AXE AND SAW
TO all good, loyal Americans, the axe is almost a sacred tool, for our
greatest American, Abraham Lincoln, was one of our greatest axemen.
When he was President of the United States he used to exercise by
chopping wood, then laughingly extended his arm holding the axe in a
horizontal position by the extreme end of the handle. This he would do
without a tremor of the muscle or movement of the axe--some stunt! Try
it and see if you can do it!
The American Indians, and practically all savages, used stone and bone
implements, and with such implements the Redmen were wont to build the
most beautiful of all crafts, the birch bark canoe. If an American
Indian produced such wonders with implements made of stones, flint and
bones, a good red-blooded American boy should be able to do the same
with a sharp axe; therefore it should not only be his pleasure but his
duty to learn to be a skillful axeman.
Brother Jonathan, the imaginary character who represented the American
people, was almost invariably pictured with a jack-knife whittling a
stick, because all early Americans were skillful in the use of the
jack-knife, but they were also skilled in the use of the axe, and every
boy of twelve years of age knew how to handle an axe.
IMPORTANCE OF THE AXE
While lecturing at the Teachers' College, Columbia University, I was
asked to give a demonstration of the use of the axe. It then and there
suddenly occurred to me that if these grown men needed and asked for
instructions in the use of this typical American tool, a talk on the
same subject would be welcomed by the American boys.
The axe is the one necessary tool of the woodsmen; the axe occupies the
same position to the wilderness man that the chest of tools does to the
carpenter; with the axe the woodsman cuts his firewood; with the axe he
makes his traps; with the axe he splits the shakes, clapboards, slabs
and shingles from the balsam tree, or other wood which splits readily,
and with the shakes, clapboards, or slabs he shingles the roof of his
hogan, his barabara, or makes the framework to his sod shack or his
dugout, or with them builds the foundation of a bogken. With his axe he
cuts the birch for his birch bark pontiac, for his lean-to or his log
cabin. Without an axe it is most difficult for one to even build a raft
or to fell a tree to get the birch bark for one's canoe, or to "fall"
the tree to make a dugout canoe. A tree may be felled by fire, as the
Indians of old used to "fall" them, but this takes a wearisome time.
THE KIND OF AXE TO USE
When bound for a real camp, take along with you a real axe. Never take
an axe which is too large and heavy for you to swing with comfort. It
is also best to avoid an axe which is too light, as with such a tool
you must use too much labor to cut the wood. You should select your own
axe according to your strength. Pick up the axe, go through the motions
of chopping and see if it feels right, if its balance suits you; hold
up the axe and sight along the top of the handle as you would along the
barrel of a gun to see that your handle is not warped.
[Illustration: 321, 322, 323, 324, 325, 326, 327, 328, 329
ABE LINCOLN THE PIONEER]
Axes may be had of weight and size to suit one's taste. In New England
they use short-handled axes which are not popular in the woods. The axe
handles should be well seasoned, second growth hickory; a ¼ axe has a
19-inch handle and weighs two pounds. A ½ axe has a 24-inch handle and
weighs two and a half pounds. A ¾ axe has a 28-inch handle and weighs
three pounds. A full axe has a 36-inch handle and weighs five pounds.
Probably the best axe for camp work, when you must carry the axe on
your back, is one with a 30-inch second growth hickory handle, weight
about two and three-quarter pounds, or somewhere between two and three
pounds. A light axe of this kind will cut readily and effectively
provided it has a slender bit; that is, that it does not sheer off too
bluntly towards the cutting edge. When you look at the top of such an
axe and it appears slender and not bulky, it will cut well and can be
wielded by a boy and is not too light for a man (Fig. 322).
Fig. 321 shows the long-handled Hudson Bay axe used much in the North
country. It is made after the tomahawk form to save weight, but the
blade is broad, you notice, to give a wide cutting edge. The trouble
with this axe is that it is too light for satisfactory work. Fig. 323
shows a belt axe of a modified tomahawk shape, only three of which are
in existence; one was in the possession of the late Colonel Roosevelt,
one in the possession of a famous English author, and one in the
possession of the writer. These axes were made for the gentlemen to
whom they were presented by the President of a great tool works; they
are made of the best gray steel and are beautiful tools. Fig. 324 is
an ordinary belt axe practically the same as those used by the Boy
Scouts. When it was proposed to arm the Boy Scouts with guns, the
writer put in strenuous objections and suggested belt axes in place of
guns; the matter of costume and arms was finally referred to him as a
committee of one. The uniform was planned after that of the Scouts of
the Boy Pioneers of America, and the belt axe adopted is the same as
that carried by the Scouts of the Sons of Daniel Boone, which axes are
modelled after Daniel Boone's own tomahawk. Fig. 325 is a very heavy
axe.
