FOREST, FISH AND GAME COMMISSION. 253 



The greater part of this floating mass was submerged, the top course being from 

 six to eight inches above the water. Occasionally a " decl<: load " of shingles or 

 dressed lumber was carried on top ; but the latter was not taken unless the owner 

 intended to peddle it out along the river at places where there were no planing 

 mills. 



At the forward end of each five-platform piece was a large oar. On a raft, such 

 as just described, there were three oars in front and three behind — not on the 

 sides, but at the ends, projecting forward and backward. The oar blade was a six- 

 teen-foot plank, fourteen inches wide, thin on the lower edge ; the oar, made from a 

 small tree, was about eighteen feet long and eight or ten inches in diameter at the 

 large end where it was attached to the blade. It was hewed tapering to the small 

 end or handle at which the men stood. So large and clumsy were these rafting oars 

 that two, and often three, men were necessary in handling them. When not in use 

 the oars rested on the raft with their projecting blades just clear of the water. At 

 the command of the pilot the blades were dipped by raising the handles high, and 

 then the men, grasping the oar, with hands high lifted above their heads tramped 

 across the platform, bracing their feet against cleats nailed on the pathway for that 

 purpose. The men pushed, not pulled, on the oars. As the raft had no motion of 

 its own the oars were used to move it sideways and keep it in the current ; or, in 

 turning sharp bends in the river, to swing it on its center by " crosspulling," in 

 which the oars at one end were worked in a direction contrary to that of the oars 

 at the other. The work of the men was directed by a pilot, whose many trips 

 down the river had made him acquainted with every rock, reef, shoal, and bar, and 

 whose long experience had taught him how to take advantage of the swirling cur- 

 rent or to avoid its treacherous force. 



As a large raft had six oars, — three in front and three behind, — a full crew 

 required from twelve to eighteen men, not including the pilot and cook on one of 

 the forward platforms. A shanty was built in which there were bunks in triple 

 tiers around the sides. For bedding there was plenty of clean straw and coarse, 

 warm blankets. A fireplace, on which the cooking was done, was made just outside 

 the cabin by placing four short boards on edge and filling the square inclosure with 

 earth. 



Rafting^ on tl)e Alle^an^^. 



On an ordinary flood the rafts would run from forty to fifty miles each day. At 

 nightfall the pilot would always tie up in some eddy, swinging in to the bank, where 

 a cable was thrown ashore and, by taking a turn or two around some large tree, the 



