rm, with accompanying wind
and the crashing of thunder. When morning came it was a dismal outlook
that they saw, peeping from the tent. The rain was still falling, and a
leaden gray sky overhead gave promise of a hopelessly long and wet day.

Steve had fetched along a rubber coat and boots, so that one of them
could go and come on errands, without getting soaked. Moses must be fed,
to begin with, and there would be numerous trips to make between tent
and supply wagon.

The fire was started in the little camp stove used by the photographer
when he took his annual pilgrimage through the country, in search of
lovely views to add to a collection he was making that would be an art
treasure when he had completed it.

"Say, that works mighty fine, let me tell you!" declared Toby, when the
grateful heat from the stove began to render the interior of the big
tent very comfortable. "We'll have no trouble keeping as snug as three
bugs in a rug, with that sheet-iron contraption to help out."

"And," added Steve, "the oven is getting hot already. I really believe I
can do that baking today, boys; so make up your minds to eat some of the
jolliest biscuits you ever put between your teeth. I made sure to carry
all the ingredients along, barring none."

"I notice that an arrangement comes with the stove so that you can burn
kerosene if wood isn't handy," remarked Jack; "which makes it all the
more valuable as a camp auxiliary. Lots of times wood is out of the
question, but you can get plenty of oil."

At that Steve began to chuckle.

"What strikes you as being so funny, Steve?" demanded Toby, who was
amusing himself by starting breakfast on the little stove, as though not
meaning to let Steve do _all_ the cooking while on their camping
trip.

"Oh! I was only thinking of that old saying about carrying coals to
Newcastle, you know--which place is the head coal centre over in
England. It would seem pretty much that way for fellows to lug a big can
of kerosene away up here, when the ground is actually reeking with the
stuff in an unrefined state. Perhaps it'd be possible to find a little
pond of the same, and dip up all you'd want to use."

"One thing I'm hoping won't happen, at any rate while we're up here,"
Toby now went on to say, reflectively; "and that is to have the woods
get afire. Whee! if that ever did happen, goodbye to Miss Priscilla's
gold mine, in the way of an oil gusher bonanza; for the whole country
might get abla