The town of Kingston was not large enough or rich enough to support a
full-fledged fire department with paid firemen and trained horses.
It had nothing but an old-fashioned engine, a hose-cart, and a
ladder-truck, all of which had to be drawn by two-footed steeds, the
volunteer firemen of the village.

The Lakerimmers had not been in Kingston many weeks before they heard
the fire-bell lift its voice. It was not more than twenty minutes
before the Kingston fire department appeared galloping along the rough
road in front of the campus at a fearsome speed of about six miles an
hour.

Several of the horses wore long white beards, and others of them were
so fat that they added more weight than power to the team.

Such of the academicians as had no classes at that hour followed these
champing chargers to the scene of the fire.

It turned out to be a woodshed, which was as black and useless as a
burnt biscuit by the time the fire department arrived.

But the Volunteers had the pleasure of dropping a hose down the well
of the owner of the late lamented woodshed, and pumping the well dry.
The Volunteers thus bravely extinguished three fence-posts that had
caught fire from the woodshed, and then turned for home, proud in the
consciousness of duty performed. They felt sure that they had saved
the village from a second Chicago fire.

Jumbo said that the department ought not to be called the Volunteers,
but the Crawfishes. B.J., who had a scientific turn of mind, said that
he had an idea for a great invention.

"The world revolves from west to east at the rate of a thousand miles
an hour," he said.

"I've heard so," broke in Jumbo, "but you can't believe everything you
see in print."

B.J. brushed him aside, and went on:

"Now, all you've got to do is to invent a scheme for raising your
fire-engine and your firemen up in the air a few feet, and holding
them still while the earth revolves under them. Then you turn a kind
of a wheel, or something, when the place you want to get to comes
around, and there you are in a jiffy. It would beat the Empire State
Express all hollow. Why, it would be faster even than an ice-boat!"
he exclaimed enthusiastically. "I guess I'll have to get that idea
patented."

"But say, B.J.," said Bobbles, in a puzzled manner, "suppose your fire
was in the other direction? You'd have to go clear around the world to
get to the place."

"I didn't think of that," said B.J., dejectedly.

And thu