“We can’t get out,” said the man, in a low, hollow tone, which seemed the concentration of fear; “I would have got out of it if I could; but just step to the back door, ma’am, and see.”

I had not felt the least alarm up to this minute; I had never seen a fallow burnt, but I had heard of it as a thing of such common occurrence that I had never connected with it any idea of danger.  Judge then, my surprise, my horror, when, on going to the back door, I saw that the fellow, to make sure of his work, had fired the field in fifty different places.  Behind, before, on every side, we were surrounded by a wall of fire, burning furiously within a hundred yards of us, and cutting off all possibility of retreat; for could we have found an opening through the burning heaps, we could not have seen our way through the dense canopy of smoke; and, buried as we were in the heart of the forest, no one could discover our situation till we were beyond the reach of help.

I closed the door, and went back to the parlour.  Fear was knocking loudly at my heart, for our utter helplessness annihilated all hope of being able to effect our escape—­I felt stupefied.  The girl sat upon the floor by the children, who, unconscious of the peril that hung over them, had both fallen asleep.  She was silently weeping; while the fool who had caused the mischief was crying aloud.

A strange calm succeeded my first alarm; tears and lamentations were useless; a horrible death was impending over us, and yet I could not believe that we were to die.  I sat down upon the step of the door, and watched the awful scene in silence.  The fire was raging in the cedar-swamp immediately below the ridge on which the house stood, and it presented a spectacle truly appalling.  From out the dense folds of a canopy of black smoke, the blackest I ever saw, leaped up continually red forks of lurid flame as high as the tree tops, igniting the branches of a group of tall pines that had been left standing for saw-logs.

A deep gloom blotted out the heavens from our sight.  The air was filled with fiery particles, which floated even to the door-step—­while the crackling and roaring of the flames might have been heard at a great distance.  Could we have reached the lake shore, where several canoes were moored at the landing, by launching out into the water we should have been in perfect safety; but, to attain this object, it was necessary to pass through this mimic hell; and not a bird could have flown over it with unscorched wings.  There was no hope in that quarter, for, could we have escaped the flames, we should have been blinded and choked by the thick, black, resinous smoke.

The fierce wind drove the flames at the sides and back of the house up the clearing; and our passage to the road, or to the forest, on the right and left, was entirely obstructed by a sea of flames.  Our only ark of safety was the house, so long as it remained untouched by the consuming element.  I turned to young Thomas, and asked him, how long he thought that would be.