Page:The crater; or, Vulcan's peak.djvu/161

 155 CHAPTER XI. &quot;The globe around earth s hollow surface shakes, And is the ceiling of her sleeping sons: O er devastation we blind revels keep ; While buried towns support the dancer s heel.&quot; YOUNG. IT was again mid-summer ere Mark Woolston had his boat ready for launching. Pie had taken things leisurely, and completed his work in all its parts, before he thought of putting the craft into the water. Afraid of worms, he used some of the old copper on this boat, too; and he painted her, inside and out, not only with fidelity, but with taste. Although there was no one but Kitty to talk to, he did not forget to paint the name which he had given to his new vessel, in her stern-sheets, where he could always see it. She was called the &quot; Bridget Yardley ;&quot; and, notwith standing the unfavourable circumstances in which she had been put together, Mark thought she did no discredit to her beautiful namesake, when completed. When he had everything finished, even to mast and sails, of the last of which he fitted her with mainsail and jib, the young man set about his preparations for getting his vessel afloat. There was no process by which one man could move a boat of the size of the Bridget, while out of its proper ele ment, but to launch it by means of regular ways. With a view to this contingency, the keel had been laid between the ways of the Neshamony, which were now all ready to be used. Of course it was no great job to make a cradle for a boat, and our boat-builder had wedged up, and got the keel of his craft off the blocks, within eight-and-forty hours after he had begun upon that part of his task. It only remained to knock away the spur-shores and start the boat. Until that instant, Mark had pursued his work on the Bridget as mechanically and steadily as if hired by the day. When, however, he perceived that he was so