Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 14.djvu/674

656 strike them as being at all necessary. The importance of such precautions is manifest when we learn that in London alone there are on the average three fires in every twenty-four hours. If this wholesale destruction were reported of an Eastern city, where the houses are of wood, and are sun-dried by incessant tropical heat, there would be some excuse for it. But here at home, where bricks and mortar are so common, it is certainly astonishing that fires should be so prevalent.

It would seem that it is a much easier task to set an entire house on fire than it is with deliberate intention, and with proper combustibles to light a stove for the purpose of boiling a kettle. This latter operation is not so simple as it appears to be, as any one may prove who has not already tried his or her hand at it. In fact, an efficient or bad house-servant may be almost at once detected by the ease or difficulty with which she lights her fires. The inefficient servant will place some crumpled paper in the grate, and will throw the best part of a bundle of wood on the top of it, crowning the whole with a smothering mass of coal; and will expect the fire to burn. The good servant will, on the other hand, first clear her grate, so as to insure a good draught; she will then place the wood above the paper, crossing the sticks again, and again; then the coals are put in deftly one by one, affording interstices through which the flames will love to linger; a light is applied; and the kettle will soon be singing acknowledgments of the warm ardor with which it has been wooed. Contrast this with the other picture, where double the fuel is wasted, and where smoke and dirt make their appearance in lieu of tea and toast. We venture to say that a badly managed kitchen fire, with its train of unpunctual meals, leads to more general loss of temper than all the other minor domestic troubles put together. The stove is usually the scapegoat on which the offending servant lays her incompetence (the cat clearly could establish an alibi); but the most perfect of ranges would not remedy the fault. The only real reason for such a state of things is the prevalence of sheer stupidity. Molly's mother was taught by Molly's grandmother to light a fire in a certain way, and Molly's descendants will, from persistence of habit, continue to Light fires in that manner, be it good or evil, until the end of time. It is quite clear that the same stupidity which causes an intentional fire to fail will occasionally lead to a pyrotechnic exhibition which has been quite unlooked for. For instance, cases are not unknown where servants have used the contents of a powder-horn for coaxing an obstinate fire to burn; the loss of a finger or two generally giving them sufficient hint not to repeat the experiment.

The general use of gas has done much to reduce the number of conflagrations, for it has replaced other illuminators far more dangerous; but it has at the same time contributed a cause of accident which before its use could not exist. So long as people will insist on looking for an escape of gas with a lighted candle, so long will their rashness be rewarded with an explosion. It is not customary, where there is a doubt as to