CAMPING ON THE PLAINS 93 



without thinking about it, and do it right. I 

 had good experience. Camp was where a camp 

 usually is where one leaves it. 



In Kingfisher Camp again I sat down and 

 traced my route in a notebook. I was surprised 

 that I remembered the turns and the objects 

 passed. In making this tracing my memory in- 

 sisted on recalling a number of objects I had 

 not remembered passing. It recalled a tree 

 with an old axe mark on it. I could not remem- 

 ber seeing this; in fact, I could not believe that 

 I had seen it. The following morning I was by 

 this tree before sunrise. It did have an old axe 

 mark on it; one, so the annual rings said, that 

 had been there for twenty-four years. I must 

 have been watching the way closely, as well as 

 other things even more interesting, but I saw 

 this landmark. 



In Alaska, Canada, Mexico, and in every state 

 in the Union I have sat by a camp-fire all alone. 

 And the most useful resource that I had in all 

 these hundreds of camping experiences in all 

 sorts of places and in all kinds of weather was 

 in ever having my reckoning without stopping to 

 take it. 



A captain must often take reckonings; wind 

 and tide drift the ship out of its course. The 

 man at the wheel must have a compass, but this 

 alone cannot navigate the ship; the compass 



