"There, I'll go." He started directly, and as soon as we heard the pony's hoofs on the road the doctor turned to me.
"Come along, Sep," he said, "and let's see if we can't make your father's fortune." He was quite at home in our house, and I followed him into the back kitchen, where he set me at work powdering up the specimens with a hammer on a block of stone, while he built up in the broad open fireplace quite a little furnace with bricks, into which he fitted a small deep earthen pot, one that he chose as being likely to stand the fire, which he set with wood and charcoal, after mixing the broken and powdered ore with a lot of little bits of charcoal, and half filling the earthen pot.

This he covered with more charcoal, shut in the little furnace with some slate slabs, and then, when he considered everything ready, started the fire, which it became my duty to blow.
This did not prove necessary after the fire was well alight, for the doctor had managed his furnace so well that it soon began to roar and glow, getting hotter and hotter, while, as the charcoal sunk, more and more was heaped on, till the little fire burned furiously, and the bricks began to crack, and turn first of a dull red, then brighter, and at last some of them looked almost transparent.
All this took a long time, and our task was a very hot one, for from between the places where the bricks joined, the fire sent out a tremendous heat, where it could be seen glowing and almost white in its intensity.
But hot as it was on a midsummer day, the whole business had a great fascination for me, and I would not have left it on any account.
The doctor, too, seemed wonderfully interested.

Kicksey came about two o'clock to say that the dinner was ready, but the doctor would not leave the furnace; neither would I, and each of us, armed with a pair of tongs from the kitchen and parlour, stood as close as we could, ready to put on fresh pieces of charcoal as the fire began to sink.
"How long will it take cooking, sir ?" I said, after the furnace had been glowing for a long time.
"Hah!" he said, "that's what I can't tell you, Sep.

You see we have not got a regular furnace and blast, and this heat may not be great enough to turn the ore into metal, so we must keep on as long as we can to make sure.

It is of no use to be sanguine over experiments, for all this may turn out to be a failure.