The Young Ship-Builders of Elm Island Page 4

  CHAPTER III.

  INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS.

  BEFORE his father and friends returned home, Ben agreed with UncleIsaac and Sam to come and commence work on the house whenever he shouldsend for them, and at the same time made an arrangement with his fatherto take some fish and lumber to Salem in the schooner, and procure forhim some bricks, hearth-tiles, window-glass, door-hinges, latches,materials for making putty, and other things needed about the house.

  “My nephew, Sam Atkins,” said Uncle Isaac, “who is a capital workman,is coming home to stay a good part of the winter. He works on all thenicest houses in Salem. I’ll bring him on with me.”

  It may not be amiss, for the information of those who have not read thefirst volume of the series, to glance for a moment at the house, inrespect to which all these improvements were contemplated. Ben wantedto dig a cellar, a few rods off, and build a good frame house, of twostories; but Sally preferred to finish the old walls. She said it waslarge enough, that the timber walls would be warmer than any framehouse, and she loved the first spot. “Better save the money to buycows, or to help some young man along that wanted a vessel.”

  The kitchen extended the whole length of the house, and occupied halfits width. At the eastern end a door opened directly to the weather;there was no entry. In the corner beside the door was a ladder, bywhich access was gained to the chamber through a scuttle in the floor.

  Against the wall at the other end were the dressers, and under them asmall closet. There was no finish around the chimney, and on eitherside of it two doors, of rough boards, hung on wooden hinges, openedinto the front part of the house, which was in one large room. Thecellar, which only extended under the front part of the house, wasreached by a trap door.

  The floors were well laid, of clear stuff, and the kitchen floor waswhite and smooth by the use of soap, and sand, and much friction.

  The first thing Ben did when his men, Uncle Isaac, Atkins, and RobertYelf, came, was to build a porch, into which was moved Charlie’s sink,and at one end of which a store-room was made, where Sally could dopart of her work, while everything was in confusion.

  During the time the joiners were at work upon the porch, Ben andCharlie dug a cellar under the rest of the house, hauled the rocks fromthe shore, and Uncle Sam built the wall, and also took up the stonehearths in the front part of the house, and laid them with tiles, andbuilt two fireplaces. He also laid a hearth with tiles in the kitchen,leaving a large stone in one corner to wash dishes on.

  “Ben,” said Uncle Sam, “I told you, when I laid your door-steps, thatthey were the best of granite, and would make as handsome steps as anyin the town of Boston, and that whenever you built a new house, if Iwas not past labor, I would dress them for you. I have brought on mytools, and now am going to do it.”

  “I’m very much obliged to you, Uncle Sam, but I am able and willing topay you for it now.”

  “No, you ain’t going to pay me; ’twill be something for you to rememberme by.”

  They now set up their joiner’s bench in the front part of the house,where they could have a fire in cold days. Ben and Charlie worked withthem, and the work went on apace. At Sally’s request, they began withthe kitchen, removing the dressers from the western end, and finishingoff a bedroom, leaving room sufficient at the end for a stairway togo down into a nice milk cellar, which Uncle Sam had parted off, andfloored with brick, and the joiners put up shelves, with a glass windowin the end, and another in the top of the door that led to it from thekitchen. They also replaced the dressers in the kitchen. At the easternend they made an entry, on one side of it a dark closet to keep meatsin from the flies, and on the other chamber stairs, instead of theladder, and under these cellar stairs, replacing the old trap door.

  They then finished the room, ceiling it, both the walls and overhead.It was not customary then to paint. Everything was left white, andscoured with soap and sand. Carpets were not in vogue, and floors werestrewn with white sand.

  Sally was jubilant, and declared it was nothing but a pleasure to dowork, with so many conveniences.

  “I thought I was made,” said she, “when I got a sink, and especiallya crane, instead of a birch withe, to hang my pot on. Now I’ve got asink, a crane, porch, meal-room, cellar stairs, chamber stairs, milkcellar, and kitchen, all ceiled up.”

  In the front room the work proceeded more slowly, as there was a gooddeal of panel-work, and this occupied a great deal of time.

