tion at once. Tools were wanting; he set to
work and made them.

For fuel he had the wreck; for motive force the water; for his bellows
the wind; for his anvil a stone; for art his instinct; for power his
will.

He entered with ardour upon his sombre labours.

The weather seemed to smile upon his work. It continued to be dry and
free from equinoctial gales. The month of March had come, but it was
tranquil. The days grew longer. The blue of the sky, the gentleness of
all the movements of the scene, the serenity of the noontide, seemed to
exclude the idea of mischief. The waves danced merrily in the sunlight.
A Judas kiss is the first step to treachery; of such caresses the ocean
is prodigal. Her smile, like that of woman's sometimes, cannot be
trusted.

There was little wind. The hydraulic bellows worked all the better for
that reason. Much wind would have embarrassed rather than aided it.
Gilliatt had a saw; he manufactured for himself a file. With the saw he
attacked the wood; with the file the metal. Then he availed himself of
the two iron hands of the smith--the pincers and the pliers. The pincers
gripe, the pliers handle; the one is like the closed hand, the other
like the fingers. By degrees he made for himself a number of
auxiliaries, and constructed his armour. With a piece of hoop-wood he
made a screen for his forge-fire.

One of his principal labours was the sorting and repair of pulleys. He
mended both the blocks and the sheaves of tackle. He cut down the
irregularities of all broken joists, and reshaped the extremities. He
had, as we have said, for the necessities of his carpentry, a quantity
of pieces of wood, stored away, and arranged according to the forms, the
dimensions, and the nature of their grain; the oak on one side, the pine
on the other; the short pieces like riders, separated from the straight
pieces like binding strakes. This formed his reserve of supports and
levers, of which he might stand in great need at any moment.

Any one who intends to construct hoisting tackle ought to provide
himself with beams and small cables. But that is not sufficient. He must
have cordage. Gilliatt restored the cables, large and small. He frayed
out the tattered sails, and succeeded in converting them into an
excellent yarn, of which he made twine. With this he joined the ropes.
The joins, however, were liable to rot. It was necessary, therefore, to
hasten to make use of these cables. He had only been able