HAMMOCK NIGHTS 197 
twice as much time—and time, in itself, is the 
most valuable thing in the world. Considered 
from this angle, it seems incredible that we have 
no connoisseurs of sleep. For we have none. 
Therefore it is with some temerity that I declare 
sleep to be one of the romances of existence, and 
not by any chance the simple necessary it is re- 
puted to be. 
However, this romance, in company with 
whatever is worthy, is not to be discovered with- 
out the proper labor. Life is not all truffles. 
Neither do they grow in modest back-yards to 
be picked of mornings by the maid-of-all-work. 
A mere bed, notwithstanding its magic cam- 
ouflage of coverings, of canopy, of disguised pil- 
lows, of shining brass or fluted carven posts, is, 
pancake like, never surrounded by this aura of 
romance. No, it is hammock sleep which is the 
sweetest of all slumber. Not in the hideous, 
dyed affairs of our summer porches, with their 
miserable curved sticks to keep the strands apart, 
and their maddening creaks which grow in length 
and discord the higher one swings—but in a 
hammock woven by Carib Indians. An Indian 
hammock selected at random will not suffice; it 
must be a Carib and none other. For they, them- 
