Further Work in Kansas Chalk 105 



The man started off after the Professor, and I 

 waited, with a good deal of curiosity, to hear his 

 report of the conversation. On his return he was in 

 a brown study. The Professor had taken him into 

 his tent, and shown him hundreds of mounted in- 

 sects, reeling off their names to him until his head 

 whirled. 



" Well, did I tell you the truth? " Jim asked. 



" That man," said the cowman, " is the smartest 

 man I ever saw. He knows the names and surnames 

 of all the bugs in this country." 



On the thirtieth of April we drove down to the 

 Smoky, thirty miles south of Buffalo, and got 

 caught in a quicksand, but managed to save both 

 team and wagon. We camped at the mouth of a 

 large ravine with plenty of grass in it. 



All that night it blew a perfect gale. Did you, 

 dear reader, ever try to sleep in a tent when the 

 wind was high and the canvas flapped about you, 

 waking the fear that at any moment the pegs might 

 pull out or a seam part ? Do you know what it is to 

 lie, deafened by thunder and blinded by lightning, 

 while the rain and sleet dash against the thin cov- 

 ering which is all that separates you from the fury 

 of the storm? It is not a pleasant experience, and 

 yet in all the years that I have gone camping, al- 

 though I have expected time and again to find my 

 tent torn to shreds over my head, my fears have 