A WORD ABOUT SWINGING THE AXE
Grasp the axe with the left hand, close to the end of the handle, even
closer than is shown in the diagram (Fig. 326); with the right hand
grasp the handle close to the head of the axe, then bring the axe up
over your shoulder and as you strike the blow, allow the right hand
to slide down naturally (Fig. 327), close to the left hand; learn to
reverse, that is, learn to grasp the lower end of the handle with the
right hand and the left hand near the top, so as to swing the axe from
the left shoulder down, as easily as from the right shoulder.
To be a real axeman, a genuine dyed-in-the-wool, blown-in-the-glass
type, each time you make a stroke with the axe you must emit the breath
from your lungs with a noise like Huh! That, you know, sounds very
professional and will duly impress the other boys when they watch you
chop, besides which it always seems to really help the force of the
blow.
HOW TO REMOVE A BROKEN AXE HANDLE
It was from a colored rail splitter from Virginia, who worked for the
writer, that the latter learned how to burn out the broken end of the
handle from the axe head. Bury the blade of your axe in the moist earth
and build a fire over the protruding butt (Fig. 328); the moist earth
will prevent the heat from spoiling the temper of your axe blade while
the heat from the fire will char and burn the wood so that it can
easily be removed.
If you are using a double-bitted axe, that is, one of those very useful
but villainous tools with two cutting edges, and the handle breaks off,
make a shallow trench in the dirt, put the moist soil over each blade,
leaving a hollow in the middle where the axe handle comes and build
your fire over this hollow (Fig. 329).
TO TIGHTEN THE AXE HEAD
If your axe handle is dry and the head loosens, soak it over night and
the wood will swell and tighten the head. Scoutmaster Fitzgerald of New
York says, "Quite a number of scouts have trouble with the axe slipping
off the helve and the first thing they do is to drive a nail which only
tends to split the helve and make matters worse. I have discovered
a practical way of fixing this. You will note that a wire passes
over the head of the axe in the helve in the side view. Then in the
cross-section in the copper wire is twisted and a little staple driven
in to hold it in place." This may answer for a belt axe but the hole in
the handle will weaken it and would not be advisable for a large axe
(Fig. 330).
ACCIDENTS
We have said that the axe is a chest of tools, but it is a dangerous
chest of tools. While aboard a train coming from one of the big lumber
camps, the writer was astonished to find that although there were but
few sick men aboard, there were many, many wounded men in the car and
none, that he could find, wounded by falling trees; all were wounded
by the axe itself or by fragments of knots and sticks flying from blows
of the axe and striking the axeman in the eyes or other tender places.
YOU MUST SUPPLY THE BRAINS
I have often warned my young friends to use great care with firearms,
because firearms are made for the express purpose of killing. A gun,
having no brains of its own, will kill its owner, his friends, his
brother or sister, mother or father, just as quickly and as surely as
it will kill a moose, a bear or a panther. Therefore it is necessary
for the gunner to supply the brains for his gun.
The same is true with the axeman. Edged tools are made for the express
purpose of cutting, and they will cut flesh and bone as quickly and
neatly as they will cut wood, unless the user is skillful in the use
of his tool; that is, unless he supplies the brains which the tools
themselves lack.
So you see that it is "up to you" boys to supply the brains for your
axes, and when you do that, that is, when you acquire the skill in the
use, and judgment in the handling, you will avoid painful and may be
dangerous or fatal accidents, and at the same time you will experience
great joy in the handling of your axe. Not only this but you will
acquire muscle and health in this most vigorous and manly exercise.
We are not telling all this to frighten the reader but to instil into
his mind a proper respect for edged tools, especially the axe.
ETIQUETTE OF THE AXE
1. An axe to be respected must be sharp and no one who has any ambition
to be a pioneer, a sportsman or a scout, should carry a dull axe, or an
axe with the edge nicked like a saw blade. It may interest the reader
to know that the pencil I am using with which to make these notes was
sharpened with my camp axe.
2. No one but a duffer and a chump will use another man's axe without
that other man's willing permission.
3. It is as bad form to ask for the loan of a favorite axe as it is
to ask for the loan of a sportsman's best gun or pet fishing rod or
toothbrush.
