We took the burro over to a clump of pine woods an' turned him loose, an' then I crawled in through the tunnel to Slocum's fire. It was in a cave which had a natural chimney runnin' up the hill, an' it looked considerable much like Paradise to me. We ate an' smoked together for a week, an' then one day our fire went out an' a flood of water poured down through the chimney. We worked like beavers for a while, gettin' our stuff outdoors, an' it was as hot as summer outside. "That's the only drawback to this cave," said Slocum. "It will be all to the good when the winter settles in earnest, but it will be some bother while it's still snowin' an' thawin'." I told him that I agreed with him to such an extent that if I could locate the burro I'd rather risk gettin' back to humanity than to dyin' there of rheumatiz. I was wringin' wet through. "Nobody can't die of rheumatiz around me," sez Slocum, an' he went to one of his packs an' got out a piece of root. "Chew this," sez he, "an' it will drive the rheumatiz out of your system." Anybody would have trusted those eyes, so I chewed the root for about a minute, an' then I chewed snow an' mud an' tobacco an' red pepper for an hour, tryin' to get rid of the taste. Drive the rheumatiz out of your system? Why, the blame stuff would drive out your system too if you chewed it long enough. It was the tarnationest stuff 'at ever a human man met up with. "It's most too strong to take pure," sez Slocum, "but if you grind it an' put a shall pinch in a quart of alcohol it makes a fine remedy. Don't throw the rest o' that root away. There is enough there to do you a lifetime." "Yes," sez I, "there is, an' more." A feller once told me that man was a slave to his envirament--envirament is anything around you, scenery, books, evil companions, an' sech; well, a burro ain't no slave to his envirament 'cause he generally eats it. My burro was fat, an' the clump of pine trees had mostly disappeared. I loaded up my stuff, shook hands with Slocum, and started down the mountain. Just as I got fully started Slocum sez to me, "I 'm sure sorry to see you go. I don't generally get much friendly with folks any more, but I took to you from the first, an' any time I can do you a favor, all you got to do is to wink." "What's your general plan of occupation, Slocum?" sez I. "All that I ever expect to do for the remainder of my days," sez he, "is to search for my Rheumatiz Remedy." "Well," sez I, "any time you get to do me a favor in that line, it'll be when I'm too weak to wink." So we parted the best o' friends, an' I went on to a lumber camp where I put in the winter bossin' a gang. I didn't know much about lumber, but the men there was just the same as anywhere else, an' we got along fine.