CHAPTER XX.The bake-house.I wakedthe boys very early, reminding them that I had promised to teach them a new trade. What is it? What is it? exclaimed they all at once, springing suddenly out of bed and hurrying on their clothes.Father.—It is the art of baking, my boys, which at present I am no more acquainted with than yourselves; but we will learn it together, and I am much mistaken if we shall not be able to produce an excellent batch of bread, which will be the greater luxury, from our having been altogether deprived of it during our residence in this island. Hand me those iron plates that we brought yesterday from the vessel, and the tobacco-graters also.Mother.—I really cannot understand what tobacco-graters and iron plates can have to do with making bread; a good oven would afford me much better hopes, and this, unfortunately, we do not possess.Father.—These very iron plates, the same you looked so disdainfully upon no longer since than yesterday, will serve the purpose of the things you are now wishing to have.—I cannot, it is true, promise, in this early attempt, to produce you light and handsome-looking bread; but I can answer that you shall have some excellent-tasted cakes, though they should be a little flat and heavy;—we will immediately make our experiment. Ernest, bring hither the roots found underground: but first, my dear, I must request you to make me a small bag of a piece of the strongest wrapper linen.My wife set instantly to work to oblige me; but having no great confidence in my talents for making cakes, she first filled with potatoes the large copper boiler we had brought from the ship, and put it on the fire, that we might not find ourselves without something to eat at the time of dinner: in the meanwhile I spread a large piece of coarse linen on the ground, and assembled my young ones round me to begin our undertaking; I gave each of the boys a grater, and showed him at the same time how to rest it on the linen, and then to grate the roots of manioc; so that in a short time each had produced a considerable heap of a substance somewhat resembling pollard. The occupation, as is always the case with novelties, proved infinitely amusing to them all, and they looked no further into the matter; one showed the other his heap, saying in a bantering tone: Will you eat a bit of nice cake made of grated radishes?Father.—Make as merry as you please, young gentlemen, on the subject of this excellent production of nature, which ere long you will acknowledge to have yielded you a most palatable kind of food; a food which is known to be the principal sustenance of whole nations of the continent of America, and which the Europeans who inhabit those countries even prefer to our wheaten bread. I must tell you, there are many kinds of manioc; one of these shoots rapidly, and its roots become mature in a short time; a second sort is of more tardy growth; and there is another, the roots of which require the space of two years to be fit for use. The first two kinds have pernicious or unwholesome qualities when eaten raw, but the third may be eaten without fear: for all this, the two first are generally preferred, as being more productive, and requiring a shorter time for being fit for use.Jack.—One would think only madmen could prefer those that are pernicious: we cannot to be sure but be overwhelmed with gratitude for some cake that is to kill us (and the young rogue threw his grater from him as he spoke)! who shall tell us that our fine roots here are not of the same pernicious kind?Father.—At all events we shall not eat them raw; as nearly as I recollect, the tardy kind, like these we have procured, grow in the form of a bush; while the other two are creeping plants. However, to be quite sure, the first thing we will do, shall be to press the pollard.Ernest.—For what end, father, shall we press it?Father.—Because, even in the pernicious kind it is only the sap which is hurtful; the more substantial part being when dried extremely wholesome and even nourishing. But that we may act with the greatest possible prudence, we will give some of our cakes to the fowls and to the monkey, before we venture to eat of them ourselves; if they do them no harm, we may then proceed to feast on them with safety.Jack.—Thank you, father; but I have no fancy to let my monkey be poisoned.Father.—You may be perfectly easy, Jack, for the preservative instinct of your monkey is such, that he would not touch it if it were poisonous; animals are in this respect better treated than man, who is called upon to use his reason in supplying the deficiency: at all events, however, we will give him so little that no harm can possibly ensue.Upon this Jack picked up his grater, and with the others began to grate the roots with new alertness: dread of the poison had for an instant palsied every arm; but a very short time was now sufficient for producing a considerable quantity of ground manioc. By this time my wife had completed the bag. I had it well filled with what we called our pollard, and she closed it effectually by sewing up the end. I was now to contrive a kind of press: I cut a long, straight, well-formed branch, of considerable strength, from a neighbouring tree, and stripped it of the bark; I then placed a plank across the table we had fixed between the arched roots of our tree, and which was exactly the right height for my purpose, and on this I laid the bag; I put other planks again upon the bag, and then covered all with the large branch, the thickest extremity of which I inserted under an arch, while to the other, which projected beyond the planks, I suspended all sorts of heavy substances, such as lead, our largest hammers and bars of iron, which, acting with great force as a press on the bag of manioc, caused the sap it contained to issue in streams, which flowed plentifully on the ground.Fritz.