When this machine was first in use the staves were made entirely from red oak and basswood, the bolts being split out with a frow or ax, brought to the mill in this way and cut into staves. Immense elm forests then attracted the attention of some of the stave manufacturers and they experimented with making elm staves. It is not a great many years ago, only since I came to this country, that red oak staves were the principal kind used on the Minneapolis market, now elm is almost entirely used, in fact red oak staves are not liked on account of being so hard to work.

For a great many years nothing but split bolts were used, until some manufacturer, with a sawmill attached, conceived the idea of sawing his bolts, but until fifteen years ago staves made from sawn bolts commanded a lower price than staves from split bolts, as the coopers were of the opinion that staves could not be made straight grained unless the bolts were split, and it took a great many years to remove this erroneous idea. Now there is hardly a mill in the country making staves from anything but sawed bolts, and elm is the principal timber used, in fact is considered always desirable to any timber at the present time, although birch, beech, maple and southern woods are now crowding elm by degrees off the market, on account of the high price of elm stumpage.

We will now turn to the hoop industry. Until about twenty years ago all of the barrels were hooped with what is known as half-round hoops. The cooper cut these hoops in the winter, hauled them to hist cooper shop, and spent the long winter months when not making staves in making hoops for his summer trade. Then the racked hoop made from black ash came into vogue, this being the precursor of the modern patent cut elm hoop. For a great many years the hoops were made either racked or split from elm, and finished with a draw knife, until the idea was conceived of cutting the hoops the same as staves from elm plank, and this hoop was found, when it was perfected, to be superior in every way to the racked or bark hoop. It is still the principal hoop on the market, although on account of the scarcity of elm a great many wire hoops are being used to supplement the elm hoops on the barrels. The iron hoop alone does not give sufficient rigidity to a barrel, and if not supplemented with the patent hoop, the barrels when stored on the bulges would collapse without the assistance of the elm hoop.

Heading, which formerly used to be made in the same way as

staves, split from bolts, dressed off with a draw knife, in fact the same as tight barrel heading, are now sawed on a swing saw, kiln dried and turned on a turning machine, at the rate of 3,000 sets per day to one machine, whereas formerly it was a very good cooper who would turn out twenty-five heads in a day.

While the tight barrel cooperage industry of Canada has declined, the slack barrel industry has leaped up until it is one of the most important industries in Canada, millions of dollars being invested in stave, hoop and heading mills all over the country from Nova Scotia to Ontario, and barrels being used for almost every conceivable purpose, as they are the handiest, strongest and best package that has yet been invented by man.

There is no doubt but there is timber in parts of Canada which are yet undeveloped to continue this industry for a number of years, and no doubt before the supply is exhausted methods of reforestry will be inaugurated by the Canadian government the same as are in vogue in Norway and Sweden. It is one of the greatest industries we have in Canada and should be fostered so as to continue in perpetuity.

CHAPTER VIII.

QUEBEC-TIMBER HISTORY AND ADMINISTRATION.

Though the lumber industry in the Provinces of Quebec and Ontario in the Dominion of Canada is, so to speak, a double tree, growing from one root, it may be well to consider them separately, passing lightly over that part in each which more fully describes the other. The history of the industry could not be otherwise than interwoven in these two Provinces because from the beginning of things' until 1791, whether under French or British rule, they constituted one colony, and from 1841 to 1867 they were again united in the Union of Upper and Lower Canada. In the latter year these two Provinces, so different in language, religion, thought and habits, were the basis of that confederation which bound all the scattered colonies of Great Britain in North America (excepting Newfoundland) into an independent auxiliary nation, with complete self-government, with national responsibilities, and national aspirations; as Kipling sings

Daughter am I in my mother's house,

But mistress am I in my own.

That confederation would have been impossible but for the mutual forbearance-the give-and-take-between these two great Provinces which now, after a generation of expansion in greater Canada, still contain about seven-tenths of the total population of the country, a forbearance whereby the solid, Protestant, English-speaking Ontarian and the dashing, Catholic, French-speaking Quebecer have, as in a marriage contract, agreed to take each other for better or for worse, for all time; and, having made up their minds to it, find each other not such bad partners after all-in fact, preferable to any other of whom they know.

