Jasper County Democrat, Volume 6, Number 43, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 January 1904 — The Blazed Trail By STEWART EDWARD WHITE [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

The Blazed Tr ail By STEWART EDWARD WHITE

CHAPTER I, I ti N ***9 network of streams drainI I ing' the eastern portion of MichI 1 I igan and known as the SagLiJ inaw waters the great firm of Morrison & Paly had for many years carried on extensive logging operations in the wilderness. Now at last, in the early eighties, they reached the end of their holdings. Another winter would finish the cut. At this juncture Mr. Daly called to him John Radway, a man whom be knew to possess extensive experience, a little capital and a desire for more of beth. “Radway,” said he when the two found alone in the mill office, “we expect to cut this year some 00,000,000, which will finish our pine holdings in the Saginaw waters. Most of this timber lies over in the Crooked Lake district, and that we expect to put in ourselves. We own, however, 5,000,000 on the Cass branch which we would like to log on contract. Would you care to take the job?” “How much a thousand do you give?" asked Radway. “Four dollars,” replied the lumberman. “I’ll look at it,” replied the jobber. So Radway got the “descriptions” and a little map divided into townships, sections and quarter sections and went out to look at it. He searched until he found a “blaze” on a tree, the marking on which Indicated it as the corner of a section. From this corner the boundary lines were blazed at right angles In either direction. Radway followed the blazed lines. Thus he was able accurately to locate isolated “forties" ((forty acres), “eighties,” quarter sections and sections in a primeval wilderness. The feat, however, required considerable woodcraft, an exact sense of direction and a pocket compass. These resources were still further drawn upon for the next task. Radway tramped the woods, hills and val•leys to determine the most practical route over which to build a logging road from the standing timber to the shores of Cass branch. He found it to be an affair of some puzzlement. The pines stood on a country rolling with bills, deep with pot holes. It •became necessary to dodge in and out, there and there, between the knolls, around and through the swamps, still (keeping, however, in the same general Idlrectlon and preserving always the 'requisite level or down grade. Radway had no vantage point from which to survey the country. A city man would promptly have lost himself in (the tangle, but the woodsman emerged at last on the banks of a stream, leaving behind him a meandering trail of clipped trees. “I’ll take it," said he to Daly. Daly now proceeded to drive a sharp •bargain with him. Customarily a jobber is paid a certain proportion of the agreed price as each stage of the work is completed. Daly objected to this method of procedure. “You see. Radway,” he explained, ‘lt’s our last season in the country. 'When this lot is in we want to pull tup stakes, so we can’t take any •chances on not getting that timber in. 'lf you don’t finish your job, it keeps ms here another season. There can be tno donbt, therefore, that you finish |your Job. In other words, we can’t itake any chances. If you start the (.thing, you’ve got to carry it ’way Ithrougb.” “I think I can, Mr. Daly,” the jobiber assured him. “For that reason,” went on Daly, “we object to paying you as the work progresses. We’ve got to have a guarantee that you don’t quit on us and 'that those logs will be driven down the [branch as far as the river in time to catch our drive. Therefore I’m going (to make you a good price per thousand, (but payable only when the logs are •delivered to our river men.” ' Radway, with his usual mental attitude of one anxious to justify the other man, ended by seeing only his employer’s argument. He did not perceive that the latter's proposition introduced into the transaction a gambling element. It became possible for Morrison & Daly to get a certain amount of work short of absolute completion done for nothing. I All this was in August. Radway, ( who was a good, practical woodsman, set about the job immediately. He gathered a crew, established a camp and began at once to cut roads through the country he had already blazed on bis former trip. 4 I Radway’s task was not merely to level out and ballast the six feet of a roadbed already constructed, but to cut a way for five miles through the unbroken wilderness. The way had, moreover, to be not less than twentyfive feet wide, needed to be absolutely (level and free from any kind of obstructions and required in the swamps liberal ballasting with poles, called corduroys. Not only must the growth be -- removed, but the roots must be cut out smd the inequalities of the ground leveled or filled up. Reflect further tbat badway had but a brief time at bis 'disposal, but a few months at most <and you will then be in a position to jgsuge the first difficulties of those the

