690 THE REDWOODS OF NORTHERN CALIFORNIA. [Mar. 



one only hears the twitter of some little mite of a bird seeking insects 

 amongst the bark. The way seems longer than it really is, the 

 expectation of the traveller being always alive, hoping that the next 

 turn may reveal a clearing and logging camp, or that the neigh of 

 the horses in the "corral" of the stopping house may bo soon 

 heard and answered by his own tired steed, — the road is ever the 

 same, and there is nothing to divert his attention. It may chance, 

 however, that the traveller comes npon the cabin of a shingle- 

 splitter, and may find the splitter himself further on, splitting out 

 "shingles" and "shakes," such as are used in California instead of 

 slates for roofing. The shingle-splitter works in parts of the forest 

 from whence, owing to the nature of the ground, it is difficult to 

 remove the timber to the mills. He selects a straight tree, and 

 tests if it seems free from twist by making a deep cutting in its 

 side and examining the grain. Should it prove satisfactory, he and 

 his mate erect a staging around it, at 5 to 12 feet from the ground 

 (so that the workable timber may be free from the bosses and twist- 

 ings of the roots), and cut it down by axe after two or three days' 

 work. A large proportion of these woodsmen are Canadians — 

 " bluenoses " from New Brunswick — and are, as might be expected, 

 experts with the axe ; and to show their skill, they will, if there be 

 onlookers, throw a tree between two stakes fixed a hundred and 

 fifty feet off, or will lay it exactly in a bed of brushwood prepared 

 for it if the curvature of the ground requires such a bed ; for it is a 

 brittle timber, and if carelessly felled may be shivered into long 

 splinters. Often a tree will spring forward 20 feet and more 

 in falling, especially if felled downwards on a slope ; and when full 

 of sap will sometimes split the bark open, and shoot clear out of it ; 

 they are generally felled to fall upwards, however. The felled tree 

 is denuded of its bark, one to two feet in thickness, by means of 

 sharpened crowbars, the branches are lopped off, and a section — one 

 and a half feet in length if for shingles, or three feet if for shakes — 

 is sawn off the trunk, and split into blocks of about 10 inches in 

 width, and from these blocks the thin shingles are rapidly split by 

 means of a "frow" or broad-bladed knife with handle set upright. 

 If the trial shingles cut prove to be perfectly flat, then more 

 sections are sawn off the trunk, and the tree is worked up ; but if, 

 as sometimes happens, a twist is shown, the fallen mass must be 

 abandoned till such time as a railroad is extended to the spot. 

 Such abandoned trunks, partly worked, give the appearance of great 

 and useless waste. The traveller may next come upon a waggon 

 loaded with these shingles, perhaps in a tight place among the 

 stumps, or sunk to the axles in a quagmire ; or he may meet a 

 couple of wild " vaqueros " driving cattle ; or he may have to give 



