when she returned with an old woman carrying her purchases. Then were we
forced to admire her skill in this business, for she had bought all that
was needful for a couple of meals, and yet had spent but half our money.
Now arose the difficult question how to make a fire, and this Jack left
us to settle by our own devices, he returning to his own occupation.
Moll resolved we should do our cooking outside the house, so here we
built up a kind of grate with stones; and, contriving to strike a spark
with the back of a jack-knife and a stone, upon a heap of dried leaves,
we presently blew up a fine flame, and feeding this with the ends of
cane we had cut and some charcoal, we at last got a royal fire on which
to set our pot of mutton. And into this pot we put rice and a multitude
of herbs from the garden, which by the taste we thought might serve to
make a savoury mess. And, indeed, when it began to boil, the odour was
so agreeable that we would have Jack come out to smell it. And he having
praised it very highly, we in return went in to look at his handiwork
and praise that. This we could do very heartily and without hypocrisy,
for he had worked well and made a rare good job, having built a very
seemly partition across the room, by nailing of the canes
perpendicularly to that kind of floor that hung over the hollowed
portion, thus making us now three rooms out of one. At one end he had
left an opening to enter the cavity below and the floor above by the
little ladder that stood there, and these canes were set not so close
together but that air and light could pass betwixt them, and yet from
the outer side no eye could see within, which was very commodious. Also
upon the floor above, he had found sundry bundles of soft dried leaves,
and these, opened out upon the surface of both chambers, made a very
sweet, convenient bed upon which to lie. Then Dawson offering Moll her
choice, she took the upper floor for her chamber, leaving us two the
lower; and so, it being near sundown by this time, we to our supper in
the sweet, cool air of evening, all mightily content with one another,