for many months to perform.

'Our "gang" did not make this hollow. But if you'll excuse me, I do
not like the way you have of styleen our party. "Gang" isn't a nice
word.'

'Who did the excavation then?'

'God,' replied The Lifter, with an assumption of solemnity that
really was comic.

'Pray cease this blasphemy. I do not wish to hear any more of it. I
am over-sick of this hypocrisy now.'

'But God it was all the same who did this; and I shall tell you how.
You know that River Rouge did not always enter Silent Lake at the
place where it runs in now. It entered down there; see where that old
beech tree stands.'

'But this makes the matter no clearer.'

'Well, you know, the ground here is very shaky, and the swamp
beneath the shores of the trees is softer than porridge. A long time
ago, during a heavy spring freshet, the river became dammed about a
quarter of a mile from the lake, and the whole body of water was
turned in another direction. But instead of flowing over the land, it
sank into the great mass of soft bog below, and forced its way
underground, till it reached the lake--there by that old beech.'

'The clay into which the roots of the trees had fastened themselves