"Dead Trees Love the Fire" 169 



man. Here, on the Great South Bay, we seem 

 to be particularly favored in the matter of sun- 

 sets, for certainly more than half our days end 

 with one of these color displays as changing as 

 it is indescribable. We have grown so used to 

 these wonderful pictures that adjectives and 

 superlatives have long ago been used up ; some 

 one points now and then to a particularly ex- 

 quisite blending of gold and silver, and the rest 

 of the party nod in silence. By the time we 

 reach our harbor, the sun has gone down with 

 the breeze, and we drift slowly into the little 

 slip. The village is at supper, and my friend 

 the Cap'n, who stands on the dock, is the only 

 one to greet us. He peers curiously at the 

 wood, and seems doubtful when I tell him that 

 it is to burn. For the Cap'n also has his ideas 

 about queer people who waste a whole day and 

 sail ten miles to get a lot of pine knots that 

 any "nigger " would have delivered for a two- 

 dollar bill. The Cap'n's notion of otium cum 

 dignitate is probably an unfailing supply of 

 tobacco, and an endless conference around the 

 village store stove upon the affairs of the neigh- 

 borhood and the nation. I told him once that 



