ddled his own horse. There are no servants in
prairie-land. Even Lanty's services extended not beyond the _cuisine_,
and for this department he had had his training as the cook of a New
Orleans trading ship. Jake had enough to do with his mules; and to have
asked one of our hunter-guides to perform the task of unsaddling your
horse, would have been a hazardous experiment. Menial service to a free
trapper! There are no servants in prairie-land.

Our horses and mules were picketed on a piece of open ground, each
having his "trail-rope," which allowed a circuit of several yards. The
two tents were pitched side by side, facing the stream, and the waggon
drawn up some twenty feet in the rear. In the triangle between the
waggon and the tents was kindled a large fire, upon each side of which
two stakes, forked at the top, were driven into the ground. A long
sapling resting in the forks traversed the blaze from side to side.
This was Lanty's "crane,"--the fire was his kitchen.

Let me sketch the camp more minutely, for our first camp was a type of
all the others in its general features. Sometimes indeed the tents did
not front the same way, when these openings were set to "oblige the
wind," but they were always placed side by side in front of the waggon.
They were small tents of the old-fashioned conical kind, requiring only
one pole each. They were of sufficient size for our purpose, as there
were only three of us to each--the guides, with Jake and Lanty, finding
their lodgment under the tilt of the waggon. With their graceful shape,
and snowy-white colour against the dark green foliage of the trees, they
formed an agreeable contrast; and a _coup d'oeil_ of the camp would have
been no mean picture to the eye of an artist. The human figures may be
arranged in the following manner.

Supper is getting ready, and Lanty is decidedly at this time the most
important personage on the ground. He is stooping over the fire, with a
small but long-handled frying-pan, in which he is parching the coffee.
It is already browned, and Lanty stirs it about with an iron spoon. The
crane carries the large coffee-kettle of sheet iron, full of water upon
the boil; and a second frying-pan, larger than the first, is filled with
sliced ham, ready to be placed upon the hot cinders.

Our English friend Thompson is seated upon a log, with the hat-box
before him. It is open, and he has drawn out from it his stock of combs
and brushes. He