Page:Castlemon--Joe Wayring at Home.djvu/205

 his cousins did their full share of the work, they did not neglect to keep an eye on their more experienced companions; and they were astonished to see how easily one can get on without a good many things which the majority of people seem to think necessary to their very existence. When the fish had been cleaned and washed in the pond, they were spread out flat and fastened with wooden pins to the boards, which were propped up in front of the fire; while the squirrels were impaled upon forked sticks and held over the coals by Arthur Hastings and Roy, who turned first one side and then the other to the heat, until they were done to a delicious brown.

"If Matt Coyle had only been good enough to leave us the bacon, which I was careful to have put up with my lunch, these squirrels would be much better than they are going to be," said Arthur, addressing himself to Ralph, who manifested the greatest interest in this rude forest cookery. "Their meat is rather dry, you know, and a strip of nice fat bacon pinned to each side of them would furnish the necessary grease—that isn't a very elegant