The Project Gutenberg eBook of Powder
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.
Title: Powder
Author: Walt Coburn
Release date: October 5, 2026 [eBook #79724]
Language: English
Original publication: New York, NY: The Butterick Publishing Company, 1928
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/79724
Credits: Prepared by volunteers at BookCove (bookcove.net)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POWDER ***
By Walt Coburn
The story of Jerk Line Smith, who drove the eighteen-horse
freight team through heat and blizzard, and his little
pardner Two Dog, the bane of whose life was——
POWDER
“Mud?” said Jerk Line Smith to the barflies in the Bloody Heart Saloon.
“Mud? I’ll tell a man we was in mud. I’m haulin’ grub, powder and licker
to the camps at the Little Rockies, five wagons and the caboose, loaded
a thousand pounds to the horse, and workin’ thirty-two o’ the best
hosses north o’ hell. Bogged to the hubs. It taken us twenty-one days
and part o’ that night tuh pull the Rocky Point Hill.
“Mud? Mister, them Montana bad lands, comin’ up from the Rocky Point
crossin’ on the Missouri, is eye deep to a tall camel. Ol’ Hard Luck
Jones laid over at the Point and goes on a big drunk. Turned his hosses
loose fergettin’ to tie up their tails. Tails gits balled with that
gumbo till it weighted down them pore animals. Stretched their hides
back. In a week every one o’ them hosses was dead. Hide so tight they
couldn’t close their eyes. The pore things died from lack o’ sleep.”
“That was in ’81,” agreed Two Dog Moore, Jerk Line’s swamper. “The
summer o’ the blue snow.”
Whereupon fresh drinks were set up. Out on the street stood Jerk Line
Smith’s freight outfit. The two wagons and canvas topped cart, or
caboose. Eighteen horses standing at rest; the off wheeler a bronc. A
battered old saddle on the nigh wheeler; brass knobbed hames; chain
harness; the lead team decorated with double rowed strings of bells
strung on a hoop shaped support fastened to the tops of the hames; check
reins and bridles ornate with ivory rings of red, white and blue. The
wagons heavily loaded with grub, dynamite and whisky billed to Zortman
and Landusky in the Little Rockies.
Presently the tall, yellow bearded freighter and his diminutive swamper
would pull out of town, before they got too drunk. And Chinook would
pause in its collective business or boredom to watch the long string
team under Jerk Line’s guidance turn the corner of the town business
street and head for the open country. From the rear of the caboose to
the ears of the lead team the distance was approximately half a block.
Yet, drunk or sober, Jerk Line Smith would accomplish the impossible by
rounding that corner with neat and profane perfection. Astride his nigh
wheeler, guiding nine span of horses by means of a single line, he would
swing around that corner and on to the straight road.
“Tighten up, thar! Blondy, Joe, Snowball, Buck! Ribs, you long backed,
cow hocked son of a cross between a bogged cow and a wore out winter!
Ginger, Pete! Tighten up! Keno, you high withered, cold shouldered, hip
shot, ring-boned, box ankled specimen o’ humanity, tighten them tugs!
You, Greyback! Born a-sleepin’ an’ never woke up! Louse! Injun! Tadpole!
Roosevelt an’ Bryan! Roulette an’ Faro! Stand Up an’ Lay Down! D. T. and
Hangover! Whisky an’ Chaser! Stumble an’ Fall Down! Tighten up!”
Out on to the open road. Winter and summer. Bells chiming, wheels
creaking, harness rattling. Jerk Line riding his nigh wheeler, Two Dog
sitting on the plank known as the jockey bar, or walking alongside. Two
Dog’s business was setting and releasing the brakes, helping with the
harnessing and hobbling of the teams, wrangling in the morning, cooking,
fastening roughlocks on grades, blocking wheels on long climbs, watching
the loads, greasing wheels, mending harness, jacking up wheels in the
mud, nursing Jerk Line over periods of delirium tremens. In short,
swamping.
* * * * *
Motor trucks have replaced the snail-like freight outfits. Fences
crisscross the old open range. That breed of frontiersman to which
belonged Jerk Line Smith and Two Dog Moore is now extinct. Save in the
memory of men who loved the old West, their names and deeds are
forgotten. Yet the freighter filled his place in the building of an
empire. When the West needed him, he served. Through heat and blizzard.
