The Young Ship Builders of Elm Island 6

The Young Ship Builders of Elm Island 6

“I never went to school, but I suppose they forgot how to do them as

fast 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 roared

and flung itself upon the ramparts of the harbor as though it would

force a passage; but, with roaring fires in the two fireplaces, the

inmates of the timber house worked in their shirt sleeves, and paid

very little attention to the weather.

 

“It is well you got on when you did, Uncle Isaac,” said Ben; “but you

will have to stay, now you are here, for there will be very little

crossing 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 signal

on 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 set

Atkins and Charlie at work upon the front stairs; thus Charlie was

so constantly and agreeably occupied as to have but little leisure

to spend upon boats. But when this job was over, which had been most

interesting and exciting, he began to give shape to the ideas that had

been germinating in his brain at intervals during the day, and in his

wakeful hours at night.

 

He wanted some plastic material that would become hard when dry, with

which to make his alterations, and determined to use putty. Leaving

that portion of his model which was to be under water as it was, he

made it fuller from that mark, by sticking on putty, and then, with his

knife and a chisel, paring off or adding to correspond with his idea of

proportions. For a long time did he puzzle over it, striving in vain

to satisfy himself, and several times scraped it all off to the bare

brick. At length he came to a point where he felt he could accomplish

no more.

 

The next night, at bed-time, with a palpitating heart, he brought it

forward for Uncle Isaac’s inspection. After looking at it long and

carefully, he said,--

 

“I wish Joe Griffin was here. I ain’t much of a shipwright, though I

have worked some in the yard, and made a good many spars for small

vessels; but he is, and has worked in Portsmouth on mast ships.

But I call that a beautiful model, and think it shows a first-rate

head-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; but

then she’s so long ’twill make up for it. She’s a beauty, and if you

can ever make another on a large scale like her, I’ll wager my life

she’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, she

comes out from the first shape a thought too quick; that it would be

better if the swell was a leetle more gradual, not sucked out quite so

much; but then I don’t want you to alter it for anything I say; but I’m

going to call Ben and Robert Yelf up to see it.”

 

“O, don’t, Uncle Isaac! Father knows all about vessels, and Mr. Yelf is

a 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 Charlie

amended the fault, till they expressed themselves satisfied.

 

“That boy,” said Yelf, as they went down stairs, “if he lives, and

gives his mind to it, will make a first-rate ship-builder.”

 

“Ever since he has been with me,” was the reply, “he has been, at

leisure moments, making boats. I believe he has a fleet, great and

small, as numerous as the whole British navy.”

 

Not the least industrious personage among this busy crew was Ben

Rhines, Jr.

 

From morning to night, with a devotion worthy of a better cause, he

improved every moment, doing mischief, till his mother was, at times,

almost beside herself. One moment she would be startled by a terrific

outcry from the buttery. Ben had tumbled down the buttery stairs; anon

from the front entry he had fallen down the front stairs; then, from

the cellar, he was kicking and screaming there.

 

This enterprising youth, bent upon acquiring knowledge, was determined

to explore these new avenues of information. Twice he set the room in

a blaze, by poking shavings into the fire, and singed his mischievous

head to the scalp, and had a violent attack of vomiting in consequence

of licking the oil from Uncle Isaac’s oil-stone. His lips were cut, and

he was black and blue with bruises received in his efforts. Despite of

all these mishaps, Ben enjoyed himself hugely; he had piles and piles

of blocks, great long shavings, both oak and pine, that came from the

panels and the banisters; he would bury the cat and Sailor all up in

shavings, and then clap his hands, and scream with delight, to see them

dig out; he would also hide from his mother in them, and lie as still

as though dead; he could pick up plenty of nails on the floor to drive

into his blocks, and didn’t scruple in the least to take them from the

nail-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, to

fish down the buttery stairs, and, when caught, surrendered it only

after a most desperate struggle.

 

“What a little varmint he is!” said Uncle Isaac. “If he don’t break his

neck, he’ll be a smart one.”

 

“I believe you can’t kill him,” said Sally, “or he would have been dead

long 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’t

see.”

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER IV.

 

THE WEST WIND.

 

 

IT was now the middle of March, and the lower part of the house was

finished.

 

“Ben,” said Uncle Isaac, “we want to go off now. Charlie can finish

these chambers as well as I can.”

 

“I have not seasoned stuff to finish but one of them now, and hardly

that. It’s too rough to go off in your canoe; stay till Saturday

afternoon, and part off some bedrooms up stairs with a rough board

partition, and make some rough doors, so that we can use them for

sleeping-rooms, and then Charlie can finish them next winter, for he

will have to go to making sugar soon. If you’ll do that I’ll set you

off in the schooner.”

 

Uncle Isaac parted off the chambers, and they now had plenty of room.

They put the best bed in one of the front rooms; the family bedroom was

off the kitchen, and there were bedrooms above.

 

Charlie was now desirous to complete his boat, but his mother wanted

the flax done out. He therefore concluded to put it off till John came

on to help him make sugar.

 

When Uncle Isaac reached home, John’s school had been out a week; but

the weather was so rough he could not reach the island; and when he

did arrive, Ben and Charlie were just finishing up the flax. The boys

now cleared out the camp, scoured the kettles, put fresh mortar on the

arch, hauled wood, and prepared for sugar-making. They resolved to tap

but few trees at first, in order to have more leisure to work on their

boat. The greatest mechanical skill was required to shape the outside.

This pertained entirely to Charlie; but the most laborious portion

of the work was the digging out such an enormous stick, and removing

such a quantity of wood at a disadvantage, as, after they had chopped

out about a foot of the surface, it would be difficult to get at, and

the work must be done with adze and chisel, and even bored out with

an auger at the ends. They decided to remove a portion of it before

shaping the outside, as the log would lie steadier. Charlie accordingly

marked out the sheer, then put on plumb-spots, and hewed the sides and

the upper surface fair and smooth.

 

He then lined out the shape and breadth of beam, and made an inside

line to rough-cut by, and at leisure times they chopped out the inside

with the axe, one bringing sap or tending the kettle, while the other

worked on the boat.

 

“John,” said Charlie, stopping to wipe the perspiration from his face,

“I’m going to find some easier way than this to make a boat; it’s too

much like work.”

 

“There is no other way. I’ve seen hundreds of canoes made, and this is

the way they always do.”

 

“Don’t you remember when we were clearing land, that we would set our

nigger[1] to burning off logs, and when it came night, we would find

that he had _burned_ more logs in two than we had cut with the axe?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“Uncle Isaac told me one night, that the Indians burned out canoes, and

I am going to try it.”

 

“I thought they always made them of bark.”

 

“He said they sometimes, especially the Canada Indians, made them of a

log, in places where they had a regular camping-ground, and didn’t want

to carry them.”

 

“You’ll burn it all up, and we can never get another such a log.”

 

“You see if I do.”

 

Charlie got a pail of water, and made a little mop with rags on the end

of a stick, then got some wet clay, and put all around the sides of the

log where he didn’t want the fire to come. He then built a fire of oak

chips right in the middle, and the whole length. The fire burned very

freely at first, for the old log was full of pitch, and soon began to

dry the clay, and burn at the edge; but Charlie put it out with his

mop, and forced it to burn in the middle.

 

When the chips had burned out, Charlie took the adze, and removed about

three inches of coal, and made a new fire.

 

“Not much hard work about that,” said John, who looked on with great

curiosity.

 

They now went about their sugar, once in a while stepping to the log to

remove the coal, renew the fire, or apply water to prevent its burning in the wrong direction.