"Let me down right here where I can get the fish!" And slowly, reluctantly, with great pains that she should not be scratched by briars, bitten by snakes, brushed by poison-ivy, muddied by the wet bank, or threatened with another fall, I put her down.

She looked diligently in the grass for the fish, picked them up, and ran off to camp.

After she had disappeared, I heard the bushes rustle, and looked up as I sat on the bank wringing the water from my socks and pouring it from my boots.
"Thank you for keeping me dry," said she.

"You did it very nicely.

And now you must stay in the wagon while I dry your socks and boots for you--you poor wet boy!" 3 She had not objected to my holding her so long; she rather seemed to like it; she seemed willing to go on camping here as long as I wished; she was wondering why I was so backward and so bashful; she was in my hands; why hold back?
Why not use my power?
If I did not I should make myself forever ridiculous to all men and to all women--who, according to my experience, were never in higher feather than when ridiculing some greenhorn of a boy.