Chapter II: Part 2

“You know what you are doing, go ahead,” said Donald; and Polly went ahead. She made another disk exactly like Figure 1 and cut both out carefully. She used a sharp pocketknife for cutting the slots and a ruler to guide the knife along the lines. Then she made her buckets, six of them, like Figure 2. First she drew a square that measured exactly two inches on each edge. This was for the bottom of the bucket. On each side of the square she added extensions three-eighths of an inch wide and one and one-half inches long, placing them at equal distances from the top and bottom edges of the square. (G G, Figure 2.) At the top of the square she added an oblong one-half inch wide and extending all the way across. The dotted line in Figure 2 shows where this oblong is to be bent up to form the front of the bucket. Along each side line of the square, at equal distances from the ends of the extension, she made slots five-eighths of an inch long. (H H, Figure 2.) The bolts, two for each bucket, she made like Figure 3. The upper part of each bolt was one inch long and three-eighths of an inch wide and the lower part was half an inch square.

“It is all ready now. See how easy it is to put together, Donald,” said Polly, as she bent up the front of a bucket and slipped one of its extensions through a slot in one of the disks and the other extension through a slot in the other disk, and then secured them in place by sliding a bolt through the slot in each extension. (Fig. 7.)

“Better glue those bolts down,” said Donald. “When the wheel turns fast they may drop out.”

By this time Donald had gathered together all the materials for his sand tower. For the base of the tower he used an empty cigar box, eight inches long and two and one-quarter inches deep, and for the reservoir a cocoa can four inches high and two inches wide at the narrow sides. On each of the wide sides of the can, about one and one-half inches from the top and at equal distances from the side edges, he made a hole by driving a large wire nail through the tin. (I, Figure 4.) In the bottom he cut with a can opener a large hole, as shown in Figure 4. This hole is not in the middle, but at the back, left-hand corner as the can stands upside down. (Figure 4.)

“The funnel goes through this hole,” Donald said. “I have made a funnel for the sand because it holds more than the can and because only a part of the sand will run out of the can without it.”

Donald made the funnel of a piece of strong paper twelve inches square. He twisted this into a cornucopia and then trimmed it off evenly at the top and cut the point off at the bottom. He enlarged the bottom opening several times in order to allow a sufficient flow of sand to turn the wheel easily. The lapped edges he pasted securely together. To hold the reservoir up he whittled out of an old shingle two uprights like Figure 5. Each upright was thirteen and one-half inches long and three-quarters of an inch wide, except at the top, where it widened out to one inch. Three-quarters of an inch from the top edge he bored a hole large enough to admit a very large, spikelike wire nail a little over four inches long and quite thick.

“I am going to spike these on,” Donald said, thrusting the large nail through the hole in one upright, then through both holes in the can and through the hole in the other upright. “It is a little loose, though,” he continued, shaking the can.

“Put a cork on the end of the spike,” said Polly; “that will hold it.” Donald took her advice and pushed a large, flat cork up on the nail until it fitted snugly against the tin and held it firmly in place. Then he took up the cigar box. “Will you make a hole in this for the shaft of the wheel, Polly? Put it just here,” he said, indicating a spot two and one-half inches from the top and half an inch from the left-hand edge as the box stands on end. (J, Figure 6.) “Bore it with a hot wire nail; it will make a smoother surface than the gimlet.”

Then Polly, holding her hot nail with a pair of pincers, burned a small round hole in the cigar box and also the hole K in the front upright, Figure 8. This front upright, which was to hold the outer end of the wheel shaft, Donald had whittled from a shingle. He made it six and one-quarter inches high, with a base three and one-half inches wide. Polly was careful to have the hole in the upright the same distance from the bottom of the box, so that the shaft of the wheel would be perfectly horizontal when put through the two holes. Donald used small wire nails for fastening the side uprights to the cigar box. He removed the lid of the box, so that he could easily get at the inside, then drove the nails through the uprights into the side, top and bottom edges of the box. (Figure 6.)

“I think we will have to nail the tower and other things to a board,” he said. “They will never stand firm on the sand.” A suitable piece of board could not be found, but Polly begged an old pastry board from the cook and that made a fine flooring for their machinery. Donald stood the sand tower on the board at the left-hand front corner, with the cigar box base just six and one-half inches from the front edge and four inches from the side edge of the board. “I can tack this down from the inside of the box,” he said, and using two good sized carpet tacks he drove them through the end of the box into the board. “Now get a shaft for your wheel, Polly, and we will put the wheel up before I nail the front upright in place.”

