Clearing of Trees, Stumps and Stones. 63 



team on the other end. With plenty of chain and a team that was 

 used to pulling, one has a chance to turn over a pretty large tree 

 without much grubbing. With rope and pulley blocks one could 

 do better, but this is the way I did, and I have pulled a good 

 many for myself and others. The team should not pull steady, 

 but spring to it with all their might, with slack chain, and then 

 let up and try again. Of course, you must have chain enough to 

 have team out of the way of the tree when it falls. One can get 

 the stump out very much easier with the tree on it as a lever. 

 I have pulled a good many old apple trees in this way, acres of 

 them, and we took them out almost as quickly as one could cut 

 them down, and then the job was thoroughly done, once for all. 

 No stumps are left in the way to bother for years. The majority 

 of farmers around here cut down an old orchard. How much 

 better to turn them out by the roots ! Two men and a team can 

 get out a good number in a day, when the ground is soft. After 

 the trees are over they can be cut up for wood and the brush 

 burned right there, after drying a little, and the stumps drawn 

 away on a stone boat. I have moved some that it took four 

 horses to handle. After they get dry they can be burned, when 

 piled with other rubbish. I have shoveled up the ashes where 

 such a pile was burned into a wagon and spread them on my land, 

 where I thought they were most needed. They would certainly 

 do more good than if left all in a heap. And I tell you we have 

 burned a great many heaps. 



A part of our land was quite free from stones, but on some 

 parts there were many tons of small ones, with here and there big 

 bowlders too large to handle. I never did much plowing around 

 these big fellows after I could possibly spare the money to pay a 

 man for sinking them ; and I found it the easiest way to get rid of 

 anything that two men could not readily roll out on a boat, to dig 

 a hole by one side and just a little under it and then pry it into its 

 grave. One needs to be sure that the hole is large and deep 

 enough to have the top down say a foot deep after it is buried. 

 Well do I remember the first work of this kind I did. I can take 

 you right to the spot now. It was a terribly hot day and I worked 

 hard with my man and got the hole ready and worked the stone 

 in. I had not calculated rightly and it was little lower than 

 before. After, doing that job all over I learned to measure and 

 estimate very carefully. When the ground is soft in the spring 

 a strong man will dig holes for quite a number of ordinary rocks 

 in a day. The worst one I ever sank was for a town friend. A 

 good man spent a day digging a regular cistern by the side of the 

 stone and as much under it as was safe. I did not know how on 

 earth we were ever going to move the stone. It would weigh 

 several tons, and I thought probably we could only get it out of its 

 bed with powder. We left it at night all ready for moving, and 

 it so happened that we had a very heavy rain before we went back 



