THE WONDERLAND OF MAINE
“I’ve already spoken about the professional honey hunter,” began
Frank, “who puts in a lot of his time summers roaming the woods in
certain sections, always on the lookout for bees working in the
blossoms or flowers.”
“Yes,” Will broke in, “and we know how they find the hives in dead
limbs of trees, by trailing working bees. They catch a bee that’s
loaded with honey, or sugar water supplied by the bee hunter, and
attach a little white stuff to him. This they can see for a long
distance as he makes a beeline for his home.”
“That’s right, because I watched a chap doing it once,” Bluff
asserted. “He kept edging closer and closer with every bee he marked,
till in the end he found the hive. I saw him take a heap of good honey
out of that tree, and I got beautifully stung in the bargain.”
“Then there’s the man who gathers the crooked wood that ship
carpenters use for making boats’ knees,” Frank continued, marking with
his fingers as he spoke. “Nearly every small boat has to have just so
many. They’re mighty hard to get, even after you’ve run across the
right juniper or hackmatack, because it’s necessary that they should
be of a certain shape.”
“That’s sure a queer occupation,” remarked Jerry.
“Of course, there are lots of trappers up here who work all winter,”
Frank observed, “just as we know our old friend, Jesse Wilcox, does
out where we live. But the furs they get here are pretty valuable,
though not bringing quite as high a price as others taken up in Canada
and the Northwest.”
“How’s that?” demanded Bluff.
“Stop and think a minute,” he was told, “and you’ll understand why it
should be so. The colder the climate the more need of a heavy coat of
fur. Now, take the common raccoon that is found all over the eastern
section of our country. The animal down in the Gulf region grows a
poor thin coat beside the one that has to stand a spell of winter
weather up here.”
“Oh, I see now, plain enough!” Bluff exclaimed.
“Trust Nature to look out for her children,” remarked sentimental
Will.
“She always does,” Frank told him seriously. “That’s why certain
animals in the far North change their coats with the coming of winter.
From gray or brown they take on a snow-white fur. That’s intended
either to help them escape from their enemies in the midst of the
snow, or else to assist them in creeping up on their food supply.”
“Yes,” broke in Jerry, “and when we were down at New Orleans and
caught some saltwater fish for a change, didn’t they tell us that
certain ground fish like the flounder is white underneath, where it
doesn’t count, but mud-colored on top? That looks as though Nature
wanted to protect him as he lay on the bottom of the shallow bayous
and flooded places.”
“Then,” continued Frank, “there are the Indians, who act as guides to
parties of sportsmen in the summer fishing and in the fall hunting.
Their women make baskets, and lots of other pretty things, using
colored grasses and porcupine quills, and sell them to the guests at
the hotels in the State.”
“How about the spruce gum hunters, Frank?” Bluff asked.
“I’m coming to them right now,” replied the other. “That’s one of the
most interesting employments in the Maine woods—gathering the gum of
the spruce trees. Of course you know it’s used in making some kinds of
chewing gum for the girls.”
“Yes, and some boys are just as bad about using the stuff,” Bluff went
on, in a scornful tone. It happened that he himself had recently
graduated from the ranks of chewers.
“These fellows keep on the move pretty much all the year,” Frank told
them. “A gum hunter has to cover his field about once in so often. He
must have pretty good eyes, or he couldn’t discover where the sticky
mass hangs on the side of tall trees. Some of them use field-glasses
in their work, and I don’t blame them much.”
“I should think that would help out considerably,” Will commented,
doubtless remembering how difficult it often was for the unaccustomed
eye to tell whether a certain protuberance far up on a tree trunk was
a boll or a woodpecker flattened out at his hammering work.
“It’s a paying business, if only they can pick up enough gum,” Frank
explained. “They get as high as a dollar and a half a pound for the
stuff. As a rule they go in couples, because there is often need of
help. And they work far away from civilization, so it must be lonely
at times.”
“But that isn’t all, Frank, I take it?” queried Bluff.
“Why,” replied the other, “I’ve hardly begun to tell you about the
scores of things that are going on up here in these wonderful woods,
pretty much the year round. Perhaps you’ve never bothered your heads
about finding out where all the hoop poles come from. They use
millions of them every year, and the supply is inexhaustible, even if
it does take time and trouble to gather it.”
“Then that’s one of the Maine woods’ industries, is it?” questioned
Will.
“A big one,” Frank answered promptly. “You know that after certain
trees like birch and ash are cut down, the roots throw up sprouts
a-plenty.”
“Yes; I’ve seen regular little forests of them, many a time,” Bluff
replied.
“Well, that’s where the harvest of the hoop pole man comes in,” Frank
continued. “He follows the path where the loggers have gone a year or
two before. Of course, his work makes it necessary for him to have a
horse, so as to carry his day’s gathering to a central point, where it
can be shipped.”
“Do they fetch the stuff out just as it’s cut?” asked Jerry.
“Not as a rule,” Frank answered. “At night the men sit by the fire,
and spend the time in talking, while they use their shavers to take
the bark off the poles. Later on these poles are split at the
factories and used for barrels, kegs, and orange boxes.”
