Forests of Maine Part 10

"_Georgius Rex_," replied Forester,--"that is, George, the king. If there are any such, the mark on them means that they belonged to the king of England, before this country was separated from England. In those days, the king's workmen went into the forests to select and mark the trees which were to be cut down for the king's use, and these marks were left upon the stumps."

"And how long ago was that?" asked Marco.

"O, it must have been sixty or seventy years ago. But I can hardly believe that the stumps would last as long as that."

"I mean to ask some of the men, when I get up in the woods, how long the stumps do last," said Marco.

"They last very long, I know," said Forester. "The people, after getting tired of waiting to have them rot out, tear them up with machines, and make fences of them."

"I don't see how they can make fences of stumps," said Marco.

"They put them in a row, with the roots in the air," replied Forester.

"They make a funny-looking fence."

Just at this time Marco perceived a large town coming into view before them, which, Forester told him, was Bath. There were several ships building along the sh.o.r.e of the river.

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CHAPTER VII.

THE BEAR IN THE MILL.

Marco and Forester found a small steamboat at Bath, going up the river, and they took pa.s.sage in it to Hallowell. At Hallowell, they took the stage, and travelled along the banks of the river, sometimes on one side and sometimes on the other. They crossed the river by means of bridges, which were erected in nearly all the princ.i.p.al towns. They pa.s.sed a number of waterfalls, where saw-mills had been built for sawing the logs. Marco was astonished at the number of these mills, the quant.i.ty of logs which lay in the booms, and the vast piles of boards which had acc.u.mulated in some of the sawing villages.

At one of these villages, where he and Forester stopped to spend the night, they went out in the evening to see the mills. The mills were lighted by little fires of pitch-pine knots, which made a bright flame and gave a fine light. These little fires were built upon slabs, which Marco thought was very dangerous. The slabs, however, though they looked dry, were really very wet, being thoroughly soaked with water within, having been sawed from logs which had been for a long time floating in the river.

The beam, to which the saw was attached in each mill, as it ascended and descended with the saw, pa.s.sed across these lights with a rapid motion, which made the lights appear and disappear, in regular succession, in a very beautiful manner.

Forester and Marco clambered into one of these mills. They had to make their way over slabs, boards and heaps of rubbish of various kinds, and the floor of the mill seemed to be made of boards and planks, laid loosely and with many open places, in which, when Marco looked down, he saw dark and frightful abysses, where he could hear the water dashing, and, now and then, could get a glimpse of the foam.

Of course, both Forester and Marco advanced very carefully. When they had entered, they found but one man tending the mill. He was seated on a square block of wood, near the fire, eating some bread and cheese. As Forester and Marco advanced towards him, he looked up and bade them good evening.

"Will you allow us to come in and see the mill?" said Forester.

"By all means," said the millman.

The millman here looked around at the log which he was then sawing, and he observed that it was time for him to attend to it. So he put down his bread and cheese upon the block, and went towards the saw. Forester and Marco both turned to see what he was going to do.

The log was lying upon a long frame, which frame seemed to be mounted upon some sort of trucks, for it advanced slowly, by a steady motion, against the saw. As the saw was constantly moving up and down with great force, the log was sawed as it advanced. It had now advanced so far that the log had been sawed nearly through, from end to end. When it had gone a little farther, the millman pulled a handle, and stopped the motion of the carriage and the log, and, in a moment afterwards, the log began to go back again; the saw, all the time, ascending and descending as before, but without doing any work. When the log had got back so far that the saw came out of the cleft which it had made, the man stopped it, and then, with an iron bar, he shifted the position of the log in such a manner that when the carriage should be put in motion, the saw would cut the log in a new place, at a little distance from the other,--a distance just equal to the thickness of the board which they wished to make.

Marco watched all these movements with great interest. Forester, who had often seen them before, went back to the fire, and held his hands out to it, for, as it was a cold evening, the feeling of the warmth was pleasant. He could see that Marco remained talking with the millman; but the noise of the machinery was so great that he could not hear what they said.

