110 FRUIT RAXCIIING. 



put out the incandescent glow immediately under- 

 neath our shoe soles, only made it gleam out in four 

 or five other places round about. Then we tried lo 

 beat it out with sticks, and after that with hay forks. 

 This last method proved the most efTective. By dint 

 of labouring until after midnight, and carrying water 

 from the lake up and over ihe railway embankment, 

 we managed to get the fire, if n(jt subdued, at all 

 events under control. 



By the next morning it was blazing out afresh in 

 two or three places. A brief attack was all that we 

 were able to spare to it then ; other work had to be 

 attended to. But after dark, when the regular day's 

 work was done, we returned to the attack, and this 

 time with a still greater measure of success, though 

 we had any amount of trouble to put out the stubborn 

 moss. Just where these fires were burning there were 

 several large boulders, and it was in the hollow spaces 

 underneath these that the ignited moss bade us 

 defiance. And it was only after we had laboriously 

 barricaded it in with earth banked all round with 

 stone, and thus smothered it, that w^e were able to feel 

 satisfied that we had conquered. 



Our anxieties from the risk of fire were not yet 

 over. The very next night following, which was 

 pretty dark, somebody came in and told us there was 

 a big fire burning two miles higher up the lake. At 

 first we paid little heed, not realising that it was any- 

 thing out of the common, because we had grown 

 accustomed to seeing bush fires on the opposite side 

 of the lake all the summer through. But by the time 

 we were ready for bed the aspect of the conflagration 

 was greatly changed. It was evident that it was 



