"I can't, child! I couldn't make a wheel, because there's a crank that must be made of iron, and we haven't got any iron. If I should make a wheel, I couldn't show you how to make a pot on it, for I don't know how myself. A potter's trade is a great trade, takes years to learn it. It's not every one who can learn it; and I have only happened to see them work a few times in my life."
"You could make a windmill without hardly any iron; and you're going to make a bail to take off the millstone without one mite of iron, when Mr. Honeywood said 'twas impossible. Everybody says you can do any thing you be a mind to. I should think you might help me."
Adopting the method he had ever found to be most effective with his mother, Sammy burst into tears; and so did the girls, who sympathized with him.
"Dear me! what shall I do with the child?" exclaimed Uncle Seth, whose whole heart went out to a boy so interested in a mechanical pursuit.
"Do help him if you can, Mr. Blanchard. I'm sure if he wants to think about or do something besides killing Indians, and risking his life on rafts, I do hope you'll gratify and encourage him, if it's only for the sake of his mother, and tell him something to pacify him."
"Well, Sammy, if I can't make you a wheel nor tell how to use it, there's one thing I can do: I can show you how to mould brick, and you can have a brick-yard and a kiln, and make your mother a brick oven that will be worth three times as much to her as the bean-pot; and she can bake beans, bread, and meat in it."
"I don't want to make no brick oven. I wouldn't give a chestnut-burr for a thousand brick ovens. I want to do what the potters do."
"Well, I'll tell you all about how the potters work their clay; and then you can make a good pot or milk-pan on a mould as you do now, and I'll make moulds for you. I'll keep thinking about a wheel; and perhaps we may have to go to Baltimore or Lancaster for salt or powder, and can get some iron: then I'll make a wheel; or perhaps I shall think of some way to make it without iron."
In this manner Mr. Seth continued to pacify Sammy, who, wiping up his tears, got up in his benefactor's lap, and wanted to know when he would show him how to fix the clay.
Mr. Seth replied, "To-morrow morning," well knowing he should have no peace till it was done.