THE RABBIT-HUNT.
Deacon Farnham was fond of chopping down trees; but he had not brought a big sleigh into the woods that morning, with two yoke of oxen, merely to have them stand still in the snow while he did some chopping. Such fires as he kept up at the farmhouse called for liberal supplies; and so Susie was to have an opportunity to see a load of logs put on.
She and Pen had to get out of the sleigh, and then she expressed her wonder if her uncle and Vosh would be strong enough to lift those huge "back-log" pieces into it:—
"They never can do it, Pen, not in all the world."
"Lift 'em! Of course they won't. I'll show you how they do it: it's dreadful easy, soon as you know how."
It would hardly have been as easy for Pen and Susie as it seemed to be for Vosh and the deacon.
They took all the side-stakes out of the sleigh, on the side towards the wood-pile; and they put down, with one end of each on the sleigh, and the other end in the snow, a pair of long, strong pieces of wood that Vosh called "skids:" that made an inclined plane, and it was nothing but good hard work to roll the logs up, and into their places on the sleigh. They made a tier all over the sleigh-bottom, and then the lighter logs were piled on them in regular order, till the load was finished off on top with a heap of bark and brushwood.
"That'll crackle good when it burns," said Vosh. "I like brush on a fire: don't you?"
Susie said she did; and she probably told the truth, for she was beginning to think she liked every thing in the country, even in winter.
"Now, Pen," said Vosh, "if you and Susie'll climb up, we'll set out for home with this load."