20 



THE HARDWOOD RECORD. 



"Along about 5 o'clock in tie afternoon 

 I got pretty tired and I sat down on the 

 bluff of the river, leaning against the skids 

 of an old roll-way where I had banked logs 

 the winter before. I fell sound asleep, with 

 my rifle across my knees. I woke up on heal- 

 ing a splash in the water. I opened my eyes 

 and there, not twenty rods up stream, with 

 heads erect, there came across a riffle in the 

 stream the handsomest buck and doe you ever 

 saw. It was a shame, I know, but 

 I couldn't resist the temptation; 

 so without leaving my sitting posi- 

 tion I drew bead on the buck, who 

 was in the lead, and aiming in ad- 

 vance of him I caught him just 

 back of the foreleg. He fell in a 

 heap in the shallow water. The 

 doe hesitated and stopped. I could 

 have killed her just as well, but I 

 hadn't the heart. Eventually she 

 scampered to the bank and disap- 

 peared in the woods. I went down 

 into the riffle and dragged the car- 

 cass up onto a rock and carefully 

 skinned it, saving both hide and antlers. I 

 cut a few choice steaks out of the deer and 

 added them to my pack. I made up the hide 

 and antlers into a bundle and, bending down 

 a sapling, fastened them in the top and let 

 the tree swing back in place. I recovered the 

 trophies afterwards. 



"Then we had a supper that was a sup- 

 per — ^just the deer and I. I have always felt 

 a little sorry about the deer's share in that 

 supper. 



"Before leaving Saginaw I had gone to the 

 land office and had found that section 

 eighteen, one west, still belonged to the gov- 

 ernment. I often wondered why, because it 

 was a magnificent piece of timber, and log- 

 ging operations had been going on up the 

 Chippewa several years. The next day I 

 found the witness tree and the corner stake 

 and I spent a week up there in the woods pac- 

 ing off forty after forty and picking out the 

 very best portion of the timber. I hadn't 

 seen a soul, but about 4 o 'clock one afternoon 

 I saw tracks. They weren't Indian tracks 

 either. I know 'em. They were landlookers' 

 tracks, and they were fresh, and I said to my- 

 self, 'Bill, if you get this land you have gut 

 to get a move on yourself. ' Bill got. 



"It was sixty miles by trail to Saginaw. 

 I stopped just long enough to hide my gun in 

 a hollow tree, and started, and I never stopped. 

 Yes, I did stop once. In the darkness, right 

 in the trail, I stumbled over a hairy animal, 

 and I was skcered plumb to death. I had 

 heard eats all night and I knew it was not 

 a cat, but I was certain it was a bear. Be- 

 fore it escaped my fingers, I found that it 

 was nothing but a measly calf that belonged 

 to some squatter down near the mouth of the 

 Kne. I regained my feet and stumbled on 

 into the night. 



' ' I didn 't go home to see my wife, but I 

 staggered into the land office at Saginaw just 

 as it was being opened up and I gasped: 



'Let me see the map covering eighteen, one 

 west, again.' I got the map in my hand. 

 The section was still unentered. I picked out 

 two hundred and forty acres of the six hun- 

 dred and forty of the section, and I had the 

 clerk enter them up to me. I handed him $25 

 and told him I would be back in fifteen 

 minutes with the rest of the $300. You know 

 we bought government land then at ten 

 shillings an acre. I rushed into my house and 

 tore up a comer of the carpet, 

 grabbed a handful of those bills 

 and rushed back to the land office. 

 The clerk was just signing my 

 receipt when up in front rode my 

 old boss' landlooker with his horse 

 dripping with sweat and dead 

 beat. I had beaten him in afoot 

 by just fifteen minutes! 



"I bought six horses, hired 

 fifteen French Canadians, not one 

 of whom could speak a word of 

 English, bought supplies of fodder 



, , ,, ,,. and provisions, axes, cant hooks 

 -The next day I found the ^ ' 



leitnese tree." and pevieo, and loaded the whole 



outfit on to an old sand scow that I chartered 

 for the winter. My wife went along. We 

 poled that good hundred miles up the Sagi- 

 naw, the Tittabawassee, the Pine and the 

 Chippewa. On the upper river we would oc- 

 casionally find a riffle where we would have 

 to unload the horses and drag the 

 scow up to deep water again. 

