After carefully examining what Ernest had found, I determined that they were cassava plants.
With the plants' roots, we could lose every other food that we possessed and still not go hungry.
"If we can collect enough roots," I said, "we'll attempt to make bread.
But the plant can be poisonous.
We'll need to take great care in preparing the flour and baking the bread.
First we must finish unloading the tub boat and the raft."
That job took us the rest of the afternoon and part of the next morning.
I had intended to spend the rest of the day at Falconhurst.
But the sea was calm, so I decided to make another trip to the wreck.
Ernest and Franz returned to the tree house with my wife while Jack lingered on the beach.
"You want to go with us, don't you?" I said to him. "Well, come on then."
Jack grinned and quickly followed Fritz and me onto the tub boat.
When we reached the wreck, Jack went down into the hold.
I soon heard a loud rattling noise as he joined me on deck.
"Look what I found—a wheelbarrow!" he said.
"This is just the thing for bringing home potatoes."
He was then followed by Fritz, who had made an even more important discovery.
"I found a small sailboat!" he announced. "All the parts are packed together.
There are even a couple of small brass cannons!"
If he was right, then this would be a most useful item.
I hurried to look at the sailboat.
"Oh," I said with disappointment in my voice.
Yes, it was a sailboat.
But it was going to take a lot of work to put it together and make it seaworthy.
At the moment we only had time enough to get something to eat and hurry to the tub boat.
We carried home a copper boiler, iron plates, tobacco graters, and three wheelbarrows.
At Falconhurst my wife and the other boys had gathered a large supply of potatoes and cassava roots.
I praised them lavishly.
"Oh, Father!" blurted out little Franz.
"What will you say when Mother and I give you melons and pumpkins and cucumbers?"
"You little chatterbox," my wife said fondly. "You've let out my secret!
I wanted to surprise Father when my plants sprouted."
I was puzzled. "Where did you get the seeds?"
"From my bag, of course," she replied.
"Every time I've gone for potatoes, I've sown seeds in the ground that we've dug up.
I've also planted potatoes."
My wife looked very pleased.
But then she caught sight of the tobacco graters that we'd brought from the wreck.
"You aren't going to make snuff?" she said in alarm.
"No," I said. "Please treat my graters with respect because they'll provide you with fresh bread."
"What connection can there be between tobacco graters and bread?" asked my wife.
"Besides, you need an oven to bake bread, and we don't have one."
"You can't expect real loaves," I said.
"But I think I can bake flat cakes on these iron plates.
We'll have to make flour first."
My wife looked skeptical. "It's probably a good thing we dug potatoes today."
After thoroughly washing the cassava roots, I spread a large sailcloth on the ground.
Then I called the boys and gave them each a tobacco grater.
Everyone worked at grating down the roots.
Luckily, no one was tempted to stop and taste the flour because it looked like wet sawdust.
When we were finished, we put the damp flour in a canvas bag.
I squeezed and squeezed, but the flour was still wet.
We laid the canvas bag on a board and put another board over it.
Then we found the heaviest things we owned—an anvil, iron bars—and set them on the top board.
The pressure on the bag was enormous, and the liquid flowed from it to the ground.
"Could we bake some bread now?" asked Fritz.
"There doesn't seem to be any moisture left."
"Certainly, but I will make only a small sample today.
We must first see how it agrees with Knips and the hens."
I placed an iron plate over the fire.
While it was getting hot, I mixed the flour with water and salt.
After kneading the dough, I laid it on the hot plate to bake.
The cake smelled delicious!
I gave a small amount to the monkey and two hens.
We watched them all evening for any signs of poisoning.
The next morning the animals were fine, so we baked more bread.
Each boy busily prepared his own cake.
Some of the bread was burned; some was underdone.
But much of it was golden brown.
We were soon enjoying a delicious breakfast of bread and milk.