Saturday, Oct 13, 1883 Downing and I started on our camping expedition on Sept. 10th and returned yesterday having been gone nearly five weeks. We went to Mink Hollow via Mt. Pleasant where Mr. Wilbers team met us and took us to the spot we had selected for our camp about a mile and a half above his mill. We had two tents and lived very comfortably doing all our cooking and work ourselves. I painted every day and made twenty five studies. I never so thoroughly enjoyed painting from nature. The place was charming and grew upon me from day to day so that when we left I really had more subjects before me than when I came. But they were getting lonely at home and my mother I feared was not as well as usual so we reluctantly came away. Eastman Johnson came last Tuesday and remained until we broke up our camp and came home with me having thoroughly enjoyed his brief visit. The Autumn glory of color was at its height when we left and I would have been glad to stay and paint a while longer. It rained when we left and our things got pretty wet although it was not a violent rain. We got home about 5 oclock and found my father waiting at the Junction for us. I talked with Mr. Wilber about buying a tract of land for half a mile along the brook above our camp and if possible I mean to secure it for a more lovely place and one more rich in picturesque material with the advantages of being so accessible and so easily supplied it would be difficult to find. We had beautiful weather most of the time, a few cold nights but we kept warm. Altogether it was the most satisfactory thing of the kind I ever undertook, and to my surprise the cooking and necessary work did not prove so irksome as I feared it would. Today we have been sunning and drying out tents and camp furniture. Eastman went to N. Y. on his way back to Nantucket by the 1150 W S. train to our regret as we hoped he would stay over Sunday. It rained again in the afternoon. Calvert came up by the 3 oclock train W. S. The autumnal color is coming on very finely and promises to be most brilliant. Girards wife presented him with a boy on Friday 12th his fourth one.
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