Chapter II: Part 2

The plans here drawn will answer for the rough or fine material, but we suppose that medium material is to be used. It will be taken for granted that the reader is able to procure enough two-by-four-inch timber to supply studs, ribs, purlins, rafters, beams, and posts for the frame shown in Fig. 49. Two pieces of four-by-four-inch timber each fifteen feet long should be made for sills by nailing two-by-fours together. Add to this some tongue-and-grooved boarding or even rough boards for sides and roof, some enthusiasm, and good American pluck and the shop is almost as good as built.

First lay the foundation, eight by fifteen feet, and then you may proceed to dig your post-holes. The outside of the posts should be flush or even with the outside edges of the sills and end beams of the house as shown in the diagram. If there are four posts on each of the long sides they should be equal distances apart.

Dig the holes three feet deep, allowing six inches of the posts to protrude above ground. If you drive two stakes a short distance beyond the foundation in line with your foundation lines and run a string from the top of one stake to the top of the other you can, without much trouble, get it upon a perfect level by testing it and adjusting until the string represents the level for your sill. When this is done, set your posts to correspond to the level of the string, then place your sill on top of the posts and test that with your level. If found to be correct, fill in the dirt around the posts and pack it firmly, then spike your sill to the posts and go through the same operation with opposite sets of posts and sill.

Fig. 49.

The first difficult work is now done and, with the exception of the roof, the rest only needs ordinary care.

It is supposed that you have already sawed off and prepared about nine two-by-four-inch beams each of which is exactly eight feet long. Set these on edge from sill to sill, equal distances apart, the edges of the end beams being exactly even with the ends of the sills as in Fig. 49. See that the beams all cross the sills at right angles and toe-nail them in place. You may now neatly floor the foundation with one-inch boards; these boards must be laid lengthwise with the building and crosswise with the beams. When this is finished you will have a beautiful platform on which to work, where you will be in no danger of losing your tools, and you may use the floor as a table on which to measure and plan the sides and roof.

Ridge Plank and Rafters

It is a good idea to make your ridge plank and rafters while the floor is clear of rubbish. Lay out and mark on the floor, with a carpenter's soft pencil, a straight line four feet long (_A_, _B_, Fig. 49). At right angles to this draw another line three feet six inches long (_A_, _D_, Fig. 49). Connect these points (_B_, _D_, Fig. 49) with a straight line, then complete the figure _A_, _B_, _C_, _D_ (Fig. 49). Allow two inches at the top for the ridge plank at _B_ and two by four for the end of the side-plate at _D_. You then have a pattern for each rafter with a "plumb edge" at _B_ and a "bird's mouth" at _D_. The plumb edge must be parallel with _B_, _C_ and the two jaws of the "bird's mouth" parallel with _D_, _C_ and _A_, _D_, respectively. Make six rafters of two-by-fours and one ridge plank.

The purlins and collar can be made and fitted after the roof is raised. Set your roof timber carefully to one side and clear the floor for the studs, ribs, and plates. First prepare the end posts and make them of two-by-fours. Each post is of two pieces. There will be four outside pieces each five feet eight inches in length, which rest on the end beams, and four inside pieces each six feet in length; this allows two inches at the top for the ends of the end plates to rest upon.

Examine the corner posts and you will see that the outside two-by-four rests upon the top side of the end beam and the side-plate rests directly upon said two-by-four. You will also observe that the inside two-by-four rests directly upon the sill, which would make the former four inches longer than the outside piece if it is extended to the side-plate; but you will also notice that there is a notch in the end plate for the outside corner piece to fit in and that the end of the end plate fits on top the inside piece of the corner posts, taking off two inches, which makes the inside piece just six feet long. This is a very simple arrangement, as may be seen by examining the diagram. Besides the corner posts, each of which we have seen is made of two pieces of two-by-fours, there are four studs for the front side, each six feet two inches long. The short studs shown in the diagram on the rear side are unnecessary and are only shown so that they may be put in as convenient attachments for shelves and tool racks.

The first stud on the front is placed two feet from the corner post and the second one about six feet six inches from the first, to allow a space for a six-foot window; the next two studs form the door-jambs and must be far enough from the corner to allow the door to open and swing out of the way. If you make your door two and one half feet wide--a good size--you may set your last stud two feet from the corner post and leave a space of two feet six inches for the doorway. Now mark off on the floor the places where the studs will come, and cut out the flooring at these points to allow the ends of the studs to enter and rest on the sill. Next make four ribs--one long one to go beneath the window, one short one to fit between the corner post and the door stud not shown in diagram, another to fit between the door stud and window stud, and another to fit between the window stud and the first corner post (the nearest corner in the diagram). Next make your side-plate exactly fifteen feet long. Fit the frame together on the floor and nail the pieces together, toe-nailing the ribs in place. Get some help and raise the whole side frame and slip the ends of the studs into their respective slots. Make the end posts plumb and hold them in place temporarily by a board, one end of which is nailed to the top end of the post and the other to the end beam. Such a diagonal board at each end will hold the side in place until the opposite side is raised and similarly supported.

