[Illustration] Timothy Timid, they say, Once traveled the loneliest way; For he traveled by night Lest he should take fright At things he could see in the day. READY FOR BUSINESS; OR, CHOOSING AN OCCUPATION.[B] A SERIES OF PRACTICAL PAPERS FOR BOYS. BY GEORGE J. MANSON [Footnote B: Copyright by G. J. Manson, 1884] BOAT-BUILDING [Illustration] Boat-building is by no means one of the "lost arts," although in this age of steam and iron, the "good old days" of the ship-builders are a thing of the past. Of late years, however, there has been a marked increase in the trade, and although the work is confined principally to yachts and smaller craft, the steady growth of this branch of boat-building offers excellent inducements to any young man whose tastes lie in that direction. I know of one boy at least, now sixteen years of age, who intends to fit himself during the next five or six years for the occupation; and his father, a prominent and highly successful naval architect, believes that there is a very promising future for American boat-building. I take it for granted that the future boat-builder has, as a boy, been fond of boats. He has not only taken advantage of the rivers and ponds near his house, has navigated them in scow, in row-boat or in sail-boat, but I will suppose that, from the time he has been the owner of a jack-knife, he has been a constructor of toy boats. And, as he has grown older and become the possessor of a tool-chest, or, at least, of a gauge, a mallet, a saw, a plane, and a good knife, he has wrought out miniature cutters and schooners, possibly a square-rigged ship, all of which have been much admired by his young companions. If it has been his object in life to become a boat-builder, he could not have been better employed during the hours that have not been taken up with school duties. In every business and profession there is some one object above all others sought after, upon which success may be said to depend. The orator endeavors to arouse our enthusiasm, the poet appeals to our sentiments, the lawyer to our reason, the clergyman to our conscience. The genius of the boat-builder lies in the one word "form." The one thing more than all others for which he aims to have a reputation is the ability to give a good shape to the mass of wood or iron coming from his hands, whether it be a man-of-war or a sail-boat. And so it was good for the boy that he made boats and models of boats. He was getting, as the naval architect would say, "form impressed upon his brain." It may have been, it probably was, a bad form, an incorrect form, but it was something from which to start. At all events, the boy has formed a speaking acquaintance with the occupation he is about to enter.