—This machine of yours, father, though simple, is as effectual as can be desired.Father.—Certainly. It is the simplest lever that the art of mechanism can furnish, and may be made extremely useful.Ernest.—I thought that levers were never used but for raising heavy masses, such as blocks of stone, and things of that degree of weight; I had no notion that they were ever used for pressing.Father.—But, my dear boy, you see that the point at which the lever rests on the planks, must always be the point of rest or compression; the point at which its extremity touches the roots of the tree would no doubt be that of the raising power, if the root was not too strong to yield to the point of the lever; but then the resistance at the point of compression or rest is still stronger, and presses effectually, as you see, the contents of the bag. The Negroes, however, have another manner of proceeding; but it would have been much too tedious in the process for us to imitate. They make tresses of the bark of a tree, and with it form a kind of basket of tolerable size; they fill it with manioc, and press it so tightly that the baskets become shorter, and increase in breadth; they then hang the baskets to the strongest branches of trees, and fasten large stones to them, which draw the baskets again lengthways; by which action upon the manioc, the sap runs out at the openings left by the tresses.Mother.—Can one make no use of this sap?Father.—Certainly, we may: the same Negroes use it as food, after mixing with it a considerable quantity of pepper; and, when they can procure them, some sea crabs. The Europeans, on the other hand, leave it to settle in vessels till it has formed a sediment; they then pour off the liquid part, wash the sediment with fresh water, and place it to dry in the sun: in this manner they obtain from it an excellent sort of starch, which is used for clearing linen. I must tell you that the potatoe also contains the same sort of substance, which may be put to the same use: for the rest, the latter is less nourishing than the manioc.Mother.—But pray tell me, are we to prepare the whole of this manioc at once? If so, we have at least a whole day’s work, and a great part must be spoiled at last.Father.—Not so, my dear; when the pollard is perfectly dry, it may be placed in casks, and being shut closely down, it will keep for years; but you will see that the whole of this large heap will be so reduced in quantity by the operation we are going to apply of baking, that there will be no cause for your apprehension.Fritz.—Father, it no longer runs a single drop; may we not now set about making the dough?Father.—I have no objection; but it would be more prudent to make only a small cake, at first, by way of experiment, which as I said before we will give to the monkey and the fowls, and wait to see the effect, instead of exhausting our whole store at once.We now opened the bag, and took out a small quantity of the pollard, which already was sufficiently dry; we stirred the rest about with a stick, and then replaced it under the press. The next thing was to fix one of our iron plates, which was of a round form, and rather convex, so as to rest upon two blocks of stone at a distance from each other; under this we lighted a large fire, and when the iron plate was completely heated, we placed a portion of the dough upon it with a wooden spade. As soon as the cake began to be brown underneath, it was turned, that the other side might be baked also.Ernest.—O how nicely it smells! what a pity that we may not eat some of it immediately!Jack.—And why not? I would eat some without the least fear; and would not you, Francis?Father.—Hah, hah! What is then become of our terrible fear of being poisoned, which made you even throw your grater from you? Ah, I see how it is; the passion of gluttony is stronger than your fear.—However, I certainly believe that in this case it might be gratified without doing you an injury; nevertheless it is better perhaps to wait till the evening, and not run a greater risk than the loss of one or two of our fowls and of the monkey; and we may say this trial of the cake will be the first service he has rendered us.As soon as the cake was cold, we broke some of it into crumbs, and gave it to two of the fowls, and a larger piece to the monkey, who nibbled it with a perfect relish, making all the time a thousand grimaces to testify his content, while the boys stood by envying the preference he enjoyed.Fritz.—Now tell me, father, how the savages manage to grate their manioc, for surely they have not, like us, an instrument fitted for the operation:—and tell me also, if they call their composition by the name of cake or bread, as we do?Father.