"Oh, lots and lots!" the children answered.
"Bring them in." And the children trooped into the cabin, which they thought quite the most wonderful place in the world. Its walls were lined with books and cases. The books were not only in English, but also in French, German, Italian, Latin, Greek, and other languages, and the cases were filled with scores of specimens, the most beautiful butterflies, moths, beetles, birds, flowers, and rare stones. The floor of the cabin was covered by different kinds of skins. Besides, there were telescopes, field-glasses, magnifying-glasses, specimen cases, old weapons, and a flute. And by the great wide fireplace, in front of which the guide was cooking biscuits and cookies in a reflector oven, lay several kittens, the old black dog, Thor, and a dappled fawn which Thor was licking.
"Those crickets sound like pop-guns," said the old man, slipping more cookies into the oven and setting a pan of biscuits on a shelf by the hearth.
"Oh, please," said little Hope, "we've got bushels of them!"
"Now we'll let those cookies bake while we 'tend to the fiddlers. Are four pans of cookies enough for five children?"
"Yes, yes."
"Now, Hope, let me have your bushel box. H'm," he murmured, peeping in, "all dressed for the party. What color?"
"Brown, sir."
"Black, too," said Betty; "and on a few," she added, "there's a stripe or a weeny spot of color."
"Oho!" exclaimed the old man, "what have we here?" He took a pale little creature from Hope's basket.