44 REDWOOD LUMBERING. 



''claims' in years gone by, and he would figure with his 

 neighbor to a nicety that such a tree, which he would dec'de 

 was a fair average of those standing upon his " claim," would 

 produce at the mill 15,000 feet of lumber. " Now," he con- 

 tinues, " I have counted thirty and forty trees to the acre in 

 different portions of my claim, but to show that I am setting 

 it low I will say twenty trees to the acre, and here I have 

 300,000 feet to the acre, or 4,800,000 on my claim. At one 

 dollar stumpage, this ' claim ' will clear me $48,000, and I 

 won't take a cent less, though all the lumbering monopolies 

 of California begged upon their knees for it." A dull season 

 in the lumber market possibly following, the boom died out. 

 No one talked of redwood that did not prophesy it would be 

 one or two hundred years before this particular "claim " would 

 be required to meet the demand for lumber, and correspond- 

 ingly he became depressed in his ideas of redwood values. 

 At this stage of his feelings regarding the value of stumpage, 

 and the possible contingency that the years of his natural life 

 would scarcely be prolonged to the day that his "claim" 

 would be called upon to supply the lumber market, he con- 

 cludes life is too short at best, and he will close out his red- 

 wood holding for three thousand dollars; take the money, 

 buy a small ranch where he can raise chickens, keep a cow 

 and horse, raise cabbages, melons, and other garden truck, 

 and console himself with the idea that he is yet to spend the 

 remainder of his days in comparative comfort. He lies in 

 his cabin bunk and ponders upon his isolated condition. He 

 goes to sleep and dreams over the same subject ; wakes up 

 and strikes for the nearest lumber mill, to sell to its propri- 



