Los Angeles herald., 1908-01-26

of fire occasionally described magnificent curves
in the air, in the accumulation of certain rhythmi
cal utterances in the corrupted Spanish of the
Mexican tongue. The lowest Mexican peon, who
all his life goes half clothed half fed and unshe-
tered handles his cigar cigarette with the fine
pomposity and careless grace of the proudest hi
dalgo.
John Proctor awoke that night to find himself
assailed by a foe mightier than his feeble imagi
nation had pictured He tried to rise but found
himself unable to move, oppressed by terrible
sense of sutfocation from dense volumes of smoke
which filled the air, through which vast sheets OF
flame darted their forked tongues toward him.
Suddenly the wall of flame and smoke was parted
and the face of the tramp bent over him. He
roughly shaken, pulled off the bed, half drag
ged, half carried through the little private office
and into the larger beyond where the fire
had begun it's work of devastation. Then voice
and memory came back and he shouted: MY
hottest In my coat pocket-under the p1llow-let
me go!'
For answer he was violently propelled forward
into the arms of some men, eagerly crowdng
through the flaming doorway He struggled to
free himself from their vise-like grasp. He fought
with them, cursed them, and finally broke down
and cried like child. Maxons fierce tones re-
called him to himself.
"Why, man, do you think we would let you go
into that fiery furnace again? See! There goes
the roof now"
With a gentle, waving motion, the roof seemed
to slowly vbrate to and fro, then sank down with
a sudden crash, and lying column OF sparks
celebrated it's downfall.
With half dazed senses John Proctor stared
about him, and his gaze wandered to the sky
above, where angry crimson glow had blotted
out the stars, and rested upon the distant noun
tain chains weirdly rejecting from their scanned
fronts and craggy peaks the glare of the upright
eous flames. Would she admire them now?
Surely it was spectacle to enchant the eye OF
an unprecedented spectator whose whole posses
sions not being sacrificed to the effect.
He turned coectedly to the scene before him.
There still something to be done. The cream
of the stock had been destroyed, but unless some
nj n
speedily removed the fire would communicate
with the whole outside stock, stretched for several
hundred yards along the railroad track. He
turned to the crowd of men who stood inactive,
gazing upon the scene:
"Come on and help us save the lumber!
A couple of dozen men came promptly forward.
The lumberman saw, to his surprise, that the vol
unteers almost exclusively composed of the
so-called professional men of the town. The local
officials of the railroad, dapper, weldressed set
of fellows commonly viewed with contemptuous
eyes by the Woodworking portion of the popua-
ton, presented themselves almost to a man. The
tall form of Judge Cheeseman, a stiff and some
what aristocratic legal luminary, doomed up in
their midst A quiet-looking little real estate
agent .eaped upon pile of shingles and began to
ding the punches down to German chemist below.
The two rival editors (for the least of New Next
can villages usually boasts its miniature news
paperdom,) who had exchanged shots on Gold Ave-
nue. the previous day, glared cordially at each
other along the lengths of the timbers they under
took to transport to place of safety The labor
ing population offered scarcely a representative,
save in the persons of few contractors and me-
chanics, who had learned to know and like the
pleasant young lumberman.
The men worked like heroes. Their energy
never waned until faint light in the east began
to rival the red glare which the flames, through
the medium of the high, rare atmosphere, cast
the desert plains for miles around, and every
piece of lumber was removed to safe distance.
Worn and weared, John Proctor sat down to
rest upon the wheel of his own copying press
gradual change had taken place in the ranks OF
@1.1 toto IF Tho iuht