Fig. 1.
If these pegs and the bolt fit tightly when they are quite dry they will swell and fit very much tighter when they become wet. Two and a half feet further back at J, K, the logs are rabbeted again in precisely the same way, and again at L M, N O, and P Q. The mast should be as long as the boat, and at its base four and a half inches in diameter. Generally it consists of a small tree, a spruce fir, or something of that kind. The boom, seen in the completed picture, is almost as long as the mast, though more slender, and it must have a fork at its thickest end. A lighter bough, with a fork, three feet six-inches long, is needed as a rest for the boom.
Fig. 2., Fig.3., Fig. 4., Fig. 5., Fig. 6.
The mast is fixed at R in Fig. 1, and is secured as in Fig. 4. It stands in a hole four inches in diameter and four inches deep. A and B in Fig. 4 stand a foot away from the mast in holes three inches in diameter and three inches deep. A and B are each eighteen inches long, and C is a piece of two-inch plank eighteen inches wide, and it has a hole bored in it four inches in diameter to admit the mast. At S, T, U, V, in Fig. 1 holes are bored three inches in diameter exactly upon the middle of the next to the outermost log on each side of the boat. These are fitted with forked uprights, those at S and T are eight inches long; those at U and V are twelve inches long. At W, X, Y and Z in Fig. 1 bore holes three inches in diameter and three inches deep, W and X being one foot away from N, O. Two feet from W and X should be Y Z. a and b are holes of the same size over the middle logs of the boat. In W, X, Y and Z should be forked uprights fourteen inches long. In a and b are uprights sixteen inches long with a cross piece upon which to rest the oar of the steersman. Fig. 5 shows what the arrangements are with regard to these uprights. A little before the mast, on each side of the boat, a pole runs through the forks of the uprights. The ends of these poles are joined aft by a piece of one-inch plank, upon which sits the man at the helm. A shelter may be made with a piece of sailcloth or other material as shown in Fig. 6.
The helm consists of a pole four feet long, which is fixed at an angle of forty-five degrees to a piece of inch plank two feet long and eight inches wide, as shown in Fig. 7. It will be found that the vessel easily answers this helm, which is used like an oar. Along the mast the sail is nine feet long. It does not run on rings, but is nailed to the mast. The corner is tied securely to the end of the boom, whose length is ten feet. The boom rests with its fork upon the mast and is prevented from slipping away by a forked, upright support. It is an easy matter to unfurl the sail. Take the fork of the boom from the mast, and the sail collapses instantaneously. Much navigation can be learned in a vessel of this kind, and it may be that some future admiral will have his small beginnings in a craft of this homely character.