ens!

Fritz and Eric did not hurry over this job, however, deferring its
completion till the morning. They camped out on the plateau so as to be
out of the way of the seals, glad enough to rest after their day's
labour, without going hunting after the goats, as they had intended at
first doing, the same afternoon.

Next morning, seeing no seals about--the animals probably not having
recovered from their fright yet--they continued carrying up the skins
and blubber, until they had quite a respectable pile on the plateau;
when, the next question arose about its transportation across the
tableland to the eastern side, immediately over the gully by which they
used to climb up, near their hut.

"I wish we had brought your carriage, Fritz," said Eric, alluding to the
wheelbarrow, which had been so styled by the sailor lad after he had
utilised it as an ambulance waggon.

"It's too late to wish that now," replied the other.

"I could soon go round in the boat and fetch it, brother," cried Eric,
looking as if he were going to start off at the moment.

"No, stop, laddie; we could not spare the boat," said Fritz, laying his
hand on his arm. "It would be more than likely that, the moment you
were out of sight the seals would land again on the rocks, when we
should miss the chance of taking them! I don't believe we shall have
more than one other chance of getting their skins; for the Tristaners
will soon be here again on their annual excursion, with that fellow
Slater in their company, and, I confess, I should not like us to be here
when they came."

"I wouldn't mind a row at all!" cried Eric defiantly; "still, as you
don't want me to go for the wheelbarrow, how do you suggest that we
should carry the skins across this dreary expanse here?"

"Let us make a stretcher with the oars," said Fritz.

"Bravo, the very thing," replied Eric. "Why, you are the inventive
genius this time!"

"Well, one must think of something sometimes," said Fritz, in his
matter-of-fact way; and the two then proceeded to carry out the plan of
the elder brother, which simplified their labour immensely. They only
had to make some three journeys across the plateau with the skins,
which, when the bundles were all transported to the eastern side of the
tableland, were incontinently tumbled over to the foot of the cliff
below, alighting quite close to the cauldron in which the blubber would
be subsequently "tried out" into oil.

Then, and not till