14 LETTERS FROM THE BACKWOODS. 



low. Recoiling from the shock, its head swung off 

 with the stream, and away it shot out of sight. 



The stream gets full of these logs, which often 

 catch on some rock or projecting root, and accumu- 

 late till a hundred or more will be all tangled and 

 matted together. There they lie, rising and falling on 

 the uneasy current, while a driver slowly and care- 

 fully steps from one to another, feeling with his feet 

 and handspike to see where the drag is. When he 

 finds it, he loosens it, perhaps with a single blow, and 

 away the whole rolling tumbling mass moves. Now 

 look out, bold driver ; thy footing is not of the most 

 certain kind, and a wild and angry stream is beneath 

 thee. Yet see how calmly he views the chaos ! The 

 least hurry or alarm, and he is lost. But no ; he 

 moves without agitation; now balancing himself a 

 moment as the log he steps upon shoots downward, 

 now quickly passing to another as it rolls under him, 

 he is gradually working his way towards the shore. 

 He has almost succeeded in reaching the bank, when 

 the whole floating mass separates so far that he can 

 no longer step from one to another, and, after looking 

 about a moment, he quietly seats himself astraddle of 

 one and darts like a fierce rider down the current. 

 These logs are carried twenty and thirty miles in 

 this way, passing from small streams to larger ones, 

 through lakes and along rivers, and are finally 

 brought up at the wished-for point by stringing poles 

 across the rivef, which stops their further descent. 

 Several different men have clubbed together to drive 

 the stream, and here they pick out each his own, by 



