VI
The full situation, as far as the wires could tell it, was laid before
Jack Orde in Washington. A detailed letter followed. Toward evening of
that day the mill crews began to come in with the four and six-horse
teams provided for their transportation. They were a dusty but hilarious
lot. The teams drew up underneath the solitary sycamore tree that gave
the place its name, and at once went into camp. Bob strolled down to
look them over.
They proved to be fresh-faced, strong farm boys, for the most part, with
a fair sprinkling of older mountaineers, and quite a contingent of half
and quarter-bred Indians. All these people worked on ranches or in the
towns during the off season when the Sierras were buried under winter
snows. Their skill at woodsmanship might be undoubted, but the
intermittent character of their work precluded any development of
individual type, like the rivermen and shanty boys of the vanished
North. For a moment Bob experienced a twinge of regret that the old,
hard, picturesque days of his Northern logging were indeed gone. Then
the interest of this great new country with its surging life and its new
problems gripped him hard.
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