“What do you ask better than this? Aren’t we lucky, Mike?”
“That we are, ’tis just what we want, as me cousin Hughey said when his mither set a bushel of peeled praties in front of him for dessert.”
And Mike walked up to the maple and tapped it smartly with his buckthorn.
“What are you driving at?” asked the astonished corporal; “that isn’t a cedar.”
“And who said it was? Why didn’t ye wait till I finished my enlightening observation? I was about to say whin ye broke in that it is the very tree that we want to lave alone. What do ye maan by such unseemly levity?” demanded Mike, turning upon the other lads who were laughing at his slip. “Now, corporal, don’t try to cut down that cedar wid the back of yer hatchet; the blade will sarve ye much better.”
With the keen-edged implement the other youth quickly severed a dry limb from the proper tree and trimmed it to a length of eighteen inches. Having done this, he looked up and saw Uncle Elk and Scout Master Hall among the spectators gathered round him. Robe turned to the old man for further directions.
“Whittle each end to a sharp point.”
This was quickly done.
“Cut another stick and hew it flat, with the thickness of the first; make a notch in it and at the end of the small end of the notch a little saucer-like pit.”
Let me describe what was done under the direction of the Instructor.