ten feet from _O_ to _N_. Then test the corner at _H_ in the
same manner.

Fig. 180. Fig. 181. Fig. 182. Fig. 183.

[Illustration: How to square the corners, roll the logs of cabin, and make
log steps.]

Log-Rolling

In the olden times log-rolling was always a great frolic and brought the
people from far and near to lend a helping hand in building the new house.
In handling logs, lumbermen have tools made for that purpose--cant-hooks,
peevy irons, lannigans, and numerous other implements with names as
peculiar as their looks--but the old backwoodsmen and pioneers who lived
in log houses owned no tools but their tomahawks, their axes, and their
rifles, and the logs of most of their houses were rolled in place by the
men themselves pushing them up the skids laid against the cabin wall for
that purpose; later, when the peddlers and traders brought ropes to the
settlements, they used these to pull their logs in place. In building my
log house in Pennsylvania we used two methods; one was hand power (Fig.
181). Taking two ropes we fastened the ends securely inside the cabin. We
then passed the free ends of the ropes around the log, first under it and
then over the top of it, then up to a group of men who, by pulling on the
free ends, rolled the log (Fig. 181) up to the top of the cabin. But when
Lafe Jeems and Nate Tanner and Jimmy Rosencranz were supplied with some
oxen they fastened a chain to each end of the log (Fig. 182), then
fastened a pulley-block to the other side of the cabin, that is, the side
opposite the skids, and ran the line through the pulley-block to the oxen
as it is run to the three men in Fig. 182. When the oxen were started the
log slid up the skids to the loose rafters _N_, _O_, _P_ and when once up
there it was easily shoved and fitted into place.

Log Steps

Sometimes one wants front steps to one's log house and these may be made
of flattened logs or puncheons, as shown by Fig. 183.

XXIX

THE ADIRONDACK OPEN LOG CAMP AND A ONE-ROOM CABIN

Adirondack Log Camp

NOT satisfied with the open brush Adirondack camp, the men in those woods
often build such camps of logs with a puncheon floor and a roof of real
shingles. The sketch (Fig. 184) is made from such a camp. At the rear the
logs are notched and placed like those of a log house (Figs. 162, 163,
164, 166), but the front ends of the side logs are toe-nailed (Fig. 173)
to the two upright supports. In this particular camp the logs