GATHERING OYSTERS That Nathaniel and I may gather oysters without too great labor of walking and carrying heavy burdens, Captain Smith has bought from the savages a small boat made of the bark of birch trees, stretched over a framework of splints, and sewn together with the entrails of deer. On the seams, and wherever the water might find entrance, it is well gummed with pitch taken from the pine tree, and withal the lightest craft that can well be made. Either Nathaniel or I can take this vessel, which the savages call a canoe, on our shoulders, carrying it without difficulty, and when the two of us are inside, resting upon our knees, for we may not sit in it as in a ship's boat, we can send it along with paddles at a rate so rapid as to cause one to think it moved by magic. With this canoe Nathaniel and I may go to the oyster beds, and in half an hour put on board as large a cargo of shellfish as she will carry, in addition to our own weight, coming back in a short time with as much food as would serve a dozen men for two days. If these oysters could be kept fresh for any length of time, then would we have a most valuable store near at hand; but, like other fish, a few hours in the sun serves to spoil them. PREPARING STURGEON FOR FOOD Of the fish called the sturgeon, we have more than can be consumed by all our company; but one cannot endure the flavor day after day, and therefore is it that we use it for food only when we cannot get any other. Master Hunt has shown Nathaniel and me how we may prepare it in such a manner as to change the flavor. It must first be dried in the sun until so hard that it can be pounded to the fineness of meal. This is then mixed with caviare, by which I mean the eggs, or roe, of the sturgeon, with sorrel leaves, and with other wholesome herbs. The whole is made into small balls, or cakes, which are fried over the fire with a plentiful amount of fat. Such a dish serves us for either bread or meat, or for both on a pinch, therefore if we lads are careful not to waste our time, Captain Smith may never come without finding in the larder something that can be eaten. TURPENTINE AND TAR To us in Jamestown the making of anything which we may send back to England for sale, is of such great importance that we are more curious regarding the manner in which the work is done, than would be others who are less eager to see piled up that which will bring money to the people. Therefore it was that Nathaniel and I watched eagerly the making of turpentine, and found it not unlike the method by which the Indians gain sugar from maple trees. A strip of bark is taken from the pine, perhaps eight or ten inches long, and at the lower end of the wound thus made, a deep notch is cut in the wood.