182 AMBITION BAFFLES ITS OWN AIMS.

 

“ IT COST MK NEARLY THREE WEEKS MORE TO CLEAR THE INSIDE.”

pains ;-—but who grudge pains that have their deliverance in view ?
But when this was worked through, and this difficulty managed,
it was still much at one; for I could no more stir the canoe than J
could the other boat.

Then I measured the distance of ground, and resolved to cut a
dock or canal to bring the water up to the canoe, seeing I could
not bring the canoe down to the water. Well, I began this work,
and when I began to enter into it, and calculate how deep it was
to be dug, how broad, how the stuff to be thrown out, I found,
that by the number of hands I had, being none but my own, it
must have been ten or twelve years before I should have gone
through with it; for the shore lay high, so that at the upper end
it must have been at least twenty feet deep. So at length, though
with great reluctancy, I gave this attempt over also.

This grieved me heartily; and now I saw, though too late, the
folly of beginning a work before we count the cost, and before we
judge rightly of our own strength to go through with it.

In the middle of this work I finished my fourth year in this
place, and kept my anniversary with the same devotion, and with