One morning Fitz-Adams and I stood together in his rig, as he was driving up the "corduroy road" to the place on the mountain where the crew were at work. Presently he pointed out to me, about forty yards up the steep ascent no our left, some long, straggling piles of bark that perched there, like peasants' huts over a precipice in the Alps.
"I don't know how to go at that bark," he said with a frown. "You can't get a wagon there, nor yet a dray; and it's so brittle that if you slide it down, you'll have nothing but chips to cart to the tannery, and the man that tries to carry it down—well, it's a three or four days' job, and he'll have his neck broke sure."
I said that I would look at it. I was "piling bark" now on my own account, and Toler had another "Buddy," a big, bouncing Irish Hercules, who had lately come to camp, and who soon won distinction by reason of the songs he sung. They were wonderful songs; long beyond belief, and they told the loves and woes of truly wonderful people.
Buddy had early made known his talent, and on his first evening in camp he was peremptorily told to sing. It was after supper. He was sitting, much at home, on the bench behind the stove, and was smoking. Instantly he took his pipe from his mouth, and cleared his throat; then, laying his hands on his knees, he sang, swaying meanwhile in time with the monotonous cadences of that strange verse, which went on and on and on for quite half an hour, while the men listened open-eyed, and punctuated the sentiment with profane approval.
When I examined the bark-piles I found that transferring them to the "corduroy road" below was a matter of carrying the bark in small loads on one's back, and of having a secure footing for the descent.
On the next morning I took a pick and spade, and first cut a series of steps to the ledge where the bark lay piled. After a little practice, I learned to make up a load, by selecting a broad, stout slab of bark and packing the smaller pieces upon it. Then stooping under the load, as it lay ready on the edge of a pile, I easily shifted it to my back and head; and holding it with one hand, while the other was free to help maintain my balance, I carefully picked a way down the steep decline.
It probably appeared a far more difficult and dangerous feat than it really was; and with a load of bark upon my back, I was more than ever an outlandish figure to the men, more in keeping with the Königsstuhl and the valley of the Neckar than with Fitz-Adams's Camp in the Alleghanies. But the actual accomplishment of the work seemed to interest them, and the teamsters used to stop and watch me in silence, and then drive off, swearing in low tones.
One evening the whole returning crew caught me at the job. The men stood still, and having watched a descent, they examined the bark piled high at the roadside, and then walked on, commenting among themselves. That night in Camp several of them spoke to me, calling me "Major" after Fitz-Adams's manner.
It was the beginning of more personal acquaintance with the men. I can but like them. In the fortnight and more of my stay I cannot lay claim to having got on intimate terms with them. But they seem to me a truthful, high-spirited, hard-working, generous set of men. They swear like fiends incarnate, and when they can, they drink, and they all have "rogued and ranged in their time." On grounds of high morality there is no possible justification for them. But these are men who were born and bred to vicious living; and the wonder is not that they are bad, but that in all their blasting departure from the good, there yet survives in them the vital power of return.