“Sellersville is where they bring most of the ties for the boats.”
“Have they started a town down there on the bottoms?”
“They have started enough saloons and gambling dens to get the money from the men that are chopping ties.”
Stanley contemplated for a moment the ill-looking settlement. A mile farther on they encountered 81 a number of men following the trail up the river.
A small dog barked furiously at the Stanley party as they came up, and acted as if he were ready to fight every trooper in the detail. He dashed back and forth, barking and threatening so fiercely that every one’s attention was drawn to him.
Stanley stopped the leader and found he was a tie-camp foreman from up-river taking men to camp. “Is that your dog?” demanded Stanley, indicating the belligerent animal who seemed set upon eating somebody alive.
“Why, yes,” admitted the foreman philosophically. “He sort o’ claims me, I guess.”
“What do you keep a cur like that around for?”
“Can’t get rid of him,” returned the foreman. “He is no good, but the boys like his impudence. Down, Scuffy!” he cried, looking for a stick to throw at his pet.
Bucks surveyed the company of men. They were a sorry-looking lot. The foreman explained that he had dragged them out of the dens at 82 Sellersville to go back to work. When remonstrated with for the poor showing the contractors were making, the foreman pointed to the plague-spot on the bottoms.