CHAPTER XXXV.

A GANG OF FRIENDLY LOGGERS.

The month of September was drawing to its close, and the gang of loggers belonging to Camp No. 10 of the Northwest Lumber Company, which operated in the vast timber belt clothing the northern flanks of Mount Rainier, were about to knock off work. From earliest morning the stately forest, sweet-scented with the odors of resin, freshly cut cedar, and crushed ferns, had resounded with their shouts and laughter, the ring of their axes, the steady swish of saws, and the crash of falling trees. To one familiar only with Eastern logging, where summer is a time of idleness, and everything depends on the snows of winter, followed by the high waters of spring, the different methods of these Northwestern woodsmen would be matters of constant surprise. Their work goes on without a pause from year's end to year's end. There is no hauling on sleds, no vast accumulations of logs on the ice of rivers or lakes, no river driving, no mighty jams to be cleared at imminent risk of life and limb--nothing that is customary in the East. Even the mode of cutting down trees is different.

The choppers--or "fallers," as they are called in the Northwest--do not work, as do their brethren of Maine or Wisconsin, from the ground, wielding their axes first on one side and then on the other until the tree falls. The girth of the mighty firs and cedars of that country is so great at ordinary chopping height that two men working in that way would not bring down more than two trees in a day, instead of the ten or a dozen required of them. So, by means of what are known as "spring-boards," they gain a height of eight or ten feet, and there begin operations.

The ingenious contrivances that enable them to do this are narrow boards of tough vine maple, five or six feet long, and about one foot wide. Each is armed at its inner end with a sharp steel spur affixed to its upper side. This end being thrust into a notch opened in the tree some four feet below where the cut is to be made, the weight of a man on its outer end causes the spur to bite deep into the wood, and to hold the board firmly in place.

Having determined the direction in which the tree shall fall, and fixed their spring-boards accordingly, two "fallers" mount them, and chop out a deep under cut on the side that is to lie undermost. They work with double-bitted or two-edged axes, and can so truly guide the fall by means of the under cut that they are willing to set a stake one hundred feet away and guarantee that the descending trunk shall drive it into the ground. With the under cut chopped out to their satisfaction, they remove their spring-boards to the opposite side, and finish the task with a long, two-handed, coarse-toothed saw.

As the mighty tree yields up its life and comes to the ground with a grand far-echoing crash, it is set upon by "buckers" (who saw its great trunk into thirty-foot lengths), barkers, rigging-slingers, hand-skidders and teamsters, whose splendid horses, aided by tackle of iron blocks and length of wire-rope, drag it out to the "skid-road." This is a cleared and rudely graded track, set with heavy cross-ties, over which the logs may slide, and it is provided with wire cables, whose half-mile lengths are operated by stationary engines. By this means "turns" of five or six of the huge logs, chained one behind the other, are hauled down the winding skid-road through gulch and valley, to a distant railway landing. There they are loaded on a long train of heavy flat cars that departs every night for the mills on Puget Sound. Here the sawed lumber is run aboard waiting ships, and sent in them to all ports on both shores of the Pacific.

The light-hearted loggers were laughing and joking, lighting their pipes, picking up tools, and beginning to straggle toward the road that led to camp, when suddenly big Buck Raulet, the head "faller," who was keener of hearing than any of his mates, called out:

"Hush up, fellows, and listen! I thought I heard a yell off there in the timber."

In the silence that followed they all heard a cry, faint and distant, but so filled with distress that there was no mistaking its import.

"There's surely somebody in trouble!" cried Raulet. "Lost like as not. Anyway, they are calling to us for help, and we can't go back on 'em. So come on, men. You teamsters stay here with your horses, and give us a yell every now and then, so we can come straight back; for even we don't want to fool round much in these woods after dark. Hello, you out there! Locate yourselves!"

So the calling and answering was continued for nearly ten minutes, while the rescuing party, full of curiosity and good-will, plunged through the gathering gloom, over logs and rocks, through beds of tall ferns and banks of moss, in which they sank above their ankles, until they came at length to those whom they were seeking--two lads, one standing and calling to them, the other lying motionless, where he had fallen in a dead faint from utter exhaustion.

"You see," explained Alaric, apologetically, half sobbing with joy at finding himself once more surrounded by friendly faces, "he has been very ill, and we've had a hard day, with nothing to eat. So he gave out. I should have too, but just then I heard the sound of chopping, and knew the light was shining, and--and--" Here the poor tired lad broke down, sobbing hysterically, and trying to laugh at the same time.

"There! there, son!" exclaimed Buck Raulet, soothingly, but with a suspicious huskiness in his voice. "Brace up, and forget your troubles as quick as you can; for they're all over now, and you sha'n't go hungry much longer. But where did you say you came from?"

