“Materials:  Four sticks, 1/4 inch thick by 5/8 inch wide by 44 inches long, for the corner sticks.  Two sticks, 1/4 inch thick by 5/8 inch wide by 15 inches long, for the short spreaders.  Two sticks, 1/2 inch square by about 38 inches long, for the long spreaders.  Two strips of cloth 81 inches long, hemmed at each edge to a width of 13 inches.  Whittle out twelve cleats to the form shown in Fig. 244.  At the ends of the 15-inch spreaders nail cleats on each side with long wire brads, so as to form forks, as shown in Fig. 245, in which two of the corner sticks are held.  The short spreaders are fastened to the corner sticks, 7 inches from the ends, with brads driven through the cleats, making the frame (as in Fig. 246).  To prevent the frame from skewing off sidewise it should be braced with wire running diagonally across from one corner stick to the other.  Ordinary soft stovepipe wire will do.  Care must be taken to have the spreaders meet the corner sticks squarely or at right angles.  Now take one of the cloth strips and sew its ends together to form a band.  The end should be lapped about an inch and fastened with the sailor stitch (see Fig. 223).  The same should be done to the other cross strip, and then each band should be marked off with pencil lines at four points, all equidistant from each other.  The two bands may now be tacked to the two ends of the frame with opposite pencil lines over the edges of the corner sticks, as in Fig. 247.  The two remaining corner sticks are then nailed to the bands at the two other pencil lines.  These corner sticks will now be braced apart by the long spreaders, which are notched to the right length to stretch the cloth taut.  A cleat is nailed over each notch, as shown in Fig. 248, forming forks to hold the corner pieces.  The long spreaders are now forced down until they meet the short spreaders, to which they are tied with waxed string.  The long spreaders may be nailed to the corner sticks by driving brads right through the cloth into the cleats and the sticks.  The belly band may be fastened to any one of the corner sticks at the spreaders, and from the points where it is tied it should measure about 45 inches in length.  The point where the main string should be attached to the belly band may be best determined by experiment.”

[Illustration:  Fig. 244.  Cleat for Spreader.]

[Illustration:  Fig. 245.  Corner Stick and Spreader.]

[Illustration:  Fig. 246.  The Narrow Frame.]

[Illustration:  Fig. 247.  Tacking on the Cloth.]

[Illustration:  Fig. 248.  Forked End of Long Spreader.]

[Illustration:  Fig. 249.  The Diamond Box Kite.]

CHAPTER XXI.

THE WATER WHEEL.