out of that oil-can in no time, and very soon--you'd scarcely believe
it if I told you how soon--I had another placid mill-pond surroundin'
of me. I sat there a-pantin' and fannin' with my straw hat, for you'd
better believe I was flustered, and then I began to think how long it
would take me to make a line of mill-ponds clean across the head of the
bay, and how much oil it would need, and whether I had enough. So I
sat and calculated that if a tumblerful of oil would make a smooth
place about seven yards across, which I should say was the width of the
one I was in,--which I calculated by a measure of my eye as to how many
breadths of carpet it would take to cover it,--and if the bay was two
miles across betwixt our house and my sister-in-law's, and, although I
couldn't get the thing down to exact figures, I saw pretty soon that I
wouldn't have oil enough to make a level cuttin' through all those
mountainous billows, and besides, even if I had enough to take me
across, what would be the good of goin' if there wasn't any oil left to
fill my sister-in-law's lamp?

"While I was thinkin' and calculatin' a perfectly dreadful thing
happened, which made me think if I didn't get out of this pretty soon
I'd find myself in a mighty risky predicament. The oil-can, which I
had forgotten to put the cork in, toppled over, and before I could grab
it every drop of the oil ran into the hind part of the boat, where it
was soaked up by a lot of dry dust that was there. No wonder my heart
sank when I saw this. Glancin' wildly around me, as people will do
when they are scared, I saw the smooth place I was in gettin' smaller
and smaller, for the kerosene was evaporating as it will do even off
woolen clothes if you give it time enough. The first pond I had come
out of seemed to be covered up, and the great, towerin', throbbin'
precipice of sea-water was a-closin' around me.

"Castin' down my eyes in despair, I happened to look through the crack
in the bottom of the boat, and oh, what a blessed relief it was! for
down there everything was smooth and still, and I could see the sand on
the bottom, as level and hard, no doubt, as it was on the beach.
Suddenly the thought struck me that that bottom would give me the only
chance I had of gettin' out of the frightful fix I was in. If I could
fill that oil-can with air, and then puttin' it under my arm and takin'
a long breath if I could drop down on that smooth bottom, I might run
along tow