WHAT IS A HUMP-DURGIN?
When the boys returned to Buck Ranlet's shack, which he had insisted
they should share with him until they could build one of their own, the
first question Alaric asked was in regard to his new employment.
"What is a hump-durgin?"
"Ho, ho! With all your learning, don't you know what a hump-durgin is?
Well, I am surprised, for it's one of the commonest things. Still, if
you don't really know, I'll tell you. A genuine hump-durgin is a sort of
a cross betwixt a boat and a mule."
"A boat and a mule?" repeated Alaric, more perplexed than ever.
"That's what I said. You see, it is something like a boat. I might say a
steamboat, or perhaps a canal-boat would be more like it, and it is
always sailing back and forth. It often rolls and pitches like it was in
a heavy sea; but at the same time it lives on dry land and never goes
near the water. It also rears and bucks, and jumps from side to side,
and tries its best to throw its rider, same as a mule does, and it
wouldn't look unlike one if it only had legs, and a tail, and ears, and
hair, and a bray."
"Humph!" interposed Bonny, who had been an interested listener to this
vague description of a hump-durgin. "A log of wood might look like a
mule if it had all those things."
"Right you are, son! A log of wood might look like a mule, and then
again it mightn't. Same time I've often thought that some hump-durgins
wasn't much better than logs of wood, after all. Anyway, now that I've
described the critter so that you know all about him, you can see why
the boss has decided to put our young friend here in charge of one."
"I'm sure I can't," said Alaric, more puzzled than ever.
"Because of your experience with both mules and boats," laughed the big
"faller" teasingly, and that was all the satisfaction the boys could get
from him that night.
The next morning, bright and early, the occupants of the camp scattered
to their respective duties: the loggers trudging up the skid-road and
deep into the forest, there to resume their work of converting trees
into logs; the loading-gang going in the opposite direction, to the
distant railway landing, where they would spend the day loading logs on
to flat cars; the engineers with their firemen to their respective
engines; the road-gang up to the head of a side gulch where they were
constructing a branch skid-road; the blacksmiths to their ringing
anvils; Bonny to the store, where he was to take an account of stock;
and Alaric, in company with the man whose place he was to fill, after
receiving from him half a day's instruction in his new duties, to make
the acquaintance of his hump-durgin. They went a short distance down the
skid-road to where one of the relay engines was winding in a half-mile
length of wire cable over a big steel drum. This cable stretched its
shining length up the gulch and out of sight around a bend. Near the
engine-house, and at one edge of the skid-road, was a little siding, or
dock, protected by a heavy sheer-skid. In it lay what looked like a log
canoe, sharp pointed at both ends, and having a flat bottom.
"There," said Alaric's guide, "is your hump-durgin."
"That thing!" exclaimed the lad, gazing at the canoe-like object
curiously. "But I thought a hump-durgin went by steam?"
"So it does," laughed the man, "when it goes at all. Just wait a minute,
and you'll see."
Almost as he spoke there came a sound of bumping and sliding from up the
skid-road, and directly afterwards the end of an enormous log came into
sight around the bend, drawn by the cable the engine was winding in. As
this log rounded the bend and came directly towards them, another was
seen to be chained to it, then another, and another, until the "turn"
was seen to contain five of the woody monsters. Attached to the rear end
of the last log came another hump-durgin, in which a man was seated, and
to the after end of which was fastened a second wire cable that
stretched away for half a mile to the next engine above.
Every log was made fast to the one ahead of it by two short chains, each
of which was armed at either end with a heavy steel spur having a sharp
point and a flat head. These are called "dogs," and, driven deep into
the logs, bind them together. The hump-durgin was also attached to the
rear log by a chain and "dog," and one of the principal duties of a
hump-durgin man is to see that none of these dogs pulls out.
As the "turn" of logs stopped just above the station, the man who had
come with them knocked out his hump-durgin dog, while the man with
Alaric disconnected the cable that had drawn the logs down to that
point, and hooked on the upper end of another that stretched away out
of sight down the road. Then he waved to the engineer, who telephoned to
the next station down the line, and at the same time to the one above.
