“It would take an everlasting great log to have any room inside, except right in the middle.”
“We could dig her out very thin, and make her long enough to make up for the sharp ends.”
“It would be a great idea. I should like dearly to try it.”
The boys now went to bed and talked boat till they worked themselves into a complete fever, and were fully determined to realize this novel idea; for, as is generally the case in such matters, the more they deliberated upon and took counsel about it, the more feasible it seemed; then they considered and magnified the astonishment of Fred and Captain Rhines when they should sail over in their new craft, and finally settled down into the belief that, if they realized their idea, it would not fall one whit short of the conception and construction of the Ark herself.
But the main difficulty—and it was one that seemed to threaten failure to the whole matter—was, where to obtain a log, as one of sufficient size for that purpose would make a mast for a ship of the line, and was too valuable, even in those days, to cut for a plaything, as it was by no means certain that she would ever be anything more: there were indeed trees enough, with short butts, large enough for their purpose, had they wanted to make a common float, or a canoe, with round ends, like a common tray; but, as they were to sharpen up the ends vessel fashion, give her quite a sharp floor, and take so much from the outside in order to shape her, it was necessary that the tree should be long, as well as large, to be recompensed by length for the room thus taken from the inside, and leave sufficient thickness of wood to hold together.
While Charlie was debating in his own mind whether to ask his father to permit him to cut such a tree, John, with a flash of recollection that sent the words from his lips with the velocity of a shell from a mortar, exclaimed, jumping up on end in bed,—
“I have it now! there’s a log been lying all summer in our cove, that came there in the last freshet, with no mark on it, more than thirty feet long, and I know it’s more’n five feet through: it’s a bouncer, I tell you; but it’s hollow at the butt, and I suppose that’s what they condemned it for; but I don’t believe the hollow runs in far. It’s mine, for I picked it up and fastened it.”
“But you are going to school. You can’t help me make it; and we should have such a good time. It is too bad!”
“Well, I can do this much towards it. I don’t care a great deal about going to school the first day; they won’t do much. I’ll help you tow it over, and haul it up; and if you don’t get it done before, when school is done, I’ll come on, help you make sugar, and finish the boat.”
“Then I won’t do any more than to dig some of it out. I won’t make the outside till you come.”