Jonathan had improvidently lighted his pipe before he noticed that the fire needed his attention. This was a mistake, because, at least in Jonathan\'s case, neither a fire nor a pipe responds heartily to a divided mind. As I watched him absently knocking the charred logs together, I longed to snatch the tongs from his indifferent hands and "change the sorry scheme of things entire." Big wads of smoke rolled nonchalantly out of the corners of the fireplace and filled the low ceiling with bluish mist, yet I held my peace, and I did not snatch the tongs. I know of no circumstances wherein advice is less welcome than when offered by a woman to a man on his knees before the fire. When my friends make fudge or rare-bits, they invite criticism, they court suggestion, but when one of them takes the tongs in his hand, have a care what you say to him! In our household a certain convention[Pg 223] of courtesy—fireplace etiquette—has tacitly established itself, in accordance with which the person who wields the tongs, assuming full responsibility for results, is free from criticism or suggestion. Disregard of such etiquette may not have precipitated divorce, but I have known it to produce distinctly strained relations. And so, while Jonathan tinkered in a half-hearted way at the fire, I ruled my tongue. At last, little vanishing blue flickers began to run along the log edges, growing steadier and yellower until they settled into something like a blaze.

Jonathan straightened up, but there was a trace of the apologetic in his tone as he said, "That\'ll do, won\'t it?"

"Why, yes," I replied cautiously, "it\'s a fire."

"Well, what\'s the matter with it?" he asked tolerantly.

"Since you press me, I should say that it lacks—style."

Jonathan leaned back, puffing comfortably—"Now, what in thunder do you mean by style?"[Pg 224]

But I was not to be enticed into an empty discussion of terms. "Well, then, say frowsy. Call it a frowsy fire. You know what frowsy means, I suppose. Of course, though, I don\'t mean to criticize, only you asked me." And I added, with perhaps unnecessary blandness, "I\'m warm enough."

Jonathan smoked a few moments more, possibly by way of establishing his independence, then slowly rose, remarking, "Oh, well, if you want a stylish fire—"

"I didn\'t say stylish, I said style—"

But he was gone. He must have journeyed out to the woodshed,—however, there was a moon,—for he returned bearing a huge backlog. He had been magnanimous, indeed, for it was the sort that above all others delights my heart—a forked apple log with a big hollow heart. In a moment, I was on my knees clearing a place for it, and he swung it into position on the bed of embers, tucked in some white birch in front, and soon the flames were licking about the flaking gray apple bark and shooting up through the hollow fork in a fashion to charm the most fastidious.

People whose open fires are machine-fed—who[Pg 225] arrange for their wood as they do for their groceries, by telephone—know little of the real joys of a fire. It is laid by a servant,—unintelligently laid,—and upon such masses of newspaper and split kindling that it has no choice but to burn. The match is struck, the newspapers flare up, and soon there is a big, meaningless blaze. Handfuls of wood—just wood, any kind of wood—are thrown on from time to time, and perhaps a log or two—any log, taken at random from the wood-box. Truly, this is merest savagery, untrained, undiscriminating; it is the Bushman\'s meal compared to the Frenchman\'s dinner. Not thus are real hearth fires laid. Not thus are they enjoyed. You should plan a fire as you do a dinner party, and your wood, like your people, should be selected and arranged with due regard to age, temperament, and individual eccentricity. A fire thus skillfully planned, with some good talkers among the logs, may be as well worth listening to as the conversation about your table—perhaps better.

To get the full flavor of a fire you must know your wood— I had almost said, you[Pg 226] must remember where the tree stood before it was cut—white birch in the dry, worn-out slopes, black birches from the edges of the pasture lots, chestnut from the ledges, maple from the swamps, apple from the old orchard, oak cut in sorrow when the fullness of time has come, and burned with the honor due to royalty.

But though this may be a refinement of fancy, it is no fancy that one kind of wood differs from another in glory. There is the white birch, gay, light-hearted, volatile, putting all its pretty self into a few flaring moments—a butterfly existence. There is black birch, reluctant but steady; there is chestnut, vivacious, full of sudden enthusiasms; the apple, cheerful and willing; the maple and oak, sober and stanch, good for the long pull. Every locality has its own sorts of wood, as its own sorts of people. Mine is a New England wood basket, and as I look at it I recognize all my old friends. Of them all I love the apple best, yet each is in its own way good. For a quick blaze, throw on the white birch; for a long evening of reading, when one does not want distraction, pile on the oak and maple. They[Pg 227] will burn quietly, unobtrusively, importuning you neither for care nor appreciation. But for a fire to sit before with friends, bring in the apple wood. Lay the great backlog, the more gnarled the better, and if there is a hole through which the flames may shoot up, that is best of all—such logs we hoard for special occasions. Then with careful touch arrange the wood in front, your bundles of twigs, your pretty white birch sticks and your dry chestnut to start the fun, then the big apple forelog, the forestick and the backstick, not too much crowding or too much space. Ah, there is a seemly fire! There is a fire for friends!

For the renewal of old friendships, as for the perfecting of new ones, there is nothing like a fire. I met a friend after years of separation. We came together in a modern house, just modern enough to be full of steam pipes and registers and gas-logs, but not so modern as to have readopted open fi............