Chapter VII
The Work Shop
When the boys entered the shop door, the first thing for Phonny to do, was to look and see if his trap was safe. It was safe. It remained standing upon the horse-block where he had placed it.
“And now,” said Phonny, “the question is, where I am to find a box for a cage. I must go and look about.”
“And I must go and look at my hen-house,” said Stuyvesant.
Phonny proposed that Stuyvesant should go with him to find a box, and then help him make a cage, and after that, he would go, he said, and help Stuyvesant about the repairs of the hen-house.
“I must go and look at the hen-house first,” said Stuyvesant. “I can do that, while you are finding the box, and then I will help you.”
“Well,” said Phonny. “But – on the whole, I will go with you to look at it, and then you can go with me to find the box.”
So the boys walked along toward the hen-house together.
When they came to the place, they went in, and Stuyvesant proceeded to examine the premises very thoroughly. There were two doors of admission. One was a large one, for men and boys to go in at. The other was a very small one, a square hole in fact, rather than a door, and was intended for the hens.
This small opening had once been fitted with a sort of lid, which was attached by leather hinges on its upper edge to a wooden bar or cleat nailed to the side of the house, just over the square hole. This lid formed, of course, a sort of door, opening outward and upward. When up, it could be fastened in that position, by means of a wooden button. The button and the bar of wood remained in its place, but the door was gone.
“Where is the door?” asked Stuyvesant, after he had examined all this very carefully.
“Why, I took it off,” said Phonny, “to make a little stool of. I wanted a square board just about that size.”
“And did you make a stool?” asked Stuyvesant.
“No,” said Phonny. “I found that I could not bore the holes for the legs. I tried to bore a hole, but I split the board.”
“Then I must find another piece of board, somewhere,” said Stuyvesant.
Stuyvesant next turned his attention to the great door. He swung it to and fro, to see if the hinges were in order. They were. Next he shut it, but he found there was nothing to keep it shut.
“There used to be a button,” said Phonny.
“Where is the button now?” asked Stuyvesant.
“I don’t know,” said he. “Let me see; – it must be about here somewhere.”
So saying, Phonny began to look around upon the ground. There was some litter upon the ground, formed of sticks, straws, &c., and Phonny began to poke this litter about with his foot.
“I saw it lying down here somewhere, once,” said he, “but I can’t find it now.”
“Why didn’t you pick it up and put it away in some safe place?” said Stuyvesant, “or get it put on?”
“Why, I don’t know,” said Phonny. “You see we don’t want to shut up the hens much in the summer.”
“No,” replied Stuyvesant; “but it is a great deal better to have the doors all in order.”
“Why is it better?” asked Phonny.
“It is more satisfactory,” said Stuyvesant.
“Satisfactory!” repeated Phonny. “Hoh!”
Stuyvesant went into the hen-house. Phonny followed him in.
It was a small room, with a loft upon one side of it. The floor was covered with sticks, straw and litter. In one corner was a barrel, three quarters filled with hay. There were two or three bars overhead for the hens to roost upon. Stuyvesant looked around upon all these objects for a few minutes in silence, and then pointing up to the loft, he asked,
“What is up there?”
“That is the loft,” replied Phonny. “There is nothing up there.”
“How do you get up to see?” asked Stuyvesant.
“I can’t get up, except when Beechnut is here to boost me,” said Phonny.
“I mean to make a ladder,” said Stuyvesant.
“Hoh!” said Phonny, “you can’t make a ladder.”
“I will try, at any rate,” said Stuyvesant. Then after a short pause and a little more looking around, he added,
“Well, I am ready now to go and help you find your box. I see what I have got to do here.”
“What is it?” asked Phonny.
“I have got a small door to make, and a button for the large door, and a ladder to get up to the loft. Then I have got to clear the hen-house all out, and put it in order. What is in this barrel?”
“That is where the hens lay sometimes,” said Phonny, “when they don’t lay in the barn.”
So saying, Phonny walked into the corner where the barrel stood, and there he found three eggs in the nest.
“Three eggs,” said he. “I think Dorothy has not been out here to-day. That is the beginning of your profits. You can take two of them; we have to leave one for the nest-egg.”
Phonny proposed that Stuyvesant should carry the eggs in, and give them to Dorothy; but he said he would not do it then. He would leave them where they were for the present, and go and look for the box. Stuyvesant was intending to look, at the same time, for the materials necessary for his door, his ladder, and his button.
