r; all its
appointments for the bodily needs express simplicity and frugality; and
its books and magazines, and the conversation of the host--are they not
there for the needs that bread alone will not supply?

"Mr. Burroughs, why don't you PAINT things?" asked a little boy of four,
who had been spending a happy day at Slabsides, but who, at nightfall,
while nestling in the author's arms, seemed suddenly to realize that
this rustic house was very different from anything he had seen before.
"I don't like things painted, my little man; that is just why I came up
here--to get away from paint and polish--just as you liked to wear your
overalls to-day and play on the grass, instead of keeping on that pretty
dress your mother wanted you to keep clean." "Oh!" said the child in
such a knowing tone that one felt he understood. But that is another
story.

The time of which I am speaking--that gray September day--what a
memorable day it was! How cheery the large, low room looked when the
host replenished the smouldering fire! "I sometimes come up here even
in winter, build a fire, and stay for an hour or more, with long, sad,
sweet thoughts and musings," he said. He is justly proud of the huge
stone fireplace and chimney which he himself helped to construct; he
also helped to hew the trees and build the house. "What joy went into
the building of this retreat! I never expect to be so well content
again." Then, musing, he added: "It is a comfortable, indolent life I
lead here; I read a little, write a little, and dream a good deal.
Here the sun does not rise so early as it does down at Riverby. 'Tired
nature's sweet restorer' is not put to rout so soon by the screaming
whistles, the thundering trains, and the necessary rules and regulations
of well-ordered domestic machinery. Here I really 'loaf and invite my
soul.' Yes, I am often melancholy, and hungry for companionship--not in
the summer months, no, but in the quiet evenings before the fire, with
only Silly Sally to share my long, long thoughts; she is very attentive,
but I doubt if she notices when I sigh. She doesn't even heed me when I
tell her that ornithology is a first-rate pursuit for men, but a bad one
for cats. I suspect that she studies the birds with greater care than
I do; for now I can get all I want of a bird and let him remain in the
bush, but Silly Sally is a thorough-going ornithologist; she must engage
in all the feather-splittings that the ornithologists do, an