Polly had secured for the shaft of her wheel a long, slender paint brush handle. The brush was a No. 2 bristle oil paint brush, and had cost five cents when new. Exactly at the center of each disk of the wheel she made a puncture and then gradually and with great care pushed her shaft through until the wheel was in the middle and on the largest part of the shaft. Then she cut a medium-sized cork into three slices. The two largest slices she pushed up on the shaft, one from either end, and before settling them in place she put a little glue on the shaft close to the wheel as well as on the inner side of the corks, then pushed the corks up over the glue on the shaft and close against the wheel. In this way the shaft, the corks and the wheel were glued together. “They must all turn together,” Polly remarked, “and not like a wheel on an axle.” On the end of the shaft which was to rest in the hole in the box, she slid the remaining slice of cork, leaving it within three-quarters of an inch of the cork fastened to the wheel. This was to keep the shaft from running too far into the box.

“Be sure you get the right end of the shaft into the box,” Donald cautioned. “Remember, the edges of the buckets bend down when the left side of the wheel is toward you.” (Figure 7.)

“I know,” said Polly. “Now I am going to put this large glass bead on to keep the cork from touching the box. The bead is so smooth and round it will turn easily against the wood.” So Polly put her bead on the shaft and slipped the end of the shaft through the box. “I will put a bead on the inside, too,” she added, “and then a cork to keep it from slipping off, and it will have to be a very small cork or it will rub against the side of the box and the shaft won’t turn.” (Figure 7.)

Meanwhile Donald had been devising a way to hold the front upright erect. “I have it now,” he exclaimed, and cutting a piece of wood half an inch wide and half an inch thick into two pieces four and one-half inches long, he nailed them to the front and back of the lower edge of the upright; then sliding the free end of the shaft through the hole in the upright, he settled the upright in place in front of the box, a little to the left, so that the hole in the box and the hole in the upright were directly opposite each other and the shaft went through true and straight. Then he nailed the supports to the board. (Figure 7.)

When the children adjusted the funnel and filled it with sand they found that to make it work perfectly it was necessary to tilt the can forward in order to send the stream of sand near the outer edge of the wheel, and that something must be invented to hold the can in that position, so Donald quickly whittled out the little brace. (Figure 9.) The brace is five inches long at the bottom, two and one-quarter inches long at the top and one and five-eighths inches high. The V-shaped notch is one inch from the front end.

Fitting the back edge of the can into the notch of the brace, Donald adjusted the brace on top of the box so that the can was held at the required angle and the falling sand struck the wheel in the right place; then with two small nails he fastened it on securely. (Figure 6.) Donald also slipped a thin strip of wood between the back of the funnel and the large nail. The wood rested on the bottom of the can and extended up to the top of the funnel.

“That will strengthen it,” he said. “The wheel works all right; now we will make it move things.”

“Let us have a merry-go-round,” Polly suggested.

“Yes, and a mine. The wheel will draw the miners up in a bucket, and then I think when the merry-go-round turns it will pull a wagon uphill, too,” Donald answered.

“And everything will move at once,” Polly cried delightedly.

“We will have to have a belt spool and a winding spool on the end of this shaft,” Donald said. “The belt spool will connect it with the merry-go-round and the winding spool will draw up the miner’s bucket. The spools must be fastened to the shaft, too, so that they will turn with it.”

As the shaft was too slender to fit the holes in the spools, Polly wrapped it with a strip of newspaper. (L, Figure 7.) She used newspaper because it was soft and would cling. She cut a strip about twelve inches long and two inches wide. This she covered on one side with glue; then sticking one end to the shaft about half an inch from the upright, she wrapped the paper tightly around the shaft, making a number of layers, which, glued together, became a solid mass. Donald had selected two spools and glued the ends together—a medium-sized spool for the belt spool and a small spool for the winding spool. When the glue had hardened on the spools and on the paper roll he covered the outside of the roll and the inside of the spools with glue and pushed the spools up on the shaft until they covered the paper roll and stuck fast. (Figure 7.)

“Now cut a round bristolboard disk for the merry-go-round, Polly,” Donald said, “while I rig up a stand for it.”