By STEWART EDWARD WHITE

American pioneer expects to encounter as a matter of course. The Jobber of course pushed his roads as rapidly as possible, but was greatly handicapped by lack of men. Winter set In early and surprised him with several of the smaller branches yet to finish. The main line, however, was done. At intervals squares were cut out alongside. In them two long timbers or skids were laid andironwise for the reception of the piles of logs which would be dragged from the fallen trees. They were called skidways. Then finally the season’s cut began. The men who were to fell the trees Radway .distributed along one boundary of a “forty.” They were instructed to move forward across the forty in a straight line, felling every pine tree over eight inches in diameter. While the saw gangs, three in number, prepared to fell the first trees, other men called swampers were busy cutting and clearing of roots narrow little trails down through the forest from the pine to the skidway at the edge of the logging road. The trails were perhaps three feet wide and marvels of smoothness, although no attempt was made to level mere inequalities of the ground. They were called travoy roads (French travois). Down them the logs would be dragged and hauled either by means of heavy steel tongs or a short sledge on which one end of the timber would be chained. Meantime the sawyers were busy. Each pair of men selected a tree, the first they encountered over the blazed line of their forty. After determining in which direction it was to fall they set to work to chop a deep gash in that side of the trunk. Tom Broadhead and Henry Paul picked out a tremendous pine, which they determined to throw across a little open space in proximity to the travoy road. One stood to right, the other left, and alternately their axes bit deep. Tom glanced up as a sailor looks aloft. “She’ll do. Hank,” he said. The two then with a dozen half clips of the ax removed the inequalities of the bark from the saw’s path. The long flexible ribbon of steel began to sing, bending so adaptably to the hands and motions of the men manipulating that it did not seem possible so mobile an instrument could cut the rough pine. In a moment the song changed timbre. Without a word the men straightened their backs. Tom flirted along the blade a thin stream of kerosene oil from a bottle in his hip pocket, and the sawyers again bent to their work, swaying back and forth rhythmically, their muscles rippling under the’texture of their woolens like those of a panther under its skin. The outer edge of the saw blade disappeared. “Better wedge her, Tom,” advised Hank. They paused while, with a heavy sledge, Tom drove a triangle of steel into the crack made by the sawing. This prevented the weight of the tree from pinching the saw. Then the rhythmical z-z-z, z-z-z, again took up its song. When the trunk was nearly severed Tom drove another and thicker wedge. “Timber!” halloed Hank in a long drawn melodious call that melted through the woods into the distance. The swampers ceased work and withdrew to safety. “Crack!” called the tree. Hank coolly unhooked his saw handle, and Tom drew the blade through and out the other side. The tree shivered, then leaned ever so slightly from the perpendicular, then fell, at first gently, afterward with a crescendo rush, tearing through the branches of other trees, bending the small timber, breaking the smallest and at last hitting with a tremendous crash and bang which filled the air with a fog of small twigs, needles and the powder of snow. Then the swampers, who have by now finished the travoy road, trimmed the prostrate trunk clear of all protuberances. It required fairly skillful ax work. The branches bad to be shaved close and clear, and at the same time the trunk must not be gashed. And often a man was forced to wield his instrument from a constrained position. The chopped branches and limbs had now to be dragged clear and plied. While this was being finished Tom and Hank marked off and sawed the log lengths, paying due attention to the necessity of avoiding knots, forks and rotten places. Thus some of the logs were eighteen, some sixteen or fourteen and some only twelve feet in length. Next appeared the teamsters with their little wooden sledges, their steel chains and their tongs. They had been helping the skidders to place the parallel and level beams, or skids, on which the logs were to be piled by the side of the road. The tree which Tom and Hank had just felled lay up a gentle slope from the new travoy road, so little Fabian Laveque, the teamster, clamped the bite of his tongs to the end of the largest or butt log. “Allex, Molly!” he cried. A horse, huge, elephantine, her bead down, nose close to her chest, inteUi-

