descended a flight of steps into a sort of cellar, from which,
I regret to say, daylight was not wholly excluded, and found
themselves-- But we will let the gaffer speak.
"Here is where we get our draught. We
are now under the large chimney,-- cone, we call it. It is
supported by these piers. Right in the centre, between them,
you see that horizontal grate, with the fire from above shining
through; that is in the bottom of the furnace,-- what we call
the eye."
"It's an awful, fiery-red eye!" said
Lawrence. "Don't it look like some horrible, one-eyed dragon
shut up there, and glaring down at us through those iron bars?"
"Not at all; not in the least," said the
Doctor, who could be dreadfully prosaic when he saw young people
inclined to be too romantic. "It looks to me like a very hot
fire. I should think your grates would burn out fast."
"They last longer than one would suppose,"
said the gaffer. "Iron bars like these will stand a couple of
years. The draught of cold air rushing up through them, and the
dead cinders accumulating, keep them comparatively cool."
"How do you get rid of the clinkers?" said
Lawrence, who remembered his bitter experience cleaning the stoves
at home. "I suppose you let the fire go out once in a awhile."
"We let this fire go down about once in
five or six years," said the gaffer. "Then it takes three
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