It is now a simple thing to slip the end plates in place under the side-plates until their outside edges are even with the outside of the corner posts. A long wire nail driven through the top-plates and end plates down into the posts at each corner will hold them securely. Toe-nail a rib between the two nearest end posts and make two window studs and three ribs for the opposite end. The framing now only needs the roof timbers to complete the skeleton of your shop. Across from side-plate to side-plate lay some loose boards for a platform, and standing on these boards let your assistant lift one end of the ridge plank while with one nail to each rafter you fasten the two end rafters onto the ridge plank, fit the jaws of the "bird's mouth" over the ends of the side-plates, and hold them temporarily in place with a "stay lath"--that is, a piece of board temporarily nailed to rafter and end plate. The other end of the ridge is now resting on the platform at the other end of the house and this may be lifted up, for the single nails will allow movement.

The rafters are nailed in place with one nail each and a stay lath fastened on to hold them in place. Test the ends with your plumb-level and when they are found to be correct nail all the rafters securely in place and stiffen the centre pair with a piece called a "collar." Add four purlins set at right angles to the rafters and take off your hat and give three cheers and do not forget to nail a green bough to your roof tree in accordance with the ancient and time-honored custom.

The sides of the house may be covered with tent-cloth, oilcloth, tin, tar paper, or the cheapest sort of lumber, and the house may be roofed with the same material; but if you can secure good lumber, use thirteen by seven eighths by nine and one quarter inch, tongue-and-grooved, one side planed so that it may be painted; you can make two sideboards out of each piece six feet six inches in length. Nail the sides on, running the boards vertically, leaving openings for windows and doors at the proper places.

If you have made a triangular edge to your ridge board, it will add to the finish and the roof may be neatly and tightly laid with the upper edge of one side protruding a couple of inches over the opposite side and thus protecting the joint from rain. Additional security is gained by nailing what are called picket strips (seven eighths by one and three quarter inches) over each place where the planks join, or the roof may be covered with sheathing boards and shingles. It is not necessary here to give the many details such as the manufacture of the door and the arrangements of the windows, as these small problems can be easily solved by examining doors and windows of similar structures.

XI

A SOD HOUSE FOR THE LAWN

THE difference between this sod house and the ones used in the arid regions consists in the fact that the sod will be growing on the sod house, which is intended for and is an ornamental building for the lawn. Possibly one might say that the sod house is an effete product of civilization where utility is sacrificed to display; but it is pretty, and beauty is always worth while; besides which the same plans may be used in building

A Real Adobe

and practically are used in some of the desert ranches along the Colorado River. The principal difference in construction between the one shown in Figs. 50, 53, and 57 and the one in Fig. 55 is that in the sod house the sod is held in place by chicken-coop wire, while in the ranch-house (Fig. 55) the dirt or adobe is held in place by a number of sticks.

Fig. 50. Fig. 51. Fig. 52. Fig. 53. Fig. 54. Fig. 55. Fig. 56.

Fig. 50 shows how the double walls are made with a space of at least a foot between them; these walls are covered with wire netting or chicken-coop wire, as shown in Fig. 53, and the space between the walls filled in with mud or dirt of any kind. The framework may be made of milled lumber, as in Fig. 50, or it may be made of saplings cut on the river bank and squared at their ends, as shown by detailed drawings between Figs. 50 and 52. The roof may be made flat, like Figs. 54 and 56, and covered with poles, as in Fig. 54, in which case the sod will have to be held in place by pegging other poles along the eaves as shown in the left-hand corner of Fig. 54. This will keep the sod from sliding off the roof. Or you may build a roof after the manner illustrated by Fig. 49 and Fig. 51, that is, if you want to make a neat, workmanlike house; but any of the ways shown by Fig. 52 will answer for the framework of the roof. The steep roof, however, must necessarily be either shingled or thatched or the sod held in place by a covering of wire netting. If you are building this for your lawn, set green, growing sod up edgewise against the wire netting, after the latter has been tacked to your frame, so arranging the sod that the green grass will face the outside. If you wish to plaster the inside of your house with cement or concrete, fill in behind with mud, plaster the mud against the sod and put gravel and stones against the mud so that it will be next to the wire netting on the inside of the house over which you plaster the concrete. If you make the roof shown in Fig. 54, cover it first with hay and then dirt and sod and hold the sod down with wire netting neatly tacked over it, or cover it with gravel held in place by wire netting and spread concrete over the top as one does on a cellar floor. If the walls are kept sprinkled by the help of the garden hose, the grass will keep as green as that on your lawn, and if you have a dirt roof you may allow purple asters and goldenrod to grow upon it (Fig. 62) or plant it with garden flowers.

