They had by this time reacted the Gangoil fence, having taken the directest route for the house.  But Harry, in doing this, had not been unmindful of the fire.  Had Medlicot not been wounded, he would have taken the party somewhat out of the way, down southward, following the flames; but Medlicot’s condition had made him feel that he would not be justified in doing so.  Now, however, it occurred to him that he might as well ride a mile or two down the fence, and see what injury had been done.  The escort of the men would be sufficient to take Medlicot to the station, and he would reach the place as soon as they.  If the flames were still running ahead, he knew that he could not now stop then, but he could at least learn how the matter stood with him.  If the worst came to the worst, he would not now lose more than three or four miles of fencing, and the grass off a corner of his run.  Nevertheless, tired as he was, he could not bear the idea of going home without knowing the whole story.  So he made his proposal.  Medlicot, of course, made no objection.  Each of the men offered to go with him, but he declined their services.  “There is nothing to do,” said he, “and nobody to catch; and if the fire is burning, it must burn.”  So he went alone.

The words that he had uttered among his men had not been lightly spoken.  He had begun to perceive that life would be very hard to him in his present position, or perhaps altogether impossible, as long as he was at enmity with all those around him.  Old squatters whom he knew, respectable men who had been in the colony before he was born, had advised him to be on good terms with the Brownbies.  “You needn’t ask them to your house, or go to them, but just soft-sawder them when yon meet,” an old gentleman had said to him.  He certainly hadn’t taken the old gentleman’s advice, thinking that to “soft-sawder” so great a reprobate as Jerry Brownbie would be holding a candle to the devil.  But his own plan had hardly answered.  Well, he was sure, at any rate, of this—­that he could do no good now by endeavoring to be civil to the Brownbies.  He soon came to the place where the fire had reached his fence, and found that it had burned its way through, and that the flames were still continuing their onward course.  The fence to the north, or rather to the northwestward—­the point whence the wind was coming—­stood firm at the spot at which the fire had struck it.  Dry as the wood was, the flames had not traveled upward against the wind.  But to the south the fire was traveling down the fence.  To stop this he rode half a mile along the burning barrier till he had headed the flames, and then he pulled the bushes down and rolled away the logs, so as to stop the destruction.  As regarded his fence, there was less than a mile of it destroyed, and that he could now leave in security, as the wind was blowing away from it.  As for his grass, that must now take its chance.  He could see the dark light of the low running fire; but there