Phonny, accordingly, led the way, and Stuyvesant followed, into various apartments in the barns and sheds, where lumber was stored, or where it might be expected to be found. There were several boxes in these places, but some were too large, and others too small, and one, which seemed about right in respect to size, was made of rough boards, and so Phonny thought that it would not do.
At last he found some boxes under a corn-barn, one of which he thought would do very well. It was about two feet long, when laid down upon its side, and one foot wide and high. The open part was to be closed by a wire front which was yet to be made.
“Now,” said Phonny, “help me to get the box to the shop, and then Wallace is coming down to help me make it into a cage.”
So Phonny and Stuyvesant, working together, got the box into the shop. The bench had been cleared off, so that there was a good space there to put the box upon. Phonny and Stuyvesant placed it there, and then Phonny went to the trap to see if his squirrel was safe.
“Now, Frink,” said he, “we are going to make you a beautiful cage. Wait a little longer, and then we will let you out of that dark trap.”
Phonny said this as he passed across the floor toward the horse-block. As soon however as he came near to the trap, he suddenly called out to Stuyvesant,
“Why, Stuyvesant, see how big this hole is.”
He referred to the hole which the squirrel had begun to gnaw. Somehow or other the opening had grown very large. Phonny stooped down with his hands upon his knees and peeped into the trap.
The squirrel was gone.
“He’s gone!” said Phonny. “He’s gone!” So saying he lifted up the lid gradually, and then holding out the empty trap to Stuyvesant, he exclaimed again in a tone of despair, – “He’s gone!”
“He gnawed out,” said Stuyvesant.
“Yes,” said Phonny.
There were two windows in Phonny’s shop. One was over the work bench and was an ordinary window, formed with sashes. The other was merely a large square hole with a sort of lid or shutter opening upward and outward, like the small door of the hen-house. Phonny used to call this his shutter window. It was the place where he was accustomed to throw out his shavings.
Of course there was no glass in this window, and nothing to keep out the wind and rain when it was open. In stormy weather, therefore, it was always kept shut. The shavings which Phonny threw out here formed a little pile outside, and after accumulating for some time, Phonny used to carry them away and burn them.
As Phonny stood showing the empty cage to Stuyvesant, his back was turned toward this window, but Stuyvesant was facing it. Happening at that instant to glance upward, behold, there was the squirrel, perched at his ease upon a beam which passed along just over the window.
Stuyvesant did not say a word, but pointed to the place. Phonny looked up and saw the squirrel.
“Oo – oo – oo! – ” said Phonny.
“Shut the window,” he exclaimed. “Let us shut the window quick,” he added impatiently; and then creeping softly up to the place, he took hold of the prop which held the shutter up, and gently drawing it in, he let the shutter down into its place.
“Shut the other window,” said Phonny. “Climb up on the bench, Stivy, and shut the other window as quick as you can.”
Stuyvesant clambered up upon the bench and shut down the sash of the window.
“Now for the door,” said Phonny; and he ran to the door and shut it, looking round as he went, toward the squirrel. As soon as he got the door shut he seemed relieved.
“There,” said he, “we have got him safe. The only thing now is to catch him.”
Here followed quite a long consultation between the two boys, in respect to the course which it was now best to pursue. Phonny’s first plan was to put the trap upon the table and then for him and Stuyvesant to drive the squirrel into it. Stuyvesant however thought that that would be a very difficult operation.
“If the squirrel were a horse,” said he, “and the trap a barn, we might possibly get him in; but as it is, I don’t believe the thing can be done.”
Phonny next proposed to chase the squirrel round the shop until they caught him. Stuyvesant objected to this too.
“We should frighten him,” said he, “and make him very wild; and besides we might hurt him dreadfully in catching and holding him. Very likely we should pull his tail off.”
After considerable consultation, the boys concluded to let the squirrel remain for a time at liberty in the shop, taking care to keep the door and windows shut. They thought that by this means he would become accustomed to see them working about, and would grow tame; perhaps so tame that by-and-by, Phonny might catch him in his hand.
“And then, besides,” said Phonny, “we can set the trap for him here to-night, when we go away, and perhaps he will go into it, and get caught so before morning.”
