Each day they camped in a new spot, and while Lita nibbled the fresh
grass at her ease, Miss Celia sketched under the big umbrella, Thorny
read or lounged or slept on his rubber blanket, and Ben made himself
generally useful. Unloading, filling the artist's water-bottle, piling
the invalid's cushions, setting out the lunch, running to and fro for a
flower or a butterfly, climbing a tree to report the view, reading,
chatting, or frolicking with Sancho,--any sort of duty was in Ben's
line, and he did them all well, for an out-of-door life was natural to
him and he liked it.

"Ben, I want an amanuensis," said Thorny, dropping book and pencil one
day, after a brief interval of silence, broken only by the whisper of
the young leaves overhead and the soft babble of the brook close by.

"A what?" asked Ben, pushing back his hat with such an air of amazement
that Thorny rather loftily inquired:

"Don't you know what an amanuensis is?"

"Well, no; not unless it's some relation to an anaconda. Shouldn't
think you'd want one of them, anyway."

Thorny rolled over with a hoot of derision, and his sister, who sat
close by, sketching an old gate, looked up to see what was going on.

"Well, you needn't laugh at a feller. _You_ didn't know what a wombat
was when I asked you, and _I_ didn't roar," said Ben, giving his hat a
slap, as nothing else was handy.

"The idea of wanting an anaconda tickled me so, I couldn't help it. I