Belington progressive. [volume] (Belington, W. Va.) 1912-1927, 1916-03-02
C0oyYa1oHT OF Oo02 MEAD AND coINaqNY
The Spirit of the East.
CHAPTER XVI.

son, they trotted swiftly up with the
quickstep of hard-trained infantry
and stood in column of fours while
the officers sought the head of af-
fairs. Daily promptly sent for the
young forest ranger, and in less than
1t takes in the telling these two keen
witted Westerners, the woodsman
and the soldier, were ready to Crap
pie with the enemy. Light-marching
kits we're dumped upon the ground
and the hard-muscled men took to
the hills and the timber under quick,
decisive orders. Two hours later
wagons arrived with commissary sup
plies and the smoky 5lackened val
ley took on a military air.
1t was Titan struggle, and it was
indicative of the force that has con-
quered nature-the human atoms toll
ing in semidarkness beneath the
threatening forest, choked by the
smoke, fiayed by the almost unbear-
able heat. menaced by the flames tfat
at any moment might sweep here or
there among the rocks and declivities
OF the uneven aills and cut off escape.
That was the great danger they
guarded against-the possibility Of
getting hemmed in. Guards were de-
tailed to watch the vanguards of the
foe, to note the speed of the flames,
the lie OF the timber. the lines that
were likely to go fastest, following the
Inherent growths, but in the mysteri-
GUS dusk and the silence OF vast
mingled sounds they were impotent
and each man. had to take care of him
self.
Inc mighty boom of falling patri-
archs of the forest. hoary with thou
SAND years OF age, crashing through
obstructing branches. shook the earth
each moment. With each such stu
pendous fall wealth and world-econ-
omy and prudence trembled at the
sacrilege. 1t was a carnival of waste.
sacrifice of the gifts of God-and
among all those who fought It with
heart and hand and brain there was
none who knew its worldwide import
so well. who lamented It SO keenly
as the lean. brown forest rangers
And to think a dozen miles of gov.
eminent trails would have prevented
IT." cried the leader with an oath
Out In the valleys beyond, the heavy
smoke had obscured the setting sun
entirely. Over the crest of the Coast
Range 1t had spread up to the heav-
ems. drifted afar on the changing wind
and all the distant valley of the Will.
lamette knew that the forest fires
were burning in the hills.
The papers throughout the state
told OF it that day. and it awakened
no more interest than would have at
tended the announcement of heavier
run of salmon than was usual in the
Columbia.
lhey were too common, those fires
that sported with the national wealth
each year, too much a part of every
day life, and they did not know that
this was to be a marker of time in
the coast country.
Time was when they were unknown.
these monsters of distinctions long
past time 1t was. when those first for
est rangers, the silent Red Men of
she hills, had burned out the under.
brush each year so that a pony might
go anywhere unhindered.
The silent rangers had gone with
the years-passed to the Hunting
Grounds and the reservations, via civ
slization. and now the great timber
had shed its dry foliage and it's pitch,
the little growths had sprung up sra
son after season. the vines had crept
between and man might not pene-
trate the Businesses without built
trails
So Destiny took up the land and
played with it that hot. dry August.
All through the early hours of the
song night they Isbored, dirty, black
ened, tattered scayScrows of men. run
ming here and there, digging like mad
!n the wide trench that was to stop
the surface hamss saving unceas-
ingly at the towering trees, while the
guards brought twenfg- minute tidings
OF the approaching fire.
High against the dun, smoke-light-
Belt whispered and moaned as if in
fear. and from time to time Sandry.
haggard. grim-lipped specter of a man
lifted his bloodshot eyes toward it. II
was still his own. his future of the
Dillingworth. despite the tangle of
4ampden's threats, the unrecorded
deed and the unfinished Il all of the
Yellow Pines at the south. and it
pulled al his heart pathetically.
There was still a stretch of almost
fmpenetrabe timber near the summit
of the big ridge which must be cut
through before the flames reached it.,
or all would be lost
Shall we make it, John?" askei
the owner desperately of Daily. who
4 ran by in the smoke with wet rags to
tie over the mouths of the men
Ought to if the wind stays where