“Then we mustn’t feed him any this afternoon,” said Stuyvesant. “He won’t go into the trap to-night, unless he is hungry.”
“Well,” said Phonny, “we won’t feed him. I will leave him to himself, and let him do what he pleases, and I’ll go to work and make my cage.”
Phonny’s plan for his cage was this. Stuyvesant helped him form it. He was to take some wire, a coil of which he found hanging up in the shed, and cut it into lengths suitable for the bars of his cage. Then he was going to bore a row of holes in the top of his box, near the front edge, with a small gimlet. These holes were to be about half an inch apart, and to be in a line about half an inch from the front edge of the top of the box. The wires were to be passed down through these holes, and then in the bottom of the box, at the points where the ends of those wires would come, respectively, he was to bore other holes, partly through the board, to serve as sockets to receive the lower ends of the wires.
This plan being all agreed upon, Phonny climbed up upon the bench, with his gimlet in his hand, and taking his seat upon the box, was beginning to bore the holes.
“Stop,” said Stuyvesant, “you ought to draw a line and mark off the places first.”
“Oh no,” said Phonny, “I can guess near enough.”
“Well,” said Stuyvesant, “though I don’t think that guessing is a good way.”
Phonny thought that it would take a great while to draw a line and measure off the distances, and so he went on with his boring, looking up, however, continually from his work, to watch the squirrel.
“And now,” said Stuyvesant, “I will begin my work.”
Stuyvesant accordingly went out, taking great care, as he opened and shut the door, not to let the squirrel escape. Presently he returned, bringing his materials. There was a short board for the small door, two long strips for the sides of the ladder, and another long strip, which was to be sawed up into lengths for the cross-bars.
Stuyvesant began first with his door. He went out to the hen-house, carrying with him an instrument called a square, on which feet and inches were marked. With this he measured the hole which his door was to cover, and then making proper allowance for the extension of the door, laterally, beyond the hole, he determined on the length to which he would saw off his board. He determined on the breadth in the same way.
He then went to the shop and sawed off the board to the proper length, and then, with the hatchet and plane, he trimmed it to the proper breadth. Next he made two hinges of leather, and nailed them on in their places, upon the upper side of the board. He then carried his work out to the hen-house, and nailed the ends of the hinges to the cross-bar provided for them. When this was all done, he turned the lid up and fastened it into its place.
Then, standing up, he surveyed his work with a look of satisfaction, and said,
“There!”
He returned to the shop again. When he came to the door he opened it a very little way, and paused, calling out to Phonny, to know if the squirrel was anywhere near.
“No,” said Phonny, “come in.”
So he went in. The squirrel had run along the beams to the back part of the shop, and was nibbling about there among some blocks of wood.
“I have a great mind to feed him,” said Phonny. “He is hungry.”
“Well,” said Stuyvesant.
So Phonny took the ear of corn out of the trap, and breaking it into two or three pieces he carried the parts into the back part of the shop, and put them at different places on the beams. Then he crept back to his work again.
Stuyvesant went to work making his button. He selected a proper piece of wood, sawed it off of the proper length, and then shaped it into the form of a button by means of a chisel, working, in doing this, at the bench. As soon as this operation was completed, he took a large gimlet and bored a hole through the center of the button. He measured very carefully to find the exact center of the button, before he began to bore.
When the button was finished, Stuyvesant looked in Phonny’s nail-box to find a large screw, and when he had found one, he took the screw-driver and went out to the hen-house and screwed the button on. When the screw was driven home to its place, Stuyvesant shut the door and buttoned it. Then standing before it with his screw-driver in his hand, he surveyed his work with another look of satisfaction, and said,
“There! there are two good jobs done.”
He then opened and shut his two doors, both the large and the small one, to see once more whether they worked well. They did work perfectly well, so he turned away and went back toward the shop again, saying,
“Now for the ladder.”
He went back to the shop and entered cautiously as before. He found that Phonny had bored quite a number of holes, and was now engaged in cutting his wire into lengths. He used for this purpose a pair of cutting-plyers, as they are called, an instrument formed much like a pair of nippers. The instrument was made expressly for cutting off wire.
Stuyvesant came to the place where Phonny was at work, and stood near him a few minutes looking on. He perceived that the holes were not in a straight line, nor were they equidistant from each other. He, however, said nothing about it, but soon went to his own work again.
