Makeshift furnace.
While coasting along the shores of North Australia we were often at a loss for something like a warm meal; fortunately, we had as a compensation a case of gin with us, and, as long as it lasted, we thankfully availed ourselves of it as a means of restoring the animal heat after we had been chilled and wearied by a night of exposure and incessant labour. When the weather moderated a little, we took a 6lb. preserved beef tin (see the following engraving), cut out the top of it, and then, after making a number of triangular cuts in the sides about half-way down, we turned the tongues inwards so as to make at the same time supports for the piece of tin we had cut out from the top, and holes by which the air could enter freely; the upper edge we cut into van-dykes, turning alternately one point inward and one a little out, so as to make a firm rest and secure hold for another tin of the same size, which we used as a boiler. We set the whole upon the bottom of our upturned baling tub, and lighted our fire upon the false bottom with coir, or fibre of cocoa-nut husk, steeped in cocoa-nut oil, and with chips of deal cut off the trail of our little carronade. In this manner we not only made tea and coffee, but warmed up our preserved meat, and fried our salt pork.
During this voyage we fell in with one of the very few so-called “edible” things we have been unable to eat, and this was the “trepang” (beche le mer, or sea-slug); this, with the scanty boiling or roasting we could afford it, was about as tender and well tasted as the sole of a shoe well saturated with sea-water; but, after having been parboiled and dried by the Malay collectors, sold by them for 15l. per ton to the Chinese, and subjected to the elaborate culinary operations of that people, we have no doubt that, with sufficient condiment, it produces a soup quite worthy of the praises they bestow upon it.
When we were left with a couple of Krooboys in the pinnace of H.M.S. Hermes, on the Zambesi, we took an empty preserved potatoe box, composed of sheet iron, between 16in. and 18in. square, and, cutting out the top as in the case before described, we made half-way up the sides a series of triangular cuts, turned the points inward as supports, and let the top sheet previously punched full of holes down upon them; above this we cut a good-sized hole for the admission of fresh fuel, and another below for access to the ashes accumulating there. This proved a first-rate portable furnace; it was large enough to accommodate the coffee kettle and a moderate-sized stew pot or frying-pan. The bottom being made with a flange riveted to the sides, as shown by the rivet heads in the sketch, was sunk nearly 1 in. within the edges, and therefore left just that amount of vacant space between it and the boat’s thwarts or other plank that it might be set upon, thus preventing any danger of burning the plank should even the falling embers heat the iron before they died out. For additional security, we put a couple of chocks under to raise it; but there was no necessity for securing it by cleats or lashings; still we have drawn them to show how they might be applied, if requisite.
A piece of the iron wire netting, now commonly sold for fencing, if neatly turned up at the sides, would make a very efficient fire-basket; and, if the meshes prove too large, a couple of pieces so cut or folded that they cover each other unequally would reduce the size of the apertures to something less than half. This might be slung by wires (as in Fig. 1), set upon legs, or supported according to convenience. The form of the old cresset, which may be well enough imitated with a few bits of iron hoop (Fig. 2), with or without rivets, is worth bearing in mind. Light may be obtained by sticking a pole into the ground, splitting the top of it, and sticking in the cleft a slip of red pine or other resinous wood; the burning may be accelerated by depressing the lighted end (as in Fig. 3), or retarded by raising it.