chat on the indispensable
hatchet; for it is the most difficult piece of camp kit to obtain in
perfection of which I have any knowledge. Before I was a dozen years
old I came to realize that a light hatchet was a sine qua non in
woodcraft and I also found it a most difficult thing to get. I tried
shingling hatchets, lathing hatchets and the small hatchets to be found
in country hardware stores, but none of them were satisfactory. I had
quite a number made by blacksmiths who professed skill in making edged
tools and these were the worst of all, being like nothing on the earth
or under it--murderous-looking, clumsy and all too heavy, with no
balance or proportion. I had hunted twelve years before I caught up
with the pocket-axe I was looking for. It was made in Rochester, by a
surgical instrument maker named Bushnell. It cost time and money to get
it. I worked one rainy Saturday fashioning the pattern in wood. Spoiled
a day going to Rochester, waited a day for the blade, paid $3.00 for it
and lost a day coming home. Boat fare $1.00 and expenses $2.00, besides
three days lost time, with another rainy Sunday for making leather
sheath and hickory handle.

My witty friends, always willing to help me out in figuring the cost
of my hunting and fishing gear, made the following business-like
estimate, which they placed where I would be certain to see it the
first thing in the morning. Premising that of the five who assisted in
that little joke, all stronger, bigger fellows than myself, four have
gone "where they never see the sun," I will copy the statement as it
stands today, on paper yellow with age. For I have kept it over forty
years.

Then they raised a horse laugh and the cost of that hatchet became a
standing joke and a slur on my "business ability." What aggravated me
most was, that the rascals were not so far out in their calculation.
And was I so far wrong? That hatchet was my favorite for nearly thirty
years. It has been "upset" twice by skilled workmen; and, if my friend
Bero has not lost it, is still in service.

Would I have gone without it any year for one or two dollars? But I
prefer the double blade. I want one thick, stunt edge for knots, deers'
bones, etc. and a fine, keen edge for cutting clear timber.

A word as to knife, or knives. These are of prime necessity and should
be of the best, both as to shape and temper. The "bowies" and "hunting
knives" usually kept on sale, are thick, clumsy affairs, with a