THE LAST SHOT 345 



cidents and experiences enjoyed in my tussle with the 

 wilds of Nature. Though the time was comparatively 

 short the trips were not. By land and water, by rail, 

 steamboat, wagon, buck-board, yacht, row-boat and 

 birch-bark canoe, the miles covered were over ten 

 thousand. No trifling distance; and yet through it 

 all I was never really ill but once, and the damage 

 done then was not serious enough to prevent my re- 

 turning home, 



" Fall of vigor, tongh and glad, 

 Feeling like a wiry lad, " 



and with a capacity for work that was well worth its 

 cost of two months' time. 



And now a parting word to you, you man of busi- 

 ness, chained like a felon in his cell, bereft of sunlight, 

 harassed with care, tiring your brain over the one 

 mighty problem of money-making — or else some scheme 

 to stave off financial disaster — 'twill pay you to pon- 

 der on my words and my experience and call a halt. 

 Make up your mind that money without health is a 

 greater calamity than health without money. Leave 

 your desk and turn your back on the steaming streets 

 of civilization and your thoughts where Nature tempts 

 with her trout streams, her mirrored lakes and her 

 game-abounding retreats ; to her forests, fragrant with 

 balsamic odors and watered with living streams made 

 wholesome with the leech ings of the spruce, and pine, 



