The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1884-08-01
The Swinging, Cleaning Ak.


which first-class chopper handles an
ak are quite remarkable. Trees three
feet in diameter are often cut entirely
through and still retain their perpen-
dicular post on until breeze, or some
slight shock topples them over. The
two gaps on either side meet in a
straight line. To the novice there are
many strange things within the prov
ince of an az In cleaning piece of
farm land it is frequently stipulation
that the chopper shall ''bucket" his
stumps to hold pail of water; in other
words, leave a conyave bowl on their
tops to catch rain-water and rot them.
In the piner;es the AK is used for nearly
every purpose for which cutting tool
is re, uired. With it the chopper trims
his ..boot-packs" cuts lacing thongs,
buckets horse and cattle feed boxes.
pins up his sheds. shanties and out
houses. constructs his hobs and ''go-
devils aud even whites his tooth
picks. He cutters chips for drinking
cups, fixes tobacco for his pipe, throws
fivinr bridges over winter streams,
whites out the checkers for his even
in IS amusement. and carves the check
er board In word, it is Il part and
parcel of himself. and its song is the
music Of life to his ear.
After leaving the pineries the axe has
a long ramb,c to Il new life upon the
Pacific Store. In California, on the
Coast Range, it enters the ia nous red
woods, and then Indeed another exist
ence is found. In fact. its posi- ion in
society is elevated. Those mob trees.
the Goliiihs of the forests. are fast dis
appearing. But their gigantic stumps
still remain to tel of their departed
greatness. And enormous st,lmps they
truly are. So much so, indeed, tina. the
axe hiss 10 cl NIB in the world to over
come them, and the chopper assumes a
position VIII CHI he is not compelled to
attempt anywhere else. To surmount
the enormo Is swell at the base of the
tree and commence operations wher
the average diameter of the trunk may
be said to- begin, he builds platform
made of stakes with cross-pieces of
rails. sometimes six or ten feet high.
around his victim, and CHOPS from that.
cutting above the Dubious swell. Or, if
an expert, he viii simply bucket 4
hole in the trunk, and driving st Ike
into it, stand perche upon that slend"r
fo1lhold as he dextrously swings his
blade. -----.
The size of the redwood giants is
world-famous, and it is legend of the
coast that a woodsman having chopped
for q week on one side of tree, walked
around it and found another chopper
who had been at work for a month on
the other side. Huge they are, but
beautiful wood to chop, fairly Turing the
;aqui> tive blade to the mysteries of I'M
told centuries wrapped up in their red
hearts: and the death-bellow of the for
est colossus, as. in his final agony. he
plunges down some dark, wooded can
yon, crushing all before him, may be
heard ieverberating in dull thunder
through the cioaked hills at all sessions
of the year.
But it is not until the cypress swamps
OF the Southland are reached that the
ave takes to wafer. In those dark
Swallowed and moss-draped lagoOns the
chopper becomes ambitious, and per-
forms his work while skillfully bal
anced in one of the most treacherous OF
all aquatic contrivanccs. Should any
one thiak there is no science required
to chop from dug-out, let the skeptic
try it. A person. not an inexpert hand
with an axe, but norice at teetering
in canoe, did So and mourned. Once
On the Bayou Teehe he padded up to
big tree, whose great, Dubious stem
reached far under water, and fastened
his dug-out to the victim. seized his axe
and boldly stood erect in the PROV.
Balancing himself for a moment, until
true equilibrium was attained, he
swung back his axe and INSIDE a bold
stroke at the tree. The dug-out at
tempted q somersault Instantly. 1t
shot out of the water st the stern; the
cutter shot under water at the bow; and
where the axe went is mystery to this
day San Francisco cal.