Harper's Young People, May 30, 1882 An Illustrated Weekly

THE BIG BLAST AT THE STONE QUARRY.

BY WILLIAM O. STODDARD.

It was Friday afternoon, right in the middle of May, and it seemed as if the wide front door of Prome Centre Academy would never get through letting out just one more squad of boys or girls. It was quite the customary thing for Felix McCue to have to wait a little later than the rest.

Miss Eccles was a faithful teacher, and she had often told Felix what an interest she took in him; but he could have heard it a great deal more thankfully at any other time than just after school, and when he knew the other boys were waiting for him. He knew they were, because he had showed them his slate in the arithmetic class, and they had read on it, in big letters, "Got something to tell you. Big."

He had printed every word of it, and he was glad he had done so now, for if he had not he would have been all alone when he at last got outside of the great door. He did not do that, either, until Miss Eccles had looked him in the face for ten of the longest minutes, and talked to him, with a ruler in one hand and a book in the other.

Felix had listened, and he had said "yessum," very respectfully, every time she mentioned George Washington or Benjamin Franklin, but for all that he was only three seconds in reaching the open air, after she said:

"You may go now, Felix, but I hope you will bring no more bumble-bees into this school-room."

"Yessum," and he was off so quickly that he did not hear Miss Eccles, who was trying hard not to laugh right out, and saying to herself:

"The queer little rogue! To think of his telling me, 'Plaze, mum, thim bees knew just the wans to go for; ye cudn't have picked out betther b'ys to have 'em light on.' And what I'm to do with him puzzles me. He's one of the brightest boys in the whole school."

At that moment Felix was walking away from the academy with a boy of about his own size on either side of him.

"B'ys," he was saying, "did yez know me uncle Mike was boss at the shtone quarry?"

"I did," said Bun Gates, on his left; and Rube Hollenhouser, on the right, inquired, almost anxiously, "Was that the big news you kept us waiting for?"

"Was it that, indade? No; but he was along the green this very noon, while I was hidin' Pete Mather's hat in the big maple-tree, and he towld me if I wanted to see the biggest blast of rock that iver was touched off at wan firing, I'd betther be where I could see the shtone quarry a little before noon to-morrow."

That was big enough news to satisfy anybody. The quarry was only a mile or so down the creek, and not a long distance from the bank. It had not been worked for some years, but Mr. Mike McCue was known to be a contractor for the new railroad, and Felix was his nephew. There was perfect confidence to be put, therefore, in the tidings; but Felix added:

"He bid me not tell everybody, for they don't want a crowd around. I asked him wud it be safe on the wather, and he said, 'Yes, it wud, or in it, or undher it, or on the far side of it.' So that's the way we'd betther go."

It was a trifle doubtful which of the ways suggested by his uncle was the one Felix recommended adopting, but Bun instantly exclaimed:

"We can get old Harms's boat. He'll lend it to me any day. It'll hold half a dozen."

"Kape shtill about it, thin. Mebbe Uncle Mike doesn't want to scare the village. He said they'd all hear it whin it kem."

"Loud as that?" said Rube. "Are they going to blast the whole quarry at once?"

"That's what I asked him, and he said, 'No; ownly the wist half of it.' It's the new powdher they're putting in. None of your common shooting powdher at all. It's a kind that bursts fifty times at wance."

There was a touch of silence after that utterance, for there were strange stories in circulation as to the explosive power of the new invention the railroad men were using. Rube Hollenhouser had heard old Squire Cudworth say that a "hatful of it would blow up the Constitution of the United States"; and if that were true, what would not be the effects of a wagon-load or so touched off all at once upon the stone quarry?

Bun and Rube were no sooner back from driving their cows that night than they both went over to the blacksmith's house, and secured the loan of his boat. Of course they told him what they wanted it for, and he said, instantly:

"Is that so, boys? Tell you what I'll do. I'd like to see that blast. I'll go myself. Plenty of room in the boat."

"What shall we do when we get to the mill-dam?" asked Bun. "The quarry's away below the pond."

"We can get another boat below the dam. If we can't, we can haul mine around it in five minutes."

The boys had been considering this problem at that very moment, but one look at Harms the blacksmith was enough to convince any one of his bodily ability to drag any boat on that creek around anything. He was tremendously large and strong, and curly-headed and good-natured. Everybody liked him, and he had more gray beard and mustache than any other man in Prome Centre.

"It's all fixed, then," said Rube.

"I told Deacon Chittenden about it when I drove his cows in for him, and he said right away that Katy and Bill could go. They won't take up any room."

"Plenty of room. Let 'em come. I'd just like to see how far that new powder can blow a rock. Glad you told me. We'll start in good season to be there."

So far everything had worked to a charm; but while Bun Gates told his mother at the supper table what was going to happen, his brother Jeff spoke right out, "Mother, may I go?"

"Yes," said his mother.

And Aunt Dorcas added at once, "Certainly, and Lois too. But, Almira, you or I, or both of us, had better go along to take care of them."

Bun said something about the size of Harms's boat, but Aunt Dorcas silenced him with: "Don't I know how many she can carry? Besides, I'm bound to see that quarry blown up, just for this once."

So Bun was put down; but when they all got out in front of the gate an hour or so after breakfast next morning, there was Rube Hollenhouser in front of his gate, and Felix McCue and little Biddy McCue were with him, and right across the street were Mrs. Chittenden and Katy Chittenden and Bill, and Bun said to himself, "If we had my speckled pig and Chittenden's brindled cow, and if Harms took his dog, the boat'd be 'most full."

Aunt Dorcas and Mrs. Chittenden began to think the party was growing pretty large, but there was no need of it; for when they reached the creek, near the bridge, there stood old Harms, and the first word he spoke was:

"I kind o' guessed how it'd be. Mornin', ladies. Glad we've got a good load for both boats. You get in with me, and the boys can handle t'other one."

It was just like Harms. In another minute he remarked: "Git in now, and we'll shove off."

Aunt Dorcas was already in the very front seat of that boat, and Mrs. Chittenden was in the middle, trying to balance herself. She made William sit beside her, and they two made the boat look wider, there was so much extra room on that seat.

The other boat, the one Harms had borrowed, was almost half a size larger, and it had a cargo this time; for Lois Gates and Katy Chittenden were on the front seat, and behind them were Felix and Biddy. Rube was on the rowing seat, and Bun and Jeff were in the stern.

It was a grand ride down the creek, but when they came out on the mill-pond, Mrs. Chittenden exclaimed: