=JANUARY 3,
MONDAY.=

_Still mild and pleasant, but cooler._

_Went to school, and failed in algebra. This X
business is too much for me._

_Abel's shoe-factory, next to our schoolhouse,
caught fire this afternoon while we were at
recess, and Mr. Nason dismissed the school. We all
hurrahed for Nason, and went to the fire. Steamer
No. 1 put it out in less than ten minutes after
she got there._

_Home all the evening, studying._

If you are like me, you will be glad by and by if you note in your diary
of the summer vacation a few dry statistics, such as distances walked,
names of people you meet, steamers you take passage on, and, in general,
every thing that interested you at the time, even to the songs you sing;
for usually some few songs run in your head all through the tour, and
it is pleasant to recall them in after-years.

Do not write so near the margins of the paper that the binder will cut
off the writing when he comes to trim them.

CHAPTER XII.

"HOW TO DO IT."

The following advice by Rev. Edward Everett Hale is so good that I have
appropriated it. You will find more good advice in the same book.[27]

"First, never walk before breakfast. If you like
you may make two breakfasts, and take a mile or
two between; but be sure to eat something before
you are on the road.

"Second, do not walk much in the middle of the
day. It is dusty and hot then; and the landscape
has lost its special glory. By ten o'clock you
ought to have found some camping-ground for the
day,--a nice brook running through a grove; a
place to draw, or paint, or tell stories, or read
them or write them; a place to make waterfalls and
dams, to sail chips, or build boats; a place to
make a fire and a cup of tea for the oldsters.
Stay here till four in the afternoon, and then
push on in the two or three hours which are left
to the sleeping-place agreed upon. Four or five
hours on the road is all you want in each day.
Even resolute idlers, as it is to be hoped you all
are on such occasions, can get eight miles a day
out of that; an