"Certainly, captain. After we have given ourselves necessaries, let us think a little of luxury. For us it may be luxury, if you like, but for things it is necessary. It isn't very convenient to climb up a long ladder when one is heavily loaded."
"Well, Pencroft, we will try to please you," replied Cyrus Harding.
"But you have no machine at your disposal."
"We will make one."
"A steam machine?"
"No, a water machine."
And, indeed, to work his apparatus there was already a natural force at the disposal of the engineer which could be used without great difficulty. For this, it was enough to augment the flow of the little stream which supplied the interior of Granite House with water. The opening among the stones and grass was then increased, thus producing a strong fall at the bottom of the passage, the overflow from which escaped by the inner well. Below this fall the engineer fixed a cylinder with paddles, which was joined on the exterior with a strong cable rolled on a wheel, supporting a basket. In this way, by means of a long rope reaching to the ground, which enabled them to regulate the motive power, they could rise in the basket to the door of Granite House.
It was on the 17th of March that the lift acted for the first time, and gave universal satisfaction. Henceforward all the loads, wood, coal, provisions, and even the settlers themselves, were hoisted by this simple system, which replaced the primitive ladder, and, as may be supposed, no one thought of regretting the change. Top particularly was enchanted with this improvement, for he had not, and never could have possessed Master Jup's skill in climbing ladders, and often it was on Neb's back, or even on that of the orang, that he had been obliged to make the ascent to Granite House. About this time, too, Cyrus Harding attempted to manufacture glass and he at first put the old pottery-kiln to this new use. There were some difficulties to be encountered, but after several fruitless attempts, he succeeded in setting up a glass manufactory, which Gideon Spilett and Herbert, his usual assistants did not leave for several days. As to the substances used in the composition of glass, they are simply sand, chalk and soda, either carbonate or sulphate. Now the beach supplied sand, lime supplied chalk, sea weeds supplied soda, pyrites supplied sulphuric acid and the ground supplied coal to heat the kiln to the wished-for temperature. Cyrus Harding thus soon had every thing ready for setting to work.
The tool, the manufacture of which presented the most difficulty, was the pipe of the glass maker, an iron tube, five or six feet long, which collects on one end the material in a state of fusion. But by means of a long, thin piece of iron rolled up like the barrel of a gun, Pencroft succeeded in making a tube soon ready for use.
On the 28th of March the tube was heated. A hundred parts of sand thirty-five of chalk, forty of sulphate of soda, mixed with two or three parts of powered coal, composed the substance which was placed in crucibles. When the high temperature of the oven had reduced it to a liquid, or rather a pasty state, Cyrus Harding collected with the tube a quantity of the paste, he turned it about on a metal plate previously arranged so as to give it a form suitable for blowing, then he passed the tube to Herbert, telling him to blow at the other extremity.