Chapter VIII

"I tell you what it is, Renny," said Yates, a few days after the soap episode, as he swung in his hammock at the camp, "I'm learning something new every day."

"Not really?" asked the professor in surprise.

"Yes, really. I knew it would astonish you. My chief pleasure in life, professor, is the surprising of you. I sometimes wonder why it delights me; it is so easily done."

"Never mind about that. What have you been learning?"

"Wisdom, my boy; wisdom in solid chunks. In the first place, I am learning to admire the resourcefulness of these people around us. Practically, they make everything they need. They are the most self- helping people that I was ever thrown among. I look upon theirs as the ideal life."

"I think you said something like that when we first came here."

"I said that, you ass, about camping out. I am talking now about farm life. Farmers eliminate the middleman pretty effectually, and that in itself is going a long way toward complete happiness. Take the making of soap, that I told you about; there you have it, cheap and good. When you've made it, you know what is in it, and I'll be hanged if you do when you pay a big price for it in New York. Here they make pretty nearly everything they need, except the wagon and the crockery; and I'm not sure but they made them a few years back. Now, when a man with a good sharp ax and a jack-knife can do anything from building his house to whittling out a chair, he's the most independent man on earth. Nobody lives better than these people do. Everything is fresh, sweet, and good. Perhaps the country air helps; but it seems to me I never tasted such meals as Mrs. Bartlett, for instance, gets up. They buy nothing at the stores except the tea, and I confess I prefer milk myself. My tastes were always simple."

"And what is the deduction?"

"Why, that this is the proper way to live. Old Hiram has an anvil and an amateur forge. He can tinker up almost anything, and that eliminates the blacksmith. Howard has a bench, saws, hammers, and other tools, and that eliminates the carpenter. The women eliminate the baker, the soap boiler, and a lot of other parasites. Now, when you have eliminated all the middlemen, then comes independence, and consequently complete happiness. You can't keep happiness away with a shotgun then."

"But what is to become of the blacksmith, the carpenter, and all the rest?"

"Let them take up land and be happy too; there's plenty of land. The land is waiting for them. Then look how the master is eliminated. That's the most beautiful riddance of all. Even the carpenter and blacksmith usually have to work under a boss; and if not, they have to depend on the men who employ them. The farmer has to please nobody but himself. That adds to his independence. That's why old