"Figures won't lie," replied Ethan; "I know they are correct, and that hogshead will go to the bottom as quick as though it were made of lead." "We shall soon see," added Lawry, as he placed a couple of skids across the "well." "Now we must place the sinker on those skids." By the aid of the derrick, which was provided with a rude windlass, constructed by Ethan, the stone post was hoisted up, and then dropped down on the skids. The sinker had been rigged with slings, and the hogshead was attached to it by a contrivance of Lawry, upon which the success of the operation wholly depended, and which it will be very difficult to describe with words. The sinker would carry the cask to the bottom of the lake, where its buoyancy was to assist in bringing the steamer to the surface of the water; but it was necessary, after the cask had been sunk and fastened to the hull, to detach it from the sinker; and this had been a problem of no little difficulty to Lawry, who managed the nautical part of the enterprise. Fastened to the slings on the sinker was a rope ten fathoms in length. A loop was formed in this line, close to the sinker, and the bight passed through the slings on the hogshead. The loop was then laid over the two ropes, one of which was fast to the sinker, and the other was the unattached end of the line, and "toggled" on with a marline-spike. If the young reader does not quite understand the process, let him take a string, with one end fastened to a flatiron; double it, and pass the loop--which sailors call a _bight_--upward between the thumb and forefinger; bring the loop down to meet the two parts of the string on the palm of the hand; then take the two lines into the loop, and put a pencil under the two parts drawn through the loop. The flatiron will correspond to the stone sinker, and the thumb to the slings on the hogshead. Lift up the flatiron, so that the weight will bear on the thumb; then pull out the pencil, and the iron will drop. The marlinespike was thoroughly greased, and a small line attached to the head of it, so that it could be easily drawn out of the loop, when the cask had been secured to the hull of the steamer. "There, we are all right now," said Lawry, after he had tried the marlinespike several times to satisfy himself that it could be easily drawn from its place. "Now we will make fast the rope which runs under the keel to the hogshead." "Here it is," added Ethan. "We want to have the cask under the guard of the steamer when we get it down." "That will be easy enough." "Perhaps it will; but I'm afraid the rope will bind on the keel." "If it does, we must take the raft round to the other side of the _Woodville_, and pass it round the windlass; we can haul it up in that way." "That will take too much time. I think you and I both will be strong enough to haul the cask into place." "Now, give us a turn at the windlass, Ethan," said Lawry, when he was ready.