And the Giant raised his hands to his mouth and shouted at the little gnomes:--
"Hurry, more coal now--make it snappy!"
And the gnomes ran back and forth from the coal-piles to the tunnels, trundling their wheelbarrows, until their legs twinkled under them as fast as the little lights in their foreheads.
Soon the coal-pile was as high as a black mountain, and the Giant began to shovel, shovel away, throwing the coal into the mouth of the furnace which was as high as the Woolworth Tower. Then he closed the door and watched.
The flames began to leap, and the steam began to hiss, and soon the great furnace began to shake all over with the steam imprisoned inside, just like a man with chills and fever. Then all-of-a-sudden, from somewhere above them on the outside of the Earth, they heard a great roar.
"There goes old Vesuvius," said the Giant.
There was another great roar.
"And there's Aetna and Cotopaxi," he added, "now for Old Chimborazo!"
Marmaduke remembered enough of his geography to know that the Giant was calling off the names of the great volcanoes of the world. It was indeed very thrilling! But he really had hardly time to think, for he had to hold on so tight to the rope hair of the Giant's beard; and if the three little Chinamen hadn't kept tight hold, too, of their flatirons, they would have been blown to the ceiling of the pit, the furnace and the whole place shook so. As it was they were tossed head over heels, their feet flying in the air, but their hands held on to the flatirons like ships to their anchors, and they were saved.
The Giant turned to Marmaduke.