A WOOD-BEE REMEDY 



f | THE minister start- 

 ed it. When the 

 church folks got 

 together and 

 i bought the house 

 for him there was 

 no coal in it. They 

 [were able to get 

 him a little but it 

 was soon gone; 

 and he said he was cold. Then they could 

 not get any more, and it was even hard 

 to get wood. 



So he called some of us together after 

 church one Sunday and told us just what 

 the trouble was. Someone suggested a 

 wood-chopping bee, and one of the men 

 said he had the wood growing in his lot, 

 and that the church folks could have it 

 for the cutting of it. He was an old 

 farmer who always sat well up front 

 because he was a bit deaf; also he always 

 wore a fur cap, even in the summer 

 time. He said it was the same as hair 

 and kept the cold out in winter, and the 

 heat out in summer. 



"What little wood-cuttin' the fellers 

 in that church kin cut," said he, 

 "wouldn't take nothin' from my piece o' 

 woods. Besides there's a lot of dead an' 

 down stuff, an' a lot of crooked trees 

 that had ought to be took out. It ain't 

 the best ten-acre woodlot that ever laid 

 outdoors; an' a little work put onto it 

 won't hurt it none." 



NEXT Saturday we started out to 

 Perry's woodlot. There were eight 

 men, and five boys and three dogs, 

 not to say anything about axes newly 

 sharpened, two-handed and one-handed 

 cross-cut saws, and large lunches. It 

 was two miles from town, but Mr. Perry 

 sent in his bob-sleds, which were to come 

 back again in the evening with what- 

 ever wood should have been cut. A good 

 deal of it would be pretty well seasoned, 

 because it had been dead some time. 



Mr. Hosmer told us what to cut. Some 

 of them growled because he picked out 

 the crookedest and knottiest trees, so 

 twisted and tough that they would not 

 split. But that pleased Mr. Perry, who 



also asked to have all the wild cherry 

 taken, since it furnished breeding places 

 for the tent caterpillars that he was try- 

 ing to keep out of his apple orchard. 



We soon found that some of the men 

 could really cut wood, though several 

 said that they had not used an ax for a 

 dozen years. Mr. Fletcher admitted 

 that he shone best at piling, but he kept 

 at the cutting most of the morning, until 

 there was enough to make the piling 

 worth while. The small boys did not 

 amount to very much; there were too 

 many of them, and, as someone said, 

 "there was too much dog along." The 

 boys studied the tracks in the snow; and 

 if the truth must be known, the minister 

 himself helped them at it, and knew 

 more than all the rest. They found the 

 trails of rabbits, a fox, deer, and red 

 squirrels. The minister could tell from 

 the tracks whether the animals had been 

 in a hurry or whether they were just 

 strolling along. 



The wives and the mothers who had 

 stayed home said that they were going 

 to have arnica and witch-hazel and 

 bandages all ready for those who chop- 

 ped themselves instead of the wood, but 

 there was no need of it. Mr. Ellenwood 

 took a slice off the edge of his rubber 

 boot, but that was the most harm that 

 was done to anything except the lunch, 

 which was Hooverized to the last crumb. 



At the end of the day there were more 

 than three cords of wood. Some of the 

 piles were pretty loose, "so's you could 

 'a' thro wed a dog through 'em any- 

 wheres," said Mr. Perry. But there was 

 a lot of good wood, most of which came 

 from an old white oak log that was 

 nearly all sound. 



Next Saturday we are going to go out 

 again, and every Saturday, unless the 

 coal-less Mondays are kept up, and then 

 we will get all the folks in the town that 

 are out of work and make a regular 

 Monday job of getting a lot of wood 

 ready for next year's coal shortage. As 

 Mr. Hosmer said, anything that can be 

 done this year is only a drop; the big 

 job is to get ready for next year when 

 things will be a lot worse. 



IW 



A\ 



