igured, and found that I had ordered the upright cut the length of
the cross pieces, and _vice-versa_, so that the whole was useless. My
disposition, however, is to take cheerful views of things, and I
explained to Mrs. W. that I could still use the stuff for pickets on
the front fence, some of which were missing. Mrs. W. quietly observed:
"How are you going to use four-foot pickets on a six-foot fence?"

When I purchased the second lot I was very careful to proceed
deliberately. I am a good deal of a carpenter, if things would only
come out square when finished: but they never will. When I saw a
board, somehow the saw runs off to one side, and when I try to nail it
to the other board, the two won't fit; and by the time I get around to
the fourth side, one end of the concern is up in the air, and I have
to sit on it to keep it down. I have often gazed with admiration on a
real carpenter, to see him run his saw along, straight as a string and
true as a die, and then put the pieces all together and have them fit,
nice as a cotton hat. This is true genius.

Sensible of the danger and liability to mistake in putting the pieces
together, I told Mrs. W., who was superintending the operation, that
we would not use nails, but screws, so that in case of error--and all
human judgment is fallible--we could take the screws out and take the
pieces apart, which could not be done with nails. Mrs. W. conceded the
suggestion to be a valuable one. So we went to work, she kindly
lending her assistance. I measured all the pieces, got them the exact
length, and for the greater certainty, stood them up on the floor to
see if they would all fit. They certainly seemed to do so, as far as
mortal vision could determine. As all this required a great deal of
deliberation, a great deal of measuring, a great deal of sawing, some
chiselling, etc., the hour of sunset was approaching when I had put in
the last screw, and triumphantly called Mrs. W. from her afternoon nap
to witness the success of my mechanical endeavors. I stood the blamed
thing up on its four legs, and three of 'em were on the floor, and the
fourth wasn't. It was impossible for me to discover the defect in my
workmanship. I could make any three of the legs stand on the floor,
but the fourth could not be prevailed upon for any consideration. The
cross-pieces, which should have been horizontal, and which, to that
end, had been measured with mathematical precision, slanted up on one
sid