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XVII
ROBINSON MAKES SOME FURNITURE
One thing troubled Robinson very much. He could not sit comfortably
while eating. He had neither chair nor table. He wished to make them,
but that was a big job. He had no saw, no hammer, no auger and no
nails. Robinson could not, therefore, make a table of wood.
Not far from his cave he had seen a smooth, flat stone. "Ay," thought
he, "perhaps I can make me a table out of stone." He picked out the
best stone and built up four columns as high as a table and on these
he laid his large, flat stone. It looked like a table, sure enough,
but there were rough places and hollows in it. He wanted it smooth.
He took clay and filled up the holes and smoothed it off. When the
clay dried, the surface was smooth and hard. Robinson covered it with
leaves and decked it with flowers till it was quite beautiful.
When the table was done, Robinson began on a chair, He made it also
of stone. It had no back. It looked like a bench. It was uncomfortable
to sit on. Robinson covered it with moss. Then it was an easy seat.
Table and chair were now ready. Robinson could not move them from one
corner to another, nor when he sat on the chair could he put his feet
under the table, and yet he thought them excellent pieces of
furniture.
Every day Robinson went hunting and shot a rabbit, but the meat would
not keep. At home they would have put it in the cellar. If only he
had a cellar! He saw near his cave a hole in the rock. He dug it out
a little with his mussel shell and found that it led back under a rock.
From much bending over in digging, Robinson's back, unused to severe
toil, ached wretchedly. He decided to make a spade. With his flint
he bored four holes in a great, round mussel shell. They formed a
rectangle as long as a little finger and as wide. Through these holes
he drew cocoanut fibre and bound the shell to a handle fast and
strong.
With his spade he dug a hole so deep that he could stand in it
upright. Then he put in a couple of shelves made of flat stones. In
this cellar he put his rabbit meat and his eggs. Then he laid branches
over it and finally covered the whole with leaves.
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Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis
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