—The savages having no such article as bread in their bill of fare, have consequently no word in their language to express it. At the Antilles, the bread from the manioc is calledcassave; the savages make a kind of grater with sharp stones, or shells; or when they can get nails, on which they set a high value, they drive them into the end of a plank, and rub the manioc upon it. But now, I pray you, good wife, give us quickly some dinner, and we will afterwards resume the baking trade, provided our tasters show no signs of the colic or swimming in the head.Fritz.—Are these, then, the only effects of poison, father?Father.—At least they are the most ordinary ones: there are poisons which paralyse and induce a heavy sleep; such are opium, if taken in too large a quantity; hemlock,&c.&c.Others are sharp and corrosive, attacking the stomach and intestines: of this class are arsenic, sublimate, and the pernicious sorts of mushrooms. If, when either of these has been swallowed, there be not immediate assistance procured, the human machine stops, becomes disorganized, and the patient dies.—I will take this occasion, my dear children, to caution you against a kind of fruit extremely dangerous in its nature, and the more so from the remarkable attraction of its external appearance. This fruit is frequently found in America on the banks of rivers or in marshes, and you may perhaps meet with it in this island. Its aspect is agreeable to the eye, resembling a handsome kind of yellow apple with red spots. It is, however, one of the strongest poisons in the world: it is even said to be dangerous to sleep under the shade of the tree which produces it. Be very careful, therefore, should you happen to meet with it: it is known by the name ofmancenilla. Indeed I cannot too seriously exhort you not to venture on eating any thing you may find, however alluring in appearance, till you have first consulted me. Promise me this, children, one and all of you.Jack.—I promise you heartily, father; and still further, I will keep my word more faithfully than Adam did towards God, who had forbidden him to eat of a certain apple.Father.—You will do well in this; but do not so presumptuously and so readily blame that in another which under the same circumstances you would have done yourself; I would lay a wager that you would be the first to be led away by any worthless knave who should come and tell you that I had been laughing at you all the while, that the mancenilla is the finest apple in the world, and that by eating it you would be rendered as strong as a lion; that ready appetite of yours, and that little vanity we now and then discover in you, would make you, I fear, forget my advice, and greedily devour the apple.—But this is enough on the subject; instead of thinking more of poisons, let us resort with confidence to our plentiful dish of boiled potatoes; perhaps, dear wife, you have some little relish to add to them to day:—what, I pray you, may there be in that boiling vessel yonder?Mother.—It is the penguin that Jack killed and brought home.To say the truth, we did not take a fancy to the dish, the bird being of a strong and fishy flavour. Jack, however, was of a different opinion, and he was left at full liberty to regale himself to his appetite’s content.The first thing we did after dinner was to visit our fowls. Those among them which had eaten the manioc, were in excellent condition, and no less so the monkey, who gave us sufficient proofs of life and health in the multitude of gambols and grimaces he exhibited. Now then to the bakehouse, young ones, said I—to the bakehouse as fast as you can scamper. The grated manioc was soon emptied out of the bag, a large fire was quickly lighted, and when sufficiently fervent, I placed the boys where a flat surface had been prepared for them, and gave to each a plate of iron and the quantity of a cocoa nut full for them to make a cake apiece, and they were to try who could succeed the best. They were ranged in a half circle round the place, where I stood myself, that they might the better be enabled to observe how I proceeded, and adopt the same method for themselves. The result was not discouraging for a first experiment, though it must be confessed we were now and then so unlucky as to burn a cake; but there was not a greater number of these than served to feed the pigeons and the fowls, which hovered round us to claim their share of the treat. My little rogues could not resist the pleasure of frequently tasting their cake, a little bit at a time, as they went on. At length the undertaking was complete; the cakes were put in a dish and served in company with a handsome share of milk, to each person; and with this addition, they furnished us an excellent repast: what remained we distributed among our animals and fowls. I observed with pleasure that the penguins which I had preserved alive, accommodated themselves perfectly to this kind of food, and that generally, they began to lose their former timid behaviour; I therefore indulged my inclination to compassionate their captive state, and ventured to disengage them from their comrades: this indulgence procured me the pleasure of seeing them seemingly in a state of newly acquired content.The rest of the day was employed by the boys in making several turns with their wheel-barrows, and by myself in different arrangements in which the ass and our raft had a principal share, both being employed in drawing to Tent-House the remaining articles we had brought from the ship. When all this was done we retired to rest, having first made another meal on our cakes, and concluded all with pious thanks to God for the blessings his goodness thought fit to bestow upon us.
