How to Do It

by Edward Everett Hale

As for Robert, I shall tell him nothing about his dress. "A true gentleman is always so dressed that he can mount and ride for his life." That was the rule three hundred years ago, and I think it holds true now.

Do not try to ride too much in one day. At the start, in particular, take care that you do not tire your horses or yourselves. For yourselves, very likely ten miles will be enough for the first day. It is not distance you are after, it is the enjoyment of every blade of grass, of every flying bird, of every whiff of air, of every cloud that hangs upon the blue.

Walking is next best. The difficulty is about baggage and sleeping-places; and then there has been this absurd theory, that girls cannot walk. But they can. School-boys--trying to make immense distances--blister their feet, strain their muscles, get disgusted, borrow money and ride home in the stage. But this is all nonsense. Distance is not the object. Five miles is as good as fifty. On the other hand, while the riding party cannot well be larger than four, the more the merrier on the walking party. It is true, that the fare is sometimes better where there are but few. Any number of boys and girls, if they can coax some older persons to go with them, who can supply sense and direction to the high spirits of the juniors, may undertake such a journey. There are but few rules; beyond them, each party may make its own.

First, never walk before breakfast. If you like, you may make two breakfasts and take a mile or two between. But be sure to eat something before you are on the road.

Second, do not walk much in the middle of the day. It is dusty and hot then; and the landscape has lost its special glory. By ten o'clock you ought to have found some camping-ground for the day; a nice brook running through a grove,--a place to draw or paint or tell stories or read them or write them; a place to make waterfalls and dams,--to sail chips or build boats,--a place to make a fire and a cup of tea for the oldsters. Stay here till four in the afternoon, and then push on in the two or three hours which are left to the sleeping-place agreed upon. Four or five hours on the road is all you want in each day. Even resolute idlers, as it is to be hoped you all are on such occasions, can get eight miles a day out of that,--and that is enough for a true walking party. Remember all along, that you are not running a race with the railway train. If you were, you would be beaten certainly; and the less you think you are the better. You are travelling in a method of which the merit is that it is not fast, and that you see every separate detail of the glory of the world. What a fool you are, then, if you tire yourself to death, merely that you may say that you did in ten hours what the locomotive would gladly have finished in one, if by that effort you have lost exactly the enjoyment of nature and society that you started for.

The perfection of undertakings in this line was Mrs. Merriam's famous walking party in the Green Mountains, with the Wadsworth girls. Wadsworth was not their name,--it was the name of her school. She chose eight of the girls when vacation came, and told them they might get leave, if they could, to join her in Brattleborough for this tramp. And she sent her own invitation to the mothers and to as many brothers. Six of the girls came. Clara Ingham was one of them, and she told me all about it. Margaret Tyler and Etta were there. There were six brothers also, and Archie Muldair and his wife, Fanny Muldair's mother. They two "tended out" in a buggy, but did not do much walking. Mr. Merriam was with them, and, quite as a surprise, they had Thurlessen, a nice old Swede, who had served in the army, and had ever since been attached to that school as chore-man. He blacked the girls' shoes, waited for them at concert, and sometimes, for a slight bribe, bought almond candy for them in school hours, when they could not possibly live till afternoon without a supply. The girls said that the reason the war lasted so long was that Old Thurlessen was in the army, and that nothing ever went quick when he was in it. I believe there was something in this. Well, Old Thurlessen had a canvas-top wagon, in which he carried five tents, five or six trunks, one or two pieces of kitchen gear, his own self and Will Corcoran.

The girls and boys did not so much as know that Thurlessen was in the party. That had all been kept a solemn secret. They did not know how their trunks were going on, but started on foot in the morning from the hotel, passed up that beautiful village street in Brattleborough, came out through West Dummerston, and so along that lovely West River. It was very easy to find a camp there, and when the sun came to be a little hot, and they had all blown off a little of the steam of the morning, I think they were all glad to come upon Mr. Muldair, sitting in the wagon waiting for them. He explained to them that, if they would cross the fence and go down to the river, they would find his wife had planted herself; and there, sure enough, in a lovely little nook, round which the river swept, with rocks and trees for shade, with shawls to lounge upon, and the water to play with, they spent the day. Of course they made long excursions into the woods and up and down the stream, but here was head-quarters. Hard-boiled eggs from the haversacks, with bread and butter, furnished forth the meal, and Mr. Muldair insisted on toasting some salt-pork over the fire, and teaching the girls to like it sandwiched between crackers. Well, at four o'clock everybody was ready to start again, and was willing to walk briskly. And at six, what should they see but the American flag flying, and Thurlessen's pretty little encampment of his five tents, pitched in a horseshoe form, with his wagon, as a sort of commissary's tent, just outside. Two tents were for the girls, two tents for the boys, and the head-quarters tent for Mr. and Mrs. Merriam. And that night they all learned the luxury and sweetness of sleeping upon beds of hemlock branches. Thurlessen had supper all ready as soon as they were washed and ready for it. And after supper they sat round the fire a little while singing. But before nine o'clock every one of them was asleep.

So they fared up and down through those lovely valleys of the Green Mountains, sending Thurlessen on about ten miles every day, to be ready for them when night came. If it rained, of course they could put in to some of those hospitable Vermont farmers' homes, or one of the inns in the villages. But, on the whole, they had good weather, and boys and girls always hoped that they might sleep out-doors.

These are, however, but the variations and amusements of travel. You and I would find it hard to walk to Liverpool, if that happened to be the expedition in hand or on foot. And in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred you and I will have to adapt ourselves to the methods of travel which the majority have agreed upon.

But for pleasure travel, in whatever form, much of what has been said already applies. The best party is two, the next best four, the next best one, and the worst three. Beyond four, except in walking parties, all are impossible, unless they be members of one family under the command of a father or mother. Command is essential when you pass four. All the members of the party should have or should make a community of interests. If one draws, all had best draw. If one likes to climb mountains, all had best climb mountains. If one rises early, all had best rise early; and so on. Do not tell me you cannot draw. It is quite time you did. You are your own best teacher. And there is no time or place so fit for learning as when you are sitting under the shade of a high rock on the side of White Face, or looking off into the village street from the piazza of a hotel.