Ragged, bearded, his blacksnake hung across his shoulders. Freezing,
drinking, laboring, cursing. Broken wheels and empty bottles marking his
passing.
Pride of their breed cropped out in their teams. Bells and colored
rings. They boasted not of their own deeds, but of what their teams
could do. The passing cowboy knew him and liked him. Trapper and
sheepherder were ever welcome to a drink and a meal and the latest
gossip of the towns.
It was said of Jerk Line Smith that he was the orneriest human north of
the Pecos, save one. That one was hanged. Tall, with rawhide muscles,
unwashed and unshaven, his rough-hewn features red and cracked from bad
weather. And each spring, after the chinook wind had melted the winter
snow, Two Dog brought the sheep shears from the jockey box and cut Jerk
Line’s matted yellow hair.
Two Dog had been a sheepherder, and as Jerk Line often said, “the damn’
li’l’ cuss never got over it.”
Small of stature, inoffensive, with watery eyes of mild blue, he did his
work, swallowed his liquor as an obedient child takes medicine, and
stoutly vouched for Jerk Line’s stories.
“Yep. It happened back in ’81, the summer o’ the blue snow.”
He had attached himself to the freight outfit in much the same manner
that a stray dog picks up a master. Jerk Line claimed that Two Dog “must
’a’ been with him six months or so afore he sobered up an’ found him one
day jackin’ up a bogged wheel with a case o’ powder fer a jack-rest.”
But the truth of that statement might be questioned, because Two Dog,
above all the dangers that roam the earth, feared powder.
At some spot along the colorless career of little Two Dog Moore, he had
been a prospector and hard rock miner. He had lost two fingers and all
the toes of his right foot while thawing a stick of frozen dynamite in
the oven.
His fear of powder became an obsession. Yet almost every freight load
had its quota of dynamite and blasting powder. Jerk Line handled powder
with a contemptuous nonchalance that drove the blood from Two Dog’s face
and sent the little swamper into a sweat chilled fever.
“Gawd. Oh, Gawd!” he groaned in silent agony. “Someday it’ll happen!
Someday....”
And he would hobble back to the Bloody Heart and the bar bottle.
Yet even his terrible fear could not drive him away from the freight
outfit. No more than beating can drive off the stray dog from the man he
has chosen for master.
Perhaps Two Dog drew wages of some sort. Or it may have been that Jerk
Line, in moments of drunken generosity, gave the little fellow money.
For the harness maker at Chinook could tell you that almost every trip
to town Two Dog would shamble into the shop. Here he would spend an hour
fondling the red, white and blue rings, brass buckles and bells. A
folded bill would come from the pocket of his disreputable overalls in
exchange for rings or buckles or a new bell.
He was never known to buy clothes of any sort. He wore what Jerk Line
cast aside as being worn out. With harness thread and the sheep shears,
he cut down and patched these abandoned garments until they hung to him
somehow. His feet, when wrapped in gunny sacking, would fill the rusty
shoes he picked up. Jerk Line fed him. He drank when called up to the
bar.
He managed to keep those eighteen horses and the wrangling pony curried
and brushed after a fashion. He spent hours trimming their tails. He
filled them with grain, and if he put an extra hatful of oats in the
nosebag, Jerk Line pretended not to notice.
A good hand around a horse, Two Dog. Even the broncs seemed to savvy
that the little old fellow was harmless. Before Jerk Line gave the
starting howl that put the long string team in motion, Two Dog went down
the line with the blacksnake no man ever saw him use. Mumbling gentle
profanity, prodding them with the wooden butt of his blacksnake, talking
to those horses as if they were children. And when Jerk Line bawled
forth his “Tighten up!” the tugs tightened along the line, lead bars and
stretchers, and chains lifted from the ground. Every horse in the string
was giving the best that was in him. And deep down in his mule-skinner’s
heart, Jerk Line gave credit to little Two Dog. Two Dog, who had a way
with hosses.
