their crops. The first barn
they had ever built, which was now the oldest and the furthest from the
stables and the residence, was a pretty large one. It was now in a
somewhat dilapidated condition, to be sure, and bowed a little northerly
by the weight of years which rested on it, but it had still some hope of
future usefulness, if it had not been for that tramp and his box of
matches.

"There isn't a bit of use in trying to save it," exclaimed Ham, as they
were whirled in through the wide gate. "It's gone."

"But," said Mrs. Kinzer, "we can save the other barns, perhaps. Look at
the cinders on the long stable. If we could only keep them off somehow."

"We can do it, Ham!" exclaimed Dab, very earnestly. "Mother, will you
send me out a broom and a rope, while Ham and I set up the ladder?"

"You're the boy for me," said Ham. "I guess I know what you're up to."

The ladder was one the house painters had been using, and was a pretty
heavy one, but it was quickly set up against the largest and most
valuable of the barns, and the one, too, which was nearest and most
exposed to the burning building and its flying cinders. The rope was on
hand, and the broom, by the time the ladder was in position.

"Ford," said Dab, "you and Frank help the girls bring water till the men
from the village get here. There's plenty of pails. Now, Ham, I'm
ready."

Up they went, and were quickly astride the ridge of the roof. It would
have been perilous work for any man to have ventured further unassisted,
but Dab tied one end of the rope firmly around his waist, Ham Morris
tied himself to the other, and then Dab could slip down the steep roof
in any direction without fear of falling.

But the broom? As useful as a small engine. The flying cinders, burning
hay or wood, as they alighted on the sun-dried shingles of the roof,
needed to be swept off as rapidly as they fell. Here and there the
flames had so good a start that the broom alone would have been
insufficient, and there the fast-arriving pails of water came into
capital play. They had to be used economically, of course, but they did
the work as effectually as if they had been the streams of a steam
fire-engine. Hard work for Ham and Dab, and now and then the strength
and weight and agility of the former were put to pretty severe tests, as
Dab danced around under the scorching heat or slipped flat upon the
sloping roof.

There were scores and scores of people from the village, now,