"Well, well, Gid," he said, "you just wait until Rube an' I come back
from our camp in the forest. I shall have dropped all the
objectionable politeness by then. We shall take no forks or plates,
but will tear our food with our teeth. We will sleep in our boots
under blankets of balsam branches, and forget the comforts of pyjamas
and hot shaving water. We're going to live like a pair of primitive
savages, talkin' in the sign language, killin' an' cookin' our own
food, takin' with us nothin' that you c'd buy in a city emporium,
except, of course, our guns and huntin' knives. An' even then we shall
be a heap better off than Robinson Crusoe, for, although he had his
shot gun an' the fixin's he'd gotten from the wreck, yet he had ter
build his own boat, while we shall have our birch bark canoe, and I
guess the things we shall carry in the canoe an' in our pockets and
haversacks 'll give us an enormous advantage over the shipwrecked
mariner."

"An' when d'you purpose startin' on this yer outlandish trip,
abandonin' the delights o' civilization?" Gideon inquired. "It's the
fust I've heard of it. You ain't bin makin' no preparations. When
d'you reckon on startin'?"

Kiddie glanced aside at Rube.

"As soon's Rube's ready," he announced.

"Why, I bin ready fer days an' days," said Rube. "I ain't thought o'
nothin' else ever since yer told me it was goin' ter happen!"

"What about the weather prospects?" Kiddie asked.

"Weather's all right," answered Rube. "I've had me eye on it a lot.
It's plumb sure t' be fine. Birds are flyin' high; flowers ain't got
much scent in 'em; the sheep are grazin' with their heads to the wind;
cattle are quiet. Mother's clothes line's saggin' betwixt the poles;
spiders' webs are slack, too, an' thar's crowds of 'em on every bush.
This mornin', when I looked out, great white mountains of cloud were
banked up in th' sky. 'Fore I'd dressed an' got out, the clouds had
melted clean away. All them signs mean fair weather, I reckon."

"That's so," agreed Kiddie, "especially the spiders' webs an' the
quickly meltin' clouds. Guess we may's well start right now."

"Some sudden, ain't it?" said Gideon in surprise.

"No advantage in delay," returned Kiddie, rising from his seat and
signing to Rube to begin at once. He went methodically about the cabin
collecting things--a sack of potatoes, a bag of flour, some tins of
milk, supplies of lard, salt, onions, rice, bacon, tinned fruit, a