The smoke of the smudge-fire is sharp and tearful, but a man can
learn to endure a good deal of it when he can look through its rings
at such scenes as these.
V
THE LITTLE FRIENDSHIP-FIRE
There are times and seasons when the angler has no need of any of
the three fires of which we have been talking. He sleeps in a
house. His breakfast and dinner are cooked for him in a kitchen.
He is in no great danger from black-flies or mosquitoes. All he
needs now, as he sets out to spend a day on the Neversink, or the
Willowemoc, or the Shepaug, or the Swiftwater, is a good lunch in
his pocket, and a little friendship-fire to burn pleasantly beside
him while he eats his frugal fare and prolongs his noonday rest.
This form of fire does less work than any other in the world. Yet
it is far from being useless; and I, for one, should be sorry to
live without it. Its only use is to make a visible centre of
interest where there are two or three anglers eating their lunch
together, or to supply a kind of companionship to a lone fisherman.
It is kindled and burns for no other purpose than to give you the
sense of being at home and at ease. Why the fire should do this, I
cannot tell, but it does.
You may build your friendship-fire in almost any way that pleases
you; but this is the way in which you shall build it best.
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