"I know the reason," said Richardson. "I couldn't get a proper heat with the house-bellows." He mended it, and this time there was no failure.
William Richardson, during all these struggles and make-shifts, had learned much, and, in a way that insured its being remembered; had learned the value and use of sand, found that it protected the iron, kept the outside from burning, while the inside was heating; that, if he put two pieces of iron in the fire, and one of them became hot before the other, he could take it out, roll it in sand, and put it back, and the sand would keep it from burning up, while the other was getting ready. He likewise perceived that there was a great difference in the effect of heat upon the different kinds of iron brought to him by his neighbors: some was fine-grained, tough, and would bear a great heat; another kind was coarse, brittle, and, if made too hot, would fly under the hammer, and fall to pieces. Every mistake added to his experience, and he was every day acquiring dexterity in the use of the hammer.
His neighbors, who watched his progress with the greatest interest, were as much delighted as himself, since they were no longer obliged to go through the woods to the village for every little job. They now told him he must learn to shoe oxen and horses, work steel, make axes and plough-irons.
You may well think Richardson was as anxious to be able to do this work as they were to have it done; and the way for the gradual attainment of it came about in the natural order of events.
David Montague had, during the winter, got out the timber for a barn, and employed Richardson to frame, board, and shingle it. This increased his stock of money very sensibly, and he felt that he could now, with the money he had saved by making his tools, the proceeds of his butter, and other matters, and that which he had earned by working for Montague, buy some iron and steel. He had also in the distant future, visions of an iron anvil, that he foresaw he must one day have.
CHAPTER V. DREW SORE AND SAVAGE.
It was now past the middle of March. A copious rain was succeeded by a sharp frost, making excellent going on the river, and Richardson resolved to improve it; the only drawback being that the river was one glare of ice, and his oxen had lost many of their shoes. He had saved part of the shoes, borrowed some more of John Bradford, and could have put them on himself, as Moody Matthews had a shoeing-hammer, but there were no nails in the neighborhood.
Richardson, however, knew that by taking time and by careful driving, he could get the cattle to the village, and determined to carry the shoes with him, and hire Drew to sharpen and nail them on. He put on the sled half a cord of hemlock bark, his own grist, the butter, cloth, and yarn, together with some corn and grain for his neighbors.