The Calling of Dan Matthews | Page 7

ravine to meet his friend who was waiting on the river bank. As
the lad sprang lightly to the ground, and, with quick fingers, took some
things from the saddle, loosed the girths and removed the pony's bridle,
the physician watched him with a slight feeling of--was it envy or
regret? "You are early," he said.
The boy laughed. "I would have come earlier if I could," Then,
dismissing the little horse, he turned eagerly, "Have you been there
yet--to that place up the river?"
"Indeed I have not," said the Doctor, "I have been waiting for you to
show me."
He was delighted at this, and very soon was leading the way along the
foot of the bluff to his favorite fishing ground.
It is too much to attempt the telling of that day: how they lay on the
ground beneath the giant-limbed cottonwoods, and listened to the
waters going past; how they talked of the wild woodland life about
them, of flower and tree, and moss and vine, and the creatures that

nested and denned and lived therein; how they caught a goodly catch of
bass and perch, and the Doctor, pulling off his boots, waded in the
water like another boy, while the hills echoed with their laughter; and
how, when they had their lunch on a great rock, an eagle watched
hungrily from his perch on a dead pine, high up on the top of the bluff.
When the shadow of the mountain was come once more and in answer
to the boy's whistle the black pony had trotted from the brush to be
made ready for the evening ride, the Doctor again watched his young
companion wistfully.
When he was ready, the boy said, "Father and mother asked me to tell
you, sir, that they--that we would be glad to have you come to see us
before you leave the hills." Seeing the surprise and hesitation of the
Doctor, he continued with fine tact, "You see I told them all about you,
and they would like to know you too. Won't you come? I'm sure you
would like my father and mother, and we would be so glad to have you.
I'll drive over after you tomorrow if you'll come."
Would he go! Why the Doctor would have gone to China, or Africa, or
where would he not have gone, if the boy had asked him.
That visit to the Matthews' place was the beginning of a friendship that
has never been broken. Every year since, the Doctor has gone to them
for several weeks and always with increasing delight. Among the many
households that, in his professional career, he has been privileged to
know intimately, this home stands like a beautiful temple in a world of
shacks and hovels. But it was not until the philosopher had heard from
Mrs. Matthews the story of Dad Howitt that he understood the reason.
In the characters of Young Matt and Sammy, in their home life and in
their children, the physician found the teaching of the old Shepherd of
the Hills bearing its legitimate fruit. Most clearly did he find it in
Dan--the first born of this true mating of a man and woman who had
never been touched by those forces in our civilization which so dwarf
and cripple the race, but who had been taught to find in their natural
environment those things that alone have the power to truly refine and
glorify life.

Understanding this, the Doctor understood Dan. The boy was well born;
he was natural. He was what a man-child ought to be. He did not carry
the handicap that most of us stagger under so early in the race. And
because of these things, to the keen old physician and student of life,
the boy was a revelation of that best part of himself--that best part of
the race. With the years this feeling of the Doctor's toward the boy has
grown even as their fellowship. But Dan has never understood; how
indeed could he?
It was always Dan who met the Doctor at the little wilderness station,
and who said the last good-bye when the visit was over. Always they
were together, roaming about the hills, on fishing trips to the river,
exploring the country for new delights, or revisiting their familiar
haunts. Dan seemed, in his quiet way, to claim his old friend by right of
discovery and the others laughingly yielded, giving the Doctor--as
Young Matt, the father, put it--"a third interest in the boy."
And so, with the companionship of the yearly visits, and frequent
letters in the intervening months, the Doctor watched the development
of his young friend, and dreamed of the part that Dan would play in life
when he became a man. And often as