ROBINSON MAKES A HUNTING BAG


Several days passed with Robinson's hat-making and his calendar-making
and his watching the sea. Every day his corn and bananas became more
distasteful to him. And he planned a longer journey about the island
to see if something new to eat could be found.

But he considered that if he went a distance from his cave and found
something it would really be of little use to him. "I could eat my
fill," he said, "but that is all. And by the time I get back to my
cave I will again be hungry. I must find something in which I can
gather and carry food." He found nothing.

"The people in New York," he said, "have baskets, or pockets, or bags
made of coarse cloth. Of them all, I could most easily make the net,
perhaps, of vines. But the little things would fall out of the net.
I will see whether I can make a net of small meshes."

But he soon saw that the vines did not give a smooth surface. He
thought for a long while. In his garden at home his father had
sometimes bound up the young trees with the soft inner bark of others.
He wondered if he could use this. He stripped away the outer bark from
the tree, which before had yielded him a fibre for his hat, and pulled
off the long, smooth pieces of the inner bark. He twisted them
together. Then he thought how he could weave the strands together.
He looked at his shirt. A piece was torn off and unravelled. He could
see the threads go up and down. He saw that some threads go from left
to right (woof), others lengthwise (the warp).