Clearing and Preparing the Land 167 



spell to die off and be fit to burn. Accord- 

 ing to the denseness of the big tree trunks, 

 and the paucity or otherwise of the lesser 

 ones and undergrowth, the labourers, divided 

 into squads, are provided . with axes, bush- 

 knives and mattocks. Always bear in mind 

 that in the Tropics the labourers, taken as 

 a whole, lack -the strength and stamina of 

 the meat-eating dwellers of temperate coun- 

 tries, and therefore the make of the tools 

 chosen for them must invariably be of a 

 lighter pattern, and, wherever feasible, the 

 shapes they are mostly used to should be 

 studied. The men with the matchets or bush- 

 knives occupy the van and cut down all the 

 growth up to about the thickness of an arm. 

 They also cut and remove it in such shape 

 that the axe-men can follow and tackle the 

 big trees without hindrance. After a few 

 days' work a way will be found for dividing 

 the various tasks to the best advantage of all, 

 so that with the various sections of men, one 

 lot does not hinder or overlap another. The 

 axe-men fell the trees as close as possible 

 to the ground. They also cut up the logs, 

 branches and boughs into handy sizes for 

 shifting to the piles for burning. A goodly 

 gang of stump-extractors should be kept busy 

 at the same time, in order also to get ahead 

 as much as possible with this important work. 

 This gang of extractors is entrusted with the 

 task of piling the debris for the holocaust of 



