Question

by Jerome K. Jerome
1
Camping out in rainy weather is not pleasant.

2
It is evening. You are wet through, and there is a good two inches of water in the boat, and all the things are damp. You find a place on the banks that is not quite so puddly as other places you have seen, and you land and lug out the tent, and two of you proceed to fix it.

3
It is soaked and heavy, and it flops about, and tumbles down on you, and clings round your head and makes you mad. The rain is pouring steadily down all the time. It is difficult enough to fix a tent in dry weather; in wet, the task becomes herculean. Instead of helping you, it seems to you that the other man is simply playing the fool. Just as you get your side beautifully fixed, he gives it a hoist from his end, and spoils it all. . . .

4
Meanwhile the third man, who has been bailing out the boat, and who has spilled the water down his sleeve . . . wants to know what the thundering blazes you're playing at, and why the blarmed tent isn't up yet.

5
At last, somehow or other, it does get up, and you land the things. It is hopeless attempting to make a wood fire, so you light the methylated spirit stove, and crowd round that.

6
Rainwater is the chief article of diet at supper. The bread is two-thirds rainwater, the beefsteak pie is exceedingly rich in it, and the jam, and the butter, and the salt, and the coffee have all combined with it to make soup.

7
In the morning you are all three speechless, owing to having caught severe colds in the night; you also feel very quarrelsome, and you yell at each other in hoarse whispers during the whole of breakfast time.

8
We therefore decided that we would sleep out on fine nights; and hotel it, and inn it, and pub it, like respectable folks, when it was wet, or when we felt inclined for a change.

Excerpt from Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog) by Jerome K. Jerome. In the public domain.

My First Summer in the Sierra (excerpt)
by John Muir
July 18. About noon we had another rainstorm with keen startling thunder, the metallic, ringing, clashing, clanging gradually fading into low bass rolling and muttering in the distance. For a few minutes the rain came in a grand torrent like a waterfall; then hail, some of the hailstones an inch in diameter, hard, icy, and irregular in form, like those oftentimes seen in Wisconsin. . . . Afternoon calm, sunful, and clear, with delicious freshness and fragrance from the firs and flowers and steaming ground.

July 19. Watching the daybreak and sunrise. The pale rose and purple sky changing softly to daffodil yellow and white, sunbeams pouring through the passes between the peaks and over the Yosemite domes, making their edges burn; the silver firs in the middle ground catching the glow on their spiry tops, and our camp grove fills and thrills with the glorious light. Everything awakening alert and joyful. . . . The whole landscape glows like a human face in a glory of enthusiasm, and the blue sky, pale around the horizon, bends peacefully down over all like one vast flower.

Excerpt from My First Summer in the Sierra by John Muir. In the public domain.

Answer 1

I can help with this—what would you like me to do with these excerpts? Here are some options (pick one or tell me another):

- Summarize each excerpt in one or two sentences.
- Compare and contrast tone, style, and themes.
- Analyze literary techniques (imagery, diction, rhythm, point of view).
- Rewrite one excerpt in modern/contemporary language or as a brief flash fiction.
- Continue one excerpt in the same style (I can attempt a short passage that matches the author’s tone).
- Create discussion questions or a short lesson plan for teaching these passages.
- Extract vivid images or phrases suitable for quotation or prompts.

Brief comparison to help you choose: Jerome K. Jerome’s passage is comic, conversational, and focused on the tedious, physical discomforts of camping in rain, using plain speech and dry humor. John Muir’s excerpt is lyrical and reverent toward nature, rich with sensory imagery and elevated metaphor celebrating landscape and light.

Which would you like me to do next?