"Well, no, ma'am; de fac' is we neber did git de ole trunk out."
"What," I said, "you have left it half done?"
"Oh, no, ma'am. We bruk up de ole trunk an' tuk out all but de bottom."
"Then the water is rushing through to-night, making the gulf wider and wider?"
"Yes, ma'am."
I was speechless. There was no use saying anything, but I decided to go over the next day and use my common sense, if I had no knowledge. Bonaparte told me he could not get the hands, any of them, to go down in the water, and no trunk can be buried with dry feet.
"Myself, ma'am, bin most stupid."
The next morning, January 13, I went, carrying lunch and a bottle of home-made wine, with a stick in it for those who were to get wet. It was a beautiful bright day, with the thermometer at 50 at 9 o'clock, for which I was very thankful. The tide was not low enough for anything to be done until then. I had had three flatloads of mud cut and put on the bank, and everything was at hand. The getting up of the bottom planks was at last accomplished, and then the new trunk floated in to place on the last of the ebb, so that it settled itself into its new bed on the low water, and then the filling up was a perfect race, so much mud to be put in before the tide began to rise, besides the inclination of the bank to cave in. I kept urging the two men down in the gulf to pack the fresh mud well as it was thrown in. The stringpiece and ground logs which Bonaparte had provided were, according to my ideas, entirely inadequate, and I sent four hands to an island near by to cut larger, heavier pieces. Altogether, the day was one of the most exciting and interesting I ever spent, though I stood six hours on the top of a pile of mud on a small piece of plank, where I had to balance myself with care to look into the gulf and not topple over. It was black dark when we left the trunk, but the mud was well packed, with every appearance of solidity and stability, and the next day I had two more flatloads of mud put on, and, though a freshet has come and gone since, "she" has not stirred; and the field drains beautifully.