Below the dam the jam crew was finding plenty to do in
keeping them moving in the white-water and the shallows. A fine
sun, tempered with a prophetic warmth of later spring, animated the
scene. Reed had withdrawn to the interior of his mill, and appeared
to have given up the contest.
Some of the logs shot away down the current, running freely. To
these the crews were not required to pay any attention. With luck,
a few of the individual timbers would float ten, even twenty, miles
before some chance eddy or fortuitous obstruction would bring them
to rest. Such eddies and obstructions, however, drew a constant
toll from the ranks of the free-moving logs, so that always the
volume of timbers floating with the current diminished, and always
the number of logs caught and stranded along the sides of the river
increased. To restore these to the faster water was the especial
province of the last and most expert crew--the rear.
Orde discovered about noon that the jam crew was having its
troubles. Immediately below Reed's dam ran a long chute strewn with
boulders, which was alternately a shallow or a stretch of white-
water according as the stream rose or fell. Ordinarily the logs
were flushed over this declivity by opening the gate, behind which a
head of water had been accumulated.
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