152 THE LOG OF A TIMBER CRUISER 
leather, reinforced everywhere, with counters riv- 
eted on, and with the soles thickly studded with huge 
Hungarian hobs. Broad steel edging nails bound the 
soles and heels till it seemed as if nothing could de- 
stroy them. Brown immediately christened them 
“‘the bear traps.’’ 
I was unable to give these massively made affairs 
a thorough test, unfortunately, for after a few days’ 
use I decided that if I had to carry them over the 
hills and valleys of the Black Range during the rest 
of the season life would not be worth living. They 
weighed together, by the way, just a little over eight 
pounds. 
Frazer, before this, had hit upon what he con- 
sidered a highly satisfactory arrangement. Instead 
of paying a big price and getting the heaviest kind 
of footwear, he went to the other extreme. He pur- 
chased several pairs of light, low athletic shoes, had 
them solidly soled and hobnailed, and wore each pair 
till it showed signs of giving out, then threw them 
away. In this way he not only got three or four 
pairs of shoes for what one expensive pair cost, but 
possessed the advantage of carrying much less 
weight on his feet where every ounce counts. 
The drawback to his scheme, applied personally, 
was that my feet were apparently not made of the 
same material as Frazer’s. I had put on a pair of 
his shoes and was discovering this fact on the run I 
had begun to describe when the digression on shoes 
began. I could feel the rocks through the soles, 
