In this he was serving not only God but his
country. And he never neglected his athletics, for it was necessary
that he keep his body in the finest physical condition that his brain
might always be keen and alert. Grenfell could not have remained a
year in the field if he had neglected his body, and he was still an
athlete in the pink of condition.
IX
IN THE DEEP WILDERNESS
Imagine, if you will, a vast primeval wilderness spreading away before
you for hundreds of miles, uninhabited, grim and solitary. None but
wild beasts and the roving Indians that hunt them live there. None but
they know the mysteries that lie hidden and guarded by those trackless
miles of forests and barren reaches of unexplored country.
And so this wilderness has lain since creation, unmarred by the hand
of civilized man, clean and unsullied, as God made it. The air, laden
with the perfume of spruce and balsam, is pure and wholesome. The
water carries no germs from the refuse of man, and one may drink it
freely, from river and brook and lake, without fear of contamination.
There is no sound to break the silence of ages save the song of river
rapids, the thunder of mighty falls, or the whisper or moan of wind in
the tree tops; or, perchance, the distant cry of a wolf, the weird
laugh of a loon or the honk of the wild goose.
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