THE SUMMER CAMP-FIRE

A thin column of smoke seen rising lazily among the leafy trees and fading to a wavering film in the warm morning air or the hotter breath of noon, a flickering blaze kindling in the sultry dusk on some quiet shore, mark the place of the summer camp-fire.

It is not, like the great hospitable flare and glowing coals of the autumn and winter camp-fires, the centre to which all are drawn, about which the life of the camp gathers, where joke and repartee flash to and fro as naturally and as frequently as its own sparks fly upward, where stories come forth as continuously as the ever-rising volume of smoke.

Rather it is avoided and kept aloof from, held to only by the unhappy wretch upon whom devolves the task of tending the pot and frying-pan, and he hovers near it fitfully, like a moth about a candle, now backing away to mop his hot face, now darting into the torrid circle to turn a fish or snatch away a seething pot or sizzling pan. Now and then the curious and hungry approach to note with what skill or speed the cookery is progressing, but they are content to look on at a respectful distance and to make suggestions and criticisms, but not to interfere with aid. The epicurean smoker, who holds that the finest flavor of tobacco is evoked only by coal or blazing splinter, steals down upon the windward side and snatches a reluctant ember or an elusive flame that flickers out on the brink of the pipe bowl, but most who burn the weed are content now to kindle it with the less fervid flame of a match.

And yet this now uncomfortable necessity is still the heart of the camp, which without it would be but a halting place for a day, where one appeases hunger with a cold bite and thirst with draughts of tepid water, and not a temporary home where man has his own fireside, though he care not to sit near it, and feasts full on hot viands and refreshes himself with the steaming cup that cheers but not inebriates.

Its smoke drifted far through the woods may prove a pungent trail, scented out among the odors of balsams and the perfume of flowers that shall lead hither some pleasant stranger or unexpected friend, or its firefly glow, flashing but feebly through the gloaming, may be a beacon that shall bring such company. In its praise may also be said that the summer camp-fire demands no laborious feeding nor careful tending, is always a servant, seldom a master.