off and at work," announced Tom.

They were soon picking their way along a shady fragrant trail, tall,
straight, noble pines about them seeming to be vieing with each other in
their efforts to reach the blue sky. The wind now bore a new fragrance,
and the air was heavily pungent with the odor of pine.

"Emma, does your nature cult explain to you why the trees grow so tall
and so straight?" asked Tom, riding up beside Miss Dean.

Emma shook her head.

"Because they are fighting the battle of nature--fighting for existence,
for their very lives, just as all the world of humans is fighting its
battle. A tree must have light and air, or it dies. To get these it must
grow up, it must keep up with its competitors, the trees about it, and
forge ahead of them if possible, ever reaching up and up for sunlight
and air. Once let it fall behind and it is lost; it is overwhelmed by
the sturdier giants; it pales and pines and seems to lose its ambition.
The tree, knowing it has lost its grip, then seems to grow thin and
gaunt, and one day it goes crashing down, to rot and furnish
nourishment for the giants that overwhelmed it. The tree's life, like
ours, is a struggle for existence, with the survival of the fittest."

"Were I a tree I think I should prefer to grow alone out in an open
field," decided Emma.

"Not if you were a wise tree, you would not," laughed Tom. "Out there
you would be the plaything of the winds. Your body would be exposed to
the glaring sun, the full blast of every passing storm, and the bitter
cold of winter, which would, unless you were very hardy, have a tendency
to retard your growth and weaken your vigor. Trees, like humans, do not
enjoy a lonely life, but when they get together they immediately enter
into bitter competition. Isn't that quite human?"

"Where are you heading, Mrs. Shafto?" interrupted Grace, as the guide
struck off, leaving the trail and entering the dense forest.

"Goin' to find a campin' place while I kin see," she answered. Now and
then Joe would halt to examine an old blaze on a tree, occasionally
making a new blaze with her short-handled woodsman's axe on the opposite
side of the tree so that, upon returning along that trail, the new blaze
might be easily seen.

"I fear that I was not born with a woodsman's sense," complained Anne.

"No one is. That is why a woodsman blazes trees," answered Tom. "I do
not know whether you people are familiar with 'blazes.' Grace knows
somethi