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It is far better to carry a real frying-pan, especially if there are three or more in your party.  If you have transportation, or are going into a permanent camp, do not think of the tin article.

A coffee-pot with a bail and handle is better than one with a handle only, and a lip is better than a spout; since handles and spouts are apt to unsolder.

Young people are apt to put their pot or frying-pan on the burning wood, and it soon tips over.  Also they let the pot boil over, and presently it unsolders for want of water.  Few think to keep the handle so that it can be touched without burning or smutting; and hardly any young person knows that pitchy wood will give a bad flavor to any thing cooked over it on an open fire.  Live coals are rather better, therefore, than the blaze of a new fire.

If your frying-pan catches fire inside, do not get frightened, but take it off instantly, and blow out the fire, or smother it with the cover or a board if you cannot blow it out.

You will do well to consult a cook-book if you wish for variety in your cooking; but some things not found in cook-books I will give you here.

Stale bread, pilot-bread, dried corn-cakes, and crumbs, soaked a few minutes in water, or better still in milk, and fried, are all quite palatable.

In frying bread, or any thing else, have the fat boiling hot before you put in the food:  this prevents it from soaking fat.

BAKED BEANS, BEEF, AND FISH.

Lumbermen bake beans deliciously in an iron pot that has a cover with a projecting rim to prevent the ashes from getting in the pot.  The beans are first parboiled in one or two waters until the outside skin begins to crack.  They are then put into the baking-pot, and salt pork at the rate of a pound to a quart and a half of dry beans is placed just under the surface of the beans.  The rind of the pork should be gashed so that it will cut easily after baking.  Two or three tablespoonfuls of molasses are put in, and a little salt, unless the pork is considerably lean.  Water enough is added to cover the beans.

A hole three feet or more deep is dug in the ground, and heated for an hour by a good hot fire.  The coals are then shovelled out, and the pot put in the hole, and immediately buried by throwing back the coals, and covering all with dry earth.  In this condition they are left to bake all night.

On the same principle very tough beef was cooked in the army, and made tender and juicy.  Alternate layers of beef, salt pork, and hard bread were put in the pot, covered with water, and baked all night in a hole full of coals.

Fish may also be cooked in the same way.  It is not advisable, however, for parties less than six in number to trouble themselves to cook in this manner.

CARE OF FOOD.