firewood from a dead pine-tree which stood conveniently at hand; and
settled down in comfort for the night.

What could have been better than our supper, cooked in the open air and
eaten by fire-light! True, we had no plates--they had been
forgotten--but we never mourned for them. We made a shift to get along
with the tops of some emptied tin cans and the cover of a kettle; and
from these rude platters, (quite as serviceable as the porcelain of
Limoges or Sevres) we consumed our toast, and our boiled potatoes with
butter, and our trout prudently brought from Horseshoe Lake, and, best
of all, our bacon.

Do you remember what Charles Lamb says about roast pig? How he falls
into an ecstasy of laudation, spelling the very name with small
capitals, as if the lower case were too mean for such a delicacy, and
breaking away from the cheap encomiums of the vulgar tongue to hail it
in sonorous Latin as _princeps obsoniorum_! There is some truth in his
compliments, no doubt; but they are wasteful, excessive, imprudent. For
if all this praise is to be lavished on plain, fresh, immature, roast
pig, what adjectives shall we find to do justice to that riper, richer,
more subtle and sustaining viand, broiled bacon? On roast pig a man can
not work; often he can not sleep, if he have partaken of it immoderately.
But bacon "brings to its sweetness no satiety." It strengthens the arm
while it satisfies the palate. Crisp, juicy, savory; delicately salt as
the breeze that blows from the sea; faintly pungent as the blue smoke
of incense wafted from a clean wood-fire; aromatic, appetizing,
nourishing, a stimulant to the hunger which it appeases, 'tis the
matured bloom and consummation of the mild little pig, spared by
foresight for a nobler fate than juvenile roasting, and brought by art
and man's device to a perfection surpassing nature. All the problems of
woodland cookery are best saved by the baconian method. And when we say
of one escaping great disaster that he has "saved his bacon," we say
that the physical basis and the quintessential comfort of his life are
still untouched and secure.

Steadily fell the rain all that night, plentiful, persistent, drumming
on the tightened canvas over our heads, waking us now and then to
pleasant thoughts of a rising stream and good water for the morrow.
Breaking clouds rolled before the sunrise, and the lake was all
a-glitter when we pushed away in dancing canoes to find the outlet.
This is one o