The Oaks 277 



small branches develop all round, standing 

 stiffly out at almost exact right angles. They 

 break through the bark as water shoots, 

 instead of growing naturally by partition of 

 the trunk proper. After a few years they die, 

 but do not break off and have done with it. 

 Instead they shed twigs, bark, and sap-wood, 

 yet persist as to the heart, standing out all 

 along the trunk like bluntish iron pegs. 



Black-jack rots quicker than any other 

 oak, and burns more slowly. Tradition says 

 that in the day of slaves, one particularly 

 griping master promised his black people : 

 " Christmas as long as the back-log lasted." 

 Then the wood-choppers laid their heads 

 together, sought out the biggest, gnarliest 

 black-jack upon the place, cut a back-log 

 from it, soaked the log in the pond for a 

 week, then rolled it in triumph to the great 

 house, and laid it behind the firedogs. There 

 it hissed and sputtered and smouldered through 

 a fortnight — until two days after Twelfth 

 Night, to be exact — in spite of all the 

 hickory sticks and oak logs, and kindling 

 truck, and dry chips, the master of the great 

 house piled upon it. A grim man, withal 

 waggish, he saw the humor of the situation, 

 and rewarded his black people for thus out- 

 witting him, with a fine supper and an extra 

 stiff dram all round. 



