BEEF SLOUGH 51 



Captain H. C. Wilcox had a nice trade between Alma, 

 Wisconsin, and Wabasha, Minnesota, making two 

 round trips a day. 



All the bosses and many of the men working in Beef 

 Slough were Scotch-Canadians, who had been lumber- 

 jacks back home on the Ottawa or Saint Maurice, and 

 their quick, decisive speech with the burr on it, pleased 

 me very much. You could not throw a boom plug at 

 any crew and not hit a Macdonald, or a Mackenzie, 

 and probably get one back from a Duncan. 



Each raft was composed of two pieces (halves) of 

 three brails each. A brail of logs was six hundred feet 

 long and forty-five feet wide. The rim was made of the 

 longest logs, fastened at the ends with about a thirty- 

 inch lap, by a short, heavy chain of three links. A two- 

 inch hole was bored nine inches deep in each log, and 

 a two-inch oak or ironwood pin, with a head on it was 

 put through an end link of the chain, and driven hard 

 into the hole in the boom log. These logs, so fastened, 

 made a strong boom or frame (with just enough flexi- 

 bility to suit the job) into which the loose logs were 

 carried by the current, and skillfully placed endwise 

 with the current, by men, using pike poles and peavies. 

 Then one-half-inch cross wires were placed and tight- 

 ened, to hold the boom and logs together and prevent 

 spreading. 



When a brail was completed, two men with a double- 

 headed skif¥ or batteaux, would drop it down, by the 

 current, one to three miles, and snub it in, where later 

 two more brails would be landed beside it. Then a fit- 

 ting crew would come and drop the three brails even at 

 the stern, fasten them together, build "snubbin works" 

 and other things necessary to complete a "piece" or 

 "half raft" all ready for a boat to hitch into. 



