House-Boat as a Fashionable Fad
which has spread to this country, and the boys now have a new source of fun, as a result of this English fad.
There are still some nooks and corners left in every State in the Union which the greedy pot-hunter and the devouring saw-mill have as yet left undisturbed, and at such places the boy boatmen may "wind their horns," as their ancestors did of old, and have almost as good a time. But first of all they must have a boat, and for convenience the American boy's house-boat will probably be found to excel either a broad-horn or a flat-boat model, it being a link between the two.
The simplest possible house-boat is a Crusoe raft,[A] with a cabin near the stern and a sand-box for a camp-fire at the bow. A good time can be had aboard even this primitive craft. The next step in evolution is the long open scow, with a cabin formed by stretching canvas over hoops that reach from side to side of the boat (see [Fig. 218]).
Fig. 218.—A primitive house-boat.
Every boy knows how to build