All About Inventions and Discoveries
The Romance of modern scientific and mechanical Achievements

28o All About Inventions have come to a decision. In the midst of a knot of trees rising from the floor of the depression a clear- ing was made. Upon this space a small, quaint, and unkempt wooden structure speedily arose, the felled trees being cut up to provide the necessary construc- tional material. An unenlightened visitor stumbling across this little party toiling industriously in the virgin forest would have been sorely mystified as to its intentions. Obviously, the men were not contem- plating farming, for the simple reason that the build- ing was as unlike any structure generally associated with agricultural operations as it is possible to con- ceive. Neither were they bent upon raising a rural residence in the wilderness, because the pile was absolutely devoid of any of the features characteristic of a dwelling-house. The building recalled nothing so much as a crude imitation of a decapitated British oast-house. There was a pyramidal tower rudely fashioned from roughly hewn, sawn, and split trees. From the bottom of this tower projected a shed which appeared to lean upon the pyramid for support. There were no win- dows ; only here and there a rude unglazed opening, while the door was misshapen and crazily built. But the members of the little community regarded this shanty-like structure with a strange concern and pride. The party numbered only five all told. One, tall, well-built, and bearded, clothed in the frock-coat and chimney-pot hat of the period, was known as “ the Colonel.” He was the leader of the little expedition, and the building had been indubitably erected at his bidding, for there, boldly blazoned upon a board nailed to one corner of the tower, was his