A BED OF BOUGHS 



express the power and aboriginal grace there is in 

 them, nor toy with them and pluck them up by the 

 hair of their heads, as Shakespeare does. There is 

 something in Peakamoose yonder, as we see it from 

 this point, cutting the blue vault with its dark, 

 serrated edge, not in the bard of Grasmere ; but he 

 expresses the feeling of loneliness and insignificance 

 that the cultivated man has in the presence of 

 mountains, and the burden of solemn emotion they 

 give rise to. Then there is something much more 

 wild and merciless, much more remote from human 

 interests and ends, in our long, high, wooded ranges 

 than is expressed by the peaks and scarred groups 

 of the lake country of Britain. These mountains we 

 behold and cross are not picturesque, they are 

 wild and inhuman as the sea. In them you are in 

 a maze, in a weltering world of woods; you can see 

 neither the earth nor the sky, but a confusion of the 

 growth and decay of centuries, and must traverse 

 them by your compass or your science of woodcraft, 

 a rift through the trees giving one a glimpse of 

 the opposite range or of the valley beneath, and 

 he is more at sea than ever; one does not know his 

 own farm or settlement when framed in these moun- 

 tain treetops; all look alike unfamiliar." 



Not the least of the charm of camping out is your 

 camp-fire at night. What an artist! What pictures 

 are boldly thrown or faintly outlined upon the can- 

 vas of the night! Every object, every attitude of 