I wakedthe boys very early, reminding them that I had promised to teach them a new trade. What is it? What is it? exclaimed they all at once, springing suddenly out of bed and hurrying on their clothes.
Father.—It is the art of baking, my boys, which at present I am no more acquainted with than yourselves; but we will learn it together, and I am much mistaken if we shall not be able to produce an excellent batch of bread, which will be the greater luxury, from our having been altogether deprived of it during our residence in this island. Hand me those iron plates that we brought yesterday from the vessel, and the tobacco-graters also.
Mother.—I really cannot understand what tobacco-graters and iron plates can have to do with making bread; a good oven would afford me much better hopes, and this, unfortunately, we do not possess.
Father.—These very iron plates, the same you looked so disdainfully upon no longer since than yesterday, will serve the purpose of the things you are now wishing to have.—I cannot, it is true, promise, in this early attempt, to produce you light and handsome-looking bread; but I can answer that you shall have some excellent-tasted cakes, though they should be a little flat and heavy;—we will immediately make our experiment. Ernest, bring hither the roots found underground: but first, my dear, I must request you to make me a small bag of a piece of the strongest wrapper linen.
My wife set instantly to work to oblige me; but having no great confidence in my talents for making cakes, she first filled with potatoes the large copper boiler we had brought from the ship, and put it on the fire, that we might not find ourselves without something to eat at the time of dinner: in the meanwhile I spread a large piece of coarse linen on the ground, and assembled my young ones round me to begin our undertaking; I gave each of the boys a grater, and showed him at the same time how to rest it on the linen, and then to grate the roots of manioc; so that in a short time each had produced a considerable heap of a substance somewhat resembling pollard. The occupation, as is always the case with novelties, proved infinitely amusing to them all, and they looked no further into the matter; one showed the other his heap, saying in a bantering tone: Will you eat a bit of nice cake made of grated radishes?
Father.—Make as merry as you please, young gentlemen, on the subject of this excellent production of nature, which ere long you will acknowledge to have yielded you a most palatable kind of food; a food which is known to be the principal sustenance of whole nations of the continent of America, and which the Europeans who inhabit those countries even prefer to our wheaten bread. I must tell you, there are many kinds of manioc; one of these shoots rapidly, and its roots become mature in a short time; a second sort is of more tardy growth; and there is another, the roots of which require the space of two years to be fit for use. The first two kinds have pernicious or unwholesome qualities when eaten raw, but the third may be eaten without fear: for all this, the two first are generally preferred, as being more productive, and requiring a shorter time for being fit for use.
Jack.—One would think only madmen could prefer those that are pernicious: we cannot to be sure but be overwhelmed with gratitude for some cake that is to kill us (and the young rogue threw his grater from him as he spoke)! who shall tell us that our fine roots here are not of the same pernicious kind?
Father.—At all events we shall not eat them raw; as nearly as I recollect, the tardy kind, like these we have procured, grow in the form of a bush; while the other two are creeping plants. However, to be quite sure, the first thing we will do, shall be to press the pollard.
Ernest.—For what end, father, shall we press it?
Father.—Because, even in the pernicious kind it is only the sap which is hurtful; the more substantial part being when dried extremely wholesome and even nourishing. But that we may act with the greatest possible prudence, we will give some of our cakes to the fowls and to the monkey, before we venture to eat of them ourselves; if they do them no harm, we may then proceed to feast on them with safety.
Jack.—Thank you, father; but I have no fancy to let my monkey be poisoned.
Father.—You may be perfectly easy, Jack, for the preservative instinct of your monkey is such, that he would not touch it if it were poisonous; animals are in this respect better treated than man, who is called upon to use his reason in supplying the deficiency: at all events, however, we will give him so little that no harm can possibly ensue.
Upon this Jack picked up his grater, and with the others began to grate the roots with new alertness: dread of the poison had for an instant palsied every arm; but a very short time was now sufficient for producing a considerable quantity of ground manioc. By this time my wife had completed the bag. I had it well filled with what we called our pollard, and she closed it effectually by sewing up the end. I was now to contrive a kind of press: I cut a long, straight, well-formed branch, of considerable strength, from a neighbouring tree, and stripped it of the bark; I then placed a plank across the table we had fixed between the arched roots of our tree, and which was exactly the right height for my purpose, and on this I laid the bag; I put other planks again upon the bag, and then covered all with the large branch, the thickest extremity of which I inserted under an arch, while to the other, which projected beyond the planks, I suspended all sorts of heavy substances, such as lead, our largest hammers and bars of iron, which, acting with great force as a press on the bag of manioc, caused the sap it contained to issue in streams, which flowed plentifully on the ground.
