Coming at length to an old camp-site by the side of a pretty little woodland stream, the guide stopped his team and, turning, said: “It’s some time past noon, boys, and we’ve got quite a spell to go yet before dark. Guess your breakfast must have been shook down long ago. Suppose we get off here, build a fire, and cook a bite to eat?”
They were quite ready; but what they were to eat, or how or where they were to cook it, they did not know, for neither Ed nor George had ever camped in the real wilderness before.
Ben soon solved the difficulty by taking from a box beneath the wagon-seat tin-plates, knives, forks, cups, and spoons. Then from a small deer-hide case he brought forth six eggs, some delicious-looking brown biscuits, a piece of bacon, and a coffee-pot. Having deposited all these things on the ground near a convenient log, he set the boys at work gathering sticks with which to start a fire.
These sticks were skilfully arranged between two logs, and soon a crackling blaze was frying the eggs and bacon in the pan, while farther along between the logs the coffee-pot was giving forth a tempting aroma.
The lads sat cross-legged on the ground and ate their first woodland meal with keen relish. When they had finished, and Ben had smoked a pipe, he sent them to the stream for water, which was heated over the bed of glowing embers. Then he gave George a dish-cloth and Ed a coarse towel, and set them at work cleaning and drying the dishes. This task finished, the horses were hitched to the wagon; and Ben and the lads climbed aboard, and once more started along the trail.
Noisy jays chattered from the tops of the tallest pines; squirrels scolded from beside the road; and high overhead a large hawk circled about on motionless wings and screamed down at them. The boys asked Ben all sorts of questions about the birds and animals they were likely to see in the woods.
Late in the afternoon they branched off upon a new road that led straight away into the deepest solitudes of the forest. Ben said they were within a short distance of the cabin, and the boys peered anxiously forward to obtain a glimpse of the place which was to be their home for many months to come. This new route followed along the shore of a beautiful woodland lake, and visions of fishing filled their minds as they gazed out over its glistening blue waters.
Just as the sun was sinking behind a ridge of pine-clad mountains Ben shouted, and, much to the surprise of his companions, an answer at once came back. Looking ahead, as the guide pointed with his whip, the boys saw the outlines of a log house. In a few moments more the wagon came to a stop before the door, where stood a great bearded man in rough hunting clothes, who greeted them heartily.
Ben introduced him as the owner of the team, and said that after spending the night with them he would drive to his own cabin, some fifteen or twenty miles distant, in the morning.
While Ben and his friend unhitched the horses, and busied themselves with unloading the wagon, the boys wandered about examining the cozy log cabin, which was the first one they had ever seen.