Evenings, when he had the time, the little swamper polished the brass
buckles and bells until they glistened.
Their evenings, especially during mild weather, were usually visited by
stray cowboys, an occasional trapper, or a sheepherder.
“I seen Jerk Line pullin’ in on to Black Coulee this evening,” word
would pass along from camp to ranch and from ranch to camp.
Later in the day, after dusk had fallen, a hail would come out of the
night.
“Hi, there, Jerk Line, you gone to bed?”
“Dunno who you are,” would come the reply from within the lantern lit
caboose, “but light and rest your saddle.”
If the man was a cowboy, or a trapper, he was welcome to imbibe freely
of the liquor. But a sheepherder was limited to one or two “light ’uns”.
Not that the freighter was snobbish, for the herder and his dog was ever
welcome. But there was a large band of woolies in the herder’s care, and
despite the fact that Montana makes wanton desertion of a band of sheep
punishable by a term in prison, herders had been known to turn loose
their sheep. Because most sheepherders were habitual drunkards, and
because it took but a few drinks to set them on the trail for town, Jerk
Line used caution in the passing of his jug.
Once when a herder, goaded by the taste from Jerk Line’s jug, quit his
band, the freight outfit laid over and Two Dog herded the sheep until
the camp tender discovered the absence of the herder and brought out a
man to relieve Two Dog. That week’s delay had cost money. Jerk Line had
been duly cussed out for his tardiness. And from that time on, the jug
was passed with due caution.
* * * * *
Jerk Line’s jug was kinfolks to that fabled pitcher that never became
empty. Care of this earthenware container fell to Two Dog. And its
replenishing was as much a rite as was the polishing of the bells and
care of the stock.
By holding the jug to his ear and gently shaking it, Two Dog could tell
a man, almost never failing, the number of man-size drinks left in it.
And when its contents were lowered to a certain amount, the swamper
would set about refilling it.
Whisky was shipped in huge barrels. To tap this barrel en route from
wholesaler to retailer was unlawful. For, allowing for small natural
shrinkage, the saloon man paid good cash for the net contents as listed
on the bill of lading made out at the shipping point.
Now Jerk Line was a man of honest habit. He paid his bills. His word in
money matters was as true and good as signed paper or Christian oath.
Yet no whisky barrel ever landed at its final destination without being
tapped.
Unlike the trained ear of Two Dog, the saloon man could not gauge the
amount of liquor inside the fifty-gallon barrel or the hundred-gallon
barrel. Furthermore, no naked eye could detect any sign of the barrels
having been tampered with. Yet, from that barrel had come a gallon,
three, or perhaps five gallons of its original contents.
Barrel tapping, like safe cracking, is an art. Two Dog was the skilled
artist.
From the jockey box would come a hammer, a strip of canvas and a cold
chisel with its edge filed round and smooth so that it made a dull sort
of instrument. Selecting one of the hoops that bound the wooden staves
of the barrel, the swamper became a barrel cooper. With hammer and
chisel, the canvas as a buffer to prevent marking the hoop, Two Dog
would lift the hoop until it was an inch or so above its original place.
A gimlet and length of rubber tubing now came from the jockey box. A
tiny hole was bored in a carefully selected spot somewhere along the rim
marked by the hoop. The bit of tubing was inserted, its lower end
vanishing into the neck of the jug. If necessary, a tiny air hole was
made in the top of the barrel. This hole was made somewhere on the
lettering of the maker that was customarily burned into the wood by a
red-hot stencil.
The siphoning was now under way. A slow process, for the air hole was
small, as was the tube that led from the barrel to the jug. But Two Dog,
from experience, could time the process with fair accuracy.
“Some barrels,” he would tell Jerk Line, “gives down their licker
faster’n others.”
And when the jug was filled, tiny wooden pegs were driven into the
gimlet holes and the white dots of the wooden pegs were seared into a
blending, charred color by means of a hot iron. The hoop was
painstakingly driven back into place. No visible trace remained of the
looting. Two Dog would step back, head on one side, surveying the barrel
with the pleased eye of an artist who has put the final touches to a
masterpiece.
Yet Jerk Line was an honest man. And Two Dog was of guileless bearing,
meek as the man of the Scriptures.
