I could not help feeling
it so.
Well, I did not go out shooting just to murder things, but to live. I
had need of one grouse to-day, and so I did not shoot two, but would
shoot the other to-morrow. Why kill more? I lived in the woods, as a son
of the woods. And from the first of June it was closed time for hare and
ptarmigan; there was but little left for me to shoot at all now. Well
and good: then I could go fishing, and live on fish. I would borrow her
father's boat and row out in that. No, indeed, I did no go out shooting
for the lust of killing things, but only to live in the woods. It was a
good place for me; I could lie down on the ground at meals, instead of
sitting upright on a chair; I did not upset my glass there. In the woods
I could do as I pleased; I could lie down flat on my back and close my
eyes if I pleased, and I could say whatever I liked to say. Often one
might feel a wish to say something, to speak aloud, and in the woods it
sounded like speech from the very heart...
When I asked her if she understood all this, she said, "Yes."
And I went on, and told her more, because her eyes were on me. "If you
only knew all that I see out in the wilds!" I said. "In winter, I come
walking along, and see, perhaps, the tracks of ptarmigan in the snow.
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