Fritz.—This machine of yours, father, though simple, is as effectual as can be desired.
Father.—Certainly. It is the simplest lever that the art of mechanism can furnish, and may be made extremely useful.
Ernest.—I thought that levers were never used but for raising heavy masses, such as blocks of stone, and things of that degree of weight; I had no notion that they were ever used for pressing.
Father.—But, my dear boy, you see that the point at which the lever rests on the planks, must always be the point of rest or compression; the point at which its extremity touches the roots of the tree would no doubt be that of the raising power, if the root was not too strong to yield to the point of the lever; but then the resistance at the point of compression or rest is still stronger, and presses effectually, as you see, the contents of the bag. The Negroes, however, have another manner of proceeding; but it would have been much too tedious in the process for us to imitate. They make tresses of the bark of a tree, and with it form a kind of basket of tolerable size; they fill it with manioc, and press it so tightly that the baskets become shorter, and increase in breadth; they then hang the baskets to the strongest branches of trees, and fasten large stones to them, which draw the baskets again lengthways; by which action upon the manioc, the sap runs out at the openings left by the tresses.
Mother.—Can one make no use of this sap?
Father.—Certainly, we may: the same Negroes use it as food, after mixing with it a considerable quantity of pepper; and, when they can procure them, some sea crabs. The Europeans, on the other hand, leave it to settle in vessels till it has formed a sediment; they then pour off the liquid part, wash the sediment with fresh water, and place it to dry in the sun: in this manner they obtain from it an excellent sort of starch, which is used for clearing linen. I must tell you that the potatoe also contains the same sort of substance, which may be put to the same use: for the rest, the latter is less nourishing than the manioc.
Mother.—But pray tell me, are we to prepare the whole of this manioc at once? If so, we have at least a whole day’s work, and a great part must be spoiled at last.
Father.—Not so, my dear; when the pollard is perfectly dry, it may be placed in casks, and being shut closely down, it will keep for years; but you will see that the whole of this large heap will be so reduced in quantity by the operation we are going to apply of baking, that there will be no cause for your apprehension.
Fritz.—Father, it no longer runs a single drop; may we not now set about making the dough?
Father.—I have no objection; but it would be more prudent to make only a small cake, at first, by way of experiment, which as I said before we will give to the monkey and the fowls, and wait to see the effect, instead of exhausting our whole store at once.
We now opened the bag, and took out a small quantity of the pollard, which already was sufficiently dry; we stirred the rest about with a stick, and then replaced it under the press. The next thing was to fix one of our iron plates, which was of a round form, and rather convex, so as to rest upon two blocks of stone at a distance from each other; under this we lighted a large fire, and when the iron plate was completely heated, we placed a portion of the dough upon it with a wooden spade. As soon as the cake began to be brown underneath, it was turned, that the other side might be baked also.
Ernest.—O how nicely it smells! what a pity that we may not eat some of it immediately!
Jack.—And why not? I would eat some without the least fear; and would not you, Francis?
Father.—Hah, hah! What is then become of our terrible fear of being poisoned, which made you even throw your grater from you? Ah, I see how it is; the passion of gluttony is stronger than your fear.—However, I certainly believe that in this case it might be gratified without doing you an injury; nevertheless it is better perhaps to wait till the evening, and not run a greater risk than the loss of one or two of our fowls and of the monkey; and we may say this trial of the cake will be the first service he has rendered us.
As soon as the cake was cold, we broke some of it into crumbs, and gave it to two of the fowls, and a larger piece to the monkey, who nibbled it with a perfect relish, making all the time a thousand grimaces to testify his content, while the boys stood by envying the preference he enjoyed.
Fritz.—Now tell me, father, how the savages manage to grate their manioc, for surely they have not, like us, an instrument fitted for the operation:—and tell me also, if they call their composition by the name of cake or bread, as we do?
