"Um!" grunted George. "Well, I guess we'd find a way to use 'em, all right."
The story of the buried cookies started us all to talking of doughnuts, and cake, and pie, and Hubbard extolled the merits of the chocolate served at one of the New York hotels.
"Wallace," he at length asked, "do you like pig's knuckles?"
"I like," I replied, "anything that can be eaten."
"Well," confided Hubbard, "I know a place down on Park Row where they serve the best pigs' knuckles you ever ate. I used to go there for them when I was on the old Daily News. They cook them just right, and serve a big plate of nice greasy cabbage or sauerkraut with them, and a cup of pretty good coffee. We'll have to go there some time when we get back."
And until it was time to go to sleep Hubbard continued to talk of the good dinners he had eaten when a child and of those his wife had recently prepared at his Congers home.
As he had decided that before proceeding farther we should know something of the country that lay to the northward, Hubbard on Monday morning (August 31) sent George on a scouting trip to the short range of mountains just ahead. He and I planned to spend the day catching and drying fish. For some reason the fish refused to rise near the camp, and Hubbard, who was so weak he could hardly stand, returned to lie down, while I went farther down the stream. Towards luncheon-time I returned with only two or three small fish. Hubbard was still resting in the tent, but soon after I had begun to repair my fishing rod by the fire he came out and joined me.
"Oh, how glad I'll be, Wallace," he said, "to get to Michikamau and finish my work here and get home again! I've been wondering when that will be. I'm afraid," he added slowly, "I've been a bit homesick to-day."
"We'll surely get there soon, old man," I said encouragingly, "and when we do get there, we'll appreciate it more than ever. Just think how it will be to eat good bread, and all we want of it." "Yes," he said, "and then we'll be glad we came here, and can laugh at the recollection of these terrible ridges, and the whole awful country, and the hard times we've been through. I'm dead glad I had just you two fellows come with me. If I'd had a single man that growled about the grub and work, or wanted to quit, it would have been hell. But we haven't had a growl or a word about quitting or turning back."
"There's no reason for quitting," said I. "And as for growling, there's no call for it. We've done the best we could, and that's enough to make any real man satisfied."