The flashes of light from the fire illuminated Marco's face, however, and Forester could see that he was much interested in what the millman was telling him. The millman sat down upon the log, and made gestures as if he was eating something. Then he took hold of Marco, and put him down upon the log in his place, and he took a seat himself beyond him--that is, between Marco and the saw. All this time, the log, riding upon the great frame, was slowly advancing against the saw, carrying Marco and the millman along with it. When it had carried them so far that the millman was getting to be very near the saw, he turned suddenly round, and made a gesture as if he was going to clasp the saw in his arms,--laughing as he did it,--and, immediately afterwards, he got up from the log, and Marco got up, too,--beginning to laugh himself, also, though his countenance had expressed surprise and anxiety before.

A short time after this, when Marco came back to the place where Forester was, Forester asked him what the millman had been saying to him.

"He was telling me a story of a bear," said Marco.

"Of a bear?" said Forester.

"Yes," said Marco, "of a bear in a saw-mill."

"I don't see what a bear had to do in a saw-mill," replied Forester.

"It was a great many years ago, when there were bears in the woods about here. There was a man sawing in a mill, and he was sitting on the end of the log that he was sawing, eating his bread and cheese. The bread and cheese were lying on the log, next to where the man was sitting.

"While the man was sitting there in this manner, eating his bread and cheese, a bear came walking into the mill,--a great black bear. He came up to the log, and when he saw that the man was eating bread and cheese, he thought he should like some too. So he sat down on the log."

"On which side of the man?" asked Forester,--"towards the saw or from it?"

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"Towards the saw," said Marco. "The man was on the end of the log farthest from the saw. The bear sat a little beyond him, nearer to the saw, and the bread and cheese was between them. The bear began to eat the bread and cheese."

"How?" asked Forester.

"Why, he took it up in his paws, I suppose," said Marco,--"though I don't know certainly about that. At any rate, he began to eat the bread and cheese,--sitting with his back towards the saw, and his face towards the man.

"And all this time, you must understand," said Marco, "that the carriage was carrying the log, man, bear, and all, towards the saw, and the man saw that if the bear would only keep still, in his place, until he was carried to the saw, he would get sawed in two, and so killed. At first, he thought it would be best for him to get hold of the iron bar, if he could, and beat the old bear's brains out. But he was afraid that he should not succeed in doing that, and so he concluded to wait and see what would happen.

"Now, bears have a way," continued Marco, "whenever they are angry with anything, of grasping it in their arms and hugging it tight. The man did not think of this; he only hoped that the saw would saw the bear in two.

The log moved on nearer and nearer, and at last brought the bear along so far that the next stroke cut right down his back. He immediately turned around and seized the saw, and hugged it with all his strength, and it tore him all to pieces."

"Indeed," said Forester. "That is quite a story."

Forester did not seem so much astonished at this account as Marco had expected, but farther conversation on the subject was prevented by the occurring of a new object of attention. The millman began to make arrangements for drawing up more logs from the water of the river, by means of a long chain pa.s.sing around a revolving axis, in the manner which has been already explained.

Marco watched the first log, as it came slowly up, and then he wanted to go down the inclined plane to the water below. The moon was just rising, which gave them sufficient light, and so Forester and Marco went down.

Marco wanted to ride up on the next log, but Forester thought that that would be a very dangerous experiment. There was, however, a boat lying there, which, Forester said, perhaps they might get into, and take a little excursion upon the water, by moonlight. Marco thought that he should like that very well, and so he went up into the mill again, to ask permission to take the boat. The millman said that they might have the boat all night, if they wanted it.

Marco accordingly returned down the inclined plane, telling Forester that they could have the boat. But Forester, who began to find the evening air too cold and chilly, said that he did not think it was worth while for them to set out on a voyage at so late an hour. But Marco's imagination was so much taken with the idea of a voyage in a boat by moonlight, that he was very urgent to have Forester go. So Forester consented, and they both got into the boat.

"Which way shall we steer?" asked Marco.

"We must go up the stream," said Forester.

"Why must we?" asked Marco.

"Because there is a dam and a waterfall below us," replied Forester.

There was a dam across the river, at the mill, and the inclined plane, which led from the floor of the mill down to the sh.o.r.e of the river, terminated at the edge of the water just above the dam. The water was so low that it did not fall over the dam near the sh.o.r.e, though Forester and Marco could hear the roaring of the water, which fell over the dam nearer the middle of the river.

"We must take care," said Marco, "or we shall get carried over the dam.

I read of an Indian once, who was carried over the falls of Niagara."