154 



INCIDENTS OF TRAVEL. 



done up in a ball, we ignited under the pile. It did 

 not answer fully, but gave us encouragement, and 

 we made a larger ball of the same, which we igni- 

 ted with a slow match. It blew our pile to atoms, 

 and scattered the materials in all directions. Our 

 ingenuity had now been taxed to the uttermost, and 

 our resources were exhausted. In extremity we 

 called in the boy. 



He had, in the mean time, been more successful ; 

 for, continuing the work at which we had set him, 

 with characteristic indifference taking no notice of 

 our endeavours, he had cleared a space of several 

 yards around the door. This admitted a sunbeam, 

 which, like the presence of a good spirit, gladdened 

 and cheered all within its reach. We intimated to 

 him by signs that we wanted a fire, and, without 

 paying any respect to what we had done, he began 

 in his own way, with a scrap of cotton, which he 

 picked up from the ground, and, lighting it, blew it 

 gently in his folded hands till it was all ignited. 

 He then laid it on the floor, and, throwing aside all 

 the material we had been using, looked around care- 

 fully, and gathered up some little sticks, not larger 

 than matches, which he laid against the ignited cot- 

 ton, with one point on the ground and the other 

 touching the fire. Then kneeling down, he encir- 

 cled the nascent fire with his two hands, and blew 

 gently on it, with his mouth so close as almost to 

 touch it. A slight smoke rose above the palms of 

 his hands, and in a few minutes he stopped blowing. 



