68 Dr Howison's Account of the Forest-trees 
Those received are rafted together, to be sent to their destina- 
tion. 
Gur journey was made for this purpose, and, on the exami- 
nation of several hundred trees, the proportion of those rejected 
was as one to ten. Much discernment and discrimination, ac- 
quired only by experience, are necessary in the examination of 
the trees. It is chiefly by the strokes of a hatchet along the 
trunk, and the sound arising from it, that they judge of its 
soundness or rottenness within. A small blemish or discolour- 
ed !Lpot upon the surface of a tree, which would appear as no- 
thing to the inexperienced observer, sometimes denotes rotten- 
ness existing in its interior, to such an extent as to render it 
good for nothing. Of this I saw several instances, and to be 
convinced of it, I laid open the suspected part with a hatchet, 
when I was surprised at the extent of rottenness which it ex- 
posed. When satisfied of its sound qualities, the quantity is 
ascertained by measurement, and the tree is marked off. This is 
a very laborious employment, it becoming necessary to turn every 
tree over and over amongst the snow. During the course of a 
night, it frequently happens that the labour of the preceding 
day is rendered useless by a fresh fall of snow, which, freezing 
firmly around the trees, wedges them so completely, that the 
frozen snow must be knocked away before a tree can be moved-: 
this the peasants do by means of wooden handspokes. The 
wood-merchant is generally obliged to take up his residence in 
the uncomfortable isba of the boor, or, as sometimes happens, 
if none of these are in the neighbourhood of the timber, in a 
wretched temporary hut, constructed of the branches of fir- 
trees. In neither of the circumstances is much comfort to be 
found. In the former, he must live on eggs, milk, black bread, 
and quass, amongst the boors, with a hard wooden bench for 
his bed ; whilst in the latter, he must exist in the miserable hut, 
amidst the smoke of the green wood, which they burn, sleep- 
ing and eating in the best way he can. 
It is surprising at what a cheap rate the wood-merchant pur- 
chases these trees in the interipr of the country. For the finest 
which the forests produce, the proprietor of the estate never re- 
ceives above sixty roubles, which, at the present rate of ex- 
change, does not amount to F 6 Sterling ; for inferior ones pro- 
t 
