ked
distressed, as though he had not been wholly satisfied with the amount
of his breakfast.

"There's nothing to delay us, since we have no tents to come down," Tom
told him. "Every fellow fold up a blanket, and make his pack ready."

"It's going to be marching in light order with us nowadays," sighed
Felix, "with all our good stuff stolen. That's the only compensation I
can see about it."

"Tom, you've studied your chart good and hard, let's hope," commented
Josh; "so we won't run any chance of going past the place without
knowing it?"

"He gave me certain land marks that I couldn't very well miss seeing,"
explained the patrol leader.

"According to my way of thinking," Felix was saying, "we must be half
around the foot of Big Bear Mountain by this time."

"You've got the right idea of it," admitted the one who carried the
chart; "and Mr. Henderson's cabin isn't far away from here. That crag
up on the side of the mountain was one of the things he told me about.
When we can get it in a direct line with that peak up there we will be
within shouting distance of his place."

Tom continued to keep on his guard as they pressed onward. Every one
was alive to the necessity of finding the cabin of the old naturalist
as soon as possible. Farms were so rare up here that they found they
could not count on getting their supplies from such places; and the
possibility of going hungry was not a pleasant prospect.

After all it was an hour after noon when Tom announced the fact that
the several land marks which had been given to him were in conjunction.

"The cabin must be around here somewheres," he said, positively.

Hardly had he spoken when Josh was noticed to be sniffing the air in a
suspicious fashion.

"What is it, Josh?" asked the scout master.

"I smell smoke, that's all," was the answer.

Others could do the same, now that their attention was called to the
fact.

"With the breeze coming from over that way, it ought to be plain enough
we must look for the cabin there," remarked Tom.

The further they advanced the plainer became the evidence that there
was a fire of some sort ahead of them. Presently they got a whiff of
cooking, at which some of the hungry scouts began to sniff the air like
war horses when the odor of burnt powder comes down the breeze from the
battlefield.

"There it is!" exclaimed one of the watchful boys, suddenly.

Yes, there stood a commodious cabin right in the midst of the thick
w