"In taking up mechanical drawing," said Ralph, "always remember that accurate and neat work, containing all necessary dimensions, is half the battle. You will probably feel, as I did at first, that it is a waste of time, but you can always consider that when your drawing is finished the work is half done. You can judge from it the number of pieces of stock required, and their over-all dimensions This saves much time at the wood pile, and tells at a glance to just what size you must square up each piece of stock.

"The drawing board is an absolute necessity. It need not be perfectly square, but the surface must be flat and true, and at least one of the edges absolutely straight. (Fig. 17.) The T square must have a thin blade—about ¹/₁₆ of an inch, and be made of hard wood. It should form a right angle with the head, which slides along the left-hand edge of the drawing board, and that must be the straight edge.

"The T square is used as a guide for the pencil in drawing horizontal lines, and it should always be kept on the same side of the drawing board. When drawing a vertical line, one of the wooden triangles should be placed on the T square and the line drawn along the left-hand edge of the triangle. Circles or arcs of circles are drawn with the compasses held at the extreme top."

With this introduction, the boys proceeded to fasten with four thumb-tacks a piece of drawing paper to the upper part of the drawing board.

"Why don't you put the paper in the centre?" asked Harry.

"Because, if one worked on the lower part of the drawing board, the T square head would extend below the edge of the board, and touch the table. You would have to watch it constantly. The head of the T square should always be tight against the board, for when you slide it too far down, it sometimes strikes the table without your knowing it, and you find your horizontal lines are not horizontal; so I always like to have the drawing paper as high up on the board as possible."

The boys agreed that while the younger was learning to make drawings, each one should represent something to be made later in wood. Drawing number one was a square, 3 inches on a side. Ralph showed how this was made with only two measurements. Drawing one horizontal and one vertical line, 3 inches were marked off on each, the other two lines drawn through these new points, and the square was finished. Ralph insisted that all lines be very light, as they could be darkened up later, if necessary, and were easy to erase in case of a mistake. (Fig. 18.)

Harry was then told to divide the upper and left-hand sides into even inches, and to draw across the square vertical and horizontal lines from the four points obtained.

Thus the large square was subdivided into nine 1-inch squares, and by darkening the lines shown in the figure at a the cross of St. George was produced.

Another 3-inch square was drawn, and marked off, as shown at b. The points were connected by oblique lines by means of the 45-degree triangle, and by darkening the lines shown at c the cross of St. Andrew was formed. After explaining that the British flag was a combination of these two figures Ralph said, "While we are drawing crosses, we may as well make a Maltese one."

Starting with a 3-inch square again, it was measured off as shown in Fig. 19. The lines were connected and darkened, as shown at b. "Now," said Ralph, "you can cut that out of wood, tie a ribbon on it and wear it as a medal."

"Huh," grunted Harry. "Pretty big medal—three inches across!"

"Well, make it any size, an inch or even less."

"That's not a bad idea. I'll make it out of white holly, and put a red, white, and blue bow on it."

"And print on it 'American Order of Junior Woodworkers'."

"Not a bad idea either; we can find lots of boys who would be glad to join and come here Saturdays to work in the shop."

"There would be no trouble to get candidates; the trouble would be to take care of them. They would fill the yard and overflow into the street," said Ralph.

"But why couldn't we——"

"Come now, let's do one thing at a time; you are supposed to be learning mechanical drawing. We'll leave the organization of the A. O. J. W. till another time. I'm going to show you how to use the compasses."While they were drawing the circle, quarterfoil, heart, and oval, shown in Fig. 20, Ralph reviewed his pupil on the meaning of diameter, radius, circumference, etc. "If you want to cut hearts out of paper or wood, I would advise you to wait until St. Valentine's Day, and reserve the oval or egg until Easter.

"The circle is a wonderful figure. By marking the radius off on the circumference, with the compasses, we find that the former divides the latter into exactly six equal parts, and by connecting the points, we have a perfect hexagon. By connecting the alternate points we obtain a perfect equilateral triangle, and by connecting the remaining points we get another triangle of the same size. The two triangles form a six-pointed star. (Fig. 21.)

"Now," said Ralph, "I am going to give you a problem by dictation; all you have to do is to obey orders. First draw a circle 3¹/₂ inches in diameter.""What's the radius?" asked Harry.

"That's for you to find out."

Harry thought a moment, divided three and a half by two, and setting his compasses at 1³/₄ , drew the circle.

"Now divide the circumference into three equal parts."

The boy puzzled over this for a moment, then marked off the radius, cutting the circumference into six parts, as if for a hexagon, and erased every other point, leaving three.

"Draw radial lines from these points to the centre."

"Easy," remarked Harry, and drew a line from each point to the centre with the edge of one of his triangles.

"Find the centre of each of those lines."

"Easy again," said the boy, as he set his compasses at ⁷/₈ of an inch, and from the centre of the circle cut each of the straight lines with an arc. (Fig. 22.)

"Draw a semicircle from each of these points with a radius of ⁵/₈ of an inch."

"Easier still," quoth Harry, as he drew the semicircles. The drawing then looked like a (Fig. 22).

"Now," said the teacher, "let me show you something." He made a few strokes with the compasses, and the drawing as shown at b was finished. "That is enough for to-day. The compasses are about the easiest of all instruments to use, provided you keep in mind that the pencil point needs to be sharpened to a chisel, or flat shape, the same as any other drawing pencil. The number of designs which may be made with it are simply endless, as you will learn later on."