“I reckon we earn that much, haulin’ the stuff over this damn’ road.
Anyhow I allers tell ’em.”
Jerk Line, with a wink and a grin, would always boast that he had tapped
the barrel.
“Show me whar we tapped ’er an’ I’ll pay fer the whole dang barrel,”
he’d tell Dutch John or Big Fred or Buster or Jew Jake or old Pike.
“Ain’t that right, Two Dog?”
“Righter’n hell, Jerk Line,” came prompt affirmation.
II
It was powder that severed a five year partnership between the
rough-hewn Jerk Line and the timid Two Dog. Frozen dynamite.
Those of you who have never cursed and prayed and coaxed and wept your
way with a freight outfit can not quite appreciate the heartbreaking
grief of the Red Lane in bad weather.
Five miles of red adobe gumbo flat. No road but the rutted strip from
the P outfit’s horse corrals to the half way house known as the Hog
Ranch. Five miles of mud up to a horse’s hocks. Mud that sticks in the
spokes of the wide tired freight wagon wheels. Wheels seven feet in
diameter, sunk to the hubs. Five miles of cold, red, sticky, horse
killing hell. Horses floundering. Two Dog hacking away with an ax at the
gumbo clogged between the spokes.
“Drop trail.”
Caboose and rear wagon unhooked. Wallowing in mud up to their knees, the
two freighters labored. Cold. Wet. Hungry. Sweat. Mud. Jerk Line too
weary to curse, blood seaming the chapped cracks that filled his hands
and red wrists. Two Dog whimpering with futile grief. His beloved horses
and rings and buckles and bells caked with mud.
Mud that thawed at midday and froze to cement-like solidity at night.
From daybreak till dark. Shivering through the brief night hours.
Harness lying in the mud. Hobbles caked with the stuff. Broken
fingernails. Freezing, sweating, sobbing, cursing across the Red Lane.
Five days making five miles.
Perhaps it was too much liquor, or it might have been that Jerk Line
needed more of the stuff that warmed the lining of a man’s belly while
his hide was plastered with half frozen mud.
The trail wagon was down to the running gear in the gumbo. The teams
stood bogged with lowered heads and heaving flanks, sweat smeared,
steaming, spent, but waiting to give again the last ounce of strength in
their loyal hearts. But no team that ever looked through collar could
budge that mired load. Jerk Line, white with fatigue and red eyed from
loss of decent rest, was on top of the load, slashing at mud caked ropes
with his jackknife. Though it was past noon they had not eaten since
four that morning. They had unloaded and reloaded that trail wagon three
times since sun-up.
Two Dog, who had been untangling a swing team from a tangle of lead bars
and stretcher chains, was limping painfully back through the mud. His
feet were twin balls of gumbo; leaden balls of weight. A cud of tobacco
bulged his unshaven cheek. Suddenly he halted. His watery eyes widened.
The cud dropped from his gaping mouth. In mud to his knees, he stood
there, petrified, breathless with terror.
For the mud crazed Jerk Line was heaving off wooden boxes with insane
abandon. Box after box, flung from the high piled wagon out into the
congealing, freezing gumbo. One of the boxes broke, spilling forth its
contents of dynamite sticks that looked like yellow candles.
Powder! Two Dog, sick with stark terror, let out a hoarse, croaking
scream.
“Gawd! Gawd A’mighty, Smith! That’s powder!”
“What the hell of it?” bellowed the yellow bearded giant, throwing
another box out. “What the hell of it, hey?” Lend a hand up here, damn
your sniveling little heart!”
Two Dog stood there, sort of crumpled. In his scarecrow rags, his
broken, bleeding, mud caked hands going out in a queer little gesture of
supplication.
“O, Gawd, Jerk Line! Don’t! Don’t, pardner! I’ll unload ’er. Every damn’
case, Jerk Line! But don’t—don’t sling that stuff like that! She’s
powder, Jerk Line! Powder!”
But the yellow haired, mud fouled Jerk Line was like a man gone stark
mad. His harsh voice roared forth a string of curses. He threw boxes of
the frozen dynamite with a sort of giant petulance that was terrible in
its blasphemous contempt for the wrath of God.
