Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1903-01-17
HlooRAPH OF A sHiNcls
Description of Life in The Lumb.r !.
j. ests Of New Brunswick

ii.
ban residence to the great aos,l
swamps OF New Brunswick Tho Ia
mit-thrush, rocking from the -
branch of stately cedar as no 1oode
the heart of the forest with his 49,.
song, IS supremacy ignorant Of ~
sparrow, twittering and shal<in. l;s
towsied feathers from the gable o,Ias
4 your head. Yet in a few montbs ~
q great cedar will no longer rock Ire -,
Z est children to sleep, but will cover ~,
roofs of men, even as your own s,;r
7, ales,, a few years since, grew stano,,
, and straight in what seemed an ;nae'
/, cessible forest-swamp.
~ As IN all great industries. only tho
toll or many hands and brains can
bring about this Transformation. The
iumbernan is in this case the nrima
mover, and cedar logs are what he
wants most. These can be obtained
only from the Government lands. as
practically all the great lumber dis
trict aot central and northern New.
Brunswick Is held by the Provincial
Government and, leased by special IL
census which expire in the year 1918.
BEFORE the land is applied for, how
ever, 8 the lulnberman sends. his
CRUISER into the woods. This "cruis
err is "a man of experience and almost
endless endurance. He must have in
sight. good judgment, and a little of
that peculiar imaginative faculty that
Peter Ibbetson calls dreaming true"
For no man can tramp fifty square
miles and actually count every stick
of standing timber. Yet the cruiser
,nutl xxzn h to-,
also il the timber stands upon a slope,
il that slope makes toward a stream,
and il that stream flows into river
that will float the logs to the mill for
which he is cruising. When he finds
well-wooded land that fulfils these
conditions he must be able to estimate
the quantity and value of the standing
timber, for, from his report the lumber
man decides what lands he wants and
hoy much he can afford to bid for
them. Then he applies for the land and
5his application is published in the Off
tcial gazette until the day comes APP
ipointed by the Government for the
sland sale at Fredericton. If there is
e.no one to bid against him the lumber
man then buys for an upset" or NOM
sinal price Of eight dollars per square
emile, for the remaining years until
1913, when the lease may be renewed
If there are no new applicants for the
sland. IN H.
All this IS before an axe has struck
the tree. In September the choppers
are sent to the woods. From then until
the heavy SHOWS come in December they
chop and ''yard"-pile-their cut. From
these yards" the teams haul to the
yt,sev 1oe. Sc
called the hauling off, and is not be-
gun until the chopping is over. The
logs when felled by the axe are yard
ed by a horse, one horse hauling the
cut of five men, AS the lumber camps
are often from, forty to sixty miles from
settlement, you will easily see that
the transportation of supplies for men
and horses is no small problem. Much
of this is done the previous winter be-
fore the roads break up, as it is easier
to haul over snow, and the men are in
the woods two or three months before
the snow comes. These supplies that
have to be left in the woods all sum-
mer are insured against forest fires at
a rate of. q per cent.
Let us start, then, on a fine January
J morning, for visit to the camps.
cap, furF mits-turn up your collar so
that only your eyes with their frosty
lashes can be seen, and so we are off
for twenty mile drive into the will
1 derness! Seven miles out and we pass
the last house, a miserable hut with a
bunch of yelping dogs at the door, and
:ssrnal towsled heads at every pane of
1.-THE dirty window No more trotting
NOV! No more Slowing and humping
over the road where each passing
sleigh cuts off al little more from the
beaten track leaving, a wider swath
for your own sleigh to twist and turn
I'm as the little horse trots along over
sthe hardened footway in the middle!
Now we come to the step-hole road,
and must go carefully, for a false step
here will plunge the horse UP to the
shafts IN snow, and he is not likely at
such time to consider his attach
ments.
You are expecting worse roads.
dare say. A sudden dip down steep
bank that sends the sleigh almost over
Sthe horses back prepares you for most
things but what really occurs. For you
have come. at right angles, upon road
smooth and level as a floor. where two
sleiEhs might run abreast with no
trouble at all. This is the Logging road,
cut through the virgin forest for the
'fifst moving of the newly cut cedar log
son its long journey toward the city OF
men. ~
BEAUTIES OF a LOGGING RUN. 3
--~-on we glide, over the road like marble
Z, pavement. between dark frs loaded
with the pearls and pendants of the
81 silver thaw." We must hurry, for,
: perfect as the road is. there is danger
lurking. If by chance we should NEE.
the teams on their midday turns
coming down the slope, we would be
but kindling wood and food for thought
before the great double sleds, with logs
piled the width of the~road and nearly
the height Of the trees, gould be check
ed in their long slide, or before we could
turn and run away. Yet the danger
seems slight one. Surely princess
with dashing out-riders, milk-wnite
steeds, silver harness, and ermine ropes
1tetr,,rf;on a all pOSSiDie