CHAPTER V
WOOD
Fig. 63. The Forest, Norway Spruce, Bavaria, Germany
28. Lumbering and Milling. It is well to remember, when using wood for any purpose, that it was once part of a living tree which had roots, bark, leaves, and flowers, and that the tree began life as a little sapling, which grew taller and larger for years before it could be called a tree, and that it was between fifty and a hundred years old before it was large enough to cut down for timber.
Fig. 64. Felling a Tree
The lumberman selects trees which have large, straight trunks. They are usually cut with the ax, although the first cut is often made partially through the trunk with a saw. The branches are then chopped off and the body of the tree cut into lengths convenient for handling. They are rolled into a stream and floated down the river to a sawmill, or, in case there is no river near by, are carted on sleds or wagons to the railroad and thence to the mill.
The cutting of the trees is usually done in winter, the floating of the logs, or river driving as it is called, beginning with the breaking up of the ice in the spring. River driving is a very interesting and dangerous business. Logs will often get caught sidewise and the whole river from shore to shore become jammed so tightly that hundreds of thousands of logs are stopped in their course, forming an immense dam which the lumbermen call a log jam.