“Git!” he bellowed. “Git, you white hearted, sheep herdin’ louse! Git,
afore I brain you with the next box!”
Two Dog turned slowly, very slowly, like a man mortally sick. Like a
stray dog being stoned by his man-god.
Shambling, stumbling, falling sometimes because he was weak and hurt and
blind from the tears that coursed down his little old cheeks, Two Dog
made his way along the Red Lane.
The weary horses eyed him with some sort of dumb understanding. But he
did not look up. He could not look at them. For he was going away. He
was quitting the only thing in the world that he had ever loved.
* * * * *
On down the Red Lane. And even after he had stumbled on for a mile and
more, the silvery tinkle of his beloved bells filled his ears. When he
reached the Hog Ranch, he crawled up into the hayloft and sobbed himself
into the oblivion of exhausted slumber.
While back along the Red Lane, Jerk Line, his sudden burst of fury
spent, worked in a brooding silence.
Already he was regretting his fit of anger. And he worked until darkness
clogged his progress. Then he unhooked his team and turned them into the
Hog Ranch pasture. Too weary and sick at heart to return to the caboose
at the far end of the lane, Jerk Line lay down on the load and slept,
too utterly tired to know that he was hungry.
He hired a passing traveler from the mines and put him to work in Two
Dog’s place. His anger had turned to guilt, then into a sort of shamed
bitterness toward Two Dog. He lied himself into believing that the
little swamper had deserted in an hour of dire need. And when the outfit
had been dragged through the lane and Jerk Line laid over at the Hog
Ranch to mend broken tugs and rebalance his freight, he got very drunk
and sank into a sullen silence.
Two Dog, refreshed by sleep, had quit the barn. Avoiding the little log
saloon and dining room that fed the stage passengers, he took to the
road before Jerk Line pulled into the ranch.
Two Dog found a sheep camp and stayed with the herder. And two days
later he hailed the passing stage and rode with the driver into the
Little Rockies. But he did not go into the town of Zortman. He got off a
mile this side of town and struck off for a sheep ranch.
A few days later Two Dog was back herding sheep. He wore real clothes.
Thick, fleece lined underwear, sox a quarter-inch thick, shoes,
overshoes, blanket lined canvas pants, a sheep lined overcoat and heavy
cap. His covered wagon held adequate bed and good grub. Two collie dogs
for company.
The feed was good, there in the scrub pines of the foothills. There was
water. A good shed for the sheep at night. And his band were stout
wethers that needed little attention save doctoring them for sore mouth
and foot rot. And each morning as they left the shed, Two Dog caught a
few sheep and sheared away the overhanging wool that sometimes grows so
thick as to make the sheep blind—wool blind.
But Two Dog was not happy. Well clothed, well fed, and an ideal winter
camp. A veritable sheepherder’s paradise. And Two Dog was a sheepherder,
as good a sheepherder as ever cheated the wolves and blizzards. He tried
to tell himself that he was happy, that freighting was a hell of a life.
Here he was, warm, with good grub, top wages. This was the life.
But when the sheep bells, reminding him of other bells, tinkled, until
the sound of them found their way into his little old heart, he would
bury his frost blackened face in the thick fur of the biggest collie and
cry like a hurt child.
Sometimes, when the wind was right—for a herder feeds into the wind in
winter so that if a storm comes, he drifts with it back to camp—Two
Dog’s band went up the wind and across the stage road below town. And
from some hiding place among the scrub pines, Two Dog’s tear dimmed eyes
would watch Jerk Line’s freight outfit crawl along the road. Wide steel
tires creaking across the packed snow. Chains rattling. The silver toned
bells sending their siren song across the frozen world to where little
two Dog squatted in the pines.
Because he never went to town, because his camp tender was a Swede who
spoke no English, and because some queer sort of pride pinched his
heart, forbidding him to question men he met, Two Dog did not know how
things were going with Jerk Line.
Jerk Line, never sober any more, whose brief stays in town were silent
and ugly and sodden. He no longer held the barflies spellbound with
fanciful tales of mud and snow and feats of expert hauling.
