CHAPTER XXIV
Anxious to do all he possibly could for them, Jefferson Wilbur had provided Dale and Owen with seats in the observation car of the train, so the young lumbermen had an excellent opportunity to gaze at the scenery along the route as the overland express roared and shrieked its way around rocky bends, over long bridges, and past immense stretches of farming lands. The view was an ever-changing one, and they were surprised when a porter came in and announced that lunch was ready in the dining car.
"It's just as elegant as anything in the East," was Dale's comment, while they were eating. "The Down-Easter who doesn't think so had better come out and see."
They had just finished lunch, when they saw that the train was approaching a bridge over a very broad river, that sparkled brightly in the sunlight.
"The Mississippi!" cried Owen, and he was right, and soon they were rumbling slowly over the Father of American Rivers. Up and down the river were numerous steam and sail boats, and freight and lumber lighters, showing that commerce was as active here as elsewhere.
As yet neither of the young lumbermen had put in a night on a regular sleeping car, and they watched with curiosity, that evening, as the porter built up the various berths, arranged the bedding, and placed the heavy curtains in position. As they were used to sleeping together, they had the porter leave out the upper berth, and used the lower only.
"This is as good as a hotel," was Owen's comment.
"Anyway, it beats the bunk up at the Hoover camp," answered Dale, with a happy laugh.
"Don't mention that bunk again, Dale. I can smell the mustiness yet."
But, though the bed was soft, sleeping, with the rumble of the train in their ears, was not so easy, and Dale lay awake for a good hour, listening to the toot-toot of the locomotive, the grinding of car wheels, and the sharp clack-clack as they sped over some intersecting tracks. He wondered what he would do if there was a wreck, and how he could save himself if the car rolled completely over, or if it took fire from the dimly burning lights in the aisle. And then tired Nature at last claimed her own, and lying back to back with Owen, he dropped off and slept as soundly as anybody.
When the young lumbermen arose and went to the lavatory to wash up, they found nobody stirring but the porter and an old ranchman, who was sitting in the smoking section, puffing steadily at his corncob pipe.
"Couldn't sleep nohow," said the ranchman, between his puffs. "Aint used to it, an' it's wuss nor trying to sleep in the saddle on a broncho. Next time I travel, I'm going to stop off for my rest."
The train had stopped at Omaha late the evening before and was now approaching Denver. By the time the other passengers were up and dressed they ran into the outskirts of the city, and here another dining car was hooked on to the train, the other having been left behind the evening before. The train stopped for twenty minutes at Denver, and the young lumbermen got off and stretched their legs by a walk along the station platform.
"I'm sorry we can't stop and look this city over," remarked Owen. "Jack Giles, the lumberman, was out here once, and he liked it very much. Said the air was the finest he had ever breathed."
"The air certainly is pure," said Dale, taking in a deep breath.
Soon they were on the train again and rushing forward. The prairie levels became less frequent and the train had often to climb the steep grade of a mountain. The scenery became wilder and wilder, and the young lumbermen could scarcely take their eyes from it. They were offered books and newspapers to read, but declined both.
"We can read any time," said Owen. "But a fellow sees this seldom, if ever. I'm going to take it in for all it's worth," and he did, hardly taking time to eat his meals.
At Denver they were joined by an elderly man who told them, during the course of a conversation, that he was in the employ of the United States Government, being attached to the Bureau of Forestry. He became much interested in the young lumbermen when he found that they were from Maine, and asked numerous questions concerning the trees and timber in that State.
"You are right," he said, in reply to a statement made by Dale. "The lumber industry of our country is rapidly centering around Washington, Oregon, and northern California. The output of Maine, Michigan, and other timber sections will, of course, be considerable for years to come, but that output is as nothing compared to what we can produce in the Far West. According to the reports of our department, Washington, Oregon, and California contain about one-third of all the timber still standing in our country. Oregon, alone, to which you are bound, contains more timber than all the New England States and New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania combined."
"Have you ever estimated the total quantity of uncut timber—I mean, with any exactness?" asked Owen. "Of course you had to do it in the rough, to make comparisons."
"We have got fairly close to it, and the figures would astonish you. For Washington, Oregon, and California, we calculate the uncut trees will yield six hundred billion feet of lumber."
"Well! well!" cried Dale. "But it will take some cutting to get that down."
"You are right, yet you will be surprised to see the inroads that have been made at different points. Lumbering there, you must remember, is advancing on a large scale, and a stick that would be thought of fair size in Maine, is discarded in Oregon as too small. I know one lumberman who won't cut a tree on his section that isn't at least twenty inches in diameter."
"They'd better save some trees," said Owen. "If they don't, they'll suffer one of these days, just as Maine is beginning to suffer."
"The government has already taken hold of the matter, and, in the three States I have named, Uncle Sam has set aside over thirty-two thousand square miles of forest lands which nobody can touch. These parks, as they are called, are filled with pines, fir, hemlock, redwood, and other trees."
"Are there many small lumbermen out there?" asked Dale.
"There used to be, years ago. A man would come out here, take up a homestead claim, and perhaps buy up some additional claims near by, and then start in to cut trees on his own account, getting them to market as best he could, and taking whatever the wholesale lumber companies cared to pay him. But all that is changed now. Business is done on a big scale, and the companies have millions of dollars invested. One company alone gets out half a million feet of logs every day."
"Such an amount would be worth a small fortune in Maine!" put in Owen. "What a plant that must be!"
"It certainly is a fine plant, and has many miles of railroad tracks, half a dozen locomotives, and ten times as many flat cars and trucks, four movable sawmills, six or eight movable donkey engines, a six-foot flume a mile long, from the top of one hill to the side of another, and a large quantity of machinery of all kinds."
"And how many men are employed at such a place as that?"
"I don't know exactly, but I should say close on to four hundred. They employ one man who does nothing but purchase provisions for the crowd, and have eight or ten cooks and also a first-class doctor."
"If they have a railroad, I don't suppose they have much use for horses," said Owen.
"The railroad runs through only a small part of the property, and to get the logs to the road they use both the donkey engines and horses. They build a skid road first, the same as you do in Maine, and then hook the logs fast to each other, making a train of them. Sometimes they use as high as twenty horses to move the log train. When they use a donkey engine, they chain the engine fast to some trees, and then hook the logs fast to a wire rope, that winds up on a big drum, moved by the engine. When the logs get to the drum, the donkey engine and drum are moved ahead, and then the logs are drawn up as before, and this is kept up until the logs are drawn to the spot where they are wanted."
"I suppose it is nothing but lumber in some towns," said Dale, after a pause.
"The majority of the cities in the Northwest owe their prosperity to the timber industry. In fact, some cities could not exist at all, were it not for this traffic. Saw- and shingle-mills abound, and the output of some of the shingle-making machines is truly astonishing. When I was out here last fall, I inspected a shingle machine that turned out five thousand first-class shingles an hour. One town in Washington turns out nothing but shingles, and sends them by trainload and shipload everywhere."
"I suppose we'll find a big difference in the work there from what it was in the East," said Dale.
"Not so very much different outside of the fact that everything is done on a large scale, as I said. The lumbermen of the United States are about the same everywhere. To be sure you'll find plenty of foreigners out in Oregon, especially Scandinavians, and also a fair portion of French-Canadians. But the men are a whole-souled lot, and if you do what is right by them, they will stick by you, no matter what happens. Ten years ago I was a total stranger in the Northwest; now I have a host of friends out there—real friends, who will help me down to their last dollar, if I actually need it," concluded the man who had given out so much valuable information.