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fair that at Rife you should have more or less
escaped its ruinous touch, & so I think its fine
to see the old place "still going on strong" - the
crop & the cattle, the store & the fur. But above all
may you both keep the same good health you now
enjoy & no real trouble cross your door - the door
of that dear snug little home that I took so much
pleasure and interest in building. True I've never
seen is real cosy, because I left before dear Maggie
arrived to put it ship shape, but I've got it sized
up in my mind's eye & nothing seems to me quite
so good & peaceful a picture as that spot on the
old homeshed, out in that great old wilderness that
we have now become so familiar with. To me
it was "home" & I know that if I ever get the
chance to go over the trail up from S. Paul & get
that distant view of "our place" as you come out
of the jack pines, above Stoney Creek, that I shall
experience the happiest moment of my life.
There are things that are & will be extremely
interesting & worth living through in this campaign
& I am [only?] interested because there is adventure &
action in it, but give me by preference an axe instead
of a bayonet, & peace instead of strife - give me
the industry of the Woods - trees to cut, logs to hew,
& sleighs & horses to work & our dear old home to go
back to, when the Sun goes down & we drop our work
or if not that, then give me another alternative - a
long, long trail by Winter or Summer "up north"
into that great lone land, with a companion - Guy or
Paul or better both - a life full of hardship -
some risks but sole satisfying in the fullest degree
& home as a far off dream (much as it is now)
a place we long to return to - some day.
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