Moving across the stage of Canada's history, crowded with com

1 In 1534 Jacques Cartier entered the Gulf of St. Lawrence, visited different coasts around the Gulf, and took possession of the country in the name of the most Christian king," Francis I., King of France. In the same year Cartier was appointed Captain General of Canada, which title he held for six years. In 1535 he explored the Gulf of St. Lawrence, landed at Quebec and sailed as far as the Indian village of Hochelaga, now Montreal, which he visited. After unsuccessful attempts at colonization by the French under Cartier, Roberval, La Roche and others, the first permanent settlement was effected at Port Royal under the direction of Champlain, in 1605. The City of Quebec was founded in 1608 by twenty-eight settlers, including Champlain. Montreal was founded by Champlain in 1611, the site being chosen by him as a favorable place for a new settlement higher up the river than Quebec.

manding figures, there is none more picturesque than that of the lumberman, beginning with the cavalier seigniors of New France, continuing with the haughty admiralty officers of old England, with their retainers singing French-Canadian boat songs, or fighting and praying as became good Glengarry covenanters, on through the stirring times of the rebellion of 1837 to the present time when, in the midst of a world of timber dues and percentages, the successful lumberman still builds his palace in the wilderness and becomes known as the King of the Gatineau or the Prince of Petawawa.

Nothing comes out more clearly in the early history of colonization in Canada than that the tree was considered man's enemy, and only valuable as a barricade against other enemies, climatic or human.

The idea of those who colonized New France was to reproduce the conditions of lord and vassal, which they thought to be eternal but were only accidental and were passing away in the old France even while they were vainly striving to reproduce them in the new. By this system the land was divided into large blocks, as large as a modern township, or small county, and each block given to a scion of a noble house who colonized his tract with tenants or retainers. These, in return for occupancy of the land, not only paid rents but performed many personal services, while the seignior on his part was invested with many privileges; among others, that of hunting over the retainer's land and of administering justice.

The place which timber occupied in this system may be best seen by examining one of the old seigniorial grants made in 1683 by the governor and indendant of Quebec, which embodies the usual conditions. No excuse is made in presenting it because it is a land grant, for from the beginning to the present time land and timber regulations have gone hand in hand:

We, in virtue of the power intrusted to us by His Majesty [the King of France] and in consideration of the different settlements which the said Sieur de la Valliere and the Sieur de la Poterie, his father, have long since made in this country, and in order to afford him the means of augmenting them, have to the said Sieur de la Valliere given, granted, and conceded the above described tract of land, to have and to hold, the same himself, his heirs and assigns forever, under the title of fief, seignory, high, middle and low justice and also the right of hunting and fishing throughout the extent of the said tract of land; subject to the condition of fealty and homage which the said Sieur de la Valliere, his heirs and assigns shall be held to perform at the Castle of St. Louis in Quebec, of which he shall hold under the customary rights and dues agreeably to the Custom of Paris; and also that he shall keep house and home and cause the same to be kept by his tenants on the

concessions which he may grant them; that the said Sieur de la Valliere shall preserve and cause to be preserved by his tenants, within the said tract of land the oak timber fit for the building of vessels; and that he shall give immediate notice to the King or to Us of the mines, ores and minerals, if any be found therein; that he shall leave and cause to be left all necessary roadways and passages; that he shall cause the said land to be cleared and inhabited, and furnished with buildings and cattle, within two years from this date, in default whereof the present concession shall be null and void.

This extract shows that the only interest the Crown took in the matter was the securing of an ample supply of oak for building ships for the royal navy. Later grants reserved timber for spars and masts, doubtless pine timber. From time to time, as war vessels were built or repaired at Quebec, permits were issued to parties to cut the oak timber reserved as above and regulations were made for rafting it to Quebec. Again, when new districts were opened in which oak timber was reported to be abundant, regulations were issued forbidding anyone cutting it until it had been examined and suitable trees had been marked for the navy. The penalty for violation of this regulation was confiscation of the timber and a fine of ten livres for each tree.

These first reservations caused trouble between the cultivator and his over-lord or the Government, as similar arrangements have done ever since in every part of the continent. If oak trees were numerous the tenant had either to destroy them or fail to fulfill his obligations to clear the land in a given time. The usual way of cutting the Gordian knot appears to have been to burn the timber; but after suits by seigniors against settlers who made the trees into boards for their own use, it was ordained by the governor that the tenant should be unmolested where the timber was cut in the actual extension of his clearing; but where the trees were cut for timber without the intention of clearing the land the party should be fined.

When the land became a little more cleared, trespass by settlers upon adjoining lands to cut suitable sticks or easily reached timber became more common and was punished by confiscation of the trucks and horses used to transport the wood and by a fine of fifty livres. In the district about Quebec City, one-half the fine and confiscation went to the proprietor of the land and the other half to the Hotel Dieu (hospital) of Quebec City.

At first the Crown reservation of timber was solely for naval purposes, and timber taken for military purposes, such as the building of casemates, was paid for by the Crown; but later the reservation was