I'se got bad luck, dat's what I has."
"Nonsense!" exclaimed Tom. "The sawmill will be going in a moment.
All I have to do is to throw it into gear. See here, Rad. When you
want the saw to go you just throw this handle forward. That makes
the gears mesh."
"What's dat 'bout mush?" asked Eradicate.
"Mesh--not mush. I mean it makes the cogs fit together. See," and
Tom pressed the lever. In an instant, with a musical whirr, the saw
began revolving.
"Hurrah! Dere it goes! Golly! see de saw move!" cried the delighted
colored man. He seized a stick of wood, and in a trice it was sawed
through.
"Whoop!" yelled Eradicate. "I'm sabed now! Bless yo', Mistah Swift,
yo' suttinly am a wondah!"
"Now I'll show you how it works," went on Tom. "When you want to
stop Boomerang, you just pull this handle. That locks the tread, and
he can't move it," and, suiting the action to his words, Tom stopped
the mill. "Then," he went on, "when you want him to move, you pull
the handle this way," and he showed the darky how to do it. In a
moment the mule was moving again. Then Tom illustrated how to throw
the saw in and out of gear, and in a few minutes the sawmill was in
full operation, with a most energetic colored man feeding in logs to
be cut up into stove lengths.
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