenched the flames. Yet 

 again, the stock buildings, carriage sheds, silo, hennery, The Cot 

 and, woe betide us, Wayside itself, stored to the roof-tree with house- 

 hold gods and heirlooms, some of which antedated Colonial days, 

 vanished in smoke. The cause (a frequent one), the careless handling 

 of a brushwood fire. 



Across the valley we saw beauteous Alta Crest, transformed 

 into a human pyre, pay its blood curdling tribute to this same relent- 

 less conqueror, and many times on summer evenings from the vantage 

 ground of Hillcrest the darkness of night was brightened by sheets 

 of flame devouring hay-barn, stack, or farm house, on some distant 

 hill or in near by valley. Fire! Fire! Fire! Expensive object 

 lessons these and if we had it all to do over again, we would plan 

 along lines that better aid in fire control. 



A fire line stack with connecting hose should be installed on 

 every floor in each building, and piped to the pressure tank or reser- 

 voir, chemical fire extinguishers on the wall wherever needed and an 

 extra supply stored in some get-at-able closet where also should hang 



