held by nailing the lower tie piece to the working platform.
Four stout spars were now cut, each about fifteen feet long.
Taking a pair at a time, we planted their lower ends firmly in
the opposite banks and sawed off their upper ends until they
could just be hammered into the notches in the king post. This
required careful fitting, but by making the spars a little too
long to start with, and then shaving them down with a draw-
knife, we managed to make fairly good joints. A couple of long
wire nails in each spar made the structure perfectly secure. The
king posts were now sawed off just above the temporary tie
piece, and the permanent cross beam was fastened to these ends
with straps of heavy wire wound tightly about them. The working
platform sagged so much that we were able to lay this cross beam
above it. From the ends of the cross beam diagonal braces
extended to the king posts (Fig. 103). Our working platform was
now removed and replaced with the permanent floor beams, which
were firmly nailed to the cen