sn't been across the Inlet for a week. He says "Tillicum too muchy
hole. Li Ho long time patch um."

On still days, I can hear him doing it. Perhaps my hostess is right and
we are not so far away from the beach as I fancied on the night of my
arrival. I'll test this detail, and many others, soon. For today I am
sitting up. I'm sure I could walk a little, if I were to try. But I am
not in a hurry. Hurry is a vice of youth.

And I am actually getting some work done. Bones, old thing, I have made
a discovery for the lack of which many famous men have died too soon. I
have discovered the perfect secretary!

These blank lines represent all the things which I might say but which,
with great moral effort, I suppress. I know what a frightful bore is
the man who insists upon talking about a new discovery. Therefore I
shall not indulge my natural inclination to tell you just how perfect
this secretary is. I shall merely note that she is quick, accurate,
silent, interested, appreciative, intelligent to a remarkable
degree--Good Heavens! I'm doing it! I blush now when I remember that I
engaged Miss Farr's services in the first place from motives of
philanthropy. Is it possible that I was ever fatuous enough to believe
that I was the party who conferred the benefit? If so, I very soon
discovered my mistake. In justice to myself I must state that I saw at
once what a treasure I had come upon. You remember what a quick, sure
judgment my father had? Somehow I seem to be getting more like him all
the time. The moment any proposition takes on a purely business aspect,
I become, as it were, pure intellect. I see the exact value, business
value, of the thing. Aunt Caroline never agrees with me in this. She
insists upon referring to that oil property at Green Lake and that
little matter of South American Mines. But those mistakes were trifles.
Any man might have made them.

In this case, where I am right on the spot, there can be no possibility
of a mistake. I see with my own eyes. Miss Farr is a dream of
secretarial efficiency. She combines, with ease, those widely differing
qualities which are so difficult to come by in a single individual. It
is inspiring to work with her. I find that her co-operation actually
stimulates creative thought. My notes are expanding at a most
satisfactory rate. My introductory chapter already assumes form.
And--by Jove! I seem to be doing it again.

But one simply does not make these discoveries every da