  There were then no planing mills, jig saws, circular saws, or mortisingmachines, but all was done by hand labor. There were no cut nails then,but all were wrought, with sharp points that split the wood, which madeit necessary to bore a great deal with a gimlet.

  A happy boy was Charlie Bell in these days, as Uncle Isaac and Atkinsgave him all the instruction in their power; and to complete the sumof his enjoyment, after he had worked with them six weeks, Uncle Isaacset him to making the front and end doors of panel-work, under hisimmediate inspection. He also had an opportunity to talk about theIndians, and seemed to be a great deal more concerned to know abouttheir modes of getting along, and manufacturing articles of necessityor ornament, without tools of iron, than about their murdering andscalping.

  Uncle Isaac could not, from personal knowledge, give him muchinformation in respect to these matters, as, at the time he was amongthem, they were, and had been for a long period, supplied, both by theFrench and English, with guns, knives, hatchets, needles, and files;but he could furnish Charlie with abundant information which he hadobtained from his Indian parents; for, as they have no books, but trustto their memories, they, by exercise, become very accurate, and theirtraditions are, in this way, handed down from father to son.

  “But,” said Charlie, who had heard about Indians having cornfields,“how could they cut down trees and clear land with stone hatchets?”

  “They didn’t cut them down; they bruised the bark, and girdled them,and then the trees died, and they set them on fire.”

  “I should think it would have taken them forever, most, to clear apiece of land in that way.”

  “So it did; but they did not clear one very often. When they got afield cleared, they planted corn on it perhaps for a hundred years.”

  “I should think it would have run out.”

  “They always made these fields by the salt water, and put fish in thehills. They taught the white people how to raise corn.”

  “I have heard they made log canoes. How could they cut the trees downwith their stone hatchets? and, more than all, how could they ever digthem out?”

  “I will tell you, Mr. Inquisitive. An Indian would take a bag ofparched corn to eat, a gourd shell to drink from, his stone hatchet,and go into the woods, find a suitable tree,--generally a dead, drypine, with the limbs and bark all fallen off,--and at the foot of itwould build a camp to sleep under. Then he would get a parcel of wetclay, and plaster the tree all around, then build a fire at the bottomto burn it off. The wet clay would prevent its burning too high up.Then he would sit and tend the fire, wet the clay, and beat off thecoals as fast as they formed, till the tree fell; then cut it off, andhollow it in the same way.”

  “I should think it would have taken a lifetime.”

  “It did not take as long as you might suppose; besides, time wasnothing to them. They did no work except to hunt, make a canoe, or bowand arrows. The squaws did all the drudgery.”

  Uncle Isaac now went home to stay a week, and see to his affairs, andAtkins with him. In this interval, Charlie began to think about hislong-neglected boat. He had already the exact model of the fish, buthe wished to get it in a shape to work from. Mixing some more clayand sand, he filled the mould with it, into which he had pressed thefish, having first greased it thoroughly, that it might not stick. Henow set it to dry, putting it in the cellar at night. When thoroughlydry, he turned it out, made an oven of stones, and baked it, so that itwas in a state to be handled without crumbling. He did not wish Ben orSally to observe his proceedings; and, as it was too c
old to stay inthe woods or barn, he resorted to his bedroom. Uncle Isaac, when there,slept with Charlie, and kept his chest beside their bed.

  Charlie was sitting on the bed, with the model in his hand, looking atit, and contriving how to work from it; and so intently was he engaged,that Uncle Isaac, who, unknown to him, had returned, and wantedsomething from his chest, came upon him before he could shove it underthe bed.

  “What have you got there, Charlie?”

  “O, Uncle Isaac, I’m so sorry to see you!”

  “Sorry to see me, Charlie? Indeed, I’m sorry to hear you say so.”

  “O, I didn’t mean that,” replied Charlie, excessively confused.“I--I--I--only meant that I was sorry you caught me with this in myhand.”

