They brought the tent and poles up and, under the direction of Dick,
who was quite in his element now, soon had them erected. Dick showed
them how to drive the pegs in a line with the guy-ropes instead of at
an angle, so that the straining of the tent in a wind would not loosen
them. The tent was not a new one, as several patches proved, but it was
made of good heavy duck and was quite tight. It was a wall tent, twelve
by eight feet in size, and there was a shelter curtain which could
be raised over the doorway. Chub called it the porch roof. Then they
had brought a third piece of canvas which could be stretched over the
little sheet-iron stove on rainy days. Dick, who had volunteered to do
the cooking, selected a site for the “kitchen,” and, while the others
went off for pine branches for the beds, he set up the stove. After
the boughs were placed in the tent and the blankets spread over them
they scooped out a trench around the outside of the tent to drain off
the water in case of a heavy rain. Then the boys separated in search
of firewood, Roy looking for dead branches in the “forest” and Chub
and Dick going to the upper end of the island. Chub took the canoe and
Dick the rowboat, and by the time they had met, after having paddled
along opposite shores, each had accumulated a respectable quantity of
driftwood. Much of it was too wet to burn, and so when they got back
to camp they spread it out in the sun. Roy had meanwhile made several
trips into the woods and a good-sized heap of dry branches lay beside
the stove.
“Now what?” asked Dick, surveying the scene with satisfaction and
wiping the perspiration from his face. Chub looked speculatively at the
flagpole which stands at the end of School Point.
“We ought to have a flag,” he said. “Why didn’t we bring along the
school flag?”
“Because this isn’t the school camp,” answered Roy. “It’s a private
affair. We must have a flag of our own.”
“With the name of the camp on it,” said Dick. “By the way, what is the
name of the camp?”
“Well, I’ve been thinking of that,” answered Chub, gravely, seating
himself on a root which had apparently shaped itself for the purpose,
“and I’ve got it all settled. It’s a nice camp, and it ought to have a
nice name, a name that stands for--er--respectability and renown. So I
suggest that we call it Camp Thomas H. Eaton.”
“What I’ve always admired in you,” said Dick, sarcastically, “is your
modesty, Chub.”
“Yes, it is one of my many excellent qualities,” Chub replied sweetly.
“Who’s got a piece of paper?” Roy demanded. No one had, so he pulled
a strip of bark from a birch-tree. “I’ve got an idea,” he said. “You
fellows wait a minute.” He seated himself cross-legged and began to
write on the bark, scowling intently. Chub viewed him apprehensively.
“Do you think it’s over-study?” he asked Dick in a hoarse whisper, “or
merely the sun?”
“Crazed by the heat,” responded Dick, sadly.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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