ADVENTURES IN THE MAHOGANY FORESTS 



sledge fashion, so that it may more readily slip over 

 the corduroy road. 



A track is now cut through the forest from the stump 

 of the tree to the nearest trolley line. Hundreds of other 

 smaller trees are then requisitioned to form a corduroy 

 track. 



Extracting the logs is the hardest work of all, and 

 now that the mahogany is getting more scarce logs often 

 have to be hauled six or seven miles before they meet the 

 trolley line which will take them on their way to the 

 nearest floating river. 



"When the logs have been pass-hammered by a Forest 

 Guard, they are ready for extraction, "potter-potter," 

 or mud, is fetched from the river bank and dozens of 

 small boys run on ahead, smearing this on the corduory 

 track, so that the logs may slip more easily on their way. 

 The small boys precede just in front of the log, carrying 

 the "potter-potter" on large trays made from tree bark. 

 When the track is ready, long steel cables are fixed round 

 the back end of the log, and a hundred or more laborers 

 take up their positions along the road, and encouraged by 

 a head man and song-leader, they strain every muscle as 

 the great log begins to move on its way to the coast. 

 When the going is good, the song of the haulers is gay, 

 but when the log sticks, its cheerful lilt changes to 

 staccato curses. Squared logs weighing up to ten tons 

 are shifted in the way described without mechanical ap- 

 pliances for a distance often of several miles, until they 

 are brought to a floating river. I have measured an ex- 



^77. 



