CHAPTER VII.
A New Contract—Obstacles.
"To him who in the love of Nature holds
Communion with her visible forms, she speaks
A various language; for his gayer hours
She has a voice of gladness, and a smile
And eloquence of beauty, and she glides
Into his darker musings, with a mild
And healing sympathy, that steals away
Their sharpness, ere he is aware."
My life, up to the time of my contract with Mr. Patrick to go with him into the wilds of Wisconsin as an apprenticed land hunter and timber examiner, had been spent on the farm, in my father's shop, at school and college, and in teaching. The change of occupation and manner of living will therefore be seen to have been radical. In six months of contact with nature, I had been born into a new life, a life of initiative, of daring, and of hardships, insuring health and inspiring hope of financial success in a way honorable and helpful. I loved the forms of nature all about me, untouched by the hand of man. I therefore sought for and found an associate with capital sufficient to permit me to continue in the same line of work. The late Robert B. Langdon then became my partner, and this relationship was most pleasantly continued to the end of Mr. Langdon's life.
"In the Vermilion country, dog trains could sometimes be advantageously used." (Page [130].)