He took the piece of wood which he had selected to make his cross-bars of, and began to consider how many cross-bars he could make from it.
“What is that piece of wood for?” asked Phonny.
“It is for the cross-bars of my ladder,” said Stuyvesant.
“The cross-bars of a ladder ought to be round,” said Phonny. “They always make them round. In fact they call them rounds.”
“Yes,” said Stuyvesant, “I know they do, but I can’t make rounds very well. And besides if I could, I could not make the holes in the side-pieces to put them into. So I am going to make them square, and nail them right on.”
“Hoh!” said Phonny, “that is no way to make a ladder. You can bore the holes easily enough. Here. I’ll show you how. I’ve got an auger.”
So saying, Phonny jumped down from the bench and went and climbed up upon the chopping-block to get down an auger. Phonny had two augers, and they both hung over the block. He took down one and began very eagerly to bore a hole into the side of the chopping-block. He bored in a little way, and then, in attempting to draw the auger out, to clear the hole of chips, the handle came off, leaving the auger itself fast in the hole.
“Ah! this auger is broken,” said Phonny, “I forgot that. I could bore a hole if the auger was not broken.”
“Never mind,” said Stuyvesant, “I don’t think I could make a ladder very well in that way, and don’t like to undertake any thing that I can’t accomplish. So I will make it my way.”
Stuyvesant went out to the hen-house, and measured the height of the loft. He found it to be seven feet. He concluded to have his ladder eight feet long, and to have six cross-bars, one foot apart, the upper and lower cross-bars to be one foot from the ends of the ladder. The cross-bars themselves being about two inches wide each, the breadth of the whole six would be just one foot. This Stuyvesant calculated would make just the eight feet.
Stuyvesant then went back to the shop. He found that the pieces which he had chosen for the sides of the ladder were just about eight feet long.
Phonny came to him while he was measuring, to see what he was going to do.
“How wide are you going to have your ladder?” said he.
“I don’t know,” said Stuyvesant. “I am going to have it as wide as I can.”
So saying, Stuyvesant took down the piece which he had intended for the cross-bars.
“I am going to divide this into six equal parts,” said he, “because I must have six bars.”
So Stuyvesant began to measure. The piece of wood, he found, was eight feet long, – the same as the side pieces of the ladder.
“And now, how are you going to divide it?” said Phonny.
“Why, eight feet,” said Stuyvesant, “make ninety-six inches. I must divide that by six.”
So he took a pencil from his pocket and wrote down the figures 96 upon a board; he divided the number by 6.
“It will go 16 times,” said he. “I can have 16 inches for each cross bar.”
Stuyvesant then measured off sixteen inches, and made a mark, then he measured off sixteen inches more, and made another mark. In the same manner, he proceeded until he had divided the whole piece into portions of sixteen inches each. He then took a saw and sawed the piece off at every place where he had marked.
“There,” said he, “there are my cross-bars!”
“What good cross-bars,” said Phonny. “That was an excellent way to make them.”
Chapter VIII
A Discovery
While the boys were at work in this manner, Stuyvesant making his ladder, and Phonny his cage, they suddenly heard some one opening the door. Wallace came in. Phonny called out to him to shut the door as quick as possible. Wallace did so, while Phonny, in explanation of the urgency of his injunction in respect to the door, pointed up to the squirrel, which was then creeping along, apparently quite at his ease, upon one of the beams in the back part of the shop.
“Why, Bunny,” said Wallace.
“His name is not Bunny,” said Phonny. “His name is Frink.”
“Frink,” repeated Wallace. “Who invented that name?”
“I don’t know,” replied Phonny, “only Beechnut said that his name was Frink. See the cage I am making for him.”
Wallace came up and looked at the cage. He stood a moment surveying it in silence. Then he turned toward Stuyvesant.
“And what is Stuyvesant doing?” said he.
“He is making a ladder.”
“What is it for, Stuyvesant?” said Wallace.
“Why, it is to go upon the loft, in the hen-house,” said Phonny, “though I don’t see what good it will do, to go up there.”
“So it is settled, that you are going to have the hen-house,” said Wallace, looking toward Stuyvesant.
“Yes,” said Stuyvesant.
