Then it was that Uncle Ed bethought himself of the klepalo.
"You ought to have some sort of a dinner call," he declared, "so that
anyone within a mile of camp will know when dinner is ready."
"Did you ever hear of a klepalo? No? Well, I was down in Macedonia a
couple of years ago inspecting a railroad, and I stopped off for the night
at a small Bulgarian village. The next day happened to be a Prasdnik, or
saint's day, and the first thing in the morning I was awakened by a
peculiar clacking sound which I couldn't make out. Calling my interpreter
I found out from him that it was a klepalo for calling the people to
church. The people there are too poor to afford a bell, and so in place of
that they use a beam of oak hung from a rope tied about the center, and
this beam is struck with a hammer, first on one side, and then the other.
Sometimes an iron klepalo is used as well, and then they strike first the
beam and then the iron bar, so as to vary the monotony of the call. I
found that the wooden klepalo could be heard for a distance of about one
and a half miles over land, and the iron one for over two miles. Now we
can easily make a wooden klepalo for use in this camp, and then if Dutchy,
or any of the rest of us, keep within a mile and a half of camp there
won't be any trouble with the cook.
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