Richardson, now taking the iron from the fire with the kitchen tongs, placed it on the anvil, and gave it in charge to the boys to hold. He then put the axe-edge down on the iron where he wished to split it, and told his wife how to hold it; then with the beetle he struck heavy blows upon the axe, forcing it into the iron at every stroke, while his wife, after every blow, drew the axe to a new place. The old axe, of excellent temper, and thick edge, that would neither turn nor break, being dipped in water when it became heated, answered the purpose of a chisel admirably, and the beetle was superb. Indeed, they would have nearly finished that heat, but the baby waked, screaming, and would not be pacified without his mother. Richardson clapped the iron in the fire, one of the children got a chair, and the mother sitting down, nursed the babe while the iron was heating. After this it became quiet, and the little girls took care of it, while the others cut the iron so nearly through that by bending it back and forth a few times, it fell apart.
He now found that the strip he had cut off was sufficient to make two links by drawing it some. He therefore made two. But it was a deal of work to heat the iron hot enough to weld, because the hand-bellows were single, and only operated by short puffs, the iron cooling in the intervals, whereas a blacksmith's bellows, being double, one part fills while the other is discharging, thus keeping up a steady current of air.
Montague was much pleased when he found that his chain, instead of being made shorter, was lengthened, and now sufficient for all purposes, paid Richardson liberally, and brought another chain that was too short, and had the remainder of his iron put into that.
"There, wife," said Richardson, as he placed the money his neighbor had paid him on the table, "is the first money earned by the hammer. You were just right when you said that mending that staple was the best day's work I ever did, and I'm sure I never earned any money so sweet as this."
CHAPTER III. EXPERIENCE THE BEST TEACHER.
The morning succeeding the events we have related, David Montague sent over the chain, into which, he wished the rest of his bar of iron worked. Richardson kindled his fire, put in the iron, and began to blow with the hand-bellows; but when he recollected how difficult it was to make iron hot enough to weld in that way, he flung down the little affair, and gave up the undertaking. Convinced that he needed a pair of bellows even more than a hammer or anything else,—for if he could only get a good heat, he could manage to hold the iron with the kitchen tongs, and work it with the claw-hammer,—he resolved to have them, especially as he felt that he could obtain them by his own efforts, without paying out money.
He knew that John Bradford, with whom he was on terms of greater intimacy than any other of his neighbors, had a large lot of logs to haul, and that he was the owner of a whip-saw. Leaving the shop, he went over to John's and said to him,—