Page:The Swiss Family Robinson (Kingston).djvu/41

 and boxes on the border of the canvas, and arranged hooks so as to be able to close up the entrance during the night.

When this was accomplished, the boys ran to collect moss and grass, to spread in the tent for our beds, while I arranged a fire-place with some large flat stones, near the brook which flowed close by. Dry twigs and seaweed were soon in a blaze on the hearth, I filled the iron pot with water, and giving my wife several cakes of the portable soup, she established herself as our cook, with little Franz to help her.

He, thinking his mother was melting some glue for carpentering, was eager to know “what papa was going to make next?”

“This is to be soup for your dinner, my child. Do you think these cakes look like glue?”

“Yes, indeed I do?" replied Franz, “And I should not much like to taste glue soup! don't you want some beef or mutton, mamma?”

“Where can I get it, dear?” said she, “we are a long way from a butcher's shop! but these cakes are made of the juice of good meat, boiled till it becomes a strong stiff jelly—people take them when they go to sea, because on a long voyage they can only have salt meat, which will not make nice soup.”

Fritz meanwhile leaving a loaded gun with me, took another himself, and went along the rough coast to see what lay beyond the stream; this fatiguing sort of walk not suiting Ernest's fancy, he sauntered down to the beach, and Jack scrambled among the rocks searching for shellfish.

I was anxious to land the two casks which were floating alongside our boat, but on attempting to do so, I found that I could not get them up the bank on which we had landed, and was therefore obliged to look for a more convenient spot. As I did so, I was startled by hearing Jack shouting for help, as though in great danger. He was at some distance, and I hurried towards him with a hatchet in my hand. The little fellow stood screaming