gently spying her steps, moved. The log half rolled over, slid three feet and menaced a stump. 1 . “Gee!” cried Laveque. Molly stepped twice directly sidewise, planted her forefoot on a root she bad seen and pulled sharply. The end of the log slid around the stump. “Allez!” commanded Laveque. And Molly started gingerly down the hill. She pulled the timber, heavy as an iron safe, here and there through the brush, missing no steps, making no false moves, backing and finally getting out of the way of an unexpected roll with the ease and intelligence of Laveque himself. In five minutes the burden lay by the travoy road. In two minutes more oue end | of it had been rolled on the little flat wooden sledge and, the other end dragging. it was winding majestically down through the ancient forest. When Molly and Fabian had travoyed the log to the skidway they drew it with a bump across the two parallel skids and left it there to be rolled to the top of the pile. Then Mike McGovern and Bob Stratton and Jim Gladys took charge of it. 1 Mike and Bob were running the cant books, while Jim stood on top of the great pile of logs already decked. A slender, pliable steel chain like a gray snake ran over the top of the pile and disappeared through a pulley to an invisible horse—Jenny, the mate of Molly. Jim threw the end of this chain down. Bob passed it/ over and under the log and returned 'it to Jim, who reached down after it with the hook of his implement. Thus -the stick of timber rested in a long loop, one end of which led to the invisible horse, and the other Jim made fast to the top of the pile. He did so by jamming into another log the steel swamp hook with which the chain was armed. ! When all was made fast the horse I started. “She's a bumper,” said Bob. “Look out, Mike!” The log slid to the foot of the two parallel poles laid slanting up the face of the pile. Then it trembled on the ascent. But one end stuck for an instant, and at once the log took on a dangerous slant. Quick as light Bob and Mike sprang forward, gripped the hooks of the cant hooks like great thumbs and forefingers, and, while one held with all his power, the other gave a sharp twist upward. The log straightened. It was a master feat of power and the knack of applying strength justly. At the top of the little incline the timber hovered for a second. “One more!” sang out Jim to the driver. He poised, stepped lightly up and over and avoided by the safe hairbreadth being crushed when the log rolled. But it did not lie quite straight or even. So Mike cut a short, thick block and all three stirred the heavy timber sufficiently to admit of the billet’s insertion. Then the chain was thrown down for another. Jenny, harnessed only to a short, straight bar with a book in it, leaned to her collar and dug her hoofs at the word of command. The driver, close to her tail, held fast the slender steel chain of an ingenious bitch about the ever useful swamp hook. When Jim shouted “Whoa!” from the top of the skidwny the driver did not trouble to stop the horse; he merely let go the hook. So the power was shut off suddenly, as is meet and proper in such ticklish business. He turned and walked back, and Jenny, like a dog, without the necessity of command, followed him in slow patience. Now came Dyer, a scaler, rapidly down the logging road, a small, slender man with a little, turned up mustache. The men disliked him because of his affectation of a city smartness and because he never ate with them, even when there w r as plenty of room/ The scaler’s duty at present was to measure the diameter of the logs in each skid-

way and bo compute the number of board feet. At the office be tended van, kept the books and looked after supplies. He approached the skidway rapidly, laid his flexible rule across the face of each log. made a mark on his pine tablets in the column to which the log belonged, thrust the tablet in the pocket of bis coat, seized a blue crayon, in a long holder, with which he made an 8 as indication that the log had been scaled, and finally tapped several times strongly with a sledge hammer. On the face of the hammer in relief was an M inside of a delta. This was the company’s brand, and so the log was branded as belonging to them. He

