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BOYS OF THE FORT.

made himself a line out of threads from his clothing. To this he attached a pin bent into shape with infinite care. Then he baited with the berries, and dropped the line in over a rock near a cottonwood.

Hardly had his bait touched the water when a good-sized fish seized it, and in a twinkling he had his catch landed. His heart gave a bound, for here was the material for at least one square meal.

"I'll cook it right away," he told himself, after feeling to see if he had any matches. His hunger was beginning to make him desperate, and he did not much care even if the desperadoes did see his camp-fire.

With some trouble he got together a few sticks of wood and some moss which the sunshine had dried out, and soon he had a respectable blaze between two rocks. With his jackknife he cleaned the fish as best he could, and then broiled it on a green twig. When done the meat was slightly burnt on one side and underdone on the other, but to the half-famished lad nothing had ever tasted sweeter, and he continued to eat until the whole fish was gone.

"Now I feel like myself," he muttered, after washing down the repast with a drink from the brook. "On a pinch that meal ought to last me