human
One of you might shut the door, said Mrs. Graham.
gpt
The nights are getting colder fast; we'll soon have to light the basement heater. She turned to Andrew.
human
This is a hard country in winter. I've seen the thermometer stand a week at fifty below.
gpt
Don't be scared, Mr. Allinson, laughed the lad, as he closed the door.
human
It's not often too fierce, and in a place like the Landing there's generally something going on. Will the frost interfere with your mining?
gpt
Not underground, said Andrew.
human
I understand that nothing can be done on the surface, but we expect to send off a good lot of ore for experimental reduction in the next week or two. Then we'll have something to base our plans on.
gpt
Mappin's going to handle the transport, I guess. That man's surely on to a soft thing. I s'pose you know he's making his pile out of the Rain Bluff?
human
I don't think you should talk to Mr. Allinson in that manner, Jim. He's a good deal older and more experienced than you are.
gpt
Your ideas are out of date, Mother; we've grown ahead of them. Mr. Allinson doesn't look as if he minded. Anyway, he doesn't know as much as I do about the Canadian contractor. He turned to Andrew.
human
Do you like it up yonder?
gpt
Yes, Andrew answered good-humoredly;
human
I like the work better than anything I remember having done.
gpt
A matter of taste. Now, I can't see much amusement in rolling rocks about or standing in wet slickers in a dark pit watching the boys punch the drills.
human
Mr. Allinson is not doing it for amusement,
gpt
Well, money isn't often made that way. You don't get rich by knowing how to use the hammer and giant-powder.
human
I believe that's true,
gpt
A sure thing! Money is made by sitting tight in your office and hiring other fellows to do the rough work. They break up the rocks and cut the milling logs; you take the profit. It's business, first and last, for mine!
human
Then it's fortunate there are people with different views, his sister interposed.
gpt
If nobody were willing to live in the logging camps all winter and go prospecting in the bush, you would be badly off.
human
But so long as there are people who like doing that kind of thing, we're glad to let them.
gpt
This is a favorite pose of his, the girl explained to Andrew.
human
It's the latest fashion among the boys; they're afraid of being thought altruistic.
gpt
Now that everything is controlled by mergers and they make all we need so dear, one is forced to be practical, Mrs. Graham remarked feelingly.
human
For all that, it jars on me to hear our young people talk as they do.
gpt
We're realists, with no use for sentiment, Jim replied.
human
We don't let our imagination run away with us. It doesn't pay.
gpt
You may be wrong in that, said Andrew, smiling,
human
I'm not much of a philosopher, but it seems to me that imagination's now and then a useful thing. I've seen it help a man through tight places. Take your prospectors, for example; they often face risks that couldn't be justified by a return in money. I heard of one fellow crossing a lake in a savage storm in a leaky canoe, to keep the time he'd allowed for his journey, because he wouldn't be beaten; and of another making two hundred miles on snowshoes with very little food, because a party he'd promised to meet was expecting him.
gpt
That, said the lad,