"Yes, that is true, but we're not going to make an ordinary canoe. We're going to cut out something as nearly like a yawl, or a ship's launch as possible. She is to be sixteen feet long, and three and a quarter feet wide amidships."
Sam had learned a good deal about boats during his boyhood in Baltimore.
"Whew! what do you want such a whopper for?"
"Well, in the first place such a boat will be of use to us down at Pensacola, where we couldn't use an ordinary canoe at all. You see I'm going to shape her like a sea boat, partly by cutting away, and partly by pinning a keel to her."
"What'll you pin it on with?" asked Tom.
"With pins, of course; wooden ones."
"What'll you bore the holes with?"
"With my bit of iron, heated red hot."
"That's so. So you can."
"But, Sam," said Sid.