Thatch

If you are going to make a thatched roof, soak your thatch in water and straighten the bent straws; build the roof steep like the one shown in Fig. 57 and make a wooden needle a foot long and pointed at both ends as shown in Fig. 59; tie your thatching twine to the middle of the needle, then take your rye or wheat straw, hay, or bulrushes, gather it into bundles four inches thick and one foot wide, like those shown in Fig. 60, and lay them along next to the eaves of your house as in Fig. 58. Sew them in place by running the needle up through the wire netting to the man on the outside who in turn pushes it back to the man on the inside. Make a knot at each wisp of the thatch until one layer is finished, let the lower ends overhang the eaves, then proceed as illustrated by Fig. 66 and described under the heading of the bog ken.

If in place of a simple ornament you want to make a real house of it and a pretty one at that, fill up the space between the walls with mud and plaster it on the outside with cement or concrete and you will have a cheap concrete house. The wire netting will hold the plaster or the concrete and consequently it is not necessary to make the covering of cement as thick as in ordinary buildings, for after the mud is dried upon the inside it will, with its crust of cement or plaster, be practically as good as a solid concrete wall.

Fig. 57. Fig. 58. Fig. 59. Fig. 60. Fig. 61. Fig. 62.

XII

HOW TO BUILD ELEVATED SHACKS, SHANTIES, AND SHELTERS

FOR many reasons it is sometimes necessary or advisable to have one's camp on stilts, so to speak. Especially is this true in the more tropical countries where noxious serpents and insects abound. A simple form of stilted shack is shown by Fig. 63. To build this shack we must first erect an elevated platform (Fig. 64). This is made by setting four forked sticks of equal height in the ground and any height from the ground to suit the ideas of the camp builder. If, for some reason, the uprights are "wabbly" the frame may be stiffened by lashing diagonal cross sticks to the frame. After you have erected the four uprights, lay two poles through the crotches, as in Fig. 64, and make a platform by placing other poles across these, after which a shelter may be made in the form of an open Adirondack camp or any of the forms previously described. Fig. 65 shows the framework for the open camp of Adirondack style with the uprights lashed to the side bars; if you have nails, of course, you can nail these together, but these plans are made on the assumption that you have no nails for that purpose, which will probably be true if you have been long in the woods.

Fig. 63. Fig. 64. Fig. 65.

XIII

THE BOG KEN

KEN is a name now almost obsolete but the bog ken is a house built on stilts where the ground is marshy, damp, and unfit to sleep upon. As you will see by the diagram (Fig. 66), the house is built upon a platform similar to the one last described; in this instance, however, the shelter itself is formed by a series of arches similar to the Iroquois (Fig. 41). The uprights on the two sides have their ends bent over and lashed together, forming arches for the roof. Over the arches are lashed horizontal poles the same as those described in the construction of the Iroquois lodge. Fig. 67 shows one way to prevent "varmints" of any kind from scaling the supporting poles and creeping into your camp.

The protection consists of a tin pan with a hole in the bottom slid over the supporting poles. Fig. 66 shows how to lash the thatching on to the poles and Fig. 68 shows how to spring the sticks in place for a railing around your front porch or balcony.

The floor to this bog ken is a little more elaborate than that of the last described camp because the poles have all been halved before laying them for the floor. These are supposed to be afterwards covered with browse, hay, or rushes and the roof shingled with bark or thatched.

Thatching

Soak your straw or hay well in water and smooth it out flat and regular. The steeper the roofs the longer the thatch will last. In this bog ken our roof happens to be a rounded one, an arched roof; but it is sheltering a temporary house and the thatch will last as long as the shack. While the real pioneer uses whatever material he finds at hand, it does no harm for him to know that to make a really good thatch one should use only straw which is fully ripe and has been thrashed clean with an old-fashioned flail. The straw must be clear of all seed or grain and kept straight, not mussed up, crumpled, and broken. If any grain is left in the straw it will attract field-mice, birds, domestic mice and rats, domestic turkeys and chickens, and these creatures in burrowing and scratching for food will play havoc with the roof.

Fig. 66. Fig. 67. Fig. 68. Fig. 69.

It is not necessary to have straight and even rafters, because the humps, bumps, and hollows caused by crooked sticks are concealed by the mattress of straw. Take a bundle of thatch in your hands, squeeze it together, and place it so that the butt ends project about three inches beyond the floor (_A_, Fig. 66); tie the thatch closely to the lower rafter and the one next above it, using for the purpose twine, marlin, raffia, or well-twisted white hickory bark. This first row should be thus tied near both ends to prevent the wind from getting under it and lifting it up. Next put on another row of wisps of thatch over the first and the butt ends come even with the first, but tie this one to the third row of rafters not shown in diagram. The butts of the third row of thatch (_B_, Fig. 66) should be about nine inches up on the front rows; put this on as before and proceed the same way with _C_, _D_, _E_, and _F_, Fig. 66, until the roof is completed. The thatch should be ten or twelve inches thick for a permanent hut but need not be so for a temporary shed.

