"Ready!" he called back merrily over his shoulder.
The hillside vibrated with the flutter of expectant juvenile humanity and a vast babel of half-suppressed excited voices.
Bart applied the punk, there was a fizz, a sharp hiss, a writhing worm of quick flame, and then came a fearful report that split the air like the crack of doom.
CHAPTER III
COUNTING THE COST
Bart had quickly moved to one side of the cannon after lighting the fuse, and was about twenty feet away when the explosion came.
The alarming echoes, the shock, flare and smoke combined to give him a terrific sensation.
The crowd that had retreated down the hill in delightful trepidation now came trooping back filled with a bolder excitement.
They had indeed "waked the natives," for gazing downhill against the lights of the street and stores at its base they could see people rushing outdoors in palpable agitation.