158 RIVER LIFE. 



ever unwelcome to himself, no sooner is his head above water 

 than he hears the wild woods echo the jeering laugh of his more 

 fortunate comrades. 



In other places, where banks are too abrupt to allow the team 

 to pass on to the river, the logs are unloaded and rolled down 

 in one general mass ; the first few fall upon the ice, others roll- 

 ing against them ; the main body fall back and accumulate in 

 great numbers. To break or clear such a landing is often very 

 dangerous. While at work prying on the foremost, large masses 

 start suddenly, and often the only way of escape is to spring in 

 advance of the rushing pile and plunge the river. " I saw one 

 poor fellow," said a logger, " hurled into eternity very suddenly 

 while at work on one of those jams. Co-operating with others 

 in an attempt to roll a stick from the pile, the main lever gave 

 way, and the stick slipped back. This person used a single 

 hand-spike, holding up the upper end and sallying back. "When 

 the log rolled back it caused the hand-spike to spring forward, 

 and, before he had time to relinquish his grasp, it flung him head- 

 long forward, like an arrow from the hunter's bow, down the 

 embankment into the water ; when recovered, he was dead. It 

 was supposed that some internal injury was inflicted by the sud- 

 den ejectment, which caused him to suffocate more readily in the 

 water. Rarely could the man be found his equal in physical en- 

 ergy ; but strength opposes no barrier to death." 



Logs are now driven down streams whose navigation for such 

 purposes was formerly regarded as impracticable — some from 

 their diminutive size, and others from their wild, craggy chan- 

 nel. There is a stream of the latter description, called "Ne- 

 sourdnehunk" which disembogues into the Penobscot on the 

 southwest side of Mount Ktaadn, whose foaming waters leap 

 from crag to crag, or roll in one plunging sheet down perpendic- 

 ular ledges between two mountains. On one section of this 

 stream, said to be about half a mile in length, there is a fall 