As there is no comb to this roof the top must be protected where the thatches from each side join, and to do this fasten a thatch over the top and bind it on both sides but not in the middle, so that it covers the meeting of the thatches on both sides of the shack; this top piece should be stitched or bound on with wire if you have it, or fastened with willow withe or even wisps of straw if you are an expert. A house, twenty by thirty feet, made of material found on the place and thatched with straw costs the builder only fifty cents for nails and four days' work for two persons. A good thatched roof will last as long as a modern shingle roof, for in olden days when shingles were good and split out of blocks, not sawed, and were well seasoned before using, they were not expected to last much over fifteen years; a well-made thatched roof will last fifteen or twenty years.

Fig. 70.

But a real bog ken is one that is built over boggy or marshy places too soft to support an ordinary structure. To overcome this difficulty required considerable study and experiment, but at length the author hit upon a simple plan which has proved effective. If you wish to build a duck hunter's camp on the soft meadows, or for any other reason you desire a camp on treacherous, boggy ground, you may build one by first making a thick mattress of twigs and sticks as shown by Fig. 70. This mattress acts on the principle of a snow-shoe and prevents your house from sinking by distributing the weight equally over a wide surface. The mattress should be carefully made of sticks having their branches trimmed off sufficiently to allow them to lie in regular courses as in the diagram. The first course should be laid one way and the next course at right angles to the first, and so on, until the mattress is sufficiently thick for the purpose.

Standing on the mattress, it will be an easy matter with your hands to force the sharpened ends of your upright posts _A_, _B_, _C_, and _D_ down into the yielding mud, but be careful not to push them too far because in some of these marshes the mud is practically bottomless. It is only necessary for the supports to sink in the mud far enough to make them stand upright.

Fig. 71.

The next step is to lay, at right angles to the top layer of brush, a series of rods or poles between your uprights as shown in Fig. 70; then take two more poles, place them at right angles to the last ones, and press them down until they fit snugly on top of the other poles, and there nail them fast to the uprights as shown in Fig. 70, after which to further bind them you may nail a diagonal from _A_ to _D_ and _B_ to _C_, but this may not be necessary.

When you have proceeded thus far you may erect a framework like that shown in Fig. 71, and build a platform by flooring the crosspieces or horizontal bars with halves of small logs, Fig. 71.

It is now a simple matter to erect a shack which may be roofed with bark as in Fig. 72 or thatched as in Fig. 74. Fig. 72 shows the unfinished shack in order that its construction may be easily seen; this one is being roofed with birch bark. A fireplace may be made by enclosing a bed of mud (Fig. 73) between or inside of the square formed by four logs. On this clay or mud you can build your camp-fire or cooking fire or mosquito smudge with little or no danger of setting fire to your house.

The mosquito smudge will not be found necessary if there is any breeze blowing at all, because these insects cling to the salt hay or bog-grass and do not rise above it except in close, muggy weather where no breeze disturbs them. I have slept a few feet over bog meadows without being disturbed by mosquitoes when every blade of grass on the meadows was black with these insects, but there was a breeze blowing which kept the mosquitoes at home.

Fig. 72. Fig. 73. Fig. 74.

XIV

OVER-WATER CAMPS

NOW that we know how to camp on solid ground and on the quaking bog we cannot finish up the subject of stilt camps without including one over-water camp. If the water has a muddy bottom it is a simple matter to force your supporting posts into the mud; this may be done by driving them in with a wooden mallet made of a section of log or it may be done by fastening poles on each side of the post and having a crowd of men jump up and down on the poles until the posts are forced into the bottom.

If you are building a pretentious structure the piles may be driven with the ordinary pile-driver. But if your camp on the water is over a hard bottom of rock or sand through which you cannot force your supports you may take a lot of old barrels (Fig. 75), knock the tops and bottoms out of them, nail some cross planks on the ends of your spiles, slide the barrels over the spiles, then set them in place in the water and hold them there by filling the barrels with rocks, stones, or coarse gravel. Fig. 77 shows a foundation made in this manner; this method is also useful in building piers (Fig. 78). But if you are in the woods, out of reach of barrels or other civilized lumber, you can make yourself cribs by driving a square or a circle of sticks in the ground a short distance and then twining roots or pliable branches inside and outside the stakes, basket fashion, as shown in Fig. 76. When the crib is complete it may be carefully removed from the ground and used as the barrels were used by filling them with stones to support the uprights. Fig. 79 shows an ordinary portable house such as are advertised in all the sportsmen's papers, which has been erected upon a platform over the water.

Fig. 75. Fig. 76. Fig. 77. Fig. 78. Fig. 79.

My experience with this sort of work leads me to advise the use of piles upon which to build in place of piers of stones. Where I have used such piers upon small inland lakes the tremendous push of the freezing ice has upset them, whereas the ice seems to slide around the piles without pushing them over. The real danger with piles lies in the fact that if the water rises after the ice has frozen around the uprights the water will lift the ice up and the ice will sometimes pull the piles out of the bottom like a dentist pulls teeth. Nevertheless, piles are much better for a foundation for a camp or pier than any crib of rocks, and that is the reason I have shown the cribs in Figs. 75 and 77, made so as to rest upon the bottom supposedly below the level of the winter ice.

