FREEMEN Yes, it is strange how little a while at a time a person can be contented.

Only a little while back, when I was riding and suffering, what a heaven this peace, this rest, this sweet serenity in this secluded shady nook by this purling stream would have seemed, where I could keep perfectly comfortable all the time by pouring a dipper of water into my armor now and then; yet already I was getting dissatisfied; partly because I could not light my pipe--for, although I had long ago started a match factory, I had forgotten to bring matches with me--and partly because we had nothing to eat.

Here was another illustration of the childlike improvidence of this age and people.

A man in armor always trusted to chance for his food on a journey, and would have been scandalized at the idea of hanging a basket of sandwiches on his spear.

There was probably not a knight of all the Round Table combination who would not rather have died than been caught carrying such a thing as that on his flagstaff.