Here there was another long pause. Wallace was looking at the ladder. He observed how carefully Stuyvesant was making it. He saw that the cross-bars were all exactly of a length, and he knew that they must have been pretty accurately measured. While Wallace was looking on, Stuyvesant was measuring off the distances upon the side pieces of the ladder, so as to have the steps of equal length. Wallace observed that he did this all very carefully.
Wallace then looked back to Phonny’s work. He saw that Phonny was guessing his way along. The holes were not equidistant from each other, and then they were not at the same distance from the edge of the board. As he had advanced along the line, he had drawn gradually nearer and nearer to the edge, and, what was a still greater difficulty, the holes in the lower board, which was to form the bottom of the cage, since their places too had been guessed at, did not correspond with those above, so that the wires, when they came to be put in, inclined some this way, and some that. In some places the wires came very near together, and in others the spaces between them were so wide, that Wallace thought that the squirrel, if by any chance he should ever get put into the cage, would be very likely to squeeze his way out.
Then, besides, Phonny had not measured his wires in respect to length, but had cut them off of various lengths, taking care however not to have any of them too short. The result was that the ends of the wires projected to various distances above the board, presenting a ragged and unworkmanlike appearance.
Wallace was silent while he was looking at these things. He was thinking of the difference between the two boys. The train of thought which was passing through his mind was somewhat as follows.
Stuyvesant is younger than Phonny, and he was brought up in a city, and yet he seems a great deal more of a man; which is very strange. In the first place he takes a great deal more interest in the hens, which are useful and productive animals, than he does in the squirrel, which is a mere plaything. Then he plans his work carefully, considers how much he can probably accomplish himself, and undertakes no more. He plans, he calculates, he measures, and then proceeds steadily and perseveringly till he finishes.
In the midst of these reflections, Wallace was called away by Phonny, as follows.
“Cousin Wallace, I wish you would finish my cage for me. I am tired of boring all these holes, and besides I can’t bore them straight.”
Wallace looked at the work a moment in uncertainty. He did not like to throw away his own time in finishing an undertaking so clumsily begun, and on the other hand, he did not like very well to refuse to help Phonny out of his difficulties. He finally concluded to undertake the work. So he took the cage down from the bench and put it upon the floor; he borrowed the iron square and the compasses from Stuyvesant; he ruled a line along the top of the box at the right distance from the edge, and marked off places for the holes, half an inch apart, along this line, pricking in, at the places for the holes, deep, with one of the points of the compass. When this had all been done he went on boring the holes.
Stuyvesant was now ready to nail the cross-bars to the side pieces of the ladder. He asked Phonny where he kept his nails. Phonny showed him a box where there was a great quantity of nails of all sizes, some crooked and some straight, some whole and some broken, and all mixed up in confusion with a mass of old iron, such as rings, parts of hinges, old locks and fragments of keys. Stuyvesant selected from this mass a nail, of the size that he thought was proper, and then went to his ladder to apply it, to see whether it would do.
“It is too large,” said Phonny.
“No,” said Stuyvesant, “it is just right. I want the nail to go through and come out on the other side, so that I can clinch it.”
“You can’t clinch such nails as these,” said Phonny. “They are cut nails, and they will break off if you try to clinch them.”
“But I shall soften them first,” said Stuyvesant.
“Soften them!” said Phonny, “how can you do that?”
“By putting them in the fire,” said Stuyvesant.
“He can’t soften them, can he, Wallace?” said Phonny.
“Yes,” said Wallace, “he can soften them so that they will clinch.”
This was true. What are called cut-nails, are made by machinery. They are cut from flat-bars or plates of iron, almost red-hot, by a massive and ponderous engine carried by water. At the same instant that the nail is cut off from the end of the plate by the cutting part of the engine, the end of it is flattened into a head by another part, which comes up suddenly and compresses the iron at that end with prodigious force. The nail is then dropped, and it falls down, all hot, into a box made to receive it below.
The prodigious pressure to which the hot iron is subjected in the process of making cut-nails, seems as it were to press the particles of iron closer together, and make the metal more compact and hard. The consequence is, that such nails are very stiff, and if bent much, they break off. This is no disadvantage, provided that the wood to be nailed is such that the nail is to be driven straight into the substance of it to its whole length. In fact, this hardness and stiffness is an advantage, for, in consequence of these properties, the nail is less likely to bend under the hammer.
