"I don't know of anything that will take the selfishness and conceit out of a fellow like a few hours spent on a mountain top," said Mr. Allen. "It makes a fellow right down glad he's alive," remarked Ham. "I always get more out of a view like this than I do out of the best sermon I ever heard." "I wish we could camp right here," exclaimed Chuck; "but we can't, and we had better be getting down before dark." Just at the base of the Dome a little stream trickled over the rocks and down into the canyon. They followed it back from the railroad and soon had a cheery fire burning and a comfortable camp made for the night. It was in a little meadow just at the edge of a grove of small aspens, and at one side of the tiny stream lay a great round boulder that had evidently rolled down from the summit of the Dome at some previous date. Beds were arranged in a row along the side of it, and a pile of dead sticks placed in a convenient position for the night's fire. The evening breezes were already beginning to play hide-and-seek in the valley, and the leaves on the trees were clapping their innumerable hands in applause at the brightly-burning fire. The sparks flew upward and the shadows danced in and out of the illuminated circle like so many happy fairies. "Do you hear it, fellows? There, now, listen! Don't you hear it?" Ham was saying as he sat back from the fire. "There it is, calling, calling!" "What is calling?" asked Willis, straining his ear to catch the sound. "Mother Nature," answered Ham, dryly. "Mother Nature's call--the call of the wild. See, even the leaves are beckoning us back farther into the deep, quiet wilderness. Some day I will part with my earthly possessions and answer that call, for, do you know, I believe that the Indian did come the nearest to living an ideal life of any of us!" Every one knew that Ham was in for a long, private soliloquy, and so began supper operations, for, although they had all heard the call of Mother Nature, as Ham put it, to some of them at least it was only an empty stomach calling to be fed. Mr. Allen and Willis were the last ones to take to their blankets, for they had many things to talk over between themselves. What can draw out the innermost thoughts of a fellow's heart more quickly than a chat with a sympathetic friend when both are seated before a fire in such a place and on such a night? If you really wish to know a fellow in a few days' time, you need to camp with him, to eat with him, and to sit with him before an open fire in the wilderness under a canopy of stars with the music of Nature about you. Then man speaks with man, and all the conventionalities of life are forgotten. "Yes, I have often wondered if I will ever find my father's partner," Willis was saying. "I would rather see him than any man on earth, sometimes." "Wouldn't you be happier if you didn't ever find him, though?" questioned Mr. Allen.