h its thin edge tucked under the thick edge
of the one above.

The men put on clapboards very fast, and David was so interested in
seeing them do it that he forgot that the foreman had not come back
for him.

He had gone up nearer, so as to see just how the clapboards went on,
when he heard the foreman's voice behind him.

"Well, Davie," said the foreman, "do you think you could put on
clapboards as fast as that?"

David shook his head.

"No, I couldn't."

"Perhaps not. But come on, and we'll see what you can do with
shingles."

And the foreman took David's small hand in his big one, and they went
to where a ladder stood leaning against the edge of the piazza roof.

A little way below the edge of the roof there was a rough sort of a
platform, made of two boards laid on some other boards that were
nailed to the posts of the piazza and to long sticks which went up and
down and had their ends resting on the ground.

This was what the carpenters called a staging or scaffolding, and when
they got through their work, they would take it down.

"Now, Davie," said the foreman, "you take hold of the rungs and climb
up. It's a pretty long stretch for little legs, but I'll hold you, and
I won't let you fall. Don't look down. Look up."

So David took hold of a rung and stretched his leg as high as it would
go, and he managed to get his foot on the first rung.

Then he pulled himself up and reached up with one hand and took hold
of the next rung; and then he put his other hand up, and he stretched
his leg up as high as it would go, and he stepped up another rung.

The rungs of a ladder are the little round sticks that go across that
you put your feet on.

David climbed very slowly, and he was rather scared at first; but he
felt the foreman's arm around him, and the foreman kept just behind
him, so that he stopped being scared.

And he climbed a little faster, and he came to the platform.

"Now, what shall I do?" he asked.

"Now you hold your breath," the foreman said, "and I'll put you over
on to the staging."

So Davie held his breath and one of the shingle men came and held him
by the arms when the foreman had set him down upon the boards.

Then the foreman stepped upon the staging and put his arm around David
again.

"There!" said the foreman. "You've climbed your first ladder. Now
we'll see about the shingling."

There was a whole bundle of shingles on the staging, and another
bundle that had been ope