always right to take other people's advice in matters where
they know more than you do. It is the experience of those who have gone
before that makes the way smooth for those who follow. So, after supper,
I got together the things I had been advised to take with me, and
arranged them on the bed, adding a few articles I had thought of all by
myself.

I put up plenty of writing paper and a bottle of ink, along with a
dictionary and a few other books of reference, in case I should feel
inclined to do any work while I was away. I always like to be prepared
for work; one never knows when one may feel inclined for it. Sometimes,
when I have been away, and have forgotten to bring any paper and pens and
ink with me, I have felt so inclined for writing; and it has quite upset
me that, in consequence of not having brought any paper and pens and ink
with me, I have been unable to sit down and do a lot of work, but have
been compelled, instead, to lounge about all day with my hands in my
pockets.

Accordingly, I always take plenty of paper and pens and ink with me now,
wherever I go, so that when the desire for work comes to me I need not
check it.

That this craving for work should have troubled me so often, when I had
no paper, pens, and ink by me, and that it never, by any chance, visits
me now, when I am careful to be in a position to gratify it, is a matter
over which I have often puzzled.

But when it does come I shall be ready for it.

I also put on the bed a few volumes of Goethe, because I thought it would
be so pleasant to read him in his own country. And I decided to take a
sponge, together with a small portable bath, because a cold bath is so
refreshing the first thing in the morning.

B. came in just as I had got everything into a pile. He stared at the
bed, and asked me what I was doing. I told him I was packing.

"Great Heavens!" he exclaimed. "I thought you were moving! What do you
think we are going to do--camp out?"

"No!" I replied. "But these are the things I have been advised to take
with me. What is the use of people giving you advice if you don't take
it?"

He said:

"Oh! take as much advice as you like; that always comes in useful to give
away. But, for goodness sake, don't get carrying all that stuff about
with you. People will take us for Gipsies."

I said:

"Now, it's no use your talking nonsense. Half the things on this bed are
life-preserving things. If people go into Germ