XV

SIGNAL-TOWER, GAME LOOKOUT, AND RUSTIC OBSERVATORY

IF my present reader happens to be a Boy Scout or a scout-master who wants the scouts to build a tower for exhibition purposes, he can do so by following the directions here given, but if there is real necessity for haste in the erection of this tower, of course we cannot build one as tall as we might where we have more time. With a small tower all the joints may be quickly lashed together with strong, heavy twine, rope, or even wire; and in the wilderness it will probably be necessary to bind the joints with pliable roots, or cordage made of bark or withes; but as this is not a book on woodcraft we will suppose that the reader has secured the proper material for fastening the joints of the frame of this signal-tower and he must now shoulder his axe and go to the woods in order to secure the necessary timber. First let him cut eight straight poles--that is, as straight as he can find them. These poles should be about four and one half inches in diameter at their base and sixteen and one half feet long. After all the branches are trimmed off the poles, cut four more sticks each nine feet long and two and a half or three inches in diameter at the base; when these are trimmed into shape one will need twenty six or seven more stout sticks each four and one half feet long for braces and for flooring for the platform.

Kite Frame

It being supposed that your timber is now all in readiness at the spot where you are to erect the tower, begin by laying out on the ground what we call the "kite frame." First take three of the four-and-one-half-foot sticks, _A_, _B_, _C_ (Fig. 82), and two of the nine-foot sticks _D_ and _E_ (Fig. 82), and, placing them on a level stretch of ground, arrange them in the form of a parallelogram. Put _A_ for the top rail at the top of the parallelogram and _C_ for the bottom of the parallelogram and let them rest upon the sides _D_ and _E_, but put _B_ under the sides _D_ and _E_. In order to bind these together securely, the ends of all the sticks must be allowed to project a few inches. _B_ should be far enough below _A_ to give the proper height for a railing around the platform. The platform itself rests upon _B_. _A_ forms the top railing to the fence around it.

Now take two of your sixteen-and-one-half-foot poles and place them diagonally from corner to corner of the parallelogram with the small ends of the poles lying over the ends of _A_ and the butt ends of the poles extending beyond _C_, as in Fig. 82. Lash these poles securely in place.

Where the poles cross each other in the _X_, or centre, it is best to flatten them some by scoring and hewing with a hatchet, but care must be taken not to weaken them by scoring too deep. Next take your lash rope, double it, run the loop down under the cross sticks, bring it up on the other side, as in Fig. 83, then pull the two loose ends through the loop. When they are drawn taut (Fig. 84), bend them round in opposite directions--that is, bend the right-hand end of the rope to the right, down and under the cross sticks, pull it out to the left, as in Fig. 84, then bend the left-hand piece of rope to the left, down and under, pulling it out to the right, as in Fig. 84. Next bring those two pieces up over and tie them together in a square knot, as shown in Figs. 85 and 86.

Fig. 80. Fig. 81. Fig. 82. Fig. 83. Fig. 84. Fig. 85. Fig. 86. Fig. 87.

Make a duplicate "kite" frame for the other side exactly as you made the first one, and then arrange these two pieces on the ground with the cross sticks _F_ and _F_ on the under-side and with their butt ends opposite the butts of the similar poles on the other frame and about five feet apart. Fasten a long line to the point where the two _F_ pieces cross each other and detail a couple of scouts to hold each of the butt ends from slipping by placing one of their feet against the butt, as in Fig. 82, while two gangs of men or boys pull on the ropes and raise the kite frames to the positions shown in Figs. 81 and 88.

Be careful, when raising the frames, not to pull them too far so that they may fall on some unwary workman. When the frames are once erected it is an easy matter to hold them in place by guy-ropes fastened to stones, stakes, or trees or held by men or boys, while some of the shorter braces are fastened to hold the two kite frames together, as in Fig. 90, wherein you may see these short braces at the top and bottom. Next, the two other long sticks, legs, or braces (_G_, _G_, Figs. 89 and 90) should be held temporarily in position and the place marked where they cross each other in the centre of the parallelogram which should be the same as it is on the legs of the two kite frames. The _G_ sticks should now be lashed together at the crossing point, as already described and shown by Figs. 83, 84, 85, and 86, when they may be put up against the sides, as in Fig. 89, in which diagram the _G_ poles are made very dark and the kite frames indicated very lightly so as to better show their relative positions. Lash the _G_ poles at the top and at the other points where they cross the other braces and secure the framework by adding short braces, as indicated in Fig. 90.

Fig. 88. Fig. 89. Fig. 90. Fig. 90A.

If all the parts are bound together with wire it will hold them more securely than nails, with no danger of the poles splitting. A permanent tower of this kind may be erected on which a camp may be built, as shown in Fig. 87. It may be well to note that in the last diagram the tower is only indicated by a few lines of the frame in order to simplify it and prevent confusion caused by the multiplicity of poles.

