Waterbury evening Democrat., 1903-09-02
WATERBURY EVENING DEMoCRAT,WEDNEsDAY.

stood on the level bottom adjacent to the 1 river and about 100 yards from it. Half mile above the mills the railroad crossed the river over long iron bridge, and from point just below the southern end of the bridge an artificial ditch had been cut to float the logs into the mill at high water It was this bridge and the ditch that were responsible for the trouble, which now prevailed.
 Au Sable river was roaring, booming, yellow flood. All day the great sawlogs, broken from their moorings above, had been rushing by in thousands. But now immense pine trees, torn up by their roots, were borne upon the bosom of the raging torrent. One of these monarchs of the forest had caught between the two middle piers of the bridge, and formed the nucleus of rapidly growing mass of timber and debris, the long stems of the great pines writhing and rolling together like the hideous forms of gigantic ser pents Not only was the bridge threat ened with momentary destruction, but tho dam thus formed caught the waters up and hurled them and their ponderous armature down the ditch and against the mills below, with violence that must soon accomplish their destruction.
 To get at the pine trunk and cut it would release the straining, tumbling mass, restore the raging waters to their natural channel, and save the bridge and the mills. But woe to him who cut it! When Tom Harding, ax in hand, stepped upon the bridge and started on his mission, not one of the group who stood looking on in breath1ess silence but felt that he was witnessing tra- gedy
 :"Fhe man is committing sheer, down right suicide" said an old lumberman who had spent his life in the forest and on the river, 'It oughtn't to be allowed
 But Tom had already reached the mid- de of the long structure, and was feeling his way down over the tumb1ing, grind ing pile as only a lumberman can. Now he stood with careful footing upon the huge pine stem, bending under the awful strain, and now he piled his ax with te1l- ing vigor, making the chips fly at each powerful stroke To an eye not cogni- zant of his terrible danger the sturdy lumberman might have been following his daily vocation for anything in his look or manner that denoted the con- trary.
 But the woman, wild-eyed and pant ing, with hair disheveled and hanging in rain-soaked tresses down her back, who just now joined the group on the bank, realized his danger, and piercing shriell mingled with the roar of the waters.
 "Oh, Tom, dear Tom, come back to me! Forgive my cruel words, and come back flor baby's sake and mine!" and she held the little, wet, shivering thing up in full view of it's parent out on the river
 He heard not her words, but he saw his child, and every feeling vanished be- fore the paterna1 Returned and looked at the towering mass above him, and for moment those on shore hoped he might escape. But the next! A terrible grind- ing crash. as the great tree parted, an awful, muf1ed roar, and for single in- stant the lumberman's form stood poised on the broken tree. He kissed his hand once, and above the din came the words, fIt was for you Maggie: you and the baby" and then he went down, and was borne away by the rushing swirl of wa, ters .<as. r, eea~4 av.s<s,s -. s.z..s
 Half an hour later searchers found limp, unconscious body suspended to the branches of tree where 1t had been left by the now receding waters. It was at first thought that the man was dead, but closer examination revealed the fact that he breathed, and a liberal draught from lumberman's flask forced down his throat partly restored him to conscious ness. That night Tom Harding was car- ried home to bis wife, terribly maimed and bruised, 1t is true, but still alive. Under her tender and happy ministra- tions he finally recovered, and from his terrible experience he g1eaned a lesson that will last him all his life. To-day not a happier trio lives than Tom and Mar garet and their baby.--Farm and Fire side. <
 u ia Rrrch Won