THE HARDWOOD RECORD. 



II 



taste good to him. The question he asked 

 himself when he sat at table was as to 

 what he could put into his stomach that 

 would best feed and sustain his body and 

 enable him to do the maximum of work 

 with the minimum of wear. And when 

 the frail tenement could be made to an 

 swer no longer, that great mind stepped 

 calmly and contidently out of it and into 

 the work God has for it beyond this life. 



And with the same calm and ceaseless 

 watchfulness with which he husbanded, 

 and the same cautious intelligence with 

 which he used, his bodily strength, he hus- 

 banded and used his great opportunity for 

 doing good in the world; and used up its 

 very last shred of possibility. 



A good man, some say; a shrewd poli- 

 tician, a great statesman, others say. A 

 wise man, we say, and that covers it all. 

 And he left the world better for having: 

 lived. And that is a good enough epitaph 

 for any man. 



THE PBICE SITUATION. 



Strong as the price of oak lumber is at 

 present, and it has never been stronger, it 

 does not seem stronger nor higher than is 

 justified by the general conditions of sup- 

 ply and demand which prevail at present 

 and will prevail under any normal condi- 

 tions in the future. 



We do not see how the upper grades of 

 quartered oak can ever be much lower in 

 price than at present. The logs that will 

 produce high-grade quartered oak are be- 

 coming scarce, and when you find such a 

 log the competition of the veneer and stave 

 people forces the saw mill man to pay so 

 much for the log that he can't make it 

 into lumber at a price much lower than at 

 present prevailing. And when prices of 

 lumber go much below the present level 

 the veneer or stave people will get the 

 logs. 



A good many people do not appreciate 

 the growth the veneer business has made 

 In recent years, and this growth guaran- 

 tees that the price of high-grade quartered 

 oak will not be lower than it is. 



Conditions have become such that high- 

 grade quartered oak lumber is too good 

 for ordinary consumption, and those wish- 

 ing to use such lumber must get it out 

 of the lower grades. 



Plain-sawed oak is higher to-day than 

 it has ever been and the demand is 

 stronger. Through all the ups and downs 

 of hardwood prices during recent years, 

 plain-sawed oak has remained fairly 

 steady — the steadiest of any hardwood on 

 the market. 



The greatest advance it has made has 

 been within the past three or four months, 

 and there is but little of it on the market. 



The situation In poplar is a little dif- 

 ff-rent than in any other hardwoods. Pop- 

 lav tinilior comes largely from the moun- 

 tainous districts of Eastern Tennessee and 

 Kiiitiii-ky and from West Virginia. It is 



difficult to get the logs to the mills, and 

 in many sections the difficulty is so great 

 that only very high prices for poplar lum- 

 ber make it profitable. When the price 

 foi poplar lumber is low, or only moderate, 

 tlie timber most difficult of access remains 

 unmolested. Under such conditions as 

 have prevailed during the past year, how- 

 ever, there is profit in operating in sec- 

 lions where under ordinary circumstances 

 there is no profit. 



Another thing is that anyone having any 

 facilities for operating has had no need 

 to remain idle from lack of funds. Poplar 

 has been so scarce and high that there 

 were any number of people ready to fur- 

 nish any amount of money on the pros- 

 pect of getting poplar lumber that would 

 give them a profit in the handling. So 

 there has been a good deal of poplar lum- 

 ber produced in unusual and unreckoned 

 territory during the past six months, and 

 it is beginning to come on the market. 

 One thing which, among ottet-s, has tended 

 to keep the poplar market up to the top- 

 notch during recent months is the convic- 

 tion apparently existing among some of 

 the producers, and notably the smaller 

 ones, that poplar will be advanced still 

 further after the first of September. Some 

 of these smaller producers are piling their 

 lumber with this expectation, but that con- 

 dition is fully offset by the fact that the 

 bigger and better posted manufacturers 

 are sold right up to the saw. Still it may 

 bo said that at present the price on poplar 

 lumber is steady. 



