soaked in water, and the two boys spent much
of the time indoors making new clothing, repairing traps and
nets, and fashioning all kinds of little implements that were of
use in their daily life. They could realize, only because they
now had to make them, how numerous such implements were. Yet
they made toasting sticks of hard wood, carved out wooden
platters, constructed a rude but serviceable dining table, added
to their supply of traps of various kinds, and finally made two
large baskets of split willow. The last task was not as
difficult as some others, as both had seen and taken a part in
basket making in Illinois. The cabin was now crowded to
inconvenience. Over their beds, from side to side, and up under
the sloping roof, they had fastened poles, and from all of these
hung furs and skins, buffalo, deer, wolf, wild cat, beaver,
wolverine, and others, and also stores of jerked game. The Annex
was in the same crowded condition. The boys had carried the
hollow somewhat higher up with their axes, but the extension gave
them far less room than they needed.
"It's just this, Dick," said Albert, "we getting so rich that we
don't know what to do with all our property. I used to think it
a joke that the rich were unhappy, but now I see where their
trouble comes in."
"I know that the trappers cache their furs, that is, bury them or
hide them until they can take them away," said Dick, "but we
don't know how to bury furs so they'll keep all right. Still,
we've got to find a new place of some kind. Besides, it would be
better to have them hidden where only you and I could find them,
Al. Maybe we can find such a place."
Albert agreed, and they began a search along the cliffs. Dick
knew that extensive rocky formations must mean a cave or an
opening of some kind, if they only looked long enough for it,
at last they found in the side of a slope a place that he thought
could be made to suit. It was a rocky hollow running back about
fifteen feet, and with a height and width of perhaps ten feet.
It was approached by an opening about four feet in height and two
feet in width. Dick wondered at first that it had not been used
as a den by some wild animal, but surmised that the steepness of
the ascent and the extreme roughness of the rocky floor had kept
them out.
But these very qualities recommended the hollow to the boys for
the use that they intended it. Its position in the side of the
cliff made it a hard pl
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