Round-about Rambles in Lands of Fact and Fancy Part 15

Nowhere on the face of the earth are there such trees as these. Some of them stand over four hundred feet high, and are thirty feet in diameter!

Their age is believed to be about eighteen hundred years. Think of it!

They have been growing there during the whole of the Christian era!

One of them, the very largest of all, has been lying on the ground for about one hundred and fifty years. When it was standing its diameter was about forty feet.

Another trunk, which is lying on the ground, has been hollowed out by fire, and through this great bore or tube a whole company of hors.e.m.e.n has ridden.

One of these trees was cut down some years ago by a party of men, who, I think, should have been sent to prison for the deed. It took five men twenty-five days to cut it through with augers and saws, and then they were obliged to use a great wedge and a battering-ram to make it fall.

These are the kings of all trees. After such a grand sight, we will not want to see any more trees to-day, and we will leave the forests of Far-away and sit and think of them under our humble grape-vines and honeysuckles.

BUILDING SHIPS.

[Ill.u.s.tration: BOAT BUILDING.]

It is a grand thing to own great ships, and to send them over the ocean to distant countries; but I will venture to say that few men have derived so much pleasure from their fine vessels, laden with all kinds of valuable freight, as many a boy has had in the possession of a little schooner, which would be overloaded with a quart of chestnuts. And it is not only in the ownership of these little crafts that boys delight; they enjoy the building of them quite as much.

And a boy who can build a good ship is not to be laughed at by any mechanic or architect, no matter how tall or how old he may be.

The young ship-builder who understands his trade, when he is about to put a vessel on the stocks--to speak technically--first makes up his mind whether it is to be a ship, a schooner, a sloop, or merely a sail-boat, and determines its size. Then he selects a good piece of solid, but light wood, which will be large enough for the hull. Pine is generally used; but if he can get a piece of well-seasoned white willow, he will find it to work very easily. Then he shapes his hull with knife and saw, according to the best of his ability. On this process the success of the whole undertaking depends. If the bottom is not cut perfectly true on both sides, if the bow is not shapely and even, if the stern is not rounded off and cut up in the orthodox fashion, his ship will never sail well, no matter how admirably he may execute the rest of his work. If there is a ship or boat builder's establishment anywhere within reasonable walking distance, it will well pay our young shipwright to go there, and study the forms of hulls. Even if he should never build a ship, he ought to know how they look out of the water.

When the hull is properly shaped it must be hollowed out. This is done by means of a "gouge," or chisel with a curved edge. A small vessel can be hollowed by means of a knife or ordinary chisel, but it is best to have a "gouge," if there is much wood to be taken out. When he has made the interior of his vessel as deep and wide as he thinks proper, he will put a deck on it, if it is a ship or a schooner; but if it is a sail-boat or sloop, he will probably only put in seats (or "thwarts," as the sailors call them), or else half-deck it.

Then comes the most interesting part of the work--the rigging. First the masts, which must be light and tapering, and standing back at a slight angle, are set up, and the booms and yards are attached. A great deal of ingenuity can be displayed: in making the booms work well on the masts. The bowsprit is a simple matter, and the stays, or ropes which support and strengthen the masts, are very easily attached, as they are stationary affairs. But the working-tackle and the sails will show whether our young friend has a genius for boat-building or not. If his vessel has but a single mast, and he merely makes a mainsail and a jib, he will not have much trouble; but if he intends to fit out a schooner, a brig, or a ship, with sails that will work (and where is the boy with soul so dead as to have any other kind?), he will find that he will have a difficult job before him. But if he tries hard, and examines the construction and working of sails in real ships, he will also find that he can do it.

If the vessel is a fine one, she ought to be painted (this, of course, to be done before the sails are finally fastened to the booms and yards), and her name should be tastefully painted on her stern, where of course, a rudder, carefully working on little hooks, is already hung.

It will be very difficult to tell when the ship will be actually finished. There will always be a great deal to do after you think all is done. Flags must be made, and little halyards running nicely through little pulleys or rings; ballast must be provided and adjusted; conveniences for storing away freight, if the ship is large and voyages are contemplated, must be provided; a crew; perhaps a little cannon for salutes; an anchor and windla.s.s, and I am sure I cannot tell you what else besides, will be thought of before the ship is done.

But it will be done some time, and then comes the happy hour!

If the owner is fortunate enough to live near a pond or a brook, so that he can send her right across to where his partner stands ready to receive her, he is a lucky boy indeed.

What a proud moment, when, with all sails set and her rudder fixed at the proper angle, she is launched!

How straight she sits in the water, and how her little streamer begins to float in the wind! Now see her sails gradually puff out! She moves gently from the sh.o.r.e. Now she bends over a little as the wind fills her sails, and she is off! Faster and faster she glides along, her cut.w.a.ter rippling the water in front of her, and her flags fluttering bravely in the air; and her delighted owner, with laughing eyes, beholds her triumphantly scudding over the surface of the pond!

