CHARLIE MAKES A POOL AND SAILS HIS BOAT
ALL the time that Charlie and his Mother and his Auntie were living in the country Charlie’s Daddy came down every single Saturday to visit them, and he stayed in the country with them until Sunday night, when he had to go back to the city. And every Saturday, when Charlie’s Daddy came to visit them in the country, he always brought a present for everybody!
One Saturday Charlie’s Daddy came and he brought Charlie’s Mother a basket of peaches, and he brought his Auntie a box of candy, and he brought Bingo a ball, and he brought Jane and Topsy a catnip mouse—and what do you think he brought for Charlie? I will tell you. Charlie’s Daddy brought Charlie a sailboat! It was a beautiful boat, painted white with a green water line. It had a mast and two sails. His Daddy told Charlie that the big sail at the back is called the mainsail and that the stick that holds it out at the bottom is called the boom; and that the little three-cornered sail in front is called the jib and the stick to which it is fastened is called the bowsprit.
Of course Charlie’s Daddy did not say “the front and back” of the ship either. Oh, dear, no! Charlie’s Daddy called the front part of the ship the bow, and he called the back part the stern, and the bottom of the ship he called the keel—and, I can tell you, nobody ought to own a ship who does not know these things.
Well, of course, the very first thing that Charlie wanted to do was to go and sail his boat—but what do you think? The brook was so shallow and full of stones that there was no place deep enough to sail the boat at all! That was very sad.
Charlie and his Daddy walked a long way beside the brook looking for a pool where the water was deeper, but they could not find one.
Then Charlie’s Daddy said, “Well, unless some rain comes to make the brook get deeper, I guess you’ll have to wait to sail your boat till you come back to town and can sail it in the bath tub. As long as you are in the country you will have to say that the boat is in ‘dry dock.’”
But what do you think? Charlie didn’t even know what a dry dock is. No, his Daddy had to explain to him all about it—how the ship is put into “dry dock” when it has to be mended or painted below the water line. First the ship sails into the dock, and then the dock is closed up behind the ship and all the water is pumped out and the ship is propped up straight with props from each side of the dock.
So Charlie and his Daddy made a dry dock for his ship on the bureau in his room. They made the dock of books, and propped the ship up straight with blocks on each side of the keel. The ship looked very beautiful on the bureau, but Charlie did wish that he could sail it and that he did not have to keep it in “dry dock” all the time.
One day, when his Daddy had gone back to town, Charlie and his Mother and his Auntie went for a walk.
They went for a new walk. Instead of just going along the road, they thought it would be interesting to follow the creek. So they climbed a wall and followed the creek through the fields and into a wood which was “private property”; but there was a sign which said people could walk there if they did not do any damage.
Then they came to a place where there was a stone wall built right across the creek from side to side and above the stone wall was a great e-nor-mous pool! And the water pounded over the stone wall like a waterfall. The pool was very deep and wide, but above the pool the creek was all stony and shallow again.
Charlie was very much interested. He said, “Why is that stone wall built across the creek, and what makes that pool so deep and broad when the rest of the creek is shallow and narrow?”
Then his Mother explained to Charlie all about it. She explained to him that the pool was a swimming pool, and that the stone wall built across the creek from side to side was a dam. The dam keeps the water in like a basin until it gets as deep as the dam is high and then the water flows over the top.
Charlie was very much interested when he heard this. He said to his Mother, “Can anybody build a dam?”
And of course his Mother said that anybody could. She said that you only had to heap a lot of mud and stones together just below where you wanted the pool to be, and just as high as you wanted the pool to be deep.
Oh, my goodness! Charlie was excited then. I wonder if you can guess what he said?
I will tell you. Charlie said, “Mother, Auntie, I want to go home im-me-di-ate-ly, I AM GOING TO BUILD A DAM! Yes, I am going to build a dam across the brook and make a great ENORMOUS pool to sail my boat in.” Of course his Mother and his Auntie said they would go home immediately when they heard that Charlie was going to do such an important thing.
So they did go home, and Charlie put on his overalls and he ran down to the brook and began to work at his dam.
First he found a place where the brook was a little wider and where the banks were quite steep. Then he started scooping out the stones at the bottom of the brook, so that there would be no rocks for his boat to get wrecked on.
You may be sure that Bingo and Topsy were very much interested in what Charlie was doing. Yes, they both came and watched him awhile. Then Topsy began to dig a hole in the grass—he wanted to show that he could dig a hole just as well as Charlie could. Bingo tried to dig a hole, too, but he soon got tired of it and ran around and barked, “Yap, yap!” He wanted Charlie and Topsy to come and play with him.
But Charlie was much too busy to pay any attention to Bingo. He just went on bending over the brook, digging out the stones until he had the bottom of the brook, where his pool was going to be, nicely cleaned out. Then he started to work on the dam.