The disk Polly made was seven and one-half inches in diameter with a round hole in the center a little larger than the hole in a spool, and while she was drawing the circle and cutting it out Donald found a level-sided block of wood, two and one-quarter inches high, for the base of his stand. To this block he nailed small strips of wood, one on either side like the supports on the front upright. (Figure 10.) Then, selecting a medium-sized spool, two smaller spools and a buttonhole twist spool to make the shaft of the merry-go-round the proper height, he glued the two smallest spools together and the larger and buttonhole twist spools together. On top of the smallest spools he glued the disk. Taking a second spikelike wire nail, longer than the one used on the sand tower (M, Figure 10), he slipped it through the disk and the two smallest spools, then stopped and thought a moment. “A washer will have to go on now,” he said, “to make these upper spools turn easily on the lower ones.” So he cut a washer like N, Figure 10, from a piece of very glossy writing paper, making it a little larger than the end of the spools. “I’ll glue these two lower spools to the block before I put the nail through,” he continued as he covered the bottom of the buttonhole twist spool with glue and fitted it on top of the block exactly in the middle. He waited a while for the glue to dry; then, placing his paper washer on top of the large spool, he dropped the point of the nail down through the washer and the spools and drove the nail into the block far enough to hold it quite steady, but leaving enough space between the top of the disk and the head of the nail to let the disk turn freely. “We will put the merry-go-round here,” Donald went on, as he placed the block directly at the front edge of the board about seven and one-half inches to the right of the sand tower. “It won’t do to have it too far from the wheel.” Then, driving nails through the strips of wood on either side of the block, he fastened the merry-go-round in place. “Now get a piece of tape for the belt, Polly, and we will make her spin,” he said. “Get cotton tape; linen is too slippery.”

Polly returned with a piece of cotton tape a little over a quarter of an inch wide and about twenty-five inches long. Donald passed it over the belt spool on the wheel shaft and around the belt spool on the merry-go-round shaft (Figure 11) and pinned the lapped ends together. Then Polly poured sand in the funnel of the sand tower and Donald watched the working of the belt, tightening or loosening it as it seemed to require. When it was in perfect working order Polly sewed the ends of the tape together, making a lapped seam, as in Figure 11. Then she proceeded to fasten a piece of thread about a yard and one-quarter long to each of the winding spools. First she placed one end of the thread lengthwise on the spool and then glued a strip of paper around the spool and over the thread. Looking up from her work, she found Donald drawing a circle on a piece of writing paper.

“I am making a cone,” he explained, “to fit over the lower spools and prevent the thread from catching on the block.”

Donald made the circle for his cone six and one-half inches in diameter, and at the center he cut a round hole large enough to fit around the spool. Out of this circle he cut a pie-shaped slice four and three-quarters inches wide at the outer edge. (Figure 12.) Adjusting the cone on the lower part of the winding spool, he lapped the edges and pasted them together. The cone stood out beyond the side edges, but did not touch the block.

“I am going to put these on the merry-go-round, they will look so pretty ‘as they sail, as they sail,’” chanted Polly, showing four little boats she had cut from writing paper and painted in gay colors with watercolor paints. Polly had made the boats with extensions at the bottom, which she slit up through the middle. Bending one half out on one side and the other half out on the other side, she pasted the extensions to the top of the disk near the edge, placing the boats at equal distances apart. By this time Donald had begun a little wagon, making it of a match box by cutting writing paper wheels and pinning them on to the box with ordinary pins, one pin for each wheel. “The wagon must not be heavy,” he said, “because our machinery is light.” The children chose a small, light toy basket to use as a miner’s bucket, and then made two paper doll miners to put in the bucket and a paper doll lady to ride in the wagon. The end of the thread hanging from the winding spool on the wheel shaft they tied to the handle of the basket and the thread fastened to the winding spool on the shaft of the merry-go-round they tied to the front of the wagon. Then they carried the whole thing out on the beach and set it up on an empty box which they had put on top of a little hill of sand to raise it high above the ground. Donald found a smooth board, one end of which he propped up directly under the merry-go-round and on this he set the little wagon, drawing it down the full length of the thread. Polly scooped a hole in the sand for a mine and dropped the little basket in it. Then, all being ready, Polly held her hand under the funnel for a stopper, Donald filled the funnel with _dry_ sand, Polly took away her hand, the sand began to run out in a steady stream, the wheel whirled round, the merry-go-round spun merrily, fluttering the tissue-paper pennants on the little boats and tipping them most naturally. The miner’s basket emerged from the mine and slowly ascended, and the little wagon climbed up the incline, bearing its lady passenger.

How to Make a Trolley Car

By Adelia Belle Beard

One of the Authors of Things Worth Doing

[All rights reserved]

“Polly!” called Donald, leaning over the banisters, “I’ve a jolly good idea this morning and I want you to help me.” Polly had been romping with her two fuzzy little kittens in the lower hall, but she promptly deserted them and mounted the stairs on a run.

“What is it?” she cried, appearing at the Kraft Shop door before Donald had reached his seat at the table.

“What do you think of making a little trolley car?” he replied.

“One that will go on a real trolley wire? I think that will be just loads of fun. How long can we have the line?”

“As long as we like, but I will use linen thread instead of wire; it is easier to manage.”

