BREAKING CAMP
‘The thirsty earth soaks up the rain,
And drinks and gapes for drink again;
The plants suck in the earth and are,
With constant drinking, fresh and fair.’
BUT it did rain; and it didn’t wait until they were out of the cañon
either. It began long before the proper time, and it by no means
confined itself to a shower, but opened the winter season fully a month
before there was any need of it, and behaved altogether in a most
heartless and inconsiderate manner, like a very spoil-sport of a rain.
It began after dark, so as to be just as disagreeable as possible, and
under the too slight cover of their tents the campers could hear the rush
and the roar of it like the tramping of myriad feet on the leaves.
Pancho and the two Chinamen huddled under the broad sycamores in their
rubber blankets, and were dry and comfortable; but all the waterproof
tents leaked, save Elsie’s.
But when it was dawn, the Sun, having heard nothing apparently of any
projected change in the weather, rose at the usual time in the most
resplendent fashion—brighter, rosier, and more gloriously, if you will
believe me, than he had risen that whole long sunshiny summer! And he
really must have felt paid for getting up at such an unearthly hour in
the morning, when, after he had clambered over the grey mountain peaks,
he looked down upon Las Flores Cañon, bathed in the light of his own
golden beams.
If he knew anything about Ancient History and Biblical Geography—and if
he didn’t I don’t know who should, inasmuch as he had been present from
the beginning of time—he must have thought it as fair as the Garden of
Eden; for Nature’s face simply shone with cleanliness, like that of a
smiling child just fresh from its bath, and every leaf of every tree
glistened as he beamed upon it, and shook off its crystal drops that he
might turn them into diamonds.
‘It was only a shower,’ said Dr. Winship, as he seated himself on a damp
board and partook of a moist breakfast, ‘and with this sun the tents will
be dry before night; Elsie has caught no cold, the dust will be laid, and
we can stay another week with safety.’
Everybody was hilarious over this decision save the men-of-all-work, who
longed unspeakably for a less poetic existence—Hop Yet particularly, who
thought camping out ‘not muchee good.’
Dicky was more pleased than anybody, perhaps, as every day in the cañon
was one day less in school; not that he had ever been to school, but he
knew in advance, instinctively, that it wouldn’t suit him. Accordingly,
he sought the wettest possible places and played all day with superhuman
energy. He finally found Hop Yet’s box of blueing under a tree, in a
very moist and attractive state of fluidity, and just before dinner
improved the last shining hour by painting himself a brilliant hue and
appearing at dinner in such a fiendish guise that he frightened the
family into fits.
Now Dr. Winship was one of the most weather-wise men in California, and
his predictions were always quite safe and sensible; but somehow or other
it did rain again in two or three days, and it poured harder than ever,
too. To be sure, it cleared promptly, but the doctor was afraid to trust
so fickle a person as the Clerk of the Weather had become, and marching
orders were issued.
The boys tramped over all their favourite bits of country, and the girls
visited all their best beloved haunts, every one of them dear from a
thousand charming associations. They looked for the last time in Mirror
Pool, and saw the reflection of their faces—rather grave faces just then,
over the leave-taking.
The water-mirror might have been glad to keep the picture for ever on its
surface—Margery with her sleek braids and serene forehead; Polly, with
saucy nose and mischievous eyes, laughing at you like a merry
water-sprite; Bell, with her brilliant cheeks glowing like two roses just
fallen in the brook; and Gold Elsie, who, if you had put a frame of green
leaves about her delicate face and yellow locks, would have looked up at
you like a water-lily.
They wafted a farewell to Pico Negro, and having got rid of the boys,
privately embraced a certain Whispering Tree under whose singing branches
they had been wont to lie and listen to all the murmuring that went on in
the forest.
Then they clambered into the great thorough-brace wagon, where they all
sat in gloomy silence for ten minutes, while Dicky’s tan terrier was
found for the fourth time that morning; and the long train, with its
baggage-carts, its saddle-horses and its dogged little pack-mules, moved
down the rocky steeps that led to civilisation. The gate that shut them
in from the county road and the outer world was opened for the last time,
and shut with a clang, and it was all over—their summer in a cañon!
[Picture: Breaking camp]
FOOTNOTES.
{100a} Foot-notes by a rival of the Countess.
{100b} Is that spelled right?
{100c} Fifty miles an hour, Jack says.
{100d} Poetic licence.
{100e} Gone back to cold cream.
{100f} And pie.
{100g} For sale at all bookstores, ten cents a copy.
{198} The words for _Pretty Polly Oliver_ are mixed with the music score
and given below for those not able to see the picture.—DP.
1. Pretty Pol-ly Ol-i-ver, will you be my own?
Pret-ty Pol-ly Ol-i-ver, as cold as a
stone; But my love has grown warm-er as
cold-er you’ve grown, O Pret-ty Pol-ly
Ol-i-ver, will you be my own?
2. Pret-ty Pol-ly Ol-i-ver, I love you so dear!
Pret-ty Pol-ly Ol-i-ver, my hope and my
fear; I’ve wait-ed for you, sweet-heart, this
many a long year; For Pret-ty Pol-ly
Ol-i-ver, I’ve loved you so dear!
3. Pret-ty Pol-ly Ol-i-ver, I’ll bid you good bye:
Pret-ty Pol-ly Ol-i-ver, for you I’ll not
die; You’ll nev-er get a tru-er true
lov-er than I, So Pret-ty Pol-ly
Ol-i-ver, good-bye, love, good-bye!
{266a} ‘Four little white doves began to coo,
To coo to their mates so fair;
And each to the other dove said, ‘Your coo
With mine cannot compare!’
{266b} The words for _Las Palomas_ are mixed with the music score and
given below for those not able to see the picture.—DP.
Cua-tro pa-lo-mi-tas blan-cas que vienen de por a—llá.
U-nas á las o-tras di-cen no hay a-mor como el de a-cá.