A Good Idea.

A Good Idea.

The Springfield Republican, referring to the exposure of small villages to destruction by fire, says.

“A large fire in another village up in Vermont, that of South Royalton, shows the absolute exposure of the small villages to fire and should stimulate the ingenuity of preventive measures for rural communities. Why do not the towns along one railroad within fifty miles organize a railroad fire service? Here, for instance, are two villages—Bethel and South Royalton—within ten miles of each other by rail, and both strung along a considerable stream of water, which have lately suffered severely from fire. Neither village is big enough to have a fire service, but ten towns along the Central Vermont might unite to maintain at some central point, where the railroad keeps an engine, a steam fire-engine mounted on a car and attended by a small paid service. The proportional expense for each town in the district would be very small, and the engine would generally arrive on the scene of the fire in season to confine it to the building in which it broke out. The river on which such villages are located would gensrally supply water enough, or a country so abounding in brooks need not lack for reservoirs offirom the main stream. As the farming community in these towns invariably votes down any proposition to protect the village at the town’s expense, and the insurance companies, even the rural ones, cannot go on taking risks in such localities, the necessity for some measures of prevention, inexpensive but efficient, is apparent.