"
The gates closed a fort which we had built since our arrival in
Arizona. Peeled pine logs, ten feet long, had been set up vertically
in the ground, two feet of them below the surface and eight above,
enclosing an area of a thousand square feet, in which were
store-rooms, offices, and quarters for two companies of soldiers and
their officers. At corners diagonally opposite each other were two
large block-house bastions, commanding the flanks of the fort. The
logs of the walls were faced on two sides and set close together, and
were slotted every four feet for rifles. At one of the corners which
had no bastions were double gates, also made of logs, bound by cross
and diagonal bars, dovetailed and pinned firmly to them. Each hung on
huge, triple hinges of iron.
The two boys returned to the gates, and, setting their backs against
one of them and digging their heels in the earth, pushed and swung it
ponderously and slowly, until its outer edge caught on a shelving log
set in the middle of the entrance to support it and its fellow.
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