First Charlie hunted around until he had got together a nice lot of flat stones, and he began to pile them up one on top of the other, and he went on piling them up until the dam went right across the brook from bank to bank.
At first the water paid no attention to Charlie’s dam at all. It just went on flowing through the chinks between the stones, just as if there were not any dam there at all! But Charlie piled up great banks of mud, and put in more big stones and then little stones to fill the chinks—and at last the water began to rise!
Yes, the water rose, and it rose until it was a nice big pool and came up to the top of the banks on both sides, and then it began to dribble over the top of the dam. So Charlie knew that the dam was finished! Of course the water in the pool was dreadfully muddy, but Charlie did not mind a bit. Why should he, when the pool was so nice and wide and deep? Yes, it was so deep that it came all the way up to his knees!
Then Charlie saw his Mother and his Auntie walking across the field from the house. They had come to see how Charlie was getting along with his dam.
And, my goodness, how astonished they were when they saw that Charlie had ac-tu-al-ly finished the dam and what a huge big pool he had made!
But both his Mother and his Auntie could not help laughing when they saw how Charlie was all covered with mud. He had mud all over the front of his overalls, and on his hands, and there was a big splash of mud on the end of his nose!
Then his Mother said, “Now, Charlie, dinner will soon be ready, so you must hurry home and wash your face and hands, and put on a clean suit. Then after dinner you may sail your boat in your beautiful big pool.”
So Charlie ran to the house, and he washed his face, and he scrubbed his hands, and he put on a clean blue sailor suit, and he ate his dinner.
Then he gave Topsy and Bingo and Jane their dinner. And then—he and his Mother and his Auntie went down to the pool to sail the boat. And, what do you think? The mud had all settled at the bottom of the pool while Charlie was eating his dinner, and the pool was as clear as glass so that you could see to the very bottom and you could see the dam that Charlie had built.
Then Charlie launched his boat. The pool was deep enough—but the boat did not sail quite well even yet. No, the boat leaned a little to one side and, when a gust of wind came, it would have turned right over if Charlie had not caught hold of the mast just in time.
Charlie felt very sad that his boat would not sail properly when he had built such a beautiful pool for it.
But his Auntie said, “Cheer up, Charlie, I know exactly what is the matter with the boat so that it will not sail, and it can be fixed so that it will sail beautifully. The trouble is that the boat has not enough ballast. That means that the masts and the sails are too heavy for the keel. But if we nail a strip of lead along the bottom of the keel the boat will stay upright and will not lean to one side.”
Well, Charlie and his Auntie took the boat and went to the barn, where the farmer was mending his mowing machine.
And his Auntie asked the farmer if he knew where they could get a strip of lead to nail to the keel of Charlie’s boat.
The farmer said, “Right here I have all the lead that you can use.” And he cut off a strip of lead just the size of the keel. Then the farmer also gave Charlie some interesting-looking nails that he said could be just the thing to nail the lead to the keel. They were crooked nails that folded over and looked just like tiny croquet hoops.
Then Charlie’s Auntie took the mast and sails off, and she hammered the nails over the lead so that it was fastened to the keel of the boat. Then she put the masts and sails back. Don’t you think that she was a clever Auntie? Yes, indeed, she was.
So they went back to the pool again, where Charlie’s Mother was waiting to see if the boat would sail right this time.
The boat sailed beautifully
And what do you think? It did! Yes, the boat sailed beautifully, it sailed right away to the other side of the brook, and when Charlie turned the rudder to the right the boat turned in the opposite direction and sailed right back again!
Yes, that boat could do everything that a real boat does, and when the wind blew hard it keeled over to one side but it did not capsize. No, nothing could make that boat capsize. Even when Bingo stood upon his hind legs and tried to catch it when it went sailing past, he fell splash into the pool and made a great ENORMOUS wave, just like the waves in the middle of the ocean—still that boat did not capsize.
Well, every day after that Charlie sailed his boat in the pool. He made a dock for it, with stones, and he put grass and pebbles on the deck for the cargo, which he loaded and unloaded at the dock, and the boat sailed from side to side of the pool. When the boat got to the other side Charlie would jump across the brook where it was narrow and turn the rudder so that the boat would turn right round and sail back again to the dock.
Yes, Charlie had more fun than I can tell you playing with his boat. And Topsy and Bingo played, too; they jumped across the brook backwards and forwards and they tried to catch the boat as it sailed past. And, Charlie’s Mother and his Auntie liked to help Charlie sail his boat; yes, they enjoyed watching it sail so beautifully before the wind.
And—on Saturday, when Charlie’s Daddy came down to visit them all—my goodness! he was surprised and de-light-ed to see the dam and the pool that Charlie had made all by himself, and to see how beautifully the boat sailed, with its sails blown out by the wind, and with its cargo of grass and pebbles piled up on deck.
Yes, Charlie’s Daddy thought that Charlie was a very clever boy to have made that dam and that pool all by himself—and I think so, too.
