Rivermen, with the touch of
superstition inseparably connected with such affairs, believe
implicitly that "logs run free at night." Certainly, though it
might be expected that each morning would reveal a big jam to break,
such was rarely the case. The logs had usually stopped, to be sure,
but generally in so peaceful a situation as easily to be started on
by a few minutes' work. Probably this was because they tended to
come to rest in the slow, still reaches of the river, through which,
in daytime, they would be urged by the rivermen.
Jams on the river, contrary to general belief, are of very common
occurrence. Throughout the length of the drive there were probably
three or four hang-ups a day. Each of these had to be broken, and
in the breaking was danger. The smallest misstep, the least
slowness in reading the signs of the break, the slightest lack of
promptness in acting on the hint or of agility in leaping from one
to the other of the plunging timbers, the faintest flicker from
rigid attention to the antagonist crouching on the spring, would
mean instant death to the delinquent. Thus it was literally true
that each one of these men was called upon almost daily to wager his
personal skill against his destruction.
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