In addition to that, the festival had too many painful memories of home, for which they now longed with an ardent desire that they had not felt in their first year on the island.
The fact was, that, now the whale-boat was destroyed, they were so irrevocably confined to the little valley where their hut was planted-- shut in alike by land and sea, there being no chance of escape from it in any emergency that might arise, save through the unlikely contingency of some stray passing vessel happening to call in at the bay--that the sense of being thus imprisoned began to affect their spirits.
This was not all.
Their provisions lately had been diminishing in a very perceptible manner; so much so, indeed, that there was now no fear of their being troubled with that superabundance of food which Eric had commented on when they were taking the inventory of their stores! But for some flour which Captain Fuller had supplied them with, they would have been entirely without any article in the farinaceous line beyond potatoes, their biscuits being all gone.

The hams and other delicate cabin stores Captain Brown had originally given them were now also consumed; so that, with the exception of two or three pieces of salt pork still remaining and a cask of beef, they had nothing to depend on save the produce of their garden and some tea--all their other stores as well as their coffee and sugar having long since been "expended," as sailors say.
The months passed by idly enough, with nothing to do, and they watched for the approach of winter with some satisfaction; for, when that had once set in, they might look for the return of the _Pilot's Bride_ to rescue them from an exile of which they were becoming heartily weary.
The penguins departed in April, as before, leaving them entirely solitary and more crusoe-like than ever, when thus left alone themselves; and, then, came the winter, which was much sharper than previously, there being several heavy falls of snow, while the waterfall froze up down the gorge, hanging there like a huge icicle for weeks.
It was dreary enough, and they hardly needed the wintry scene to make their outlook worse; but, one bitter morning they made a discovery which filled them with fresh alarm.
They had finished eating all their salt pork, but had never once opened the cask of beef since Eric abstracted the piece he roasted the year before "for a treat"; and, now, on going to get out a good boiling piece, in order to cook it in a more legitimate fashion, they found to their grief that, whether through damp, or exposure to the air, or from some other cause, the cask of beef was completely putrid and unfit for human food! This was very serious! They had kept this beef as a last resource, trusting to it as a "stand- by" to last them through the winter months; but now it had to be thrown away, reducing them to dry potatoes for their diet--for, the penguins, which they might have eaten "on a pinch," had departed and would not return to the island until August, and there was no other bird or animal to be seen in the valley! Their plight was made all the more aggravating from the knowledge of the fact that, if they could only manage to ascend the plateau, they might live in clover on the wild pigs and goats there; so, here they were suffering from semi-starvation almost in sight of plenty! Fritz and Eric, however, were not the sort of fellows to allow themselves to be conquered by circumstances.

Both, therefore, put their thinking caps on, and, after much cogitation, they at last hit upon a plan for relieving their necessities..