q 



of consultation decided us, and we started to burn a 

 patch for standing room and protection. 



The hot sun and strong wind had long evaporated 

 all the dew and moisture from the grass, but the sap 

 was still up, and the fire our fire seemed cruelly 

 long in catching on. With bunches of dry grass for 

 brands we started burns in twenty places over a length 

 of a hundred yards, and each little flame licked up, 

 spread a little, and then hesitated or died out : it 

 seemed as if ours would never take, while the other 

 came on with roars and leaps, sweeping clouds of sparks 

 and ash over us in the dense rolling mass of smoke. 



At last a fierce rush of wind struck down on us, 

 and in a few seconds each little flame became a living 

 demon of destruction ; another minute, and the stretch 

 before us was a field of swaying flame. There was a 

 sudden roar and crackle, as of musketry, and the whole 

 mass seemed lifted into the air in one blazing sheet : it 

 simply leaped into life and swept everything before it. 



When we opened our scorched eyes the ground 

 in front of us was all black, with only here and there 

 odd lights and torches dotted about like tapers on 

 a pall ; and on ahead, beyond the trellis work of bare 

 scorched trees, the wall of flame swept on. 



Then down on the wings of the wind came the other 

 fire ; and before it fled every living thing. Heaven I 

 only knows what passed us in those few minutes when 

 a broken stream of terrified creatures dashed by, _ 

 hardly swerving to avoid us. There is no coherent^ 

 picture left of that scene just a medley of ^ impres- 

 sions linked up by flashes of unforgettable vividness 

 291 