“And we will use spools for wheels, of course, and bristolboard for the car,” said Polly.

“Yes, and I’m going to make as much of the car in one piece as I can.”

“Then I don’t see what I can do,” Polly objected.

“Oh, there will have to be some separate parts,” Donald hastened to say. “You can make the little top roof and the trolley pole, and you can get the spools and thread and two little sticks for axles. That will be a big help. Now look at my pattern; you see, I’ve worked it down until it fits into an oblong, fourteen inches long and seven and one-half inches wide. This takes in the main part of the car, but not the platforms. (Figure 1.) Now I will carry these two lines (J H and J L) down to make a platform and the upright front of the platform. I don’t suppose it is called a dashboard.”

“Where will you put the other platform?” inquired Polly.

“At the upper right hand corner,” said Donald. Then Donald drew below the lines H H and above the lines G G the platform which, for lack of space, is given separately here, but which must be traced and made a part of the pattern by being fitted out at each end of the car.

“This projection,” (M) Donald continued, “is to fasten the front of the platform to the roof.”

“You haven’t made a place for the wheels,” said Polly.

“You’re right, I haven’t. We will put them here,” and Donald drew the axle guards, marked F. “This is the place for the doors,” he went on, indicating the spaces at either end of the two sides of the car. “The top part of the door is glass, you know,” he said. On the door at the upper left-hand corner (Figure 2) he made the catch B and on the middle line of the lower door he cut the slot B. The inner edge of the slot is on the line, the outer edge is left of the line. The order was reversed on the right-hand side. (Figure 2.) Here he put the catch (A) on the lower door and the slot (A) on the upper door.

“If you will tell me how large you want the little top roof I’ll make it now,” said Polly.

“All right. I’ll draw a place for it, then I’ll know,” and on the top of the car Donald drew the oblong two and one-quarter inches wide. The top line of the oblong was three-eighths of an inch below the line I I, and the bottom line of the oblong was three-eighths of an inch above the line J J, Figure 2.

“Now I have it,” he said. “You must make the little top roof just eight inches long and two and one-quarter inches wide. Draw an oblong exactly that size, you know, for the top. I want it to stand up half an inch above the car, so you must add half an inch at each side and each end, with bend-overs and catches at each corner to hold the sides and ends together, and slits in the sides for the catches. Then make large catches to hold the top roof to the other roof, one catch at each end of each side and one in the middle of each end. (Figure 3.) Be sure and make the side catches half an inch from the end of the oblong.”

“You mean,” said Polly, “that the neck of the catch must be half an inch from the corner when the sides and ends are bent down.”

“That’s it, and make the neck half an inch wide and the catch about one inch long from end to end. Don’t forget the hole in the middle of the roof for the trolley pole,” Donald added. “Make it not quite half an inch in diameter. (Figure 3.) Then Donald drew slots for the catches in the oblong on top of his car, placing them to correspond with the catches on the top roof and making them a little more than half an inch long. He placed each side slot just half an inch from the ends of the oblong, and all inside the boundary line.

“Now I will draw in the windows, eight on each side,” he announced, spacing them off carefully with a rule. He made each window three-quarters of an inch wide and seven-eighths of an inch high, allowing one-quarter of an inch space between. Then on the front of each platform he drew an opening two inches wide and one and one-quarter inches high. On a line with the lower edge of the front of the bottom, in the middle of the projection, he drew a slot a little over one inch long (Figure 2), and on the roof extension at each end of the car he made a slot a little over two inches long, C and D, page 41. These slots are one and one-quarter inches from the end lines of the middle oblong on the roof.

“My car is ready to cut out now,” said Donald.

“So is my top roof,” said Polly. “Is the trolley pole all right?”

Polly had made the pole seven and one-half inches long and one-quarter of an inch wide, with a ring at one end five-eighths of an inch in diameter, and a ball as the other end one-half an inch in diameter. (Figure 4.)

Donald pronounced the pole “first rate.” “Put the ball through the hole, Polly,” he said. So when Polly had cut out the roof according to the heavy lines and bent down the sides and ends according to the dotted lines (Figure 3), she turned in one edge of the ball and pushed it through the round hole in the roof. When she flattened the ball out again it could not slip through the hole, but the pole could be moved in any direction.

Donald cut out his car according to the heavy lines and bent it according to the dotted lines. Both he and Polly remembered to score the dotted lines lightly with the edge of a pocket knife before bending them. The sides of the car Donald bent down; the doors he bent inward to meet under the projecting roof; the platform he turned out and the front of the platform up. Before fastening the catches and projections in their slots he fitted the top roof on the car, putting the catches marked X through the slots marked X. First he bent both ends of each catch inward, which made them narrow enough to slide through the slots, then he pushed the catches through the slots, settled the top roof firmly on the main roof and opened the catches on the inside of the car. When this was done he fastened the doors by putting the catch B through the slot B in the opposite half of one door, and the catch A through the slot A on the opposite half of the other door. The projections at the top of the fronts of the two platforms he pushed through their corresponding slots in the roof.

