Across the valley hung a dusky pall of smoke, and beneath it all trunks stripped to bare spires stood out black against a sea of flame.

The latter, however, was of no very great extent from wing to wing, and, now that the wind had almost dropped, it made very little progress, though it crept on down the valley in a confined belt, rising and falling in pulsations with the sharp crackle of licked-up undergrowth breaking through the deep-toned roar.

Saunders, lying propped up on one elbow, watched it meditatively.
"It's a high-class burn," he said.

"Going to save somebody quite a lot of chopping.

But if that breeze whipped round there'd sure be trouble." As the men at work on the lode lived either in tents or rude shelters of bark and logs, this seemed very probable; but Weston was not in the mood to concern himself about the matter then.
"How much giant-powder have we got in hand ?" he asked.
"Almost enough to last another three weeks with fuse and detonators to match.