s gin to me by Squire Mosely. His
best cow got out, and came down into this swamp. She got mired in the
mud, and couldn't get out. I dug her out for him, and took her home.
Squire Mosely wanted to do something for me, and asked me what he should
give me. I was going to say something to eat; but I felt kinder 'shamed.
I was cuttin' wood for the fire, when he come over, with an old blunt
axe, the only one Barkspear would let me use. So I told him I'd like a
good axe, because I couldn't think of anything else I wanted. He gin me
the best axe he could find in town. I used it when Barkspear wan't
round; but I kept it hid away in the barn. I went up and got it after
you left."

"All right, Sim; I don't want to have anything done that isn't right."

"What you goin' to do with them ropes, Buck?" he asked, as I threw the
clothes-lines upon the raft.

"We want them to haul the logs out with."

Sim was in high spirits, and I concluded that he had filled himself
again from the provisions I brought. I was confident that he would be
satisfied as long as the rations were supplied. We poled the raft over
to the branch of the creek; and, as I had the plan of the structure we
were to build in my mind, we lost no time in commencing the work.

"I don't know what you're goin' to do, Buck," said Sim, as he picked up
his axe; "but I can chop as well as the best on 'em. If you'll tell me
what to do, I'll go into it like a hund'ed of bricks."

"You won't need your axe yet," I replied, assured there would be no
difference of opinion in regard to the manner of constructing the raft,
for my companion had few ideas of his own. "We must build the raft on
the stream."

I selected two logs from the pile, thirty feet in length, attached one
of the lines to each of them, and hauled them out of the pile of lumber,
though not till after we had secured the boards, slabs, and other
smaller pieces. We placed them side by side over the deep water. I then
nailed each end of a couple of slabs to the inner log, at the two
extremities of it. We next rolled the outer log away from the other
until the two were ten feet apart, and the other end of the slab was
nailed to it, thus forming the shape of the raft--thirty feet long, and
ten feet wide.

"Now, Sim, we want another log thirty feet long," I continued, when the
work was laid out.

"I see it," replied Sim; and, in his eagerness to be useful, I was
fearful he would tumble into the river, for he was ra