WOOD STOCKING. 179 



young gentlemen would have felt any desire 

 to see the operation which had been referred 

 to. However^ they were now impatient to 

 proceed thither ; and^ as Mr. Longhurst ex- 

 plained to the ladies^ that the explosion had 

 taken place^ they were induced to follow ; 

 perhaps hoping as much that this process 

 would not be repeated^ as the young gentle- 

 men wished it might. 



A prodigious block of a tree was soon per- 

 ceived^ at which three or four men were busily 

 employed. They had dug and cut a deep 

 trench all round the stump, at some distance 

 from it ; and by working regularly and neatly 

 through earth, wood, and stone, and then pro- 

 ceeding under the mass, they had apparently 

 detached it from the soil. But this was not 

 really the case, as one of the men confessed, 

 to his sorrow. Four of us have been at this 



N 2 



