CHAPTER XXI
RAINY DAY--THE KITCHEN AND FIRE--HUNTING THE OPOSSUM
It was fortunate for the young adventurers that they had executed so promptly their intended work upon the tent, for though they had no heavy wind, the rain poured down during the whole night; and when they arose next morning, the sky was full of low scudding clouds, which promised plenty of rain for all that day, and perhaps for days to come. But, though the tent was dry as a hay loft, there were several deficiencies. They had but a meagre supply of wood, and their kitchen fire was without a shelter. The wind and rain were both chilly; and, it was plain, that without somebody's getting wet they must content themselves with a cold breakfast, and a shivering day.
"Why did we not think of this before?" Robert querulously asked.
"Simply because we had other things to think of," replied Harold. "For my part, I am thankful that we have a dry tent."
"So am I," rejoined Robert, changing his tone. "But I should be still more thankful if we had a place where we could sit by the fire."
"Very likely, now since we know from experience, how uncomfortable it is to be without. But I doubt if any of us would be half so thankful, were it not for being put to inconvenience. I recollect a case in point. My mother was once taken sick while we were travelling through the Indian nation. At that time the Indians were becoming hostile, and we were every day expecting them to declare war. O, how troubled we all were! I remember that every morning we made it a point to say how thankful we were for spending another night, without being scalped. But afterwards, when we had returned home, and could spend our days and nights in peace, we forgot to be thankful at all."
Robert smiled at the naturalness of the description, and remarked, "Well, I think we shall be thankful now for a fire and shelter. Can we not devise some way to have them?"
The result of this conference was, that in the course of an hour they set up the boat-awning as a sort of kitchen, enclosed on three sides by the remaining bed-sheets, and having a fire at the windward gable, near which they sat very cosily on boxes and trunks brought from the tent.
Contrary to their expectation, the rain began to abate about noon, and long before sunset the surface of the earth was so much dried, and the drops left upon the trees and bushes so thoroughly exhaled or shaken off by a brisk wind, that the boys used the opportunity to bring in a supply of wood and lightwood. The light-wood was very rich, and split into such beautiful torch pieces, that Harold was tempted to think of a kind of sport in which he had often engaged, and in which he was very fond. "We have been pent up all day," said he to Robert; "suppose we change the scene by taking a fire-hunt tonight."