When, however, the nailing to be done is of such a kind that it becomes necessary that the nail should pass through the wood so as to come out upon the other side, to be clinched there, the stiffness of the iron in a cut-nail constitutes a serious difficulty; for the end of the nail where it comes through, instead of bending over and sinking into the wood, as it ought to do, at first refuses to bend at all, and then when the workman attempts to force it to bond by dint of heavier blows with the hammer, it breaks off entirely.
To remedy this difficulty, it is found best to heat nails intended for clinching before driving them. By heating the iron red hot, the metal seems to expand to its original condition of ductile iron, and it loses the extreme hardness and stiffness which was given to it by the force and compression of the nail-making machine.
Stuyvesant had seen a carpenter in New York heating some nails on one occasion, and he had asked him the reason. He, therefore, understood the whole process, and his plan was now, after selecting his nails, to go and heat them red-hot in the kitchen-fire.
He made a little calculation first in respect to the number of nails that he should want. There were six cross-bars. These bars were to be nailed at both ends. This would make twelve nailings. Stuyvesant concluded that he would have four nails at each nailing, and multiplying twelve by four, he found that forty-eight was the number of the nails that he should require. To be sure to have enough, he counted out fifty-two. Some might break, and perhaps some would be lost in the fire.
Phonny felt a considerable degree of interest in Stuyvesant’s plan of softening the nails, and so he left Wallace to go on boring the holes, while he went with Stuyvesant into the house.
“You never can get so many nails out of the fire in the world,” said Phonny. “They will be lost in the ashes.”
“I shall put them on the shovel,” said Stuyvesant.
When they got into the kitchen, Stuyvesant went to Dorothy, who was still ironing at a table near the window, and asked her if he might use her shovel and her fire to heat some nails.
“Certainly,” said Dorothy. “I will go and move the flat-irons out of the way for you.”
Stuyvesant was always very particular whenever he went into the kitchen, to treat Dorothy with great respect. He regarded the kitchen as Dorothy’s peculiar and proper dominion, and would have considered it very rude and wrong to have been noisy in it, or to take possession of, and use without her leave, the things which were under her charge there. Dorothy observed this, and was very much pleased with it, and as might naturally be expected, she was always glad to have Stuyvesant come into the kitchen, and do any thing that he pleased there.
There was a large forestick lying across the andirons, with a burning bed of coals below. Directly in front of these coals was a row of flat-irons. Stuyvesant put his nails upon a long-handled shovel, and Dorothy moved away one of the flat-irons, so that he could put the shovel, with the nails upon it, in among the burning coals.
“Now,” said he, “it will take some time for them to get hot, and I will go and clear out the floor of the hen-house in the meanwhile.”
“Well,” said Phonny, “I will help you.”
“Only,” said Stuyvesant, turning to Dorothy, “will you look at the nails when you take up your irons, and if you see that they get red-hot, take the shovel out from the coals and set it down somewhere on the hearth to cool?”
“Yes,” said Dorothy, “but what are you going to heat the nails for?”
“To take the stiffness out of them,” said Stuyvesant.
“To take the stiffness out?” replied Dorothy. “What do you wish to do that for?”
“So that I can clinch them,” replied Stuyvesant, “and I should like to have you take them off the fire as soon as you see that they are red-hot.”
“Yes,” said Dorothy, “I will.”
So Phonny and Stuyvesant went away, while Dorothy resumed her ironing.
They got a wheel-barrow and a rake, and went out to the hen-house. They raked the floor all over, drawing out the old straw, sticks, &c., to the door. They then with a fork pitched this rubbish into the wheel-barrow, and wheeled it out, and made a heap of it in a clear place at some distance from the buildings, intending to set it on fire. There were four wheel-barrow loads of it in all.
They then went into the barn and brought out a quantity of hay, and sprinkled it all over the floor of the hen-house, which made the apartment look extremely neat and comfortable. They then brought out another fork-full of hay and pitched it up upon the loft.
“There!” said Stuyvesant, “now when we have got our ladder done, we will climb up and spread it about.”
“Hark!” said Phonny.
“What is that?” said Stuyvesant.
“It sounded like a hen clucking. I wonder if it is possible that there is a hen up there.”
“We will see,” said Stuyvesant, “when we get our ladder done.”
“Yes,” said Phonny, “we must go and finish our ladder; and the nails – it is time to go and get the nails or they will be all burnt up.”