and at last everything was packed up again, and, the fire being out for
want of more food, the engine was dragged back to its dwelling-place in
the belfry, to go on growing older and more mildewy and useless.

It took a great many years to teach people that, but for the show of the
thing, a great deal more good would have resulted if everybody had
carried a tin mug of water and thrown it upon the fire. Still, they did
learn this truth at last, and the result was that one day the old
fire-engine was sold by auction in the marketplace of the nearest town
and bought for a trifle by one of the hop-growers.

From that day the engine began to lead a new life, for it was cleaned
up, newly leathered and suckered, and kept in a barn, from which it was
dragged year after year to put out a plague as bad as fire.

Upon the morning in question there was a little procession from the
oast-houses down to the gardens in the hollow, where, in a sheltered
bower, a fire was lit under a huge copper, which had led the way; a
great water-tub brought fluid from the muddy pond, and a kind of hot
soup was made, bucketfuls of which were mixed with tubs of water; the
suction-pipe of the engine was inserted in these, the hose and branch
attached, and the slaughter of the insects began down between the rows
of hop-poles, where the blackened, blight-covered hops clustered,
twined, and hung.

_Fizz-fuzz_, _spitter-sputter_! Away flew the medicated water in a
poisonous spray, and row after row of the blighted hops was relieved of
the insect enemies, while the farmer's men kept the fire going, the
water boiling, and the poison brewing to save the crop.

There was just enough room for the little engine to be dragged down
between the hills--as they term them--of the hops without much crushing;
but the labourers took good care to empty it first, and even then the
wheels made deep ruts in the well-dug soil. After some hours' work the
men had drawn it well into the middle of the garden; and while two
pumped and another directed a fine spray under the leaves and among the
tendrils, others plodded steadily along from the copper and tubs, each
bearing a couple of buckets, and carefully picking a fresh way from time
to time so as to avoid the shower of fine rain dripping from the verdant
arches overhead.

"Hope nobody won't taste none o' this stuff in his yale, Joey," said one
of the bucket-bearers, as he tossed the medicated water into the big tub
fro