In another minute the hump-durgin that had just arrived was being pulled
back by its cable over the way it had come, and the "turn" of logs was
drawn forward by the new cable just attached to them. When the rear end
of the last log was passing Alaric's hump-durgin, the man with him
hammered its "dog" into the wood, the chain straightened with a jerk,
and the novel craft was under way. As it started, both the man and
Alaric jumped in, and away they went, bumping and sliding down the
skid-road, slewing around corners that were protected by sheer-skids,
and dragging behind them a half-mile length of cable attached to the
after end of their craft.
In this way they were dragged half a mile down the gulch to a second
engine station, where a new relay of cable with a third hump-durgin
awaited the logs, and from which their own craft, laden with the chains
and dogs just brought up from below, was dragged back uphill to the
station from which they had started.
Every now and then on their downward trip the man jumped from the
hump-durgin, and, maul in hand, ran along the whole length of the
"turn," giving a tap here and there to the "dogs" to make sure that none
of them was working loose. As the cables were only speeded to about four
miles an hour, he could readily do this; but after he had thus examined
one side he had to wait until the whole turn passed him, and then run
ahead to examine the other. Alaric asked why he did not run on the logs
themselves, and, by thus examining both sides at the same time, save
half his work.
"Because I ain't that kind of a fool," replied the man. "There is them
as does it; but a chap has to be surer-footed and spryer than I be to
ride the logs, 'specially when they're slewing round corners. I reckon,
though, from all I hear of you, that you'll be jest one of the kind to
try it on; and all I can say is, I hope you'll be let off light when it
comes your time to be flung. Some gets killed, and others only comes
nigh it."
The hump-durgin man at the lower relay station followed the first "turn"
of logs to the railway landing, and then went back to the extreme upper
end of the skid-road. With the second "turn" Alaric and his instructor
did the same thing. The next man above him followed the third "turn" to
its destination, while the man farthest up of all travelled the whole
length of the road with the fourth "turn," covering its two miles in
four different hump-durgins; and at length Alaric had a chance to do the
same thing. Thus each hump-durgin driver became familiar with every
section of the road, and made six round trips a day.
At noon of that first day Alaric's instructor in the art of navigating a
hump-durgin bade him "so long," and left him in sole command of the
clumsy craft. The man had no sooner gone than his pupil began practising
the science of log-riding, and before night he had triumphantly ridden
the whole length of the road mounted on the backs of his unwieldy
charges. To be sure, he sat down most of the way, and was thrown twice
when attempting to walk the length of the "turn" while it was slewing
around corners. Fortunately he escaped each time with nothing more
serious than a few bruises, and that night he drove a number of hobnails
into the soles of his boots. These afforded him so good a hold on the
rough bark that he was never again flung, and within a week had become
so expert a log-rider that he could keep his feet over the worst "slews"
on the road.
The hump-durgins brought up many things from the railway landing besides
chains and "dogs," for they were the sole conveyances by which supplies
of any kind could reach the camp. It often happened that they carried
passengers as well, and in this respect running a hump-durgin was, as
Alaric said, very much like driving a stage-coach--a thing that he had
always longed to do.
Bonny was so envious of his comrade's job that on that very first day he
made application for the next hump-durgin vacancy, and two weeks later
was filled with delight at receiving the coveted appointment.
By the time that both our lads became hump-durgin boys they were living
in their own shack, which stood just beyond Buck Ranlet's, and which
nearly every man in camp had helped them to build. So proud were they of
this tiny dwelling that they nearly doubled their bill at the store in
procuring bedding and other furnishings for it.
Although thus amply provided with rude comforts, or, as Bonny expressed
it, "surrounded with all the luxuries of life," Alaric fully realized
that it would soon be time to exchange this mode of living for another.
He knew that he owed a duty to his father, as well as to the station of
life into which he had been born; and, having proved to his own
satisfaction that he was equally strong with other boys, and as well
able to fight his way through the world, he was more than willing to
return to his own home. Now that he felt competent to hold his own,
physically as well as mentally, with others of his age, he was filled
with a desire to go to college. On talking the matter over with Bonny he
found that the latter cherished similar aspirations, the only difference
being that the young sailor's longing was for a mechanical rather than
a classical education. "Though, of course," said Bonny, with a sigh, "I
shall always have to take it out in wishing, for I shall never have
money enough to carry me through a school of any kind, or at least not
until I am too old to go."
At this Alaric only smiled, and bade his comrade keep on hoping, for
there was no telling when something might turn up. As he said this he
made up his mind that if ever he went to college Bonny should at the
same time go to one of the best scientific schools of the country.