[Illustration: 330, 331, 332, 333, 334, 335
AXES AND SHEATHS]
4. To turn the edge or to nick another man's axe is a very grave
offense.
5. Keep your own axe sharp and clean, do not use it to cut any object
lying on the ground where there is danger of the blade of the axe going
through the object and striking a stone; do not use it to cut roots of
trees or bushes for the same reason. Beware of knots in hemlock wood
and in cold weather beware of knots of any kind.
When not in use an axe should have its blade sheathed in leather (Figs.
331, 332, 333 and 334), or it should be struck into a log or stump
(Fig. 335). It should never be left upon the ground or set up against a
tree to endanger the legs and feet of the camper. Fig. 341 shows how a
firewood hod is made and used.
HOW TO SHARPEN YOUR AXE
On the trail we have no grindstones, and often have recourse to a file
with which to sharpen our axe; sometimes we use a whetstone for the
purpose. New axes are not always as sharp as one would wish; in that
case if we use a grindstone to put on an edge we must be sure to keep
the grindstone wet in the first place, and in the second place we must
be careful not to throw the edge of the blade out of line. When this
occurs it will cause a "binding strain" on the blade which tends to
stop the force of the blow. If the edges are at all out of line, the
probabilities are one will knock a half moon out of the blade in the
first attempt to cut frozen timber. The best axe in the world, with
an edge badly out of line, cannot stand the strain of a blow on hard
frozen wood. While grinding the axe take a sight along the edge every
once in a while to see if it is true.
THE BEST TIME TO CUT OR PRUNE TREES
Is when the sap is dormant, which I will explain for my younger readers
is that time of year when the tree is not full of juice. The reason
for this is that when the sap or juice is in the wood when cut, it
will ferment, bubble and fizzle the same as sweet cider or grape juice
will ferment, and the fermentation will take all the "life" out of
the lumber and give it a tendency to decay; again to translate for my
younger readers, such wood will rot quicker than wood cut at the proper
season of the year.
[Illustration: 336, 337, 338, 339, 340, 341
WOOD-YARD CONVENIENCES]
With pine trees, however, this is not always the case, because the
pitchy nature of the sap of the pine prevents it from fermenting like
beech sap; in fact, the pitch acts as a preservative and mummifies, so
to speak, the wood. Pine knots will last for a hundred years lying in
the soft, moist ground and for aught I know, longer, because they are
fat with pitch and the pitch prevents decay.
Beech when cut in June is unfit for firewood the following winter, but
authorities say that the same trees cut in August and left with the
branches still on them for twenty or thirty days, will make firmer and
"livelier" timber than that cut under any other conditions.
An expert lumberman in ten minutes' time will cut down a hardwood tree
one foot in diameter, and it will not take him over four minutes to cut
down a softwood tree of the same size.
CLEAR AWAY EVERYTHING
Before attempting to chop down a tree; in fact, before attempting
to chop anything, be careful to see that there are no clothes lines
overhead, if you are chopping in your backyard, or if you are chopping
in the forests see that there are no vines, twigs, or branches within
swing of your axe. By carefully removing all such things you will
remove one of the greatest causes of accidents in the wilderness, for
as slight a thing as a little twig can deflect, that is, turn, the
blade of your axe from its course and cause the loss of a toe, a foot,
or even a leg. This is the reason that swamping is the most dangerous
part of the lumberman's work.
HOW TO "FALL" A TREE
If the tree, in falling, must pass between two other trees where there
is danger of its "hanging," so cut your kerf that the tree in falling
will strike the ground nearest the smallest of the trees, or nearest
the one furthest away. Then, as the tree falls, and brushes the side of
the smallest tree or the one furthest away, it will bounce away, thus
giving the fallen tree an opportunity to bump its way down to the place
on the ground selected for it, in place of hanging by its bough in the
boughs of other trees.
Do not try to "fall" a tree between two others that are standing close
together; it cannot be successfully done, for the tops of the three
trees will become interlaced, and you will find it very difficult
and hazardous work to attempt to free your fallen tree from its
entanglement; probably it cannot be done without cutting one or both
of the other trees down. The truth is, one must mix brains with every
stroke of the axe or one will get into trouble.
