“Just a sixteenth, as near as I can make it out,” replied Ben.
The boys began to laugh, for they saw the result of the argument.
“There will be four edges to the two strips of six inches in width, when the board is sawed through its length, will there not, Ben?”
“Yes, sir,” answered the other side of the question.
“Will those edges be perfectly smooth?”
“Of course they will not: they will be just as the saw left them.”
“They are not likely to be sawed perfectly straight, even if the job were done by an experienced workman. How much shall we have to plane off in order to get the edges straight and smooth?”
“I don’t know,—half an inch from each, perhaps. I give it up. I was wrong, sir.”
“Not half an inch, with such clear, finish-lumber as this board: that would be shameful. Call it an eighth of an inch; and from the four sides you will take off half an inch, besides the sixteenth
cut out by the saw. Your shelves would be less than five and three-quarters wide, which is not six inches. When we want any stock to be of a certain width, it won’t do to make it a quarter of an inch less than that. You might waste the whole board in that way.”