 Eventually we arrived at the land and 

 built a shanty of logs roofed with 

 rived shakes, partitioning off a little 

 room in the rear for my wife's bed 

 room, and started camp 

 life for the winter. The 

 boys slept and ate and 

 fought and swore, and 

 swore and fought and 

 ate — all in French 

 Canuck — in the main part 

 of the shanty. We built 

 another shanty for the 

 horses ; then we made the 

 few roads that were 

 necessary and started to 

 felling and skidding logs. 

 "We all worked like 

 Trojans. Those French- 

 men worked because I worked with them. My 

 days were busy in the woods, and the even- 

 ings I spent in repairing harness or mending 

 sleds and making whiffletrees. My wife was 

 the only woman in the camp and was the 

 most popular person in it. Even out of the 

 few materials at hand §he conjured dainties 

 for the men that they highly appreciated. It 

 was a great winter. The snow fell early and 

 stayed without a break-up. We did hustle 

 logs, and in the spring with the breaking up 

 of the river we started down a drive of 

 1,400,000 feet of cork pine logs, that aver- 

 aged less than three to the thousand. The 

 old sand scow was transformed into a cook 

 house, and with my wife aboard, brought up 

 the rear of the drive. We made a clean drive 



that spring and we got the whole bunch of 

 logs safe and clean into the Green point 

 boom. 



' ' I owed everybody. I didn 't have a cent 

 left to pay my crew, but I coaxed Unde 

 John Estabrook — dear old chap, now dead 

 and gone — to advance me $2,500 and take 

 his pay in lumber at $7 for culls, $12 for 

 common and $40 for uppers. Seven, twelve 

 and forty was no slouch of a price for lum- 

 ber in those days. 



"Well, that was my start, and — " 



"Say, BiU, " came a voice from the ad- 

 joining card room, "ain't you ever going to 

 quit gassing with that chap, and come back 

 yere and finish this game of seven up?" 



The septuagenai-ian rose slowly and said 

 to me apologetically, "That's Fi-ed Carlisle. 

 He 's got a notion in his head he knows how 

 to play seven up, but he knows just about as 

 much about seven up as you fellows nowadays, 

 know about lumbering." 



Henry H. Gkson. 



I had beaten him in afoot by just fifteen 

 mtnutes/' 



New Philadelphia House. 



On Jan. 1 the firm of Soble Brothers com- 

 menced business as a wholesale and commis- 

 sion hardwood lumber house at Philadelphia, 

 with offices at 722 Land Title building. The, 

 Arm is made up of Harry I. Soble and his 

 brother John J. Soble. Harry I. Soble has 

 been engaged with the 

 W. M. Bitter Lumber 

 N^ Company, Columbus, O., 

 for some years as sales- 

 man, and during the last 

 year as sales superintend- 

 ent. He began his lum- 

 ber experience as eookee 

 in a lumber camp in Pot- 

 ter county. Pa,, and has 

 gradually advanced to 

 his present position of 

 proprietor. 



John J. Soble also 

 started at work in a lum- 

 ber camp in Pennsyl- 

 vania and afterward went 

 into one of the Bitter, 

 W. Va., yards handling 

 lumber. He has acted 

 as salesman for some 

 years, and goes from that position with 

 the Bitter company to join his brother 

 in the new enterprise. 



The new concern has a source of supply 

 of poplar and oak in the Long-Pole Lumber 

 Company, of Blue Fields, W. Va., and also 

 has the handling of the white pine and oak 

 bill timber of the Raleigh Lumber Company, 

 Ealeigh, W. Va. Messrs. Soble have made 

 an enviable record so far in the lumber busi- 

 ness, and there is a well grounded belief 

 that they will make good in their new un- 

 dertaking. They have been boys wlio have 

 saved their earnings, and start out equipped 

 with both money and experience to do busi- 

 ness on the right kind of lines. 