Where possible select a tree that may be made to fall in an open space
where the prostrate trunk can be easily handled. Cut your kerf on the
side toward the landing place, let the notch go half-way or a trifle
more through the trunk. Make the notch or kerf as wide as the radius,
that is, half the diameter of the tree trunk (Fig. 344), otherwise you
will have your axe pinched or wedged before you have the kerf done and
will find it necessary to enlarge your notch or kerf. Score first at
the top part of the proposed notch, then at the bottom, making as big
chips as possible, and hew out the space between, cutting the top parts
of the notch at an angle but the bottom part nearly horizontal. When
this notch or kerf is cut to half or a little more than half of the
diameter of the tree, cut another notch upon the opposite side of the
tree at a point a few inches higher than the notch already cut; when
this notch is cut far enough the tree will begin to tremble and crack
to warn you to step to one side. Don't get behind the tree; it may
kick and kill you; step to one side and watch the tree as it falls;
there are many things that may deflect it in falling, and one's safety
lies in being alert and watching it fall. Also keep your eye aloft to
watch for limbs which may break off and come down with sufficient force
to disable you; accidents of this kind frequently happen, but seldom or
never happen where the axeman uses common sense or due caution.
HOW TO TRIM OR SWAMP
After a tree is felled, the swampers take charge of it and cut away all
the branches, leaving the clean log for the teamsters to "snake." They
do the swamping by striking the lower side of the branch with the blade
of the axe, the side towards the root of the tree, what might be called
the underside, and chopping upwards towards the top of the tree. Small
branches will come off with a single blow of the axe.
When the tree has been swamped and the long trunk lies naked on the
turf, it will, in all probability, be necessary to cut it into logs of
required lengths. If the trunk is a thick one it is best to cut it by
standing on the tree trunk with legs apart (Fig. 336), and chopping
between one's feet, making the kerf equal to the diameter of the log.
Do this for two reasons: it is much easier to stand on a log and cut
it in two that way than to cut it part the way through the top side,
and then laboriously roll it over and cut from the underside; also when
you make the notch wide enough you can cut all the way through the log
without wedging your axe. To split up the log you should have
A BEETLE OR MALL,
A thing usually to be found among the tools in the backwoodsman's hut
and permanent camps; of course we do not take the time to make them
for an overnight camp or a temporary camping place, but they are very
handy at a stationary camp. To make one select a hardwood tree, which,
when stripped of its bark will measure about five inches in diameter.
The tree selected should not be one that would split easily but may
be a young oak, beech or hickory, which with the bark on is six or
seven inches in diameter at the butt. In chopping this tree down leave
a stump tall enough from which to fashion your beetle, and while the
stump is still standing hew the top part until you have a handle scant
two feet in length, leaving for the hammer head, so to speak, a butt
of ten inches, counting from the part where the roots join the trunk.
Before cutting the stump off above the ground, dig all around the
roots, carefully scraping away all stones and pebbles, then cut the
roots off close up to the stump, for this is the hardest part of the
wood and makes the best mall head (Fig. 337).
HOW TO MAKE THE GLUTS OR WEDGES
Farmers claim that the best wedges are made of applewood, or locust
wood; never use green wedges if seasoned ones may be obtained, for
one seasoned wedge is worth many green ones. In the north woods, or,
in fact, in any woods, applewood cannot be obtained, but dogwood and
ironwood make good substitutes even when used green (Figs. 338 and 357).
HOW TO HARDEN GREEN WOOD
Many of the Southern Indians in the early history of America tipped
their arrows with bits of cane; these green arrow points they hardened
by slightly charring them with the hot ashes of the fire. Gluts may be
hardened in the same manner; do not burn them; try to heat them just
sufficiently to force the sap out and harden the surface. Where
dogwood, ironwood and applewood are not to be obtained, make your gluts
of what is at hand; that is true woodcraft (Fig. 337).
[Illustration: 342, 343, 344, 345, 346, 347, 348, 349, 350, 351, 352,
353, 354, 355, 356, 357, 358, 359, 361]
A year or two ago, while trailing a moose, we ran across the ruins of
a lumber camp that had been wiped out by fire, and here we picked up
half a dozen axe heads among the moose tracks. These axe heads we used
as gluts to split our wood as long as we remained in that camp, and by
their aid we built a shack of board rived from balsam logs.
Fig. 341 shows how to make and how to use firewood hods on farms or at
permanent camps.
HOW TO MAKE A CHOPPING BLOCK
After you have cut the crotch and trimmed it down into the form of Fig.
