It was a very hard task and you couldn't
have hired us to do it under any other circumstances. First, Bill planned
out on paper just how the house was to be built, and we cut all the pieces
to the right size so as not to carry up any superfluous matter. When all
was ready the boards and sticks were loaded on the scow, and ferried over
to the cliff. Then we carried them on our backs, three or four at a time,
up the slanting hillside to the first ledge. From there up, owing to the
steepness of the ascent, we had to employ different tactics.
The Derrick.
[Illustration: Fig. 137. The Derrick in Use.]
A derrick was constructed of two sticks 10 feet long, which were bolted
together at the top, and secured about five feet apart at the bottom by a
cross piece, as shown in Fig. 136. The derrick was then taken apart and
with some difficulty hauled piecemeal up to the next ledge above. Here it
was put together again. The fall and tackle used in our aerial railway was
attached to the apex of the derrick, and the latter was then erected with
the legs set into depressions in the ledge and the upper ends slanting
outward but kept from falling over the edge by a rope tied to one of the
fixed rungs set in the fissure.
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