His horses sensed the change in the man. They no longer gave the best
that was in them. Harness and animals alike took on a shabby, prideless
appearance. Uncurried, with burrs and witches’ knots in their manes and
tails, the eighteen horses, from prideful lead team to the line backed
bronc on the off wheel, seemed to miss the unobtrusive care and
companionship of little Two Dog. Even the bells, weather tarnished and
dull, had lost something of their gallant silvery tone. The caboose was
a litter of cast off clothing, dirty dishes and blackened pots and
skillets. Man, horses, harness and wagons had a neglected appearance.
Nor was that all. There were complaints from Dutch John and Big Fred.
And on one occasion when the outfit had been snowbound a week, and had
taken three weeks to pull from the railroad into the twin towns of
Zortman and Landusky, the saloon men, becoming wrathful at the light
weight of a fifty-gallon barrel, checked up. The whisky was siphoned
into jugs. The barrel was twenty gallons short. And the gimlet marks
were plain to be seen.
Dutch John accused Jerk Line there in the saloon, before a big crowd.
Jerk Line knocked the old fellow through the front window and almost
into the arms of the deputy sheriff who happened to be passing. Jerk
Line was duly jailed, tried and fined. And the final outcome of it all
was this: The saloon men got together and bought a small freight outfit
of their own. A six horse outfit; a former stage driver for skinner. And
when Jerk Line threatened to work over this six horse skinner with a
stay chain, that gentleman borrowed Big Fred’s sawed-off shotgun and
sent word across the street where Jerk Line was doing his drinking.
“Tell that unwashed, louse bound jasper to come on with his stay chain.
This town needs a corpse about his size.”
The skinner had been a shotgun messenger for Wells Fargo in Indian days
and meant just about what he said. Jerk Line ignored the message and
carried the bitterness of defeat into a sullen, sulking week of
inebriation.
* * * * *
Jerk Line still hauled powder and grub for the two camps under an old
contract. He still brought in an occasional barrel of whisky to
Landusky, for Jew Jake and old Pike Landusky were too ornery to side in
with the Zortman saloon men.
As the goose flies, Landusky is only about five miles or so across the
mountain from its sister town of Zortman. But the wagon road, heading
the coulees and cañons, is better than twelve miles. And there is the
Grouse Gulch grade. A sharp pitch, twisting and narrow. The skinner of a
jerk line team must need know his business to avoid disaster on the
Grouse Gulch hill. For if a wagon slipped off there, it dropped for a
hundred feet.
“Haulin’ powder down Grouse Gulch hill,” agreed the mule-skinner clan,
“is like sittin’ on the lid of hell.”
But since the departure of Two Dog, Jerk Line displayed a blood-chilling
contempt for powder that made even the hardened miners and “powder
monkeys” shiver. For powder, as any man who handles it will tell you, is
temperamental stuff. Freakish, sort of. And the tawny bearded freighter
handled it as if it were flour.
Perhaps, in his present unhealthy state of mind, Jerk Line blamed the
stuff for all his troubles. He hated powder as if the stuff were alive
and understood. He cursed it as he would curse a man, in terms of the
most terrible blasphemy. No swamper ever made a second trip with him.
The men at the powder house called him crazy. And perhaps they were
right. No man now stayed at his roadside camps for a meal or a drinking
bout; Jerk Line was likely to drive him off in a quick fit of anger. And
when men began to shun his company, Jerk Line grew the more sullen and
moody. Above the sound of bells and chains and creaking wheels could be
heard his big voice as he rode the nigh wheeler or walked alongside,
talking to himself. Jerk Line Smith was no longer quite sane.
Men pitied him without knowing why they did so. Landusky and Zortman did
not know that the bearded, rough-mouthed Jerk Line was grieving for the
companionship of Two Dog. They did not know that he sometimes lay awake
through the long night, calling in a broken, croaking whisper, for his
little partner. That in town or on the road his bloodshot eyes searched
with restless stare for a glimpse of Two Dog Moore.
They did not know, because Jerk Line hid his grief, covering it with
sulky brooding and fits of sudden anger.
Sometimes Jerk Line saw the band of wethers feeding up the wind among
the scrub pines