Pieces of shingle, whittled to a sharp edge, did very well for chisels, and no mallets were called for. It was easy to work that kind of marble, and it was just as Joe Larkin had said about mending it. He had to carve Ben's nose for him over and over again, and the last time he shaved it smooth with his jackknife.
"We'll make his hair long, Burr, and lots of it. That'll help hold his head up stiff, and we won't have to cut out so much coat collar. I say, you've made his arm on that side twice as big as this one."
"I can scrape it down. What'll we do for buttons?"
"Boys," said Joe, "pack a lot of round, hard snow-balls, and cut 'em in two. They wore the biggest kind of buttons when Ben was alive; big as dollars."
"How about his hat?"
"He'll look better bare-headed. You can't make a snow brim stay on—not unless it's three or four inches thick, and that won't do."
Joe was giving special attention just then to the parting of Benjamin Franklin's hair, but in a moment more he sang out, "Look here, boys, he never was as fat as all that."
They had been digging away industriously at their part of the great patriot, but they had carefully put on quite as much snow marble as they had cut away. They had made Ben look more like Daniel Lambert than anybody else; but Joe Larkin came down now, and he speedily effected a wholesome change.
"Looks as if he could lift himself and get up now."
"Well, ye—es," said Burr, doubtfully; "but what about his legs? We haven't left any room for 'em."