CHAPTER XIII. 



The Fire Fiend. 



One of the most valuable assets which the province 

 of British Columbia possesses is her extensive forests. 

 The Provincial Government is fully alive to the im- 

 portance of this asset, and has taken legislative and 

 other means to preserve the live timber. Fire wardens 

 are appointed for each district, and settlers and others 

 who cause forest fires are heavily fined. In spite of 

 these precautions, there is a woeful waste of good 

 timber every year. A spark from a passing loco- 

 motive, the ashes from a half-smoked pipe, or any 

 similar cause, is enough to start a fire, especially when 

 woods and scrub and fallen leaves are all parched by 

 the sun. Once started, a fire may smoulder for days, its 

 presence hardly suspected, owing to the fact that it 

 spreads by means of a species of dried-up moss, which 

 forms a carpet immediately underneath the surface. 

 It is this moss which smoulders, breaking out every 

 now and then into little tongues of flame, to which 

 nobody as a rule pays heed. Nevertheless, these little 

 tongues of flame may be instrumental in causing 

 thousands of dollars' loss. 



In the height of the summer of 1908 the prosperous 

 mining town of Fernie, in the Crows' Nest Pass, was 



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