"Ride! Ride for your lives!" cried Mr. Sneed, dashing up on one of the plow horses. "The prairies are on fire and it's coming this way lickity-split!" Of course his words would not be heard by the moving picture audiences, though those accustomed to it can read the lip motions. Really the words need not have been said, and it was this feature of the "movies" that enabled Mr. DeVere to take up the work when he had failed in the "legitimate" because of his throat ailment. "Flee for your lives!" cried Mr. Sneed. "We're going to try to burn it back, or plow a strip that it can't get over." Thereupon ensued a scene of fear and excitement at the slab hut. A wagon was hastily brought up by some of the cowboys, who were taking part in the picture, and the household goods, (provided of course by the ever-faithful Pop Snooks), were hastily packed into it. Then the girls and others, with every sign of fear and dismay, properly "registered" for the benefit of those who would later see the film in the darkened theaters, gathered together their personal belongings, and entered the wagon. Meanwhile Russ was kept busy getting different views of the big scene. Sometimes there would be shown the raging fire sweeping onward, the black clouds of smoke rolling upward, and the red tongues of flame leaping out. In reality the fire was only a small one, but by cleverly manipulating the camera, and taking close views, it was made to appear as if it was a raging conflagration. As Russ would have difficulty in showing alternate views of the fire itself and the preparations at the slab hut to flee from it, Mr. Pertell, at times, worked an extra camera himself. Thus the time was shortened, for the fire was something that could not be held back, as could something of purely human agency. "Ride! Ride for your lives!" now shouted Mr. Sneed, as he sat on his heaving horse, ready to ride back and help fight the fire. With dramatic gestures he pointed ahead, seemingly to a place of safety. "Ride for your lives!" "But you? What of you?" cried Miss Pennington, as she held out her hands to him imploringly. She was supposed (in the play) to be in love with him. "I go back--to do my duty!" he replied, as his lines called for. There was a dramatic little scene and then Miss Pennington, "registering" weeping, went inside the "prairie schooner," as the big covered wagon was called. Paul, on the driver's seat, cracked his whip at the horses and the vehicle lumbered off, Ruth, Alice and the others who were inside, looking back as if with regret at the home that was soon to be destroyed.