“That’s right,” said Matthew, “have the stanchions on the square if we mean to use the machine on the level, then—”
Mac walked grimly up to him and shook a chisel in his face. “Matthew, the day has just started; you are forgiven this once, but don’t let it happen again. Now, you remember!”
“Come on, messmates,” said Walden, tightening his belt; “are we going to get through to-night?”
“Indeed we are!” said Harry.
They placed one of the four-foot stanchions in the corner of the frame, held it upright, and screwed it on by means of the right-angle, wrought-iron braces. They used two of the braces, one flange of each screwed to a side of the upright, the other two flanges screwed one along the long beam, the other along the end cross-bar. When they had done this, the stanchion stood plumb upright and solid. If you do not care to pay fancy prices for brass stanchion sockets, do not let the books frighten you into doing so. These little wrought-iron braces, with screws to match, will do very well, and square stanchions are not half bad.
They put a stanchion wherever there was a cross-bar end. Now came the job of lifting the other frame and placing it on the stanchion-tops. When this had been secured, the whole frame was not as steady as they wished. But they contemplated their handiwork with admiring comments. It looked for all the world like Goodwin’s biplane.
Now it was time to lay violent hands on Mac’s old bicycle, and the boys went at it as if it were a cold turkey the day after Thanksgiving. Their object was to furnish the glider with wheels, placing them to the rear near the ends of the lower plane, so that the legs of the operator might form a third wheel, in a sense, relieving him of much of the strain of a sudden alighting. They remembered the wheels on Goodwin’s machine, and they had not stopped to reflect that in a light-weight glider their room might be better than their company. It fell to Harry to discover a better use for the old wheels.
“Here’s a way to truss her up good and tight,” said he. “We don’t need these wheels—she’s as light as a feather. And here’s a way to pull the wiring taut. That’s very necessary. Why, Goodwin walked around his machine trying all the wires, and they sounded like harp strings, they were so tight.”
If you have a bicycle, you must have noticed that one end of the spoke is threaded and screws into a little turnable socket. They filed off each one, leaving the threaded end and its socket on the spoke. Then they cut the spokes a few inches from the sockets, and bent the other ends into the shape of a hook eye. Now, they took a strand of wire, bound it firmly to one corner of the frame, drew it loosely to an opposite corner, and cut it in the middle. One severed end they bound to the threaded socket, the other to the eyelet they had made in the spoke. The spoke was then screwed into its socket, and by this operation the wire was pulled taut. It sang and vibrated when they tried it with their fingers.
“Hurrah! How’s that for trussing!” exclaimed Howard Brent.