Boy-Scout Tower

If you desire to make a tower taller than the one described it would be best, perhaps, to take the regular Boy-Scout dimensions as given by Scout-master A. G. Clarke:

"Eight pieces 22 feet long, about 5 or 6 inches thick at the base; 4 pieces 6 feet long, about 3 or 4 inches thick at the base; 12 pieces 6 feet long, about 2½ or 3 inches thick at base; 12 or 15 pieces for braces and platform about 6 feet long."

When putting together this frame it may be nailed or spiked, but care must be used not to split the timber where it is nailed. With most wood this may be avoided by driving the spikes or nails several inches back of the ends of the sticks. To erect a flagpole or a wireless pole, cut the bottom of the pole wedge-shaped, fit in the space between the cross poles, as in Fig. 90 _A_, then lash it fast to the _B_ and _A_ pole, and, to further secure it, two other sticks may be nailed to the _F_ poles, one on each side, between which the bottom of the flagpole is thrust, as shown by Fig. 90 _A_.

The flooring of the platform must be securely nailed or lashed in place, otherwise there may be some serious accident caused by the boys or men falling through, a fall of about twenty and one half feet according to the last measurements given for the frame.

An observatory of this kind will add greatly to the interest of a mountain home or seaside home; it is a practical tower for military men to be used in flag signalling and for improvised wireless; it is also a practical tower for a lookout in the game fields and a delight to the Boy Scouts.

XVI

TREE-TOP HOUSES

BY the natural process of evolution we have now arrived at the tree-top house. It is interesting to the writer to see the popularity of this style of an outdoor building, for, while he cannot lay claim to originating it, he was the first to publish the working drawings of a tree-house. These plans first appeared in _Harper's Round Table_; afterward he made others for the _Ladies' Home Journal_ and later published them in "The Jack of All Trades."

Having occasion to travel across the continent shortly after the first plans were published, he was amused to see all along the route, here and there in back-yard fruit-trees, shade-trees, and in forest-trees, queer little shanties built by the boys, high up among the boughs.

In order to build a house one must make one's plans _to fit the tree_. If it is to be a one-tree house, spike on the trunk two quartered pieces of small log one on each side of the trunk (Figs. 91 and 92). Across these lay a couple of poles and nail them to the trunk of the tree (Fig. 91); then at right angles to these lay another pair of poles, as shown in the right-hand diagram (Fig. 91). Nail these securely in place and support the ends of the four poles by braces nailed to the trunk of the tree below. The four cross-sills will then (Fig. 95) serve as a foundation upon which to begin your work. Other joists can now be laid across these first and supported by braces running diagonally down to the trunk of the tree, as shown in Fig. 95. After the floor is laid over the joist any form of shack, from a rude, open shed to a picturesque thatch-roofed cottage, may be erected upon it. It is well to support the two middle rafters of your roof by quartered pieces of logs, as the middle rafters are supported in Fig. 95; by quartered logs shown in Fig. 92.

Fig. 91. Fig. 92. Fig. 93. Fig. 94. Fig. 95. Fig. 96. Fig. 97.

If the house is a two-tree house, run your cross-sill sticks from trunk to trunk, as in Fig. 94; then make two T-braces, like the one in Fig. 94 _A_, of two-inch planks with braces secured by iron straps, or use heavier timber, and bolt the parts together securely (Fig. 93), or use logs and poles (Fig. 94), after which hang these T's over the ends of your two cross sticks, as in Fig. 94, and spike the uprights of the T's securely to the tree trunks. On top of the T you can rest a two-by-four and support the end by diagonals nailed to the tree trunk (Fig. 94) after the manner of the diagonals in Fig. 95. You will note in Fig. 95 that cleats or blocks are spiked to the tree below the end of the diagonals in order to further secure them. It is sometimes necessary in a two-tree house to allow for the movement of the tree trunks. In Florida a gentleman did this by building his tree-house on the _B_ sills (Fig. 94) and making them movable to allow for the play of the tree trunks. Fig. 96 shows a two-tree house and Fig. 97 shows a thatch-roofed cottage built among the top branches of a single tree.

It goes without saying that in a high wind one does not want to stay long in a tree-top house; in fact, during some winds that I have experienced I would have felt much safer had I been in a cyclone cellar; but if the braces of a tree-house are securely made and the trees selected have good, heavy trunks, your tree-top house will stand all the ordinary summer blows and winter storms. One must remember that even one's own home is not secure enough to stand some of those extraordinary gales, tornadoes, and hurricanes which occasionally visit parts of our country.

Since I published the first plans of a tree-top house many people have adopted the idea and built quite expensive structures in the boughs of the trees. Probably all these buildings are intact at the present writing.

