"So it is, so it is," chuckled Uncle Christopher. "Wal, I suppose you're all ready to go to work now, eh?"
"To be sure I am, uncle; ready to begin right off."
"That's right, that's right; but s'posing we just look in on Mrs. Wing first, and see what she's got for supper, and then, after sleeping a bit, and eating again, and sort o' shaking ourselves together, we'll begin to consider. There ain't nothing to be gained by hurrying and worrying through the only lifetime we've got in this world, eh?"
The Doctor and Mrs. Wing welcomed Uncle Christopher most warmly, for he was a very dear friend of theirs, and they never allowed him to stay anywhere in Norton but at their house, now that the Elmers had moved away. After supper Ruth and the Mays came over to see him, and he entertained them the whole evening with his funny stories and quaint sayings.
In the morning, after breakfast, they began to "consider," as Uncle Christopher called it. First he made Mark stand in front of him, looked him all over from head to foot with a quizzical expression, and finally said, "Yes, you look strong and hearty, and I guess you'll do.
"Fact is, Mark, I've got to take a trip down into Aroostook, and as I'm getting pretty old and feeble—Oh, you needn't smile, youngster, I am old and I've made so many bad jokes lately that I must be getting feeble. As I was saying, having reached an advanced state of infirmity, it has occurred to me that I need a travelling companion, a young, able-bodied fellow like you, for instance, to protect me against the dangers of the journey. Who knows but what we may meet with an alligator, eh? and so I want you to go along with me."
Of course Mark agreed readily to this proposition, though he had expected one far different, and the next morning he and Uncle Christopher took leave of their Norton friends and started for Bangor. From there another train carried them for miles along the upper Penobscot River, past the Indian settlement at Old Town, past the great saw-mills and millions of logs at Mattawaumkeag, and finally to McAdam Junction in "Europe," as Uncle Christopher called New Brunswick. Here they took another road, and were carried back into Maine to Houlton, the county seat of Aroostook County. After staying overnight here they took a stage, and for a whole day travelled over pleasant roads, through sweet-scented forests of spruce and balsam, broken here by clearings and thrifty farms, until at last the journey ended in the pretty little backwoods settlement of Presque Isle.
Here Uncle Christopher's lumber business detained him for a week, and here he introduced Mark to all his friends as "My grandnephew, Mr. Mark Elmer, Jun., President of the Elmer Mills down in Floridy," covering Mark with much confusion thereby, and enjoying the joke immensely himself. Now the real object of bringing the boy on this trip was disclosed. Mr. Bangs not only wanted Mark to meet with these practical men, and become familiar with their ways of conducting a business which was very similar to that which the Elmers had undertaken in Florida, but he knew that pine lumber was becoming scarce in that Northern country, and thought perhaps some of these men could be persuaded to emigrate to another land of pines if the idea was presented to them properly. So he encouraged Mark to talk of Florida, and to give them all the information he possessed regarding its forests of pine and its other resources. As a result, before they again turned their faces homeward, half a dozen of these clear-headed Maine men had promised them to visit Florida in the fall, take a look at the Wakulla country, and see for themselves what it offered in their line of business.
When Uncle Christopher and Mark returned to Bangor, the latter began to attend school regularly; not a grammar-school, nor a high-school, nor a school of any kind where books are studied, but a mill-school, where machinery took the place of books, where the teachers were rough workmen, and where each lecture was illustrated by practical examples. Nor did Mark merely go and listen to these lectures: he took an active part in illustrating them himself; for Uncle Christopher had explained so clearly to him that in order to be a truly successful mill president he must thoroughly understand the uses of every bit of mill machinery, that the boy was now as eager to do this as he had been in Wakulla to learn how to fish for alligators, or fire-hunt for deer.
All that summer he worked hard—two months in a saw-mill, and two more in a grist-mill—and though he did not receive a cent of money for all this labor, he felt amply repaid for what he had been through, by a satisfied sense of having, at least, mastered the rudiments of what he knew was to be an important part of his work in life for some years to come.