e tree. Just as the tree is ready to go over, the
saw handle at one end is unhooked and the saw pulled out at the other
side. "Timber!," the men cry out as a warning to any working near by,
for the tree has begun to lean slightly. Then with a hastening rush
the top whistles thru the air, and tears thru the branches of other
trees, and the trunk with a tremendous crash strikes the ground. Even
hardened loggers can hardly keep from shouting, so impressive is the
sight of a falling giant tree.

[Illustration: Fig. 5. Felling Red Spruce with a Saw. Adirondack
Mountains, New York.]

[Illustration: Fig. 6. Sawing Logs into Lengths.]

All this seems simple enough in outline, but the actual execution
requires considerable skill. Trees seldom stand quite vertical, there
is danger of lodging in some other tree in thick woods, and it is
therefore necessary to throw trees quite exactly. Some men become
so expert at this that they can plant a stake and drive it into the
ground by the falling trunk as truly as if they hit it with a maul. On
the other hand, serious accidents often happen in falling trees. Most
of them come from "side winders," i. e., the falling of smaller trees
struck by the felled trees.

After "falling" a tree, the sawyers mark off and saw the trunk into
log lengths, Fig. 6, paying due attention to the necessity of avoiding
knots, forks, and rotten places, so that some of the logs are eighteen
feet, some sixteen feet, some fourteen feet, and some only twelve feet
in length. Meanwhile the swampers trim off the branches, Fig. 7, a job
requiring no little skill, in order that the trunk may be shaved close
but not gashed.

[Illustration: Fig. 7. Trimming off Branches of Spruce. Adirondack
Mountains, New York.]

[Illustration: Fig. 8. Hauling Spruce Logs to the Skidway. Adirondack
Mountains, New York.]

This finishes the second group of operations, the felling. Next the
logs are _dragged_ out to the dray roads, Fig. 8. A heavy pair of
tongs, like ice-tongs, is attached to one end, and the log is snaked
out by horses to the skidway. If the log is very heavy, one end is put
on a dray. By one way or another the log is dragged out and across the
two parallel skids, on which it is rolled by cant-hooks to the end
of skids toward the road way. If other logs already occupy the skids,
each new log as it arrives is piled on the first tier. As the pile
grows higher, each log is "decked," that is, rolled up parallel poles