The Bottineau courant. (Bottineau, Bottineau County, N.D.) 1895-1929, 1915-10-28

the enthuslasism OF the younger gave
q carrying quality to his voice.
He was, It appeared from the sollci.
tude. seeking a billet which it lay in
the power Of his elder vis-a-vis to be-
stow.
From the discussion, which neither
Of them treated as confidential, !
learned that there is somewhere in
the Pacific ocean a perfectly useless
island from which certain ethnologi-
cal data and exhibits might be OBJ
tanned. 1t further appeared that the
British museum was deficient in these
particular cufios, and that the glass
cases were yearning to be filled.
The youth had been employed in
Sudanese excavations and research.
Now that work had ended-and with
it the pay-the necessity for other
work and pay had not ended.
"The billet down there" suggested
the elder man, twill be no end beast
ly, l dare say. A tramp steamer sails
from Port Said in three days for Sim
6dpUIC, olIludhdu dllu JIc OOULH oGdS.
The pay will be one hundred and fifty
pounds for the job. The fare will
probably be stale biscuits-still, If
you feel game to have a dash at it"
The speaker finished with a shrug
which seemed to add: ITS never diff
ficult to find a fool"
But the young man laughed with a
whole-hearted enthusiasm that entire
ly missed the under note Of contempt
In the manner of his b]enefactor.
"Well, rather" he declared. "And
l say, you know, it's jolly good of you,
sir"
Later I made the acquaintance of
the Britain in the American bar
where, over Scotch and soda, we dis
cussed the project to the end that |
nominated and electd myself an as
sistant foraeer for the, British muse
UNI, serving at my own expense.
There was something likable about
my new and naive acquaintance, who
was so eager to shoulder his futile
way across a third of the globes cir
conference in search of crudely in
caying skulls.
My own experience in life had been
ever more futile. I had learned to
speak five languages and had COM
pletely failed of gaining a foothold in
five useful professionalism, law, liter
ature, music, and-contentment.
Possibly the appeasement of my
Salathiel hunger, the curing of the
curse, did not, after all, lie along the
routes of Cunards and Pullmans.
Maybe l was still nibbing at travel
as the schoolgirl nibbles at choco-
lates. Perhaps his method of taking
the trail was the heroic medicine my
itching feet required.
At all events, sententiously quoted
to myself, II think it will kill me or
cure, and I think l will go and see."
When I informed young Mansfield
for that proved to be his name
that I meant to be his traveling-com-
panion, his almost child-like face took
on an i%ncredulous expression. He was
a great two hundred pound chap
whose physique should logically have
been the asset of a pirate or a pugil-
list; but the visage which surrounded
it had a rosy pinkness, and his blue
eyes were the guileless charity of es-
sential innocence.
With his physical power went a
long-suffering ~good-nature; and as he
talked of the widely scattered places
he had seen and the things which
should have made him wise in his
generation, it seemed to me that his
soul must have worn a macintosh,
from which the showers of experience
had been shed off without leaving a
mark. l have seen mastiffs with
eyes full of usefulness because ma
ture has denied her affectionate tenn
ornaments the gentle lives Of lap-dogs.
Mansfield struck me the same way.
Why I, a man, by his simple stand
ards as rich as Croesus, should care
to ship with him on a voyage prQmis-
ing stale biscuits, was quite beyond
his mental process. He confessed, in
all f%rankness, that he did it merely
for the money-the pitiful hundred
and fifty.
And where was the girl back in
England, probably al devoid of sur
plus and complications Of character
as a lakeside primrose. I pictured
her to myself al a creature of pink
and shallow prettiness. The day to
which his ambition strained as the
ultimate goal was the day when he
could become a curator in the British
museum and transplant her to decent
London lodgings.
He longed to placard and arrange
scarabs in a plate glass case to class
ify Chombote pottery-and on bank
holidays to push a go-cart In the park.
I was glad, however, when I went
over the rust-red side Of the Wastrel,
that Mansfield went with me. We had
known that we were shipping on 4
mean vessel, one shouldered out Of
more orderly chartings because Of her
unwOrthiness. Liners did not ply the