“I should begin with number one, sir,” I said.
“And so we will, Nat. Nothing like order. Look here, my boy. Here is my book for cataloguing.”
He showed me a large blank book ruled with lines, and on turning it over I found headings here and there under which the different specimens were to be placed.
But I could not look much at the book while “our great traveller”, as Uncle Joe used to call him to me, was busy at work with the screw-driver, taking out the great screws, one after another, and laying them in a box.
“Now, Nat,” he said, “suppose after going through all my trouble I find that half my specimens are destroyed, what shall I do?”
“I don’t know, uncle,” I said. “I know what I should do.”
“What, my boy?”
“Go and try and find some more.”
“A good plan,” he said laughing; “and when it means journeying ten or twelve thousand miles, my boy, to seek for more, it becomes a serious task.”
All this while he was working away at the screws, till they were half out and loose enough for me to go on turning them with my fingers, and this, after the first two or three, I did till we came to the last, when my uncle stopped and pretended that it was in so tight that it would not turn.