The boys at Lynn, Mass., built a very substantial house in the trees, and the truant officer claimed that the lads hid away there so that they could play "hookey" from school; but if this is true, and there seems to be some doubt about it, it must be remembered that the fault was probably with _the schools_ and not the boys, for boys who have ingenuity and grit enough to build a substantial house in a tree cannot be bad boys; industry, skill, and laborious work are not the attributes of the bad boy.

Some New York City boys built a house in the trees at One Hundred and Sixty-ninth Street, but here the police interfered, claiming that it was against a city ordinance to build houses in shade-trees, and maybe it is; but, fortunately for the boys, there are other trees which may be used for this purpose. There is now, or was recently, an interesting tree-house on Flatbush Avenue, Brooklyn; a house so commodious that it was capable of accommodating as many as fifteen people; but it was not as pretty and attractive a tree-house as the one located at the foot of Mount Tamalpais, in Mill Valley, San Francisco, which is built after the plan shown by Fig. 95. This California house is attached to the trunk of a big redwood tree and is reached by a picturesque bridge spanning a rocky canyon.

Tree-houses are also used as health resorts, and recently there was a gentleman of Plainfield, Mass., living in a tree-house because he found the pure air among the leaves beneficial; while down in Ecuador another man, who feared malarial mosquitoes and objected to wild beasts and snakes, built himself a house on top of an ibo-tree, seventy feet from the ground. This is quite a pretentious structure and completely hides and covers the top of the tree. It is located on the banks of the Escondido River; and in this tropical country, while it may be a safe retreat from the pests enumerated, it might not be so safe from lightning in one of those violent tropical storms. But it is probably as safe as any house in that country, for one must take chances no matter what kind of a house one dwells in.

Primitive and savage men all over the world for thousands of years have built dwellings in tree tops. In the Philippines many natives live in tree-top houses. The Kinnikars, hill-tribesmen of Travancore, India, are said to live in houses built in the trees, but in New Guinea it seems that such houses are only provided for the girls, and every night the dusky lassies are sent to bed in shacks perched in the tree tops; then, to make safety doubly safe, the watchful parents take away the ladders and their daughters cannot reach the ground until the ladders are replaced in the morning.

The most important thing about all this is that a tree-house is always a source of delight to the boys and young people, and, furthermore, the boys have over and over again proved to the satisfaction of the author that they themselves are perfectly competent to build these shacks, and not only to build them but to avoid accidents and serious falls while engaged in the work.

XVII

CACHES

THE difference between tomahawk shacks and axe houses reminds me of the difference between the ileum and the jejunum, of which my classmate once said: "There is no way of telling the beginning of one or the ending of t'other 'cept by the pale-pinkish hue of the latter."

It must be confessed that some of the shacks described in the preceding pages are rather stout and massive to be classed as tomahawk shelters, but, as indicated by my reference to physiology, this is not the writer's fault. The trouble is owing to the fact that nature abhors the arbitrary division line which man loves to make for his own convenience. The tomahawk shacks gradually evolve into axe camps and houses and "there is no telling the beginning of one and the end of t'other." Hence, when I say that all the previous shacks, sheds, shelters, and shanties are fashioned with a hatchet, the statement must be accepted as true only so far as _it is_ possible to build them without an axe; but in looking over the diagram it is evident at a glance that the logs are growing so thick that the necessity of the woodman's axe is more and more apparent; nevertheless, the accompanying caches have been classed with the tomahawk group and we will allow them to remain there.

Wherever man travels in the wilderness he finds it necessary to cache--that is, hide or secure some of his goods or provisions. The security of these caches (Figs. 98-111) is considered sacred in the wilds and they are not disturbed by savages or whites; but bears, foxes, husky dogs, porcupines, and wolverenes are devoid of any conscientious scruples and unless the cache is absolutely secure they will raid it.

Fig. 98. Fig. 99. Fig. 100. Fig. 101. Fig. 102. Fig. 103. Fig. 104. Fig. 105.

The first cache (Fig. 98) is called the "prospector's cache" and consists simply of a stick lashed to two trees and another long pole laid across this to which the goods are hung, swinging beneath like a hammock. This cache is hung high enough to be out of reach of a standing bear.

The tripod cache (Fig. 100) consists of three poles lashed at the top with the goods hung underneath.

Another form of the prospector's cache is shown by Fig. 102, where two poles are used in place of one and an open platform of sticks laid across the poles; the goods are placed upon the platform.

The tenderfoot's cache (Fig. 105) is one used only for temporary purposes as it is too easily knocked over and would be of no use where animals as large as bears might wreck it. It consists of two sticks lashed together at their small ends and with their butt ends buried in the earth; their tops are secured by a rope to a near-by tree while the duffel is suspended from the top of the longest pole.

The "Montainais" cache is an elevated platform upon which the goods are placed and covered with skins or tarpaulin or tent-cloth (Fig. 99).

The "Andrew Stone" cache is a miniature log cabin placed on the ground and the top covered with halved logs usually weighted down with stones (Fig. 101).

