It is often of interest to boys to make a fire in the primitive way: by
friction; perhaps to produce the "new fire" for some ceremonial
occasion, or it may be to win honors as a scout. If a boy is fond of
wilderness camping, it is possible that such knowledge may prove of
vital importance to him some day, for even the experienced woodsman may
be caught out without matches, or may get his matches wet.
This is the way the Indians made fire before they obtained matches or
flint and steel from the white man, and the way I have many times done
it myself as a boy. For tools you need a block, a drill, a bow, a
socket, and some tinder, dry punk, or cat-tail down, all of which you
can make or find in the woods.
For the first, take a smooth piece of pine board, cedar, basswood,
cottonwood, or any other wood, but these are soft and easy to work. It
should be a foot long by two inches wide and about half an inch in
thickness. Make a round hole or pit in the center half through the
board. From this hole cut a notch or groove to the edge of the board.
[Illustration: Fig. 6.]
For the drill, take a hard wood stick about a foot long, whittled down
at both ends to fit the hole in block. A piece of wood two by six inches
with a hole halfway through its thickness to fit the upper end of the
drill forms the socket.
If you have no bow with you, make one of any limber stick two feet long,
with a loose buckskin or other thong.
[Illustration: Fig. 7.]
Now put a little tinder--shredded birch-bark or dry pine-needles--along
the groove in your block and especially at its upper end. Adjust your
fire-maker, wind the bowstring once about the drill, place a foot on
each end of the block while your left hand supports and presses down on
the socket, and your right saws with the bowstring, causing the drill to
revolve rapidly in the hole. This friction in time produces smoke and
then sparks, which, when you blow upon them, ignite the tinder. It is
then only a matter of sufficient dry bark and kindling to make a good
fire. You cannot fail after a little practice, if you follow directions
carefully. Mr. Seton's record time for making fire in this way is
thirty-one seconds, but it will be more likely to take you from one to
three minutes, even after you have experimented a little.
The Indian or expert woodsman is never at a loss for dry fire material
in the wettest woods. He knows how to look for the _inside_ bark of the
birch and the _inside_ of dead stumps and logs; and a good fire, once
kindled, will burn on even under discouraging circumstances.
Indian methods of cookery are of interest in camp, more particularly if
the common utensils have been dispensed with as too cumbersome to carry.
Neither pots, pans, nor dishes are essential to a good meal in the
woods. Berries, some roots, smoked or sun-dried meats may be eaten raw,
also eggs, though the latter are preferred cooked by the Indian. He is
especially fond of turtle eggs, which are buried in the sand along the
lake shores and may be found by searching for them with a pole in the
spring.
The simplest method of cooking thin pieces of meat is by broiling over a
bed of live coals, upon a long-handled pronged stick or fork of green
wood. The meat is turned as often as necessary and is perfectly done in
a few minutes.
Roasting is done by spitting your haunch of venison or other large piece
of meat upon a stick two to four feet long and sharpened at both ends.
This may be thrust into the ground at the right distance from the blaze
and turned occasionally, or suspended over the fire from a cross-bar of
green wood by a hooked stick, or "planked" against a flat rock inclined
toward a hot fire.
The only method of boiling known to the Indian before the white man came
with iron and copper kettles was crude but very ingenious, and is known
as "stone-boiling." We dug a hole in which we placed a dozen or more
round stones of medium size, and over these we built a good fire. About
the hole in a square we drove four forked sticks of green wood, and from
these suspended a square piece of tripe or rawhide, cutting a small hole
in each corner to admit the prong of the support. This bag-kettle was
then half filled with water. The heat of the fire soon contracted it,
and from time to time a red-hot stone was lifted from the fire and
dropped into the water by means of two sticks. When the water boiled, we
put in a small piece of meat, and by adding now and then another piece
and a hot stone, and taking out the meat as fast as cooked, a savory
boil was produced. We liked starchy roots or spicy leaves boiled with
our meat, and of these we had a variety to choose from. We had also wild
rice and hulled corn, but no bread.
When you wish to hunt or to leave camp for any length of time while your
meal is cooking, none of these methods will do, and you had better
resort to casing the food in wet clay and burying fairly deep in ashes
or sand under a good fire. If you have birds it is only necessary to wet
the feathers thoroughly before burying them, and they will come out
juicy and delicious under a black coat that peels off like the skin of
an onion. Fish cooks perfectly in this manner, as do potatoes, green
corn, shell fish--in fact, almost anything. It should be done in two or
three hours, but you may leave it all day if necessary without harm.
Every camper or Boy Scout should familiarize himself with all the edible
roots, herbs, fruits, and fungi in his locality. Lives have been saved
by this knowledge, especially in the north woods. Lichens and the inner
bark of certain trees are "famine foods," eaten by Indian and white man
when hunger presses and no other food is to be found.
The Indian method of preserving fresh meat in summer by "jerking," or
cutting in thin strips and drying on poles in the sun (no salt being
needed), is useful only on the high central plains where the air is dry.
All kinds of berries and wild fruits are easily sun-dried for future
use.
The "cache," an Indian custom extensively copied by white hunters and
trappers, is the concealment of reserve stores of food, usually in a
hole in the ground, protected by an inner wrapping of bark or rawhide.
The mouth of the "cache" is well hidden by building a fire over it, or
by covering with rocks, brush, dry leaves, or sand, according to the
locality.