Any fool can start a forest fire. Indeed, a fool generally does.
But a hundred men cannot check it. Forest wardens post warnings.
Forest patrols, afoot or in airships, keep sharp watch. But the
selfish carelessness of man undoes their best precautions.
Sometimes in spring or in lush summer, but far oftenest in the
dry autumn, the Red Terror stalks over mountain and valley;
leaving black ruin in its wake. Scarce an autumn passes that the
dirty smoke reek does not creep over miles of sweet woodland,
blotting out the sunshine for a time and blotting out rich
vegetation for much longer.
This particular autumn was no exception. On the day before camp
was broken, the Mistress had spied, from the eyrie heights of the
knoll, a grim line of haze far to southward; and a lesser
smoke-smear to the west. And the night sky, on two horizons, had
been faintly lurid.
The campers had noted these phenomena, with sorrow. For, each
wraithlike smoke-swirl meant the death of tree and shrub. Lad
noted the smudges as distinctly as did they. Indeed, to his
canine nostrils, the chill autumn air brought the faint reek of
wood-smoke; an odor much too elusive, at that distance, for
humans to smell.
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