“Hello! we’ve forgotten the bolts for these projections,” Donald suddenly exclaimed.

“I’ll make them while you put on the wheels,” said Polly. Then she cut two bolts like Figure 5, making them one and one-half inches wide at the bottom and one inch wide at the top. When the bolts were slipped through the slots in the projections C and D they held the fronts of the platforms securely in place. The two spools that Polly had selected for wheels were like Figure 6, each about two inches high, and the slender, round sticks, pointed at each end, were four inches long. Donald slipped a spool on one of the sticks, then pushed one end of the stick through the middle of one of the axle guards from the inside, and the other end of the stick through the middle of the opposite axle guard.

“Here are the hubs,” said Polly, producing four small corks. Then Donald pushed a cork on each end of the stick. The corks kept the axle from slipping out of place. He adjusted the other spool in the same way, then threaded a large needle with a piece of linen thread several yards long and pushed the needle through the front of the platform below the opening at the place marked with a dot in Figure 2. A large knot on the inside of the front of the platform held the string in place and the needle was again threaded with a long thread to fasten on the other end of the car. (Figure 7.)

“Now for the trolley wire,” exclaimed Polly. “How shall we put that up?”

“This way,” said Donald, and he placed two chairs at opposite ends of the room, then he cut a piece of thread a little longer than the space between the chairs and tied one end to the top rung of one chair. The other end of the thread he passed through the ring in the top of the trolley pole and then tied it to the top rung of the other chair.

“There we are. Now, Polly, you sit down by the chair and take hold of one thread, and I will sit by this chair and hold the other thread. When you pull your thread the car will run all the way to your chair; when I pull my thread back it will come to me.”

The children kept the little car running back and forth for some time and were vastly entertained. When they wished, they had it make several stops to allow imaginary passengers to get off and on, and again it was an express car and went from one end of the line to the other without stopping. Finally Donald was called away to go an errand and Polly discovered that she could work the car entirely alone by running the loose ends of the threads over the lower rungs of the chairs, tying the two ends together and pulling the thread first one way, then the other. Figure 8 shows the trolley in working order with the threads tied together in the way Polly devised.

Making Toy Furniture Without Glue

By Adelia Belle Beard

“I am going to have a Kraft Shop, a Kraft Shop!” sang Polly, noisily pulling out the old and much-battered table in the children’s play room and then skipping excitedly around to hunt up scissors, knife, ruler and pencils, the tools she thought would be necessary. Donald watched proceedings over the top of his book. Things were beginning to look interesting. “What do you know about Kraft Shops?”

“Everything. Mother told me and, besides, I went through a real Kraft Shop last summer and saw all the people at work.”

“What were they making?”

“Why—er—I am not sure that I quite remember just what they were making, but I know they do make beau-ti-ful things, and all with their hands, too. They don’t use machinery at all. That’s what I’m going to do, and you, too, Donald. I don’t want to be a Krafter all by myself. Mother said it would be nice if you and I started a home Kraft Shop and made toys and all sorts of things.”

Donald’s book closed with a snap. “All right, I’m ready. What shall we try first?”

“Suppose we make toy furniture and call it—oh, I know, we will call it KraftShop furniture, and pretend that it’s real.”

“First rate; but I’ll have to get some wood.”

“No you won’t; we can make it of this cardboard; it will be easier to cut, anyway.”

“That is bristolboard, but it is better than cardboard, stronger and tougher, you know, and we can put the furniture together with pegs, just as if it were of wood.”

“Yes, yes!” said Polly, jumping up and down in her enthusiasm. “That’s it. I was sure you would know how. What will you make?”

“A table, I think—a library table.”

“Then I’ll make an armchair, and, Donald, it is going to have rockers, too.”

“How about bookshelves, Polly? They would make the library set complete.”

“Dear me! Of course we must have the shelves. Now let’s begin this very minute.”

“Well, get the furniture advertisements you saved—the pictures, you know. They will give us ideas, but we won’t have to copy them exactly.”

After many experiments and alterations, and with much fitting together of the various parts, Donald finished his table, Polly her chair, and together they worked out the bookshelves, using bolts for the shelves, instead of pegs, to hold them together. Here they are, Figures 1, 2, and 16.

“They are good and strong,” Donald said.

“And so pretty,” Polly added.

