? ? ? ? 'Blithering idiot!' I was continuing.
? ? ? ? But Maud said, 'Tut! tut!' in gentle reproval, and then asked why I was a blithering idiot.
? ? ? ? 'No matches!' I groaned. 'Not a match did I bring! And now we shall have no hot coffee, soup, tea, nor anything.'
? ? ? ? 'Wasn't it er- Crusoe who rubbed sticks together?' she drawled.
? ? ? ? 'But I have read the personal narratives of a score of shipwrecked men who tried, and tried in vain,' I answered. 'I remember Winters, a newspaper fellow with an Alaskan and Siberian reputation. Met him at the Bibelot once, and he was telling us how he attempted to make a fire with a couple of sticks. It was most amusing. He told it inimitably, but it was the story of a failure. I remember his conclusion, his black eyes flashing as he said: "Gentlemen, the South Sea Islander may do it, the Malay may do it, but, take my word, it's beyond the white man.
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