distinctness the giant, the old man and the Indian. Brick closed
the stove-door, and the sudden gloom brought out in mellow effect
Wilfred's animated face, the dull yellow wall against which his
sturdy shoulder rested, and the letter in his hand.



CHAPTER XIV
WRITING HOME


"Dear Brick and Bill:

"I don't know what to tell first. It's all so strange and
grand--the people are just people, but the things are wonderful.
The people want it to be so; they act, and think according to the
things around them. They pride themselves on these things and on
being amongst them, and I am trying to learn to do that, too. When
I lived in the cove--it seems a long, long time ago--my thoughts
were always away from dirt-floors and cook-stoves and cedar logs and
wash-pans. But the people in the big world keep their minds tied
right up to such things--only the things are finer--they are marble
floors and magnificent restaurants and houses on what they call the
'best streets.' At meals, there are all kinds of little spoons and
forks, and they think to use a wrong one is something dreadful; that
is why I say the forks and spoons seem more important than THEY are,
but they want it to be so.

"They have certain ways of doing everything, and just certain times
for doing them, and if you do a wrong thing at a right time, or a