"Charlie, they have a new fashion of building boats in France."
"How is that, father?"
"Why, instead of doing as you do, and getting natural crooks for timbers, they saw them out of a white-oak plank, or whatever kind of wood they make them of, put them into a steam-box, and bend them. They generally get natural crooks for stem, stern-post, and floor-timbers; but often they saw them out of plank, because timber is not so plenty there as here, and necessity has driven them to it."
"I see, father," said Charlie, "you could build two boats in that way while you were building one in our fashion."
Charlie instantly set to work, at odd jobs, to build a boat for the Perseverance that should take the fly off of everything. It was a labor of love, because he meant to make a present of it to Lion Ben, and felt all the enthusiasm naturally connected with new ideas.
He made the stem, stern-post, sharp-risers, and floor-timbers of apple tree, which takes a very good polish, and the other timbers from plank sawed out of small, second-growth white-oak butts, tough enough for ox-goads, and as blue as a whet-stone. The excellent quality of the wood enabled him to secure sufficient strength, and yet make them quite small and neat. She was planked with the best of cedar.
He then made a fancy rudder, fancy oars, mast, and boom, and painted her white to correspond. As she was small, Lion Ben made a shoulder-of-mutton sail for her, which shape brought the body of the sail low in the boat, enabling her to carry it much longer. She was just the prettiest, lightest thing imaginable; and she would streak it with a good breeze. After work at night, the boys did enjoy sailing in her. Pleasantly and swiftly did these days pass away. They hardly ate two meals in the same house; for they were universal favorites, and all wanted to have the boys at their houses, and it was only on Sabbath days that Walter spent the day at home.
Again he sat beside Charlie Bell in the old church, and had many a pleasant talk with him; but Walter was obliged to tell Charlie, that, although he had often thought of that moonlight talk by the brook, and how vividly, among the crumbling ruins of the old castle, the power of association recalled that conversation, he had complied with his request no farther than to repeat the Lord's Prayer with Ned then, and ever after when he retired to rest.
The Perseverance was now ready for sea; as Dick Cameron said, everything about her was ship-shape and Bristol fashion. Never did more good wishes and fervent prayers follow a craft than followed her, as, with a wholesale breeze, she weighed anchor, and went down the bay like a race-horse. Reluctantly the crowd of spectators left the heights from which they had watched her as she faded from view, and slowly sought their different places of abode.