it out of sight, and then began another collection of
wood for his signal-fire.

When it was made, he again crossed the island, selected a blazing stick
from the camp-fire, and started to retrace his steps. By the time he
reached the log-hut he found it necessary to stop and renew his blaze
by building a fire in the rude chimney. By thus establishing a relay
station he finally succeeded in getting a blaze to the desired spot on
the channel side of the island, and in starting a brisk fire at that
point.

Here the boy would have stayed and watched for the craft that he fondly
hoped would come to his deliverance; but it was now a long time since
breakfast, and his hard work had made him very hungry. He might find
something to eat at that abandoned camp, which he had not yet examined.
At any rate he would go and look. So he piled logs on his fire until
satisfied that it would last for some hours. Then picking up a bit of
shingle from the beach, he wrote on it with the stump of a lead-pencil:

"I am on the island. Follow the trail and you will find me.----WINN
CASPAR."

This note he stuck in a cleft sapling, from which he first cut the top,
and which stood so near the fire that it was certain to attract
attention. Then feeling that he could do nothing more in that place,
he set forth in search of something with which to satisfy his hunger.
On his way back he stopped at the hut, and made a thorough but vain
search for food. There was not so much as would have fed a mouse, and
the only thing of value that the boy discovered was a rusty fish-hook
stuck into one of the wall logs. Before leaving the hut he replenished
the fire in the chimney-place, thinking that perhaps he might return
there to sleep. Then he went on to the camp.

Here Winn's search for food was as unsuccessful as it had been at the
hut. He found a number of cooking utensils, battered and smoked, and
discovered an old axe still sticking in the log on which it had been
last used. He also found some bits of rope and cord. He knotted
together enough of the latter to make a rude line, attached his
fish-hook to it, cut a pole, dug some bait, and began to fish just
above the "river-traders'" boom. For some time he sat there,
patiently, but got no bites. The poor boy began to grow desperate with
hunger.

"I declare! I've a great mind to swim for the main-land," he said,
aloud. "No I won't, though. I can do better than that. Besides, the
wat