339, you may find it convenient to flatten the thing on one side. This
you do by hewing and scoring; that is, by cutting a series of notches
all of the same depth, and then splitting off the wood between the
notches, as one would in making a puncheon (Fig. 342). (A puncheon is
a log flattened on one or both sides.) With this flattened crotch one
may, by sinking another flattened log in the earth and placing the
chopping block on top, have a chopping block like that shown in Fig.
343. Or one may take the crotch, spike a piece of board across as in
Fig. 339 and use that, and the best chopping block or crotch block is
the one shown in Fig. 339, with the puncheon or slab spiked onto the
ends of the crotch. In this case the two ends of the crotch should be
cut off with a saw, if you have one, so as to give the proper flat
surface to which to nail the slab. Then the kindling wood may be split
without danger to yourself or the edge of the hatchet.
CHOP IT THE RIGHT WAY
If you are using an ordinary stick of wood for a chopping block, and
the stick you are about to chop rests solidly on top of the block
_where the axe strikes_ it will cut all right, but if you strike where
the stick does not touch the chopping block the blow will stun the hand
holding the stick in a very disagreeable manner. If you hold your stick
against the chopping block with your foot, there is always danger of
cutting off your toe; if you hold the stick with your hand and strike
it with the axe, there is danger of cutting off your fingers. When I
say there is danger I mean it. One of our scouts cut his thumb off,
another cut off one finger, and one of my friends in the North woods
of Canada cut off his great toe. In hunting for Indian relics in an
old camping cave in Pennsylvania, my companion, Mr. Elmer Gregor,
made the gruesome find of a dried human finger near the embers of an
ancient campfire, telling the story of a camping accident ages ago, but
evidently after white man's edged tools were introduced.
If you have no chopping block and wish to cut your firewood into
smaller pieces, you can hold the stick safely with the hand if you
use the axe as shown in Fig. 345. This will give you as a result two
sticks, and the upper one will have some great splinters.
HOW TO SPLIT KINDLING WOOD
When splitting wood for the fire or kindling, make the first blow as in
Fig. 346, and the second blow in the same place, but a trifle slanting
as in Fig. 347; the slanting blow wedges the wood apart and splits it.
If the wood is small and splits readily, the slanting blow may be made
first. These things can only be indicated to the readers because there
are so many circumstances which govern the case. If there is a knot in
the wood, strike the axe right over the knot as in Figs. 348 and 349.
If you are chopping across the grain do not strike perpendicularly as
in Fig. 350, because if the wood is hard the axe will simply bounce
back, but strike a slanting blow as in Fig. 351, and the axe blade
will bite deeply into the wood; again let us caution you that if you
put too much of a slant on your axe in striking the wood, it will cut
out a shallow chip without materially impeding the force of the blow,
and your axe will swing around to the peril of yourself or anyone else
within reach; again this is a thing which you must learn to practice.
In using the chopping block be very careful not to put a log in front
of the crotch as in Fig. 340, and then strike a heavy blow with the
axe, for the reason that if you split the wood with the first blow your
axe handle will come down heavily and suddenly upon the front log, and
no matter how good a handle it may be, it will break into fragments, as
the writer has discovered by sad experience. A lost axe handle in the
woods is a severe loss, and one to be avoided, for although a makeshift
handle may be fashioned at camp, it never answers the purpose as well
as the skillfully and artistically made handle which comes with the axe.
HOLDERS OR SAW BUCKS FOR LOGS
Select two saplings about five inches in diameter at the butts, bore
holes near the butts about six inches from the end for legs, make a
couple of stout legs about the size of an old-fashioned drey pin, and
about twenty inches long, split the ends carefully, sufficiently to
insert wedges therein, then drive the wedge and ends into the hole
bored for the purpose. When the sticks are driven home the wedge will
hold them in place. You now have a couple of "straddle bugs," that is,
poles, the small ends of which rest upon the ground and the butt ends
supported by two legs. In the top of the poles bore a number of holes
for pins, make your pins a little longer than the diameter of the log
you intend to saw; the pins are used exactly like the old-fashioned
drey pins, that is, you roll the log up the incline to the two straddle
bugs and hold the logs in place by putting pins in the nearest holes.
Of course, the pins should work easily in and out of the holes (Fig.
357).
With such an arrangement one man can unaided easily roll a log two feet
in diameter up upon the buck; the log is then in a position to be cut
up with a cross-cut saw (Fig. 357). Another form of sawbuck may be made
of a puncheon stool (Fig. 358), with holes bored diagonally in the top
for the insertion of pins with which to hold the log in place while it
is being sawed. But with this sawbuck one cannot use as heavy logs as
with the first one because of the difficulty in handling them.
