194 NARRATIVES. 



stick, that will defy the rain. Hemlock or pine bark, taken 

 from dead trees, is excellent fuel for an incipient fire. But it 

 must be laid on carefully in cob-house fashion, with the out- 

 side next the fire. After a while, the furious blaze you 

 have started with light material will get possession of the 

 great green logs, and then the fire will take care of itself 

 for hours. Almost literally it shall be to you a ' wall of fire ' 

 through the long cold-night. 



" Now hang on the kettle for supper. This is easily done 

 by cutting a pole ten or fifteen feet long, sharpening the large 

 end, and thrusting it obliquely into the ground back of your 

 fire-place, so that the small part will rest on the top back-stick, 

 and the end will project over the fire. A twig left at the 

 proper place will prevent the kettle from slipping. 



" All that remains, to make ready for sleep, is to prepare 

 your bed. For this, hemlock or cedar boughs will do; but 

 balsam boughs are the best. The handiest way is to cut down 

 a good-sized balsam-tree near your camp, and strip off its top 

 brush either with your jack-knife or hatchet. Tiiis bed- 

 material must not be tumbled into the sleeping-place pell-mell ; 

 but must be carefully packed, bough by bough, by thrusting 

 the stick-ends into and under the mass, and leaving the brush- 

 ends to shingle over each other, like the feathers of a bird. If 

 you neglect this, you must expect to roll and groan on hard 

 sticks, instead of sleeping quietly on tree feathers. You sleep, 

 of course, in your blanket, with your boots for your pillow, and 

 with your feet to the fire. If ' the stars look kindly down ' 

 upon you, no matter how cold the weather is. You can sleep 

 within the magic circle of that Cyclopean fire, though the 

 water freezes hard in your water-pail at a little distance. 



"But what if it rains? Then the party must put their 

 blankets into common stock, extemporize a shelter-tent with 

 one or two of them, and sleep as well as they can under the 

 rest, spread bed-fashion. For the frame-work of the tent you 

 can cut five or six fish-poles, and thrust their large ends ob- 

 liquely into the ground at the head of your bed, so that they 

 slope up over the place where you are to lie, like the rafters 

 of a roof. You fasten the upper ends with strings to a tran^- 



