nners and
disposition more closely than I had done. I said to myself, I have been a dreamer. I am now awake, and I have a purpose.
That purpose became my hobby. I rode that hobby to the bitter end. Old men have hobbies sometimes as well as boys. The Civil War was born of hobbies. When a hobby becomes a success it is then baptized and given another name. I engaged in many pursuits through the summer, always leaving a place or calling so soon as it afforded me no further instruction. On Dead wood, a mining stream with a large and prosperous camp, I found some old ac quaintances of The Forks, and finding also a library, a debating society, and a temperance lodge, I joined all these, took part, and on every fit and unfit occasion began to urge my hobby. Yet I never admitted that I had cast my fortune with the Indians or even had been among them. This would have been disgrace and defeat at once. I engaged as a common labourer, shovelling dirt and running a wheelbarrow with broad-backed Irishmen and tough Missourians, in order to get acquainted with the men who clustered about the library. The books 300 in number were kept at the cabins of the men who employed me. Of course I could not stand the work long, but I accomplished my object. I got acquainted with the most intelligent men of the camp, and so enlarged my life.
I remained a month. I read Byron and Plutarch s Lives over and over again. They were the only
