take a lead in this at a finish. And he agreed I was to be leader.

Just now I began working in my mind on an invention.

With the ordinary sort of saw now in use, the men have to lie down
crookedwise on the ground and pull _sideways_. And that's why there's
not so much gets done in a day, and a deal of ugly stumps left after in
the woods. Now, with a conical transmission apparatus that could be
screwed on to the root, it should be possible to work the saw with a
straight back-and-forward movement, but the blade cutting horizontally all
the time. I set to work designing parts of a machine of this sort. The
thing that puzzled me most was how to get the little touch of pressure on
the blade that's needed. It might be done by means of a spring that could
be wound up by clockwork, or perhaps a weight would do it. The weight
would be easier, but uniform, and, as the saw went deeper, it would be
getting harder all the time, and the same pressure would not do. A steel
spring, on the other hand, would slacken down as the cut grew deeper, and
always give the right amount of pressure. I decided on the spring system.
"You can manage it," I told myself. And the credit for it would be the
greatest thing in my life.

The days passed, one like another; we felled our nine-inch timber, and cut
off twigs and tops. We lived in plenty, taking food and coffee with us
when we started for the woods, and getting a hot meal in the evening when
we came home. Then we washed and tidied ourselves--to be nicer-mannered
than the farm-hands--and sat in the kitchen, with a big lamp alight, and
three girls. Falkenberg had become Emma's sweetheart.

And every now and then there would come a wave of music from the piano in
the parlour; sometimes Fruen herself would come out to us with her girlish