THE LONG TRAIL 



narrative, father would be the first to rec- 

 ognize it, and knew that if inadequately- 

 described, the most eventful careers may 

 be of no more interest than the catalogue 

 of ships in the Odyssey, or the "begat" 

 chapters in the Bible. If, however, father 

 felt that there existed a genuine ability to 

 write, he would spare no efforts to place 

 the articles ; in some cases he would write 

 introductions, and in others reviews, of the 

 book, if the results attained to that pro- 

 portion. 



One of the most careful preparations 

 that father made for the African expedi- 

 tion was the choosing of the library. He 

 selected as wide a range as possible, get- 

 ting the smallest copy of each book that 

 was obtainable with decent reading type. 

 He wanted a certain number of volumes 

 mainly for the contrast to the daily life. 

 He told me that he had particularly en- 

 49 



