NATURE GUIDING AT HOME 235 



up I asked him why there were pines on the 

 sunny wall of the canon up which we climbed 

 and spruces on the northerly facing wall; and I 

 also asked why at timberline there were spruces, 

 firs, and willows in the moist places and pines 

 in the near by dry places. I told him many 

 things concerning glaciers how they worked 

 and how they dug lake basins and piled up 

 moraines of rocks and soil. 



I came to be considered a nature guide. At 

 first I gave my services free, but as I was so 

 often wanted, and had to work for a living, I 

 began to charge for guiding. People wanted to 

 see and hear about rocks, trees, birds, wild 

 flowers, beavers, bears, and everything. 



A surprise came when a man took me to Idaho 

 to guide through a region I had not seen. But 

 I knew how to start a fire, and Idaho wood and 

 Colorado wood behaved about the same; Idaho 

 grizzlies had a different bill of fare, but I found 

 that what I had learned of Colorado grizzlies 

 enabled me to understand them without an in- 

 troduction. 



And so it was during my camping trips in 

 Canada, Alaska, and Mexico; the things that I 

 had learned while in sight of my cabin made me 

 more or less at home with the rocks, trees, animals, 

 and beavers a thousand or more miles from home. 



In guiding people I found that they cared 



