244 THE BED MOUNTAIN OF ALASKA. 
to the labors of building, but lightened them. Little 
Nat's work was constantly to help Teddy collect green fir 
and spruce boughs, and soft, thick moss ; they soon had a 
pile of each as large as a good-sized haycock. 
Chloe absented herself on this particular morning for a 
couple of hours, much to Mrs. Button's surprise. She 
returned, however, bearing a big armful of green and 
withered rushes, of which a great abundance lined a cove 
in a small pond close by. These rushes she dried before 
the fire, and, while they were spread out, gathered as many 
more, cutting every blade with scissors ! On the morrow 
she showed Mrs. Button how to braid the rushes into long 
ropes. These she proposed to coil up so as to make mat- 
ting, but both string and thread were scarce. What 
should she do ? She had recourse to Solomon, who 
was half-way through the trunk of a seventy-five-foot 
poplar. 
Let me see," said the chopper, leaving his axe buried 
in the wood, " I guess I c'n find suthin' that'll dew ye. 
Look here ! " 
He pulled up a little spruce, not more than a foot high, 
that grew beside the brook. As he shook the dirt off, 
Chloe could see a large number of fine, long rootlets. 
"See ef ye c'n break one." 
The negro woman found them tough as stationers' 
twine. 
Naow," said Solomon, resuming his axe, "them's what 
the Injuns use in sewing their bark canoes. You want to 
