A routine of some sort should be adopted and is one of the best ways to assist him. One girl should be on duty at one time and another at another and all in regular rotation. No camp life can go on successfully without some law and order of this sort. For it is just as necessary for the smooth running of household wheels in the log cabin as it is in the city home. Whoever occupies the guide’s position, that is the one who is chiefly responsible for everything, should be ably helped by the whole party but not by the whole party at the same time. Evolve a system for the particular conditions of the camp life in which you find yourself and stick to it. Let one girl or one set of girls help one day and another the next. Let the girl be detailed to do one kind of work one day and another another. This system, with proper rotation, means that nobody gets tired of her work. A girl cannot be too self-reliant if she is ever to be wise in the way of the woods. There is no need for discouragement if everything is not learned at once, for camping is like skating and is an art to be learned only through many tumbles and mistakes. Be prepared to take it and yourself lightly—in short, to laugh readily over the mistakes made in the art of living in the woods.
Now we have come to the very tip of the tail of the camp dog. You will be interested to know how an old timer was obliged to laugh at herself. I am ashamed to tell you how recently this occurred. I was in the northernmost wilderness of the state of Maine, and near a big lumber camp, when I saw a “camp dog” lying on the ground, its long axe handle shining from use, its pickaxe blade a bright steel color, and the tooth at the back looking as if it had been often used. I was delighted.
“Oh,” I said to my guide, “look at that camp dog lying there!”
He was particularly attentive to my pronunciation, for he said I pronounced some words, such as “girl,” as he had never heard them pronounced before. I saw a curious expression pass across his face.
“What did you say that was?” he asked.
“Why, that camp dog lying there.”
“Camp dog!”
Then he began to laugh and he kept right on until the woods echoed with his roars.
“Well,” he said finally, wiping away the tears, “if that doesn’t beat everything! That isn’t a camp dog, that’s a cant dog,—you know what you cant logs and heavy things over with, roll ’em over and pry ’em up with when you couldn’t do it any other way. My grief, to think of your calling that a camp dog all these years!”