he Wootuppocut. The felled trees had
been mostly cut into pieces of from two to four feet in length, and
collected into piles which looked like so many altars scattered over
the ground. Here it was intended they should remain to dry, during the
summer, to be ready for a market in the fall.

"So it's you, Judge and Mr. Armstrong," exclaimed Gladding as the two
came up. "I guessed as much, that somebody was coming, when I heard
Tige bark. He makes a different sort of a noise when he gits on the
scent of a rabbit or squirrel."

"I dare say, Tiger knows a great deal more than we fancy," said the
Judge. "Why, Gladding you come on bravely. I had no idea you had made
such destruction."

"When I once put my hand to the work," said Tom, laughing, "down they
must come, in short metre, if they're bigger than Goliah. Me and my
axe are old friends, and we've got the hang of one another pretty
well. All I have to do, is to say, 'go it,' and every tree's a goner."

After this little bit of vanity, Tom, as if to prove his ability to
make good his boast by deeds, with a few well-directed blows, that
seemed to be made without effort, lopped off an enormous limb from the
tree he had just cut down.

"I've heard tell," said Tom, continuing his employment of cutting off
the limbs, "that the Britishers and the Mounseers don't use no such
axes as ourn. You've been across the Big Pond, and can tell a fellow
all about it."

"It is true, they do not. The European axe is somewhat differently
shaped from your effective weapon."

"The poor, benighted critturs!" exclaimed Tom, in a tone of
commiseration. "I saw one of them Parleyvoos once, try to handle an
axe, and I be darned, if he didn't come nigh cutting off the great toe
of his right foot. If he hadn't been as weak as Taunton water--that,
folks say, can't run down hill--as all them outlandish furriners is,
and had on, to boot, regular stout cowhiders, I do believe he'd never
had the chance to have the gout in one toe, anyhow. Why, I'd as soon
trust a monkey with a coal of fire, in a powder-house, as one of them
chaps with an axe."

"We have the best axes, and the most skillful woodmen in the world,"
said the Judge, not unwilling to humor the harmless conceit of the
wood-chopper.

"It's plaguy lucky we have, seeing as how we've got so many thousands
and thousands of acres to clear up," said Tom, with a sort of confused
notion, that the skill of his countrymen was a natural faculty not