in a way, but they had a
civilization of their own, and a great many of their practices are
particularly well adapted to this country."

"Oh, I see! You don't want them to be forgotten."

"That's just it. It's a good way to keep the memory of earlier times
alive, and there seems to be something romantic and picturesque about
the Indian names and the Indian things."

"That's one of the things I like best that I've found out about the Camp
Fire since you came to Camp Sunset. We used to think the Camp Fire meant
being goody-goody and learning to sew and cook and all sorts of things
like that. But you have a lot of fun and good times, too, don't you?"

"Yes, and there really isn't anything goody-goody about us, Marcia.
You'd soon find that out if you were with us."

"Well, I'm very glad that so many people have been led to know the truth
about us," said Eleanor, with a smile. "If everyone knew the truth about
the Camp Fire, it would soon be as big and as influential as even the
most enthusiastic of us hope it will be. And I'm sure that we'll grow
very fast now, because when girls understand us they see that we simply
help them to have the sort of good times they enjoy most. Having a good
time is a pretty important thing in this life."

"I--I rather thought you would think that we spent too much time just
having a good time," said Marcia, plainly rather surprised by this
statement.

"I don't say anything about you girls in particular, because I don't
know enough about you," replied Eleanor. "Of course, it's easy to get to
be so bound up in enjoying yourself that you don't think of anything
else. But people who do that soon get tired of just amusing themselves,
so, as a rule, there's no great harm done. They get so that everything
they do bores them, and they turn to something serious and useful, for a
change."

"But you just said having a good time was important--"

"And I meant it," said Eleanor, with a smile. "Because it's just as bad
to go to one extreme as to the other, and that's true in about
everything. People who never work, but spend all their time playing
aren't happy, as a rule, or healthy, either. And people who reverse
that, and work all the time without ever playing, are in just about the
same boat, only they're really worse off than the others, because it's
harder for them to change."

"I think I'm beginning to see what you mean, Miss Mercer."

"Why, of course you are, Marcia! It's in the middle