“The men who gather them don’t get rich at the job, I reckon,” Bluff
commented, at a hazard, seeking still more information concerning this
wonderful country which he had never dreamed could produce so many
strange livelihoods.
“Oh, they get a few cents apiece for the poles,” said Frank, “but as
they work steadily, and there are no labor agitators to call them out
on strike, I guess they make it pay. Another strange business up here
is getting ax-handles.”
“Gee whiz! doesn’t it beat the Dutch about that?” chuckled Bluff.
“Like every other fellow, I’ve often wondered where they got all those
fine ax-handles that come to our town. So here’s where they come from?
I’m glad to know it.”
“A fair part of the supply comes from up around Maine,” Frank told
him. “The woods roamer needs the best quality of ash for his business.
He hunts over a large territory to find just what he wants. In the
fall of the year the trees are dropped, and in a rough way each handle
is shaped by a tool they call a ‘froe.’ After that they keep them
underground for a time.”
“What’s that—bury the handles?” remarked Will wonderingly.
“Just to season the wood so it will not crack,” Frank explained. “Of
course, after all this the finer work of finishing the ax helves has
to be done at the factory. Another man who makes his living from the
woods is the fellow who gathers the hemlock bark used by nearly all
tanneries. Besides, all sorts of roots that bring in good money are
being dug every year throughout Maine.”
“You mean wild ginseng roots, and golden seal, don’t you, Frank?” Will
asked.
“Yes, and many others in the bargain. In lots of places boys make
quite a little money finding these roots, and drying them. Then—let’s
see, did you know that pearl hunting had become a regular business in
some parts of Maine?”
“Now you must be joshing us, Frank,” Bluff remonstrated, “because
pearls are found in oysters; and I’ve read that there are only a few
places in the wide world where these pearl oysters grow plentifully
enough to pay for working the banks.”
“You’re mistaken about that,” Will broke in. “I know fine pearls have
been picked out of mussels in Missouri and Indiana. Is that what you
mean, Frank?”
“Yes,” the other explained, “there’s been considerable hunting in the
streams up here for mussels, or fresh water clams, that happened to
have a pearl in the shell. While every hunter isn’t lucky enough to
make a big find, still a man found one last summer near Moosehead Lake
that sold for several hundred dollars.”
“And then there’s the shells; they say they’re worth something,” added
Will, who apparently was posted on that subject at least.
“They sell those to factories where buttons and such things are made,”
continued Frank. “If you’ve ever noticed the shell of a mussel, you’ve
seen that the inside is mother-of-pearl and mighty fine.”
“Does that finish the list?” Jerry wanted to know.
“There are plenty of other things that bring in money to those who
follow them up,” Frank told him; “but in every case it takes more or
less hard work. Thousands of men are employed in logging during the
winter. Then, ice is gathered in great quantities, to be shipped to
Boston, and even to New York, when it’s warm weather. Protecting the
game in the close season gives work to a good many men as wardens.”
“I never would have dreamed a single State could have so many ways of
making a living in its woods,” murmured Will.
“Think of the hotel men,” Frank continued, “who live on the swarms of
tourists and sportsmen. And the guides who get big pay for their work
in season. There are the canoe-makers in Oldtown and other places;
they seldom try to build the older style of birch-bark boats nowadays,
even the Penobscot Indians preferring the smooth-sided canvas canoe,
painted green, so the fish can hardly notice it above them in the
water. There must be thousands of these boats built every year, and
they find a ready market from Florida to the far West, and all over
the country.”
“Well, you have certainly interested us by telling about these
things,” declared Bluff. “Nobody but a fellow who had lived in Maine
pretty much all his life would be apt to know so much about how people
made their living up in these Big Woods.”
“I’ll have a heap more respect for the Maine pine woods after this,”
admitted Jerry. “Up to now I kind of looked down on ’em, because there
didn’t seem to be a great many whopping big trees, such as we see out
our way in the forests. But, shucks! the more you travel the bigger
your knowledge box grows.”
“That’s right,” added Bluff frankly.
“There are plenty of other things I could tell you,” continued Frank,
“but they wouldn’t seem quite as interesting after what you’ve heard.
And I’ve talked myself pretty hoarse by now, so I’d better close shop
and quit.”
“I hope my flashlight trap works all right,” mused Will.
The fire felt so delightful that no one seemed in any hurry to crawl
into his bunk. This was the life these boys enjoyed more than anything
they could imagine. Will was perhaps the only one of the quartet who
cared little for hunting; but it pleased him to be in the company of
his chums, and, besides, his new hobby was causing him to look forward
to a season of profitable employment.
He was fully determined not to let any opportunity pass whereby he
might secure some remarkable pictures of outdoor life to enter in that
competition which the railroad companies had inaugurated.
While they sat there, looking into the fire, each one engaged with his
own thoughts, Frank was noticed to suddenly raise his head and listen.
“What was that sound, Frank?” demanded Bluff. “Ever since we spent
that time out in the Rockies on that ranch I’ve believed I’d be able
to know the howl of a wolf if ever I heard one again, and seems to me
that was what came down on the wind just then.”