LETTERS FROM AN OREGON RANCH
done, much to the satisfaction of his ground-floor assistant, who, feeling that the worst of the work was about over, and himself safe on terra firma, was now in buoyant spirits, singing in tones loud enough to have been heard on the top of Mount Hood,—
“High in the belfry the old sexton stands,
Grasping a wire in his thin bony hands.”
“The troubadour is most flattering, especially as to thin, bony hands; but I would suggest that he leave off that bellowing and go inside and start up his old furnace.”
“‘I do make all convenient haste, my lord,’” he called, as he came bustling into the kitchen. “That old Santa Claus on the roof, in the heel-cracker coat, is advising me to fire up,” he said to us, cramming in fuel and striking matches. “I’ll have this thing going like a house afire in about a minute. You can start your biscuit now; and, say, open a can of maple syrup, and we’ll have a high jinks of a time.”
And we had it too; for no sooner was the fire started than smoke began pouring out from every crack and crevice of that stove, even from the front draught. It filled the house and rolled in billowy masses from open doors and broken windows. We were sure that nothing like it had been seen since the burning of Chicago. The operator, dumb with amazement, was dimly seen through the haze prancing round and round the stove
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