rhythm. The hose writhed and swelled; the light engines quivered. Bert
Taylor and the Eureka foreman, Carter by name, walked back and forth as on
their quarterdecks, exhorting their men. Relays, in uniform assumed on the
spot, stood ready at hand. Nobody in either crew knew or cared anything
whatsoever about the fire. As the race became closer, the foremen got more
excited, begging their crews to increase the stroke, beating their speaking
trumpets into shapeless battered relics. An astute observer would now have
understood one reason why the jewellery stores carried such a variety of
fancy speaking trumpets. They were for presentation by grateful owners
after the fire had been extinguished, and it was generally necessary to get
a new one for each fire.

Keith, acting under previous instructions, promptly seized a helmet and
poleaxe and made his way to the front. The fire had started in one of many
flimsy wooden buildings, and had rapidly spread to threaten a whole
district. Men from the hook and ladder companies were already at work on
some of the hopeless cases. A fireman or two mounted ladders to the eaves,
dragging with them a heavy hook on the end of a long pole. Cutting a small
hole with their axes, they hooked on this apparatus and descended. As many
firemen and volunteers as could get hold of the pole and the rope attached
to it, now began to pull.

"Yo, heave ho!" they cried.

The timbers cracked, broke, the whole side of the house came out with a
grand and satisfying crash. An inferno of flame was thereby laid open to
the streams from the hose lines. It was grand destructive fun for
everybody, especially for the boys of all ages, which included in spirit
about every male person present.