Crouching in the water in complete secrecy, beneath the bushes and among the tall flags, my uncle now stealthily produced a hammer and wrench from one of his enormous pockets, and presently tapped the box. But the sound alarmed him. ‘Yorpy,’ he whispered, ‘go you off to the right, behind the bushes, and keep watch. If you see anyone coming, whistle softly. Youngster, you do the same to the left.’ We obeyed; and presently, after considerable hammering and supplemental tinkering, my uncle’s voice was heard in the utter solitude, loudly commanding our return. Again we obeyed, and now found the cover of the box removed. All eagerness, I peeped in, and saw a surprising multiplicity of convoluted metal pipes and syringes of all sorts and varieties, all sizes and calibres, inextricably interwreathed together in one gigantic coil. It looked like a huge nest of anacondas and adders. ‘Now then, Yorpy,’ said my uncle, all animation, and flushed with the foretaste of glory, ‘do you stand this side, and be ready to tip when I give the word. And do you, youngster, stand ready to do as much for the other side. Mind, don’t budge it the fraction of a barley-corn till I say the word. All depends on a proper adjustment.’ ‘No fear, uncle. I will be careful as a lady’s tweezers.’ ‘I s’ant lift de heavy pox,’ growled old Yorpy, ‘till de wort pe given; no fear o’ dat.’ ‘Oh, boy,’ said my uncle now, upturning his face devotionally, while a really noble gleam irradiated his gray eyes, locks, and wrinkles! ‘oh, boy! this, _this_ is the hour which for ten long years has, in the prospect, sustained me through all my painstaking obscurity. Fame will be the sweeter because it comes at the last; the truer, because it comes to an old man like me, not to a boy like you. Sustainer! I glorify Thee.’ He bowed over his venerable head, and--as I live--something like a shower-drop somehow fell from my face into the shallows. ‘Tip!’ We tipped. ‘A little more!’ We tipped a little more. ‘A _leetle_ more!’ We tipped a _leetle_ more. ‘Just a _leetle_, very _leetle_ bit more.’ With great difficulty we tipped just a _leetle_, very _leetle_ more. All this time my uncle was diligently stooping over, and striving to peep in, up, and under the box where the coiled anacondas and adders lay; but the machine being now fairly immersed, the attempt was wholly vain. He rose erect, and waded slowly all round the box; his countenance firm and reliant, but not a little troubled and vexed. It was plain something or other was going wrong. But as I was left in utter ignorance as to the mystery of the contrivance, I could not tell where the difficulty lay, or what was the proper remedy. Once more, still more slowly, still more vexedly, my uncle waded round the box, the dissatisfaction gradually deepening, but still controlled, and still with hope at the bottom of it.