Jack grinned as he replied, "Don't be afraid, Hugh. I'm going to fill myself just as full of the good things as I possibly can, and when I get where I can't have them, why, I will enjoy the things we can have just as much as I know how."
"That's good philosophy, Jack," said his uncle; "stick to it; always get the best you possibly can, but never grumble if that best is pretty poor."
Dinner over, Hugh and Jack adjourned to the bunk house, and there, sitting in its lee in the warm sunshine, they began to discuss their plans.
"Now, Hugh," said Jack, "what do you think about our summer's trip? Tell me all you can, for I want to know what is coming. Of course whatever you say goes."
"Well, son," said Hugh, "you have traveled and hunted and seen Indians, but there's one thing you have not done; you haven't done any trapping. It seems to me that it would not be a bad idea for you to learn something about that. I used to be a pretty fair trapper in my young days, and I reckon we can go down south here in the high mountains and perhaps get some fur; not much, but enough, maybe, to pay our expenses, and then we can come back here and turn it in to Mr. Sturgis as a sort of pay for our time and for the use of the horse flesh we have had."
"That seems to me a bully idea, Hugh; it does seem a shame for me to come out here every year and take you away from the ranch for all summer, for I suppose that, of course, my uncle pays you right along?"
"Sure he does," said Hugh. "He paid me my wages that season we spent up in the Blackfoot country, and again when we came down through the mountains, and again out in British Columbia, just the same as if I had been here hunting and wrangling horses for the ranch, working thirty days in every month. Of course, he does this on your account, he don't do it on my account; he does it because he is fond of you, and wants you to have a good time, and wants you to learn things about this Western country. I'm a kind of hired school teacher for you, and I tell you, Jack, I like the job, and I reckon you do, too. The reason I speak to you about it now is because you're older, and you ought to think about things more, and not just take the good things that come to you, like a hog under an acorn tree."
"Of course, Hugh, I understand, and I'm glad that you speak to me like this about it; but what do you mean by 'a hog under an acorn tree'?"
"Why don't you know that old saying about a hog going along and eating the acorns under an oak tree and never stopping to think where they come from, or who sends them? I expect it's just because he's a hog."