Two Days Together 37 



A camp without tobacco is unthinkable. The equally effi- 

 cient substitute for thought has not yet been discovered or devised. 

 Nor is there any known means so effective for bridging the 

 conversational lacunae that often occur between even the most 

 sociably inclined of camp dwellers. Art's particular addiction 

 is to a cigarette before breakfast, which he rolls himself from a 

 pouch that contains tobacco and papers both. In the matter of 

 cigars also Art has a discriminating and matured judgment, while 

 the single corona to each that Bill passes out each evening is of 

 a soul-satisfying goodness. Bill does not smoke cigars when he 

 has a job that calls for active use of his hands. At these times he 

 favors a fatbellied briar — an excellent cadging pipe — with a drop 

 stem. The painter, though given to cigarettes, in the field prefers 

 a light straight bitted briar, as needing less attention than any 

 other mode of consuming the weed. 



Early to bed is the rule, and so, somewhere around nine, 

 with an overcast sky and no frost in the air the day ends. 



Friday the eighteenth. 



At half after one this morning, being awake, through the tent 

 door I saw the stars. Brilliant, near, in this high clear sky they 

 lit the night as never in the smoke-shrouded city. It was frosty, 

 and the fire had died down in the stove. Awake for some time, 

 mentally debating whether to mend the fire or, being up, lay on 

 the desired extra coverings that were just out of reach, after va- 

 rious ineffectual attempts to conserve warmth by tucking in the 

 edges of the blankets more tightly, a decision was finally arrived at, 

 to do both. Presently, the fire mended, and with a handy overcoat 

 drawn up to my chin, and much more to my comfort, having dis- 

 turbed neither of my tentmates, I fell into a comfortable sleep 

 that lasted till well after daybreak. 



After breakfast, in a clear and sunny morning, the motor 

 was shipped on the boat, and all three of us started upstream with 

 rods and tackle for two of us and a sketching outfit for the third. 

 The boat ran through a succession of sedgy meadows thicketed 

 with dog willows, from which a heron or two rose, and sailed lazily 

 away to a new stand. Looking downstream to the west, above 

 the tapestried gold and russet of the willow meadows, bounded 



