tering of my spare muscle, I picked it up, and,
going along to a favorable spot, succeeded in getting down to the
beach with it, whence I toiled along to our camp-fire. Weymouth had
got there a little ahead of me with a flat stone worn smooth by the
waves. It was not so thick as mine, nor so heavy: it was a sort of
dark slate-stone. Forthwith a discussion arose as to the merits of the
two _spiders_; which was finally decided in favor of the one I had
found, from its being the whitest and cleanest-looking. Meanwhile
Donovan had been feeding the fire so profusely, that all hands had
been obliged to get back from it. Animal fat, like this of the walrus,
makes an exceedingly hot flame. Three flat stones were set up
edgewise, and the spider set on them. The flaming meat was then thrust
under it so as to heat the spider. From its thickness, it took some
minutes for it to become heated through; but, in the course of a
quarter of an hour, Kit pronounced it ready. Weymouth cut out a chunk
of walrus-blubber, with which he basted it, the melted fat collecting
in a little puddle at the bottom.

"Now for the eggs!" he exclaimed.

Raed handed them to him, one by one; while he broke them on the edge
of the butcher-knife, and dropped a half-dozen into the novel
frying-pan.

"Better be getting your plates ready!" he shouted, turning them over
with the knife to the tune of a mighty frizzling.

We all took the hint, and scattered to find flat stones for platters.
'Twas a singular assortment of kitchenware that we re-appeared with a
few minutes later. Taking up the fried eggs with his knife, Weymouth
tossed us each one, which we caught on our _plates_. Another batch was
then broke into the spider, fried, and distributed like the first.

"Now then!" cried Kit. "Draw jack-knives, and dine!"

Several mouthfuls were eaten in silence.

"What think of 'em?" Weymouth asked, casting a sly glance around. "How
do they go?"

"Rather oily!" grumbled Wade.

"Awful fresh!" Kit complained.

"Not a dust of salt in this camp!" Raed exclaimed.

"We never can live without any salt," said I. "Nothing will relish so
fresh as these eggs."

"But where's your salt coming from?" Kit demanded.

"Plenty of it in the sea," said Donovan. "Might boil down some of the
salt water."

"If we only had a kettle to boil it in," Raed added.

"Well, there's the old tin dipper in the boat that we used to bail out
the rain-water with," replied Don. "We could k