Use Rope for Binding
Set the side-pieces upon their bottoms or shorter edges and place the brace between the sides. Now bind the stern ends with a rope and bring the bow-pieces together until they touch; rope them in this position, and when all is fast push the brace up until it rests at a point nine feet from the bow; fasten it here with a couple of nails driven in, but leaving their heads far enough from the wood to render it easy to draw them out. Now adjust the bow-piece, and use the greatest of care in making the sides exactly alike, otherwise you will wonder how you happened to have such an unaccountable twist in your craft. When the stem is properly adjusted fasten on the side-boards with screws. Do not try to hammer the screws in place, but bore holes first and use a screwdriver.
Take your stern-piece and measure the exact width of the stern end of the bottom-boards and mark it at the bottom of the stern-piece; or, better still, since the stern-board will set at an angle, put it temporarily in place, bind it fast with the ropes, and mark with a pencil just where the side-boards cross the ends of the stern-board. Remove the stern-board and saw out a piece one inch wide, the thickness of the bottom-board, from the place marked to the bottom of the stern-board. Because the top side-board overlaps the bottom one at the stern, there must be either a large crack left there or the stern-board notched to fit the side-boards ([Fig. 214]). Replace the stern-board and nail side-boards fast to it; now loosen the ropes which have held your boat in shape, and fit on the upper side-boards so that at the stern they will overlap the lower side-boards an inch. Hold in place with your rope, then bring the bow end up against the stern-piece over the top of the lower side-board and fasten it in place with a rope. With your carpenter's pencil mark the overlap, and with a plane made for that purpose, called a rabbet, trim down your board so that it will have a shoulder and an overlap to rest on the bottom-board, running out to nothing at the bow. When the boards fit all right over the lower ones bind them in place and then nail them there ([Fig. 208]). If you can obtain two good boards of the requisite size, you need have but one board for each side of your boat; this will obviate the necessity of using the rabbet, and be very much easier; but with single boards of the required dimensions there is great danger of splitting or cracking while bending the boards.
The rough-and-ready.