The Honest Man having lived on this spot the summer before, the floors were laid of boughten lumber, and the frames were up. Also, the private walks, made of such bits of board as the Good Lord had pleased to send upon the rolling waves, nailed upon saplings from the wood back of the camp, were still in place, so that there wasn’t much to do, a circumstance that grieved the Honest Man no little. He liked to be busy. The Lazy Man was patient under this affliction. He did help when there were things to do. He got the nails and handed the hatchet, and generally fetched and carried, knowing full well what are the drawbacks incident to being a heaven-gifted literary genius, such as not being of the least account about a place. Among the triumphs of the Honest Man’s saw and hammer were the tables, prime among them being the dining-table under the same maple tree, whereon we ate our every meal from July 2 until September 3. It is fitting that in this public manner I should return thanks for our kind and considerate treatment by the weather. I can cheerfully recommend it to all and sundry. It rained at times, I won’t deny. It had to. I can see that. But I must say it was most forbearing in the matter, and rained only out of meal hours. Once or twice it was plain to see that it strained a point in our behalf, for example, that time we had to have our Sunday ice-cream in our tents, and the two or three occasions when the breakfast dishes were practically storm-washed. This dining-table, the serving-table, the table in the cook-tent, and the china-closet—Oh my yes! We had a china-closet. It was made out of a packing box, had shelves in it, and four plank legs—these articles of furniture were covered with marbled oil-cloth, and the door of the china-closet was of the same rich material, being secured with loops and nails. The cook-tent reared its lofty A on a frame with a waist-high board-wall, lined with shelves. It was so studded with nails that for once in their lives the women were speechless of complaint that there weren’t places enough to bestow the junk without which, so it seems, life in the kitchen is insupportable. Hard by the china-closet was the refrigerator, in whose construction, let me say, the Lazy Man bore his part. He dug the hole in the sand in which was sunk a barrel with a perforated bottom through which the melting ice drained off. The women professed they lay awake nights listening for the things piled upon the ice to topple over into smash. They had to worry about something. There wasn’t a thing else for them to do but cook, and make the beds and wash the dishes.