“And we didn’t use a bit of glue,” continued Donald, proudly.

“And I can put cushions in my chair if I like—real huffy, puffy cushions.”

“And little books on the shelves,” suggested Donald.

“Oh!” breathed Polly, estatically; “and, Donald, we can take them all apart and pack them in a flat box. Isn’t that fine?”

“It just is.”

Donald made the top of his table first. With careful measurements he drew on the smooth bristolboard an oblong eight and one-quarter inches long and six inches wide (Fig. 3), which he cut out with the large shears. Within that oblong he drew another five and three-quarter inches long and three and one-half inches wide. This left a border one and one-quarter inches wide all around the center oblong. At the sides and ends of the inner oblong he drew lines for slits, as shown in Figure 3. The inside edge of each slit is _on_ the outline of the oblong, and the outside edge _outside_ of the oblong. The end slits (AA) are two and one-eighth inches long and the side slits (BB BB) are seven-eighths of an inch long, and extend a little beyond the end lines of the inner oblong. He cut these slits with a sharp knife and made them about one-sixteenth of an inch wide, which is a little more than the thickness of the bristolboard. The two end supports of the table Donald made like Figure 4, which is cut from an oblong five inches wide and four inches high. The real end of the table, from dotted line to dotted line, is three and one-half inches wide, just the width of the inner oblong on the top of the table, under which it must fit. The parts to the right and left of these dotted lines are the table legs. The projection in the middle, at the top, is two inches long and three-eighths of an inch high. The projections at the ends just over the table legs are the same height. Slits are cut in these projections one-half an inch long, with the _lower_ edge of each slit on a line with the top edge of the end pieces, as shown in Figure 4.

In the middle of each end piece, two inches from the bottom, there is another slit, two and one-eighth inches long, for holding the shelf, and the bottom is cut in a half-circle arch. When the end pieces were completed Donald scored the dotted lines by lightly drawing the blade of his knife down their entire length. Then he bent the bristolboard along these lines so that the table legs faced the sides.

Without the projections CC the shelf (Figure 5) is formed of an oblong exactly the size of the inner oblong on the table top. The projections are two inches long and a quarter of an inch wide. In these are cut slits seven-eighths of an inch long, and the slits are outside of the lines of the oblong, just as the slits are outside of the lines of the oblong on the table top.

Donald put all these parts together, slipping the projections A through the slits A, the projections B through the slits B, and the projections C through the slits C, and was delighted to find they fit perfectly. Then he made pegs like Figures 6 and 7; two like Figure 6, which is three-quarters of an inch wide at the bottom, one and one-eighth inches wide at the top and one inch high; and four like Figure 7, which is three-eighths of an inch wide at the bottom, five-eighths of an inch wide at the top and three-quarters of an inch high. He slid the two pegs (Figure 6) through the slits in the shelf, and the four pegs (Figure 7) through the slits in the projections above the table legs, and the stanch little table (Figure 1) was complete. He dropped it on the floor; it did not break. He tossed it into the air; its joints held firmly. Then Donald was satisfied with his work.

Polly made her chair in three parts, not counting the pegs. First she drew the two sides (Figure 8), which are six and three-quarter inches high, and three inches wide from front of arm to back edge. The rockers are five inches long from end to end and one-half an inch wide. One-quarter of an inch from the back edge Polly drew a straight line, extending it from the top edge of the chair to the top of the rocker (Figure 8), and along this line she cut three slits, each slit just one inch long. The top of the first slit is half an inch from the top edge of the chair; the top of the second slit one inch below the first slit; and the top of the third slit is three-quarters of an inch below the second slit. Just above the rocker she cut an arch half an inch high, and half an inch above the arch she made a horizontal slit one inch long. This finished the two sides of the chair.

For the back Polly drew an oblong six inches long and three inches wide. To this she added three projections on either side one-quarter of an inch wide. She spaced the projections exactly as she did the slits in the sides of the chair, making them each one inch long. Then, to allow them to pass easily through the slits, she cut a fraction off each end of each projection, which left the projections seven-eighths of an inch long. In the two top and two bottom projections there are slits for the pegs half an inch long, and three-quarters of an inch above the bottom edge there is a horizontal slit one and one-half inches long (Figure 9.)

