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To them we were obliged to explain the whole process by which rods are unscrewed and put together again, reels turned round, and flies attached to casting lines; and I dare say that to this hour, they have not ceased to talk about the whole affair as an invention, second in point of ingenuity, only to the steam-engine. This done, we became, in our turn, the querists.

After passing the great loggia, which is adorned with stucco-work and with many arms and various other bizarre ornaments, one comes to some rooms filled with such a variety of fantasies, that the brain reels at the thought of them.

A manager, or director, will decide on the importance of the various scenes, and then divide up the film, giving so many feet to each act. The standard length of film is a thousand feet. It comes in thousand foot reels, but some plays are so elaborate that two, three or even seven reels have been given up to them. Great scenic productions, such as "Quo Vadis?" use up many thousand feet of film.

"The negative is not all spliced together, the same length as the reels of positive, because the printing machines are equipped to take two-hundred-foot pieces at a time, or approximate fifths of a reel, the size of a roll of raw positive film stock.

Then the producers, finding that, for reasons they do not understand, with the best and most earnest actors they cannot work the three reels into an emotional climax, introduce some stupid disaster and rescue utterly irrelevant to the character-parts and the paintings that have preceded.

To the city-bred Applebys there would have been cheer and excitement in this mild activity, after their farm-house weeks; indeed Father suggested, "We ought to stay and see the movies. Look! Royal X. Snivvles in 'The Lure of the Crimson Cobra' six reels that sounds snappy." But his exuberance died in a sigh.

"I can come pretty near to guessing," said Macaroni, as he stretched his lank legs, which had, in part, earned him the nickname. "That fake lieutenant is planning some game with the German spy, that's his game." "Maybe," admitted Joe. "But I don't see how we figure in it." "Perhaps we will after we've gotten some reels of valuable film," suggested Charlie.

Like blocks of tin soldiers the army covers the cornfield, moves up the hillside, stops, reels slightly this way and that, and falls flat, save that, through field glasses, it can be seen that one or two pieces still agitate up and down like fragments of broken match-stick.

And if we place in the hands of the patriarchs the ancestral axes, and tell them to get out charcoal for three millions of tons of iron, to be hauled an average of a hundred miles to market by oxen over roads whose highest type was the corduroy, the imagination reels at the helplessness of the heroes.

"I should say not. Look here!" and he pointed to the upset pile of boxes and bales, only a few of which were now left. "We have had the worst kind of bad luck!" "How's that?" demanded Joe, hurrying to the side of his chum. The fire was brighter now. "What did they take?" "Our reels of exposed film, for one thing!" cried Blake. "What! Not our prize Indian pictures?" gasped Joe.