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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Life on the Mississippi by Mark Twain: and then went on loading and firing until he was out of adjectives.
I had learned long ago that he only carried just so many rounds
of ammunition, and was sure to subside into a very placable and
even remorseful old smooth-bore as soon as they were all gone.
That word 'old' is merely affectionate; he was not more than
thirty-four. I waited. By and by he said--
'My boy, you've got to know the SHAPE of the river perfectly.
It is all there is left to steer by on a very dark night.
Everything else is blotted out and gone. But mind you, it hasn't
the same shape in the night that it has in the day-time.'
'How on earth am I ever going to learn it, then?'
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