I have just returned from a trip up into the woods where they still use
the primitive pioneer methods of handling and cutting timber, and I
note up there in Pike County, Pennsylvania, they make the sawbuck for
logs by using a log of wood about a foot in diameter and boring holes
diagonally through the log near each end (Fig. 359); through these
holes they drive the legs so that the ends of them protrude at the top
and form a crotch to hold the wood to be sawed. The sawbuck is about
ten or twelve feet long; consequently, in order to provide for shorter
logs there are two sets of pegs driven in holes bored for the purpose
between the ends of the buck.
THE PARBUCKLE
When one person is handling a heavy log it is sometimes difficult, even
with the lumberman's canthook, to roll it, but if a loop is made in a
rope and placed over a stump or a heavy stone (Fig. 360), and the ends
run under the log, even a boy can roll quite a heavy piece of timber by
pulling on the ends of the rope (Fig. 360).
TO SPLIT A LOG
The method used by all woodsmen in splitting a log is the same as
used by quarrymen in splitting bluestone, with this difference: the
quarryman hunts for a natural seam in the stone and drives the wedge in
the seam, while the lumberman makes a seam in the form of a crack in
the log by a blow from his axe. In the crack he drives the wedge (Figs.
352 and 353). But if the log is a long one he must lengthen the crack
or seam by driving other wedges or gluts (Fig. 353), or he may do it by
using two or more axes (Fig. 352).
If he wishes to split the logs up into shakes, clapboards or splits, he
first halves the log, that is, splitting it across from A to B (Fig.
356), and then quarters it by splitting from C to D, and so on until he
has the splits of the required size.
A SAWPIT
In the olden times, the good old times, when people did things with
their own hands, and thus acquired great skill with the use of their
hands, boards were sawed out from the logs by placing the log on a
scaffolding over a sawpit (Fig. 361).
In the good old times, the slow old times, the safe old times, a house
was not built in a week or a month; the timber was well seasoned,
well selected, and in many cases such houses are standing to-day! On
the next block where I live and from where I am writing, and across
the street, there stands a house still occupied which was built in
1661. It is the house that Fox, the Quaker, was quartered in when he
was preaching under the spreading oaks on Long Island. The timbers of
this house are still sound and strong, although the woodwork in nearby
modern houses is decaying.
In the mountains of Kentucky and Tennessee they still use the sawpit,
and the logs are held in place by jacks (Fig. 355), which are branches
of trees hooked over the log and the longest fork of the branch is then
sprung under the supporting cross-piece (Fig. 361).
Of course, the boy readers of this book are not going to be top sawyers
or make use of a sawpit; that is a real man's work, a big HE man's
work, but the boys of to-day should know all these things; it is part
of history and they can better understand the history of our own
country when they know how laboriously, cheerily and cheerfully their
ancestors worked to build their own homesteads, and in the building of
their own homesteads they unconsciously built that character of which
their descendants are so proud; also they built up a physique that was
healthy, and a sturdy body for which their descendants are particularly
thankful, because good health and good physique are hereditary,
that is, boys, if your parents, your grandparents and your great
grandparents were all healthy, wholesome people, you started your life
as a healthy, wholesome child.
In this chapter the writer has emphasized the danger of edged tools
for beginners, but he did that to make them careful in the use of
the axe, not to discourage them in acquiring skill with it. We must
remember that there is nothing in life that is not dangerous, and the
greatest danger of all is not firearms, is not edged tools, is not
wild beasts, is not tornadoes or earthquakes, avalanches or floods, but
it is LUXURY; expressed in boy language, it is ice cream, soda water,
candy, servants and automobiles; it is everything which tends to make a
boy dependent upon others and soft in mind and muscle and to make him
a sissy. But hardship, in the sense of undergoing privation and doing
hard work like chopping trees and sawing logs, makes a rugged body, a
clean, healthy mind, and gives long life. So, boys, don't be afraid to
build your own little shack, shanty or shelter, to chop the kindling
wood for your mother, to split up logs for the fun of doing it, or just
to show that you know how. Don't be afraid to be a real pioneer so that
you may grow up to be a real Abe Lincoln!
If I am talking to men, they need no detailed definition of luxury;
they know all about it, its cause and its effect; they also know that
luxury kills a race and hardship preserves a race. The American boy
should be taught to love hardship for hardship's sake, and then the
Americans as a race will be a success, and a lasting one.