"Can we camp here?" we inquired.
"Sure thing," he bellowed. "Turn your horses into the meadow. Camp right here."
But with the vision of a rounded wooded knoll a few hundred yards distant we said we'd just get out of his way a little. We crossed a creek, mounted an easy slope to the top of the knoll, and were delighted to observe just below its summit the peculiar fresh green hump which indicates a spring. The Tenderfoot, however, knew nothing of springs, for shortly he trudged a weary way back to the creek, and so returned bearing kettles of water. This performance hugely astonished the cowboy, who subsequently wanted to know if a "critter had died in the spring."
Wes departed to borrow a big Dutch oven of the man and to invite him to come across when we raised the long yell. Then we began operations.
Now camp cooks are of two sorts. Anybody can with a little practice fry bacon, steak, or flapjacks, and boil coffee. The reduction of the raw material to its most obvious cooked result is within the reach of all but the most hopeless tenderfoot who never knows the salt-sack from the sugar-sack. But your true artist at the business is he who can from six ingredients, by permutation, combination, and the genius that is in him turn out a full score of dishes. For simple example: GIVEN, rice, oatmeal, and raisins. Your expert accomplishes the following:
ITEM—Boiled rice.
ITEM—Boiled oatmeal.
ITEM—Rice boiled until soft, then stiffened by the addition of quarter as much oatmeal.
ITEM—Oatmeal in which is boiled almost to the dissolving point a third as much rice.
These latter two dishes taste entirely unlike each other or their separate ingredients. They are moreover great in nutrition.