Later they watched as the donkey engine, stronger than ten oxen, was made
fast to a stump and stoked till it could move itself into position to
haul the log lengths to the waiting ox team. Peelers with axes and long
steel bars had been peeling off the thick red bark, which the boys found
could be whittled into odd shapes and rubbed velvety at the cut ends. The
sawyers were sawing the trunk into lengths short enough to ride on box
cars, and the chain tenders were driving the "dogs" or steel hooks into
the forward segment preparatory to attaching the chain that was to draw
the log after the panting donkey engine. The block shifter was ready with
his pulley, and the gypsy tender was gathering down wood.

Suddenly, just as the chain had stretched till the log began to move,
some weak link snapped and with a rebound like that of a cannon it
flashed over the hillside, catching one man and toppling him over with a
broken leg. The camp cook, whose accomplishments varied from the ability
to deliver an impromptu and usually unsolicited sermon to that of calling
off the numbers at a stag dance, was summoned in haste and from a long
black bag that went with the framed diploma that hung at the head of his
bunk, this unusual individual administered surgical treatment. The
injured man took it philosophically,--his out of door constitution would
repair the damage with more than average speed,--and the work of getting
out the big log proceeded as before.

They also watched, fascinated, as the logs at a camp further back were
sent down a crude slide that slanted sheer to a sizeable lake. Ace
threatened to try riding a log some time, but Norris rendered one of his
rare ultimatums on that score.

"Let's take plenty to eat!" bargained Pedro, who was beginning to suspect
it was no afternoon stroll he had embarked upon. "Hadn't we better 'phone
old Lester to lay in some extra supplies?"

"There is always fish," Norris reminded him.

"One gets tired of fish. I say let's take plenty of grub, if we're going
away off where for weeks we may not see a living soul to buy a pound of
bacon of. Eating's half the fun of camping. And if we get up there on the
John Muir Trail, we can't even catch fish, can we--always?"

"That's the stuff!" seconded Ace. "If we aren't tied too tightly to the
problem of rustling grub, we will be freer to roam where we please. But
gosh! Won't it take a whole train-load of burros to pack enough stuff?
Five men, three