Was he wrong, or did her smile move still a little further out?
“Uncle John,” said Billy, “are ships made of iron?”
“Why, Billy, you’re not going to sail away from us, are you?” said Uncle John, almost unconsciously putting his hand on Billy’s. “Ships are made of steel.”
“Mr. Prescott,” said Billy, “explained to me about steel, and about forges.”
“When this country was first settled,” said Uncle John, “men had little forges to make iron, just as their wives had spinning wheels to make wool for clothes.
“When they began to make nails—they couldn’t build houses without nails—there was a forge in almost every chimney corner. Children, as well as grown people, used to make nails and tacks in the long winter evenings. People then took nails to the store to pay for things, as in the country they now take eggs.
“That old forge iron was never very pure. It did the work that they had to do, but the world needed better iron, and more of it. It took a good while to find out a better way. The men that finally succeeded worked hard and long. You ought to begin to read up about those men.
“Of course it closed out a good many blacksmiths, but it helped the world along. Guess they found, in the end, that it helped them along, too.”
Then Billy told Uncle John what Thomas Murphy had said about being “nothing and nobody.” Aunt Mary came out to know what they were laughing about, so he told her the story.
“Mind you, Billy,” said Uncle John, “I’m only laughing at the way he put it. Murphy is right. He seems to be unusually clear on the usefulness of iron.”