"The top of the mountain."

"Not down the north side?"

"Yes."

"Great Scott! you are the first that ever did it, then. How long have you been on the way?"

"I don't know exactly, but something over a month."

"The poor chap's mind is wandering," said the big man to one of his companions; "for no one ever came down the north side alive, and no one could spend a whole month doing it, anyway. I've often heard, though, that folks went crazy when they got lost in the woods."

The men took turns, two at a time, in carrying Bonny, and Buck Raulet himself assisted Alaric, until, guided by the shouts of the teamsters, they reached the point from which they had started.

By this time Bonny had regained consciousness, and was wondering, in a dazed fashion, what had happened. "Is it all right, Rick?" he asked, as his comrade bent anxiously over him.

"Yes, old man, it's all right; and the light I told you of is shining bright and clear at last."

"Queer, isn't it, how the poor lad's mind wanders?" remarked Raulet to one of the men. "He thinks he sees a bright light, while I'll swear no one has so much as struck a match. We must hustle, now, and get 'em to camp. Do you think you feel strong enough to set straddle of a horse, son?" he asked of Alaric.

"Yes, indeed," answered the boy, cheerfully. "I feel strong enough for anything now."

"Good for you! That's the talk! Give us a foot and let me h'ist you up. Why, lad, you're mighty nigh bare-footed! No wonder you didn't find the walking good. Here, Dick, you lead this horse, while I ride Sal-lal and carry the little chap."

Thus saying, the big man vaulted to the back of the other horse, and reaching down, lifted Bonny up in front of him as though he had been a child.

Camp was a mile or more away, and as the brawny loggers escorted their unexpected guests to it down the winding skid-road, they eagerly discussed the strange event that had so suddenly broken the monotony of their lives, though, with a kindly consideration, they refrained from asking Alaric any more questions just then.

"Hurry on, some of you fellows," shouted Raulet, "and light up my shack, for these chaps are going to bunk in with me to-night. I claim 'em on account of being the first to hear 'em, you know. Start a fire in the square, too, so's the place will look cheerful."

No one will ever know how cheerful and homelike and altogether delightful that logging camp did look to our poor lads after their long and terrible experience of the wilderness, for they could never afterwards find words to express what they felt on coming out of the darkness into its glowing firelight and hearty welcome.

"Stand back, men, and give us a show," shouted Raulet, as they drew up before his own little "shack," built of split cedar boards. "This isn't any funeral; same time it ain't no circus parade, and we want to get in out of the cold."

The entire population of the camp, including the cook and his assistants, the blacksmith with his helper, and the stable-boys, as well as the logging gang, were gathered, full of curiosity to witness the strange arrival. Besides these there was Linton, the boss, with his wife, who was the only woman in that section of country. Her pity was instantly aroused for Bonny, and when he had been tenderly placed in Buck Raulet's own bunk, she insisted on being allowed to feed and care for him. She would gladly have done the same for Alaric, but he protested that he was perfectly well able to feed himself, and was only longing for the chance.

"Of course you are, lad!" cried the big "faller," heartily, "and you sha'n't go hungry a minute longer. So just you come on with me and the rest of the gang over to Delmonico's."

The place thus designated was a low but spacious building of logs, containing the camp kitchen and mess-room. Raulet sat at the head of the long table, built of hewn cedar slabs, and laden with smoking dishes. Alaric was given the place of honor at his right hand.

The plates and bowls were of tin; the knives, forks, and spoons were iron; but how luxurious it all seemed to the guest of the occasion! How wonderfully good everything tasted, and how the big man beside him heaped his plate with pork and beans, potatoes swimming in gravy, boiled cabbage, fresh bread cut in slices two inches thick, and actually butter to spread on it! After these came a huge pan of crullers and dozens of dried-apple pies.

How anxiously the men watched him eat, how often they pushed the tin can of brown sugar toward him to make sure that his bowl of milkless tea should be sufficiently sweetened, and how pleased they were when he passed his plate for a second helping of pie!

"You'll do, lad; you'll do!" shouted Buck Raulet, delighted at this evidence that the camp cookery was appreciated. "You've been brought up right, and taught to know a good thing when you see it. I can tell by the way you eat."

After supper Alaric was conducted to a blanket-covered bench near the big fire outside, and allowed to relate the outline of his story to an audience that listened with intense interest, and then he was put to bed beside Bonny, who was already fast asleep. When Buck Raulet picked up his guest's coat, that had fallen to the floor, and a baseball rolled from one of its pockets, the big logger exclaimed, softly:

"Bless the lad! He's a genuine out-and-out boy, after all! To think of his travelling through the mountains with no outfit but a baseball! If that isn't boy all over, then I don't know!"