“Camping out,” said Sylvia, “ought to be a complete holiday from the
 food bother.  Why not live on unfired food, such as tinned tongue,
 sardines and bottled shrimps?”

 Thereupon Felix laughed a great laugh, and said:  “Just try and do a
 thousand miles on sardines.”

Felix is Sylvia’s brother, who has spent some twenty years in America, travelling for weeks through country that contained no people, and spending nearly two years in a single journey to Dawson City and home again.  He plainly knows far more about bed-rock camping than anyone else in the family and we allowed him to take the floor for a time.

“The first thing is bread.” said Felix, “because you can’t do without bread.  You must take some yeast or else some baking-powder with you to make it rise, or you must bake it very quickly so that the steam aerates it.  You might take a Dutch oven with you, but it’s nothing like the Dutch oven that you know in this country.  It is an iron pot on three legs, with an iron lid.  You stand it in the fire and cover the lid with hot brands and you can cook anything inside it—­ducks and chunks of venison, and bread of course.”

 “But Mr Freeman has barred the oven,” said Sylvia, “and if we are not
 going a thousand miles from home perhaps we can do without it.”

“As you like,” answered Felix.  “I only mention it so that you can get hold of the general principle.  You can make very good bread in a frying-pan.  You must mix the dough up stiff so that when the pan is nearly upright it won’t tumble out.  You fix the pan up with a prop behind it so that the dough faces the fire, quite close, and you draw some more fire behind it so that the back is warmed as well.  When it burns a good crust on both sides it is done.”

 “What are flap-jacks,” I asked.

“Just pan-cakes made without eggs or milk,” said Felix.  “You mix a quart of flour with a tablespoonful of baking-powder and put in water till it is just so thin that when you take up a spoonful and let it drop back you can see the shape of it for a few seconds before it melts into the rest.  You fry the batter in bacon fat or butter just like pan-cakes, and the cakes are very good.”

 [Illustration:  A Summer Idyll]

“That’s a good tip for us,” I said, “and another good thing to take is cuddy biscuits, a kind of captain’s biscuit.  Soak them a few minutes in water or milk and fry them.  They’re nice with tomatoes or anything, or by themselves.”

“Mebbe,” said Felix, and his tone said, “Mebbe not.”  “I’m only discussing general principles, and you’ve got to work your own way out in the light of them.  I’ve known an outfit come away without a frying-pan.  How do you make bread then?”

We had to give it up, and Felix went on:  “Open your flour sack, turn down the edge like