Figure 10 shows the seat which Polly made, three inches square, then added three projections one-quarter of an inch wide. The side projections are seven-eighths of an inch long and the back projection one and three-eighths inches long. Slits five-eighths of an inch long are cut in the side projections. The dotted line one-half inch above the bottom edge (Fig. 10) shows where the seat is scored to be bent down in front (Figure 2.) Of the six pegs needed for the chair, four are three-eighths of an inch wide at the bottom, not quite an inch wide at the top and three-quarters of an inch high (Figure 11.) The other two pegs are half an inch wide at the bottom, one inch wide at the top and one and one-quarter inches high (Figure 12.) Polly fitted the two sides of the chair to the back, sliding the projections on the back (II FF) through their corresponding slits (I F) in the sides, and fitted the seat to the back and sides, slipping the projection D through the slit D and the projections EE through the slits EE. Then she pegged them all together, using the pegs (Figure 11) for the slits II FF, and the pegs (Figure 12) for the slits EE. When it was finished she set the chair to rocking and clapped her hands with delight to see how perfect it was.

When the children made the bookshelves (Figure 16) they cut an oblong for the back piece six and one-quarter inches high and five inches wide (Figure 13.) On either side of this oblong, one-quarter of an inch from the edge, they drew straight lines from top to bottom; then, between these lines, they marked the position of the shelves with five horizontal lines one and one-half inches apart, making the first line one-quarter of an inch from the top edge. On either side of the back piece they made slits to hold the bolts on the side pieces (OO OO) (Figure 13.) The inner edge of these slits is _on_ the side lines and the outer edge _outside_ the side lines, and the slits are each three-quarters of an inch long. The top slits are five-eighths of an inch from the top edge and the bottom slits are one inch from the bottom edge of the back piece.

Of course the side pieces had to be made exactly as high as the back piece, six and three-quarters inches, and the children decided that one and three-quarters inches was a good width, but this width does not include the bolts (OO) (Figure 15.) The bolts are three-eighths of an inch wide at their widest part and a trifle less than three-quarters of an inch long, so that they will slip easily through the slits. The necks of the bolts measure three-eighths of an inch from top to bottom.

“Look out, Polly!” exclaimed Donald, suddenly. “You are not getting those in the right places. The lower edge of the neck of the top bolt _has_ to be the same distance from the top edge of the side piece as the lower end of the top slit is from the top edge of the back piece, because it rests upon it. Don’t you see?”

“Yes, I see,” said Polly. “That will make it one and three-eighths inches from the top edge. And by the same token the bottom edge of the neck of the lower bolt must be just one inch above the bottom edge of the side piece, for the lower slit is one inch from the bottom edge of the back piece. Is that right?”

“You’ve got it,” answered Donald.

“That is the way it works; now draw the shelf lines across your side pieces to correspond to those on the back piece, and make them exactly the same distance apart. The top line must be one-quarter of an inch from the top edge, remember.”

Along the shelf lines Polly made slits for holding the shelves (L, Figure 15); the lower edge of each slit is _on_ the line, the upper edge of the slit _above_ the line. Each slit is three-quarters of an inch long. The left-hand ends of the slits are five-eighths of an inch from the left edge of the side piece.

Figure 14 is the shelf. Donald made five of these shelves. They are four and one-half inches long; not including the bolts, and one and three-quarter inches wide, just the width of the side pieces. The bolts LL are the same size as the bolts OO on the side pieces. The lower edge of the neck of each bolt is five-eighths of an inch from the bottom edge of the shelf. The bottom edge of Figure 14 is the front edge of the shelf when it is put up.

When all the parts were finished the children first fitted the shelves to the side-pieces, sliding the bolts L through the slits L and pushing them forward until the bolts held fast and each shelf fitted the sides exactly. Then they slid the slits O in the back over the bolts O on the sides, pushed the sides down, the bolts slid into place and the little bookshelves were securely fastened together.

Wild Animals for the Menagerie

Invented by Adelia Belle Beard

One of the Authors of Things Worth Doing

“‘The giraffe belongs to the ru-minant group of the—’” “Skip that, Polly. What I want is to know the kind of horns he has and how many toes. This picture doesn’t show; it’s no good for that, and while we are making the animals for our menagerie we may as well have them as nearly right as we can.”

“To be sure, little brother. Well, here it is: ‘The giraffe possesses two solid, bony ap-pen-da-ges’—that means horns, I suppose—‘which are completely covered with the skin of the forehead, and are ter-mi-na-ted by a tuft of bristles.’ Queer kind of horns, aren’t they, Donald, with bristles sprouting out of the top?”

“That’s all right. What about his feet?”

“Why—wait a minute, I’ve lost my place. Oh, yes: ‘It’s feet ter-mi-nate in a divided hoof.’ There, he hasn’t any toes, after all; just hoofs like a cow.”

“How big does it say he is? We want our animals in the right proportion to one another.”

Polly fluttered the leaves of her book; she had been taking a peep at some of the other animals. “It says this: ‘The giraffe is the tallest of existing animals, and is usually from fifteen to sixteen feet high.’”