  He then told Uncle Isaac what he was about, adding, in conclusion,“You see, when I am trying to study anything out, I don’t like to havefolks that know all about it looking on; it confuses and quite upsetsme.”

  “But if you ever make the boat, you will have to make it out of doors,in plain sight.”

  “Yes, sir; but if I succeed in making a good model, I know I canimitate it on a large scale, and shan’t be afraid then to do it beforefolks; but if I can’t, why, then I will burn the model up, and nobodywill be the wiser for it, or know that I tried and couldn’t. I’m notafraid to have any one see me handle tools.”

  “You have no reason to be, my boy. Yet, after all, it was a very goodthing that I surprised you before you got any farther; for, had youbuilt a large boat after these lines, she never would have been of anyuse to you.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because this is precisely the shape of a mackerel, to a shaving.”

  “Well, don’t a mackerel sail?”

  “Yes, sail like blazes, _under_ water; but I take it you want yourboat to sail on top of water. All a fish has to do is to carry himselfthrough the water; but a boat or vessel has to carry cargo, and bearsail. A vessel made after that model wouldn’t stand up in the harborwith her spars in, and a boat made like it would have to be filled sofull of ballast, to keep her on her legs, that she would be almostsunk; and the moment you put sail on her, in anything of a workingbreeze, her after-sail would jam her stern down, and she would fillover the quarter.”

  Charlie looked very blank indeed at this, which seemed at one fell blowto render abortive all his patient toil, and annihilate those sanguinehopes of proud enjoyment he and John had cherished, when they shouldappear in their new craft among the fleet of dug-outs, then belowcontempt, and witness the look of mingled astonishment and envy onthe faces of the other boys, especially as he began to feel a growingconviction that what Uncle Isaac had said was but too true. Stillstruggling against the unwelcome truth, he replied, after a long pause,“But a mackerel keeps on his bottom.”

  “Yes, because he’s alive, and can balance himself by his fins and tail;but he always turns bottom up the minute he is dead.”

  “I heard Captain Rhines say, one time, that if a vessel could bemodelled like a fish, she would sail. I thought he knew, and so Idetermined to try it.”

  “Captain Rhines does know, but he spoke at random. He didn’t mean_exactly_ like a fish, but somewhat like them,--sharp, and with atrue taper, having no slack place to drag dead water, but with properbearings.”

  “Then this model, with proper alterations, would be the thing, afterall,” said Charlie, a gleam of hope lighting up his clouded features.

  “Sartain, if you should--”

  “O, don’t tell me, Uncle Isaac, don’t! It’s no use for me to try tomake a boat if I can’t study it out of my own head. I think I see whatyou mean. I thank you very much, and after I try and see what I cando, I want you to look at it, and see how I’ve made out, and tell mehow and where to alter it. I hope you won’t think I am a stuck-up,ungrateful boy, because I don’t want you to tell me.”

  “Not by any means, Charlie; it is just the disposition I like to see inyou. I have no doubt you will think it all out, and then, my boy, itwill be your own all your life.”

  “Yes, sir; for, when I went to school, I minded that the boys who werealways running up to the master with their slates, or to the biggerboys, to be shown about their sums, were great dunces, while the smartboys dug them out themselves.”

  “I never went to school, but I suppose they forgot how to do them asfast as they were told.”

  “That was just the way of it.”

  The next day there came a snow-storm and a severe gale; the sea roaredand flung itself upon the ramparts of the harbor as though it wouldforce a passage; but, with roaring fires in the two fireplaces, theinmates of the timber house worked in their shirt sleeves, and paidvery little attention to the weather.

  “It is well you got on when you did, Uncle Isaac,” said Ben; “but youwill have to stay, now you are here, for there will be very littlecrossing to the main land for the rest of the winter.”

  “But what if any of my folks are sick? I told Hannah to make a signalon the end of the pint if anything happened.”

  “In case of necessity, Charlie and I could set you off in the schooner.”

