dry White Pine,
but the Chippewas mostly use Balsam Fir. The easiest way is with a
bow-drill. Have ye any buckskin?"

"No."

"Or a strip o' soft leather?"

"I've got a leather shoe-lace," said Yan.

"Rather slim; but we'll double it an' make it do. A cord will answer,
but it frays out so soon." Caleb took the lace and the axe, then said,
"Find me a stone 'bout the size of an egg, with a little hole into
it--like a socket hole--'bout a quarter inch deep."

The boys went to the creek to seek a stone and Caleb went into the
woods.

They heard him chopping, and presently he came back with a flat piece
of very dry Balsam Fir, a fifteen-inch pin of the same, a stick about
three feet long, slightly bent, some dry Pine punk and some dry Cedar.

The pin was three-quarters of an inch thick and was roughly
eight-sided, "so the lace would grip." It was pointed at both ends. He
fastened the lace to the bent stick like a bow-string, but loosely, so
that when it had one turn around the pin it was quite tight. The flat
piece of Balsam he trimmed down to about half an inch thick. In the
edge of this he now cut a notch one-quarter inch wide and half an inch
deep, then on the top of this fire-board or block, just beyond the
notch, he made with the point of his knife a little pit.

He next scraped and shredded a lot of dry Cedar wood like lint. Then
making a hole half an inch deep in the ground, he laid in that a flat
piece of Pine punk, and across this he set the fire-board. The point
of the pin or drill was put in the pit of the fire-board, which he
held down with one foot; the lace was given one turn on the pin, and
its top went into the hole of the stone the boys brought. The stone
was held firmly in Caleb's left hand.

"Sometimes," he remarked, "when ye can't find a stone, a Pine knot
will do--ye kin make the socket-hole with a knife-point."

Now holding the bow in his right hand, he began to draw it back and
forth with long, steady strokes, causing the pin to whirl round in the
socket. Within a few seconds a brown powder began to run out of the
notch of the fire-board onto the punk. The pit increased in size and
blackened, the powder darkened, and a slight smoke arose from the pit.
Caleb increased the pressure of his left hand a little, and sawed
faster with the right. The smoke steadily increased and the black
powder began to fill the notch. The smoke was rolling in little clouds
from under the pin, and it even seemed