In the afternoon of the second day we came to where there was
plenty of beaver sign. In fact the trees they had gnawed down were
so thick that we could not travel along the river, but had to take
to the hillsides.

We camped that night at the mouth of a little stream that empties
into the Arkansas, and the following morning, after looking over
the trapping ground, the two men selected a place to build our
winter quarters, and we went to work. They worked at the cabin
while I killed the game for our meat and did the cooking, my
outfit being a frying-pan, a coffee-pot and a tin cup for each of
us.

They were about two weeks getting our cabin, or dugout, completed.
It was made by first digging out a place in the hillside, about
twelve feet square, and building up the front with logs, then
brush and pine boughs, and then the whole with dirt, the door was
made of hewed logs, fastened together with crossed pieces by means
of wooden pins, and it was hung on heavy wooden hinges.

Our winter quarters being thus completed, Uncle Kit and Mr. Hughes
set out one morning for the cache, intending to return that same
evening. Before starting they told me to go out some time during
the day and kill a small deer, that I would be able to carry to
camp, and have a good lot of it cooked for supper, as they would
be very hungry when they returned that night. They started
sometime before daylight, and I stayed around the cabin, clearing
things up and cutting wood, until about ten o'clock, then cleaned
up my rifle and started out to kill the deer. It was an easy
matter to find one, for they were as thick in that country as