"Had anything to eat?" asked Anne, who always felt sorry for any one who was hungry.
"We ate the mushrooms we found," meekly replied Joan.
"Then come back and eat what we left for you. We had fish and greens and biscuit," said Hester.
While they were munching the cold food, Alec questioned them further. "Why didn't you use what scout-sense you had? You know you could have found the way you came through those woods by looking for broken cobwebs across the bushes; by overturned stones with the damp under side showing; or by broken twigs and crushed blades of grass; and last, but hardest, you might have looked to see where leaves on trees and bushes were turned awry from your brushing against them. They do not right themselves immediately, you know."
"We never heard of that before," admitted Julie.
"But Dick has, even though he has forgotten it," said Alec. "He had to learn it from the Manual—what he would do in case of being lost in a forest."
"But even if you knew nothing about that, you all knew it would simplify things for us if you were to blaze a way to guide us the way you went. You could easily have broken twigs and left them hanging, or piled little heaps of stones along the trail you took."
"Oh, for goodness sake! Let up on us now, and wait until you are lost, will you?" cried Julie, placing her palms over her ears.
"Yes, it's so easy to tell the other feller what to do!" was all the retort Dick made.
"Well, children, after all I have my inning!" declared Mr. Gilroy, chuckling.