  While Uncle Isaac was putting up the mantel-piece in the front room,which had a great deal of old-fashioned carving about it, he setAtkins and Charlie at work upon the front stairs; thus Charlie wasso constantly and agreeably occupied as to have but little leisureto spend upon boats. But when this job was over, which had been mostinteresting and exciting, he began to give shape to the ideas that hadbeen germinating in his brain at intervals during the day, and in hiswakeful hours at night.

  He wanted some plastic material that would become hard when dry, withwhich to make his alterations, and determined to use putty. Leavingthat portion of his model which was to be under water as it was, hemade it fuller from that mark, by sticking on putty, and then, with hisknife and a chisel, paring off or adding to correspond with his idea ofproportions. For a long time did he puzzle over it, striving in vainto satisfy himself, and several times scraped it all off to the barebrick. At length he came to a point where he felt he could accomplishno more.

  The next night, at bed-time, with a palpitating heart, he brought itforward for Uncle Isaac’s inspection. After looking at it long andcarefully, he said,--

  “I wish Joe Griffin was here. I ain’t much of a shipwright, though Ihave worked some in the yard, and made a good many spars for smallvessels; but he is, and has worked in Portsmouth on mast ships.But I call that a beautiful model, and think it shows a first-ratehead-piece. She’s very sharp, and will want a good deal of ballast;so there won’t be much room in her as far as depth is consarned; butthen she’s so long ’twill make up for it. She’s a beauty, and if youcan ever make another on a large scale like her, I’ll wager my lifeshe’ll sail. I suppose you’ll kind of expect me to find some fault,else you’ll think I’m stuffing you. It strikes me, that in the run, shecomes out from the first shape a thought too quick; that it would bebetter if the swell was a leetle more gradual, not sucked out quite somuch; but then I don’t want you to alter it for anything I say; but I’mgoing to call Ben and Robert Yelf up to see it.”

  “O, don’t, Uncle Isaac! Father knows all about vessels, and Mr. Yelf isa regular shipwright.”

  “So much the better; they’ll be able to see the merits of it.”

  Ben and Yelf made the same criticism as Uncle Isaac, upon which Charlieamended the fault, till they expressed themselves satisfied.

  “That boy,” said Yelf, as they went down stairs, “if he lives, andgives his mind to it, will make a first-rate ship-builder.”

  “Ever since he has been with me,” was the reply, “he has been, atleisure moments, making boats. I believe he has a fleet, great andsmall, as numerous as the whole British navy.”

  Not the least industrious personage among this busy crew was BenRhines, Jr.

  From morning to night, with a devotion worthy of a better cause, heimproved every moment, doing mischief, till his mother was, at times,almost beside herself. One moment she would be sta
rtled by a terrificoutcry from the buttery. Ben had tumbled down the buttery stairs; anonfrom the front entry he had fallen down the front stairs; then, fromthe cellar, he was kicking and screaming there.

  This enterprising youth, bent upon acquiring knowledge, was determinedto explore these new avenues of information. Twice he set the room ina blaze, by poking shavings into the fire, and singed his mischievoushead to the scalp, and had a violent attack of vomiting in consequenceof licking the oil from Uncle Isaac’s oil-stone. His lips were cut, andhe was black and blue with bruises received in his efforts. Despite ofall these mishaps, Ben enjoyed himself hugely; he had piles and pilesof blocks, great long shavings, both oak and pine, that came from thepanels and the banisters; he would bury the cat and Sailor all up inshavings, and then clap his hands, and scream with delight, to see themdig out; he would also hide from his mother in them, and lie as stillas though dead; he could pick up plenty of nails on the floor to driveinto his blocks, and didn’t scruple in the least to take them from thenail-box if he got a chance. The moment Uncle Isaac’s back was turned,in went his fingers into the putty; he carried off the chalk-line, tofish down the buttery stairs, and, when caught, surrendered it onlyafter a most desperate struggle.

  “What a little varmint he is!” said Uncle Isaac. “If he don’t break hisneck, he’ll be a smart one.”

  “I believe you can’t kill him,” said Sally, “or he would have been deadlong ago. He’s been into the water and fire, the oxen have trod on him,and a lobster shut his claws on his foot; why he ain’t dead I don’tsee.”