4 iIILL CN CONSTRUCTIONAL WOODS OF BRITISH GUIANA. [Selected 



The following is the usual mode of procedure in establishing 

 and working a wood-cutting grant : The particular section of 

 forest-land which it is proposed to work upon, having been located 

 by a timber prospector, is surveyed by an officer of the Government 

 Lands Department, and a licence of occupancy is granted to the 

 timber merchant or wood-cutter interested in the venture. Labour- 

 ers are engaged in town and registered at the Institute of Mines 

 and Forests for 3 months' or 4 months' work in the interior. Then, 

 with sufficient provisions to last out the term of engagement, they 

 are conveyed, under charge of a manager or overseer, by steamer 

 and boat to the location grant, where a camp is established, houses 

 or bush benabs are erected, and a provision-shop is opened for the 

 accommodation of the labourers, the cost of the goods supplied as 

 extras to their ordinary rations being deducted from the labourer's 

 account for wages on the termination of his engagement. The 

 work of felling the trees and squaring the timber is then proceeded 

 with, some of the men in the meantime being engaged in the 

 construction of wood -paths leading from the actual site of the 

 growing timber to the nearest creek or waterway (a distance, 

 perhaps, of 1 mile or 2 miles), along which the scjuared timbers 

 are hauled by direct manual labour, although on some of the larger 

 wood-cutting grants draught oxen and mules aie employed for this 

 work, and on one extensive grant a light railway was worked for 

 some years advantageously. These wood-paths are usually 6 feet 

 to 15 feet in width, roughly levelled and " corduroyed " with round 

 spars to act as rollers. They are carried across the smaller ravines 

 by means of trestles and beams, but frequently on higher hillsides 

 the timbers are simply precipitated to the bottom down a roughly 

 improvised chute. To facilitate haulage the forward end of the 

 timber, which is always the butt, is " sniped " or turned up in the 

 form of a sleigh. In this a strong iron bolt is inserted, standing 

 upright, to which a chain and hauliug-ropes are attached. Some 

 twenty men take hold of this chain by cross sticks, known as 

 " grail sticks," fastened to it at intervals, and to the music of a 

 hearty sing-song steadily march away with their load, very fre- 

 quently for a considerable distance before reaching the waterside 

 depot. There, if the creek is a small tributary one, the timbers, 

 two or more pieces at a time, are attached to a small punt or 

 " ballahoo" and floated out to the main creek or river, where they 

 are loaded on to a larger punt known as a " sling-punt." This is 

 usually a square-ended quarter-decked vessel measuring 25 feet by 

 12 feet, capable of carrying ins,ide about 20 tons; but by taking 

 advantage of the floatage of the timber in the water it is able to 



