base-burning

"There would be the base-burning, high-pressure, anti-friction catcher," he wrote, "and the shortstop made of aluminium and rivets and filled with cogs, cams, valves, shafts, and belting."

A Machine Before Its Time 2010

Every article of furniture, every bit of painting, the carpets, and even the base-burning stove, were the trophies of successful robberies.

Jim Cummings Or, The Great Adams Express Robbery A. Frank [pseud.] Pinkerton

Beside our base-burning stove she sat night after night playing cinch or dominoes to amuse my father, while creaking footsteps went by on the frosty board-walks and in a distant room my aunt lay waiting for the soft step of the Grim Intruder.

A Daughter of the Middle Border Hamlin Garland 1900