“That’s measuring from the ground to the top of his head,” commented Donald.

“It must be,” returned Polly, “because he slopes so you would never know where else to stop in the measurement.”

Donald worked away in silence, and Polly, with elbows on table, continued to read aloud. “It’s dreadfully interesting, isn’t it?” she said when she had finished the description of the giraffe given in Donald’s natural history, “and it really would be a shame to make all the animals and not know anything about them except their names. I feel quite intimate and friendly with the giraffe now that I know what country he comes from and what he likes for dinner.”

“There is your friend, then,” said Donald, standing his little giraffe on the table (Figure 1.)

The various parts of the giraffe are shown in Figure 2. They are cut from cardboard and made to be put together by means of the slots. You can trace the patterns and make the animals without trouble.

The slot A of the fore legs fits into the slot A of the body, and the slot B of the hind legs fits into the slot B in the body. D is the pattern of the ears. The ears are to be put through the slit D in the head and then bent back, as in Figure 1. C is the pattern of the queer horns, the points on the ends represent the bristles. The horns are to be slipped through the slit C at the top of the head, and then bent in the middle to make them stand upright.

“He is just fascinating, Donald,” exclaimed the ever enthusiastic Polly. “Don’t you think it is quite as easy to make wild animals as farm animals?”

“Polly, you do ask a lot of questions. Go on and make the elephant now and let me read about him.”

“All right,” said Polly, quite ready to change occupations. “Where is that picture I saved? There, that is about the right size, isn’t it?”

“Yes, it will do. Here we are,” Donald continued, bending over his book. “‘The elephant belongs to the order of Proboscidea—’”

“Now, Donald,” Polly interrupted, “I don’t want to hear that.” “Yes you do; it means creatures with long noses, and the elephant has the longest nose on record.”

“How long?”

“It says here: ‘They are from six to eight feet long, and almost wholly composed of muscles, numbering nearly forty thousand.’”

“Forty thousand muscles in the poor thing’s nose! Why, it makes me want to sneeze just to think of it. What else does it say?”

But Donald was watching Polly’s scissors. “Don’t make the hind legs so big, Polly; they don’t look right.”

“An elephant’s legs are big, Donald.”

“Not like that. Let me trim them off for you. His back must slope more, too. Don’t you remember how most elephants look, as though they were just going to sit down?”

“I think I will make the ears and tusks of writing paper instead of cardboard,” Polly ventured, “they will be easier to manage.”

“That’s a good scheme. Have the ears large, for this elephant comes from Africa; and they can flop or stand out straight, and if you cut the tusks crescent shape they will turn up at the points.”

“Isn’t he a dear old fellow?” said Polly, standing her elephant on the table beside the giraffe. (Figure 3.)

The different parts of the elephant are given in Figure 4. They are lettered, and by putting the corresponding letters together the parts will fit perfectly. E fits E, F fits F. The ears G slip through the slit G, and the tusks H through the slit H.

The kangaroo (Figure 5) was the next animal the children made, and they were both delighted with its absurdly unequal legs and immense tail, which takes the place of another leg. Polly giggled a good deal over its great, long feet, and persisted in calling its fore legs arms.

“See how short they are, and since it doesn’t use them for walking, they must be arms,” she argued.

“Whatever they are, we will make them of writing paper and hitch them on as we did the elephant’s tusks,” said Donald.

Figure 6 gives the patterns for the kangaroo as Polly and Donald made it. They put the parts together according to the letters and bent the hind legs at the dotted lines for the feet, as shown in Figure 5.

Figure 7 is the camel, “whose legs are as humpy as its back,” Polly said. Then she looked it up in the natural history and found out why it had such peculiar legs, and also many more interesting things about this patient traveler. Figure 8 shows the various parts of the camel.

Donald made the rhinoceros (Figure 9.) Polly said she liked either pretty or funny animals. “I think the old duffer is funny,” Donald returned. “See the horn on the end of his nose; doesn’t it look just as though it had slipped down his head and he had caught it there?” Figure 10 gives all the parts of the rhinoceros.

“The lion is a handsome fellow. You can make him, Polly, and I will see what I can do with the polar bear.”

Polly made the lion (Figure 11.)

“He is switching his tail very angrily. Be careful not to get too near him, Donald,” she laughed. Figure 12 gives the four parts of the lion. Figure 13 is Donald’s polar bear, and Figure 14 gives his body, legs and ears.

“He is a clumsy-looking creature, isn’t he?” Polly remarked, “but I would love to see him roll up in a ball and tumble about in the water just for the fun of it, as your book says he does, sometimes.”

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TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES

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