It isn't often that an outside lumber- 

 man comes to Chicago a bear and goes 

 away a bull on prices, but we saw such a 

 happening last week. A gentleman came 

 here to sell some gum lumber and ex- 

 pressed himself in this office as being pessi- 

 mistic as to the prices on gum being main- 

 tained. He found so much better demand 

 for all grades of his gum, however, and 

 he disposed of it at so much better prices 

 than he expected that he went home jubi- 

 lant. 



It is true that a great deal of gum lum- 

 ber is being produced at present, but it is 

 also true that a great deal is being con- 

 sumed. The high price of all oUier kinds 

 of hardwoods and the extreme scarcity 

 which has characterized th.t «tipply of re- 

 cent months, has given gum its opportunity 

 to make a place for itself as a substitute 

 for higher priced stock; and much of the 

 ground it has gained it will hold on its 

 merits. Cottonwood is very scarce and 

 very firm in price and bids fair to hold its 

 own strongly. 



In northern hardwoods we consider the 

 situation very strong and there is no pros- 

 pect of any weakness that we can detect. 

 In maple, the great staple of Michigan, it 

 is beginning to be difficult, even this early 

 ill the season, to place orders for certain 

 thicknesses, and there is every prospect 

 at present that when navigation closes this 



fall the docks and yards of the producers 

 will be cleaned up thoroughly, and that 

 the stock in the city markets will barely 

 avail to carry the trade through the win- 

 ter and early spring. We consider the 

 situation as regards maple to be as strong 

 as it has been in recent years. 



And that which is true of maple is true 

 of other northern hardwoods. 



On the whole the price situation as re- 

 gards hardwood lumber is very strong and 

 nothing short of a great slump in general 

 business can impair the prosperity of the 

 hardwood lumber trade. 



A SOUND POSITION. 



Charles A. Towae of Minnesota, who has 

 a considerable reputation as as orator and 

 a general all-purpose windbag, made an 

 attack on Grover Cleveland in a recent 

 speech, which had a great deal of humor 

 and more truth in it than he probably un- 

 derstood. He said that Grover Cleveland 

 never had an original idea in his life, and 

 he poked fun at Mr. Cleveland's ponderous 

 style of oratory by picturing him deliver- 

 ing an address after this fashion: 



"My Fellow Citizens: After that calm 

 and deliberate reflection which we shou'd 

 all give to the weighty problems which 

 confront us, and after careful inquiry into 

 the experience of mankind, in this and 

 other countries, and in former times, as 

 well as in our own era, I have come to the 

 conclusion that two and two make four." 



Then, said Mr. Towne: 



The multitude of Cleveland worshipers 

 would throw their hats in the air and 

 huzza and turu to one another and ex- 

 claim: "Do you hear that? Mr. Cleve- 

 land says two and two make four. That's 

 right. That's what I've said all along. 

 Bully for Grover! And you may depend 

 upon it that he'll stick to it as long as he 

 lives. They can't bulldoze him. He'll 

 never, never compromise and admit that 

 two and t«-o make three, or five, or even 

 four and a half." 



Now that's funny, of course, and it's 

 true — all true— truer than Mr. Towne un- 

 derstands, probably. 



It is true that Mr. Cleveland, if he felt 

 called upon to state that two and two 

 make four, would deliver himself about as 

 Mr. Towne says, for he is a very ponder- 

 ous and pompous kind of a man. And it 

 is true that his friends and admirers, who, 

 as has been proven on several occasions 

 are a majority of the people of this coun- 

 try, would probably heartily concur in the 

 statement that two and two make four, 

 and would be pleased to hear Mr. Cleve- 

 land give voice to a conviction they had 

 long entertained. For Mr. Cleveland's 

 friends and admirers are of the sober and 

 conservative class of citizens who have a 

 strong predisposition to adhere closely to 

 that which is tried and proven. And one 

 reason of his popularity among the people 

 is the belief they entertain that on all 

 other points he is as sound and safe as on 

 the proposition that two and two make 

 four. Vou see, there are at this time n 

 great number of brilliant men endeavoring. 



