LIGHTING A WOOD FIRE [To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.]
SIR,—In your issue of March 12th I read with interest an article by Mr. Hamish Maclaren on "The House to Live
After paying tribute to the many inventions which make house-keeping easy, he deplores the fact that no invention has contributed a device which will simplify the laying and lighting of a wood fire.
In this part of the United States a small and simple device has at least partially supplied this need. This is known as the Cape Cod Lighter, so named from the district from which it originated—the long, curving sandy cape which forms the southern and part of the eastern boundary of Massachusetts Bay, and where the Pilgrim Fathers first landed. The Cape Cod Lighter consists of an egg-shaped mass of porous brick material with a wire handle. When not in use it reposes in a small brass can of pleasing appearance and filled with kerosene
(paraffin). To build a fire two or three logs of wood are put on the andirons, the lighter is ignited and placed under the logs, where it burns long enough to ignite them, and you have your fire. No paper or small wood need be used. The whole process of laying and lighting should not take sixty seeondq.– I am, Sir, &c.,
Boston, Massachusetts,
G. S. DERBY.
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