The Journal of a Sporting Nomad 

 thick logs and placed them about a foot apart, 

 then collected a handful of " old man's beard," 

 a lichen growing in abundance on the fir trees, 

 which makes splendid kindling for a fire, even 

 when wet. Then he brought some birch boughs 

 and a log or two of the same wood, and stripping 

 off some of the highly resinous bark soon had 

 a fire started. Whilst it was burning up the 

 cook filled the kettle at the river. 



Meantime Johnny had been getting on famously 

 with the lean-to. He had stuck in some poles 

 slanting towards the fire about three feet apart, 

 and interlacing some spruce boughs between 

 them, built out a wing of the same description, 

 where the head of my bed was to be. Fresh 

 armfuls of the tips of spruce boughs, with the 

 cut ends tucked beneath, made me a couch a 

 foot thick, and as night fell I spread my blankets 

 and waterproof sheet on the sweet-scented 

 resting-place. A small log provided the founda- 

 tion for a pillow of all my spare clothes a bed 

 for a king ! 



Then supper. Bacon, bread and butter, and 

 tea. 



More tired than I had ever been, I was as happy 

 as it is possible for mortal man to be in this 

 wicked world. 



The fire had burnt low when I turned in 

 between my warm blankets. Towards morning, 

 when the cold was at its greatest, the fire having 



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