Father.—The savages having no such article as bread in their bill of fare, have consequently no word in their language to express it. At the Antilles, the bread from the manioc is calledcassave; the savages make a kind of grater with sharp stones, or shells; or when they can get nails, on which they set a high value, they drive them into the end of a plank, and rub the manioc upon it. But now, I pray you, good wife, give us quickly some dinner, and we will afterwards resume the baking trade, provided our tasters show no signs of the colic or swimming in the head.
Fritz.—Are these, then, the only effects of poison, father?
Father.—At least they are the most ordinary ones: there are poisons which paralyse and induce a heavy sleep; such are opium, if taken in too large a quantity; hemlock,&c.&c.Others are sharp and corrosive, attacking the stomach and intestines: of this class are arsenic, sublimate, and the pernicious sorts of mushrooms. If, when either of these has been swallowed, there be not immediate assistance procured, the human machine stops, becomes disorganized, and the patient dies.—I will take this occasion, my dear children, to caution you against a kind of fruit extremely dangerous in its nature, and the more so from the remarkable attraction of its external appearance. This fruit is frequently found in America on the banks of rivers or in marshes, and you may perhaps meet with it in this island. Its aspect is agreeable to the eye, resembling a handsome kind of yellow apple with red spots. It is, however, one of the strongest poisons in the world: it is even said to be dangerous to sleep under the shade of the tree which produces it. Be very careful, therefore, should you happen to meet with it: it is known by the name ofmancenilla. Indeed I cannot too seriously exhort you not to venture on eating any thing you may find, however alluring in appearance, till you have first consulted me. Promise me this, children, one and all of you.
Jack.—I promise you heartily, father; and still further, I will keep my word more faithfully than Adam did towards God, who had forbidden him to eat of a certain apple.
Father.—You will do well in this; but do not so presumptuously and so readily blame that in another which under the same circumstances you would have done yourself; I would lay a wager that you would be the first to be led away by any worthless knave who should come and tell you that I had been laughing at you all the while, that the mancenilla is the finest apple in the world, and that by eating it you would be rendered as strong as a lion; that ready appetite of yours, and that little vanity we now and then discover in you, would make you, I fear, forget my advice, and greedily devour the apple.—But this is enough on the subject; instead of thinking more of poisons, let us resort with confidence to our plentiful dish of boiled potatoes; perhaps, dear wife, you have some little relish to add to them to day:—what, I pray you, may there be in that boiling vessel yonder?
Mother.—It is the penguin that Jack killed and brought home.
To say the truth, we did not take a fancy to the dish, the bird being of a strong and fishy flavour. Jack, however, was of a different opinion, and he was left at full liberty to regale himself to his appetite’s content.
The first thing we did after dinner was to visit our fowls. Those among them which had eaten the manioc, were in excellent condition, and no less so the monkey, who gave us sufficient proofs of life and health in the multitude of gambols and grimaces he exhibited. Now then to the bakehouse, young ones, said I—to the bakehouse as fast as you can scamper. The grated manioc was soon emptied out of the bag, a large fire was quickly lighted, and when sufficiently fervent, I placed the boys where a flat surface had been prepared for them, and gave to each a plate of iron and the quantity of a cocoa nut full for them to make a cake apiece, and they were to try who could succeed the best. They were ranged in a half circle round the place, where I stood myself, that they might the better be enabled to observe how I proceeded, and adopt the same method for themselves. The result was not discouraging for a first experiment, though it must be confessed we were now and then so unlucky as to burn a cake; but there was not a greater number of these than served to feed the pigeons and the fowls, which hovered round us to claim their share of the treat. My little rogues could not resist the pleasure of frequently tasting their cake, a little bit at a time, as they went on. At length the undertaking was complete; the cakes were put in a dish and served in company with a handsome share of milk, to each person; and with this addition, they furnished us an excellent repast: what remained we distributed among our animals and fowls. I observed with pleasure that the penguins which I had preserved alive, accommodated themselves perfectly to this kind of food, and that generally, they began to lose their former timid behaviour; I therefore indulged my inclination to compassionate their captive state, and ventured to disengage them from their comrades: this indulgence procured me the pleasure of seeing them seemingly in a state of newly acquired content.
The rest of the day was employed by the boys in making several turns with their wheel-barrows, and by myself in different arrangements in which the ass and our raft had a principal share, both being employed in drawing to Tent-House the remaining articles we had brought from the ship. When all this was done we retired to rest, having first made another meal on our cakes, and concluded all with pious thanks to God for the blessings his goodness thought fit to bestow upon us.