*wai ted over the skidway, rapid and absorbed, In strange activity to the alower power of the actual skidding. In a moment he moved on to the next scene of operations without having said a word to any of the men. “A fine t’lng,” said Mike, spitting. So day after day the work went on. Radway spent his time tramping through the woods, figuring on new work, showing the men how to do things better or differently, discussing minute expedients with the blacksmith, the carpenter, the cook. He was not without his troubles. First he had not enough men, the snow lacked and then came too abundantly, horses fell sick of colic or calked themselves, supplies ran low unexpectedly, trees turned out “punk,” a certain bit of ground proved soft for travoy lng, and so on. At election time, of course, a number of the men went out. And one evening, two days after election time, another and important character entered the North woods and our story. CHAPTER 11. the evening in question some 1111I 111 thirty or forty miles southeast 1111 of Radway’s camp a train was crawling over a badly laid track tbat led toward the Saginaw valley. The whole affair was very crude. To the edge of the right of way pushed the dense swamp, like a black curtain shutting the virgin country from the view of civilization. Across the snow were tracks of animals. The train consisted of a string of freight cars, one coach divided half and half between baggage and smoker, and a day car occupied by two silent, awkward women and a child. In the smoker lounged a dozen men. They were of various«izes and descriptions, but they all wore heavy blanket mackinaw coats, rubber shoes and thick German socks tied at the knee. The air was so thick with smoke that the men bad difficulty in distinguishing objects across the length of the car. The passengers sprawled in various attitudes, and their occupations were diverse. Three nearest the baggage room door attempted to sing, but without much success. A man in the corner breathed softly through a mouth organ, to the music of which his seat mate, leaning his head sideways, gave close attention. One big fellow with a square beard swaggered back and forth down the aisle offering to every one refreshment from a quart bottle. It was rarely refused. Of the dozen probably three-quarters were more or less drunk. After a time the smoke became too dense. A short thickset fellow with an evil, dark face coolly thrust his heel through a window. The conductor, who, with the brakeman and baggage master, was seated in the baggage van, heard the jingle of glass. He arose. “Cuess I’ll take up tickets,” he remarked. “Perhaps it will quiet the [ boys down a little.” The conductor was a big man. raw- •

I boned tmu broad, with a hawk face. . His every motion showed lean, quick, | pantherlike power. “Let her went” replied the brakeman. rising as a matter of course to follow his chief. i The brakeman was stocky, short and long armed. In the old fighting days Michigan railroads chose their train officials with an eye to their superior deltoids. The two men loomed on the noisy smoking compartment. “Tickets, please,” clicked the conductor sharply. Most of the men began to fumble about in their pockets, but the three singers and the man who had been offering the quart bottle did not stir. “Ticket, Jack!” repeated the conductor. “C<yne on, now!” The big bearded man leaned uncertainly against the seat. “Now, look here. Bud,” he urged in wheedling tones, “I ain’t got no ticket. You know how it is. Bud. I blows my stakes.” He fished uncertainly in his pocket and produced the quart bottle, nearly empty. “Have a drink?” “No,” said the conductor sharply. “A’ rjght.” replied Jack amiably. “Take One myself.” He tipped the bottle, emptied it and hurled it through a window. The conductor paid no apparent attention to the breaking of the glass. “If you haven’t any ticket, you’ll have to get off,” said he. The big man straightened up. “You go to blazes!” be snorted, and with the sole of his spiked boot delivered a mighty kick at the conductor’s thigh. The official, agile as a wildcat, leaped back, then forward and knocked the man half the length of the car. You see, he was used to it. Before Jack could regain his feet the official stood over him. The three men in the corner had also risen and were staggering down the aisle intent on battle. The conductor took in the chances with professional rapidity. “Get at ’em, Jimmy!” said he. And as the big man finally swayed to his feet he was seized by the collar and trousers in the grip known to “bouncers” everywhere, hustled to the door, which some one obligingly opened, and hurled from the moving train into the snow. The conductor did not care a straw whether the obstreperous Jack lit on his head or his feet, hit a snow bank or a pile of ties. The conductor returned to find a rolling, kicking, gouging mass of kinetic energy knocking the varnish off all one end of the car. A head appearing, he coolly batted it three times against a corner of the seat arm, after which he pulled the contestant out by the hair, and threw him into a seat, where he lay limp. Then it could be seen that Jimmy bad clasped tight in his embrace a leg each of the other two. He i hugged them close to bis bqeast and j jammed his face down against them to protect his features. They could pound the top,of his bead and welcome. The only thing he really feared was a kick in the side, and for that there was liArrllv rorun

-a lie conductor stood over the heap, *- at a manifest advantage. “You lumber jacks had enough, or dc * you want to catch it plenty?” The men, drunk though they were, realized their helplessness. They signified they had had enough. Jimmythereupon released them and stood tip,, brushing down his tousled bkir with .his stubby fingers. “Now, is it ticket or bounce?” inquire ed the conductor. After some difficulty and' grumblinfr ' the two paid their fare and that of tltf*' third, who was still dazed (TO BE CONTINUED)'

“ Alles!" Commanded Laveque.

He was seized by the collar.