fire to fry his cakes, he suddenly discovered that dry twigs do not
make coals, and that his previous operations had used up all the fuel
within easy circle of the camp.

So he had to drop everything for the purpose of rustling wood,
while the coffee chilled, the rice cooled, the bacon congealed, and all
the provisions, cooked and uncooked, gathered entomological specimens.
At the last, the poor bedeviled theorist made a hasty meal of scorched
food, brazenly postponed the washing of dishes until the morrow, and
coiled about his hummocky couch to dream the nightmares of complete
exhaustion.

Poor Dick! I knew exactly how he felt, how the low afternoon sun
scorched, how the fire darted out at unexpected places, how the smoke
followed him around, no matter on which side of the fire he placed
himself, how the flies all took to biting when both hands were
occupied, and how they all miraculously disappeared when he had set
down the frying-pan and knife to fight them. I could sympathize, too,
with the lonely, forlorn, lost-dog feeling that clutched him after it
was all over. I could remember how big and forbidding and unfriendly
the forest had once looked to me in like circumstances, so that I had
felt suddenly thrust outside into empty spaces. Almost was I tempted to
intervene; but I liked Dick, and I wanted to do him good. This
experience was harrowing, but it prepared his mind for the seeds of
wisdom. By the following morning he had chastened his spirit, forgotten
the assurance breathed from the windy pages of the Boy Trapper Library,
and was ready to learn.

Have you ever watched a competent portraitist at work? The infinite
pains a skilled man spends on the preliminaries before he takes one