The "Belmore Browne" cache consists of a pole or a half of a log placed in the fork of the two trees on top of which the goods are held in place by a rope and the whole covered with a piece of canvas lashed together with eyelets, like a shoe (Fig. 103).

The "Herschel Parker" cache is used where the articles to be cached are in a box. For this cache two poles are lashed to two trees, one on each side of the trees (Fig. 104), and across the two poles the box is placed.

We now come to more pretentious caches, the first of which is the "Susitna," which is a little log cabin built on a table with four long legs. The poles or logs composing the legs of the table are cut in a peculiar fashion, as shown in the diagram to the left of Fig. 107; this is intended to prevent animals from climbing to the top; also, as a further protection, pieces of tin are sometimes tacked around the poles so as to give no foothold to the claws of the little animals.

Fig. 106 shows two other methods sometimes adopted to protect small caches and Fig. 108 is still another method of using logs which have the roots still attached to them for supports. Such logs can be used where the ground is too stony to dig holes for posts.

Fig. 109 shows another form of the Susitna cache wherein the goods are packed in a box-like structure and covered with tent-cloth tightly lashed down.

The "Dillon Wallace" cache (Fig. 110) is simply a tent erected over the goods and perched on an elevated platform.

The "Fred Vreeland" cache is a good, solid, practical storehouse. It is built of small logs on a platform, as shown by Fig. 111, and the bottom of the building is smaller than it is at the eaves. It is covered with a high thatched roof and is ornamental as well as useful.

Fig. 106. Fig. 107. Fig. 108. Fig. 109. Fig. 110. Fig. 111.

These caches might really belong to a book of woodcraft, but it is another case of the "ileum and jejunum," and we will rule that they technically come under the head of shacks, sheds, shelters, and shanties and so are included in this volume; but there is another and a very good reason for publishing them in this book, and that is because some of them, like Figs. 107 and 111, suggest novel forms of ornamental houses on country estates, houses which may be used for corn-cribs or other storage or, like the tree-top houses, used for pleasure and amusement.

XVIII

HOW TO USE AN AXE

THE old backwoodsmen were as expert with their axes as they were with their rifles and they were just as careful in the selection of these tools as they were in the selection of their arms. Many a time I have seen them pick up a "store" axe, sight along the handle, and then cast it contemptuously aside; they demanded of their axes that the cutting edge should be exactly in line with the point in the centre of the butt end of the handle. They also kept their axes so sharp that they could whittle with them like one can with a good jack-knife; furthermore, they allowed _no one_ but themselves to use their own particular axe. In my log house in the mountains of Pike County, Pa., I have a table fashioned entirely with an axe; even the ends of the boards which form the top of the table were cut off by Siley Rosencranz with his trusty axe because he had no saw.

Both General Grant and Abraham Lincoln were expert axemen, and probably a number of other Presidents were also skilful in the use of this tool; but it is not expected that the modern vacation pioneer shall be an expert, consequently a few simple rules and suggestions will be here given to guide the amateur and he must depend upon his own judgment and common sense to work out the minor problems which will beset him in the use of this tool.

Dangers

All edged tools are dangerous when in the hands of "chumps," dangerous to themselves and to any one else who is near them. For instance, only a chump will use an axe when its head is loose and is in danger of flying off the handle; only a chump will use his _best_ axe to cut roots or sticks lying flat on the ground where he is liable to strike stones and other objects and take the edge off the blade. Only a chump will leave an axe lying around on the ground for people to stumble over; if there is a stump handy at your camp and you are through using the axe, strike the blade into the top of the stump and leave the axe sticking there, where it will be safe from injury.

Remember, before chopping down a tree or before using the axe at all, to see that there is enough space above and around you to enable you to swing the axe clear (Fig. 112) without the danger of striking bushes or overhanging branches which may deflect the blade and cause accidents more or less serious.

Do not stand behind a tree as it falls (Fig. 115), for the boughs may strike those of a standing tree, causing the butt to shoot back or "kick," and many a woodsman has lost his life from the kick of a falling tree. Before chopping a tree down, select the place where it is to fall, a place where it will not be liable to lodge in another tree on its way down. Do not try to fell a tree against the wind.

Cut a notch on the side of the tree facing the direction you wish it to fall (Fig. 113) and cut it half-way through the trunk. Make the notch, or kerf, large enough to avoid pinching your axe in it. If you discover that the notch is going to be too small, cut a new notch, _X_ (Fig. 116), some inches above your first one, then split off the piece _X_, _Y_ between the two notches, and again make the notch _X_, _Z_, and split off the piece _Z_, _W_, _Y_ (Fig. 116), until you make room for the axe to continue your chopping. When the first kerf is finished begin another one on the opposite side of the tree a little higher than the first one (Fig. 114). When the wood between the two notches becomes too small to support the weight of the tree, the top of the tree will begin to tremble and waver and give you plenty of time to step to one side before it falls.

Fig. 112. Fig. 113. Fig. 114. Fig. 115. Fig. 116. Fig. 117. Fig. 118.