"Well, we can't risk anything here; so I'll get your coffee, and after breakfast, if Peter will get me a little pitch off the branches, I'll make something for your cough."
The birds were well cooked and quite appetizing; and as he rose Peter handed La Salle a small handful of Canada balsam, which in the shape of small tears clung to many of the larger branches on the floor.
"That enough? If not, Peter get more."
"That will do—thank you, Peter."
But the eye of the speaker caught a look directed by Regnar at the roof of the hut, from whence exuded a few drops of a blacker resin.
"Yes, I see Stockholm tar; that will help the cure much."
Placing the two in an iron spoon, rudely made from a fragment of the decoys, they were gently melted, and a small quantity of sugar added, with enough powdered biscuit to enable the mass to be rolled into little balls.
"You must chew these and swallow the tar-water thus formed, and finally the resins themselves, and you will find your cough much loosened by to-morrow."
"Sposum you no want boat-hook, me make draw-knife of him. He steel, I s'pose."
"Yes, Peter. The spike is very fine steel, I believe, as I told the blacksmith I wanted it light and sharp. If you want it you can have it; that is, if you feel sure you can make a knife."