I tell you what it is, boys, I have built a great many ships, and I feel very much like building another.

THE ORANG-OUTANG.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

The Orang-outang and the Chimpanzee approach nearer to man in their formation and disposition than any other animals, and yet these Apes seldom evince as much apparent sense and good feeling as the dog or elephant. They imitate man very often, but they exhibit few inherent qualities which should raise them to the level of many of man's brute companions.

I do not wish, however, to cast any aspersions on an animal generally so good-tempered and agreeable in captivity as the Orang-outang. What he might become, after his family had been for several generations in a condition of domestic servitude, I cannot tell. He might then even surpa.s.s the dog in his attachment to man and his general intelligence.

At all events, the Orang-outang has a certain sense of humor which is not possessed by animals in general. He is very fond of imitating people, and sometimes acts in the most grotesque and amusing way, but, like many human wits of whom we read, his manner is always very solemn, even when performing his funniest feats.

An old gentleman once went to see a very large and fine Orang-outang, and was very much surprised when the animal approached him, and taking his hat and his cane from him, put on the hat, and, with the cane in his hand, began to walk up and down the room, imitating, as nearly as possible, the gait and figure of his venerable visitor.

There was another Orang-outang, who belonged to a missionary, who performed a trick even more amusing than this. His master was preaching one Sunday to his congregation, when Mr. Orang-outang, having escaped from the room where he had been shut up, slipped very quietly into the church, and climbed up on the top of the organ, just over the pulpit, where his master was delivering his sermon. After looking about him for a minute or two, the ape commenced to imitate the preacher, making all his gestures and motions. Of course the people began to smile when they saw this, and the minister, thinking that they were behaving very improperly, rebuked them for their inattention, and preached away more earnestly than before. The Orang-outang, of course, followed his example, and commenced to gesticulate so earnestly and powerfully that the congregation burst into laughter, and pointed out the irreverent ape.

When he turned and saw the performance of his imitator, the preacher could not help laughing himself, and the Orang-outang, after a good deal of time had been spent in catching him, was put out of church, and the services went on as usual.

n.o.body likes to be made an object of ridicule, and it is probable that this disposition of making fun of people, which seems so natural to the Orang-outang, would prevent his becoming a domesticated member of our families, no matter how useful and susceptible of training he might prove to be.

Nearly all of us have some comical peculiarity, and we would not want an animal in the house who would be sure, at some time, to expose us to laughter by his imitative powers.

So I am afraid that the Orang-outangs, intelligent as they are, will have to stay in the woods.

LITTLE BRIDGET'S BATH.

Little Bridget was a good girl and a pretty one, but she had ideas of her own. She liked to study her lessons, to mind her mother, and to behave herself as a little girl should, but she did despise to be washed. There was something about the very smell of soap and the touch of water which made her shrink and shiver, and she would rather have seen the doctor come to her with a teaspoonful of medicine than to have her Aunt Ann approach with a bowlful of water, a towel, and a great piece of soap.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

For a long time little Bridget believed that there was no escape from this terrible daily trial, but one bright morning, when she awoke very early, long before any one else in the house, she thought that it was too bad, when everything else was so happy,--when the birds and b.u.t.terflies were flying about so gayly in the early sunbeams, and the flowers were all so gay and bright, and smelling so sweet and contented, that she should have to lie there on her little bed until her Aunt Ann came with that horrible soap and towel! She made up her mind! She wouldn't stand it; she would run away before she came to wash her. For one morning she would be happy.

So up she jumped, and without stopping to dress herself, ran out among the birds and flowers.

She rambled along by the brook, where the sand felt so nice and soft to her bare feet; she wandered through the woods, where she found blackberries and wild strawberries, and beautiful ferns; and she wandered on and on, among the rocks and the trees, and over the gra.s.s and the flowers, until she sat down by a great tree to rest. Then, without intending anything of the kind, she went fast asleep.

She had not slept more than five minutes, before along came a troop of fairies, and you may be a.s.sured that they were astonished enough to see a little girl lying fast asleep on the gra.s.s, at that time in the morning.

"Well, I never!" said the largest fairy, who was the Princ.i.p.al One.

"Nor I," said the Next Biggest; "It's little Bridget, and with such a dirty face! Just look! She has been eating blackberries and strawberries--and raspberries too, for all I know; for you remember, brother, that a face dirtied with raspberries is very much like one dirtied with strawberries."

"Very like, indeed, brother," said the Princ.i.p.al One, "and look at her feet! She's been walking in the wet sand!"

"And her hands!" cried the Very Least, "what hands! They're all smeared over with mixtures of things."

"Well," said the Next Biggest, "she is certainly a dirty little girl, but what's to be done?"

"Done?" said the Princ.i.p.al One. "There is only one thing to be done, and that is to wash her. There can be no doubt about that."