es were sparkling as he ruthlessly masticated his
tobacco. This man pleased him mightily.

"That's all right," he said. Then he went on after a silent moment while
he gazed thoughtfully out of the window. "It's right here," he
exclaimed. "Here's a mill, a swell mill that don't lack for a thing to
make it well-nigh perfect. I'll tell you about it. Its capacity. Its
present limit is six thousand tons dry weight groundwood pulp to the
week. That's runnin' full. There's a hundred and twenty grinders feeding
a hundred and eighty sheetin' machines. And they're figgered to use up
fifty-five thousand horse power of the five hundred thousand we got
harnessed on this great little old river that falls off the highlands.
That power is ours winter an' summer. It don't matter a shuck the
'freeze up.' It's there for us all the darn time. Then we've forest
limits to hand us the cordage for that output that could give us three
times what we're needing for a thousand years. Labour? We got it
plenty. And later, by closing in our system of foresting, I figger to
cut out present costs on a sight bigger output. The plans for all that
are fixed in my head. Then we come to the market for our stuff, an' I
guess that's the syrup in the pie. The world's market's waitin' on us.
It's ours before we start. Why? Our power don't cost us one cent a unit.
We're able to hand our folks a standard of living through the nature of
things that leaves wages easy. The river's wide, and full, and it's _our
own_. Then our sea passage to Europe's just eighteen hundred miles
instead of three thousand. An' these things mean our costs leave us
cutting right under other folks, and Skandinavia beat. There it is," he
cried, with a wide gesture of his knotted hands. "It's pie!"

Something of the lumberman's enthusiasm found reflection in Sternford's
eyes.

"But Nature's handed us a lemon in the basket of oranges," Bat went on,
with a shake of his head. "It's that woman in her again. Y'see, she
gives us just four months in the year to get our stuff out. Oh, she
don't freeze the cove right up. No. That's the tough of it. The
channel's mostly open. But storm, and fog, and ice, beats the
ocean-going skipper's power to navigate it with any sort o' safety. The
headlands are desperate narrow, and--well, there it is. We've four
months in the year to get our stuff out. It's a sum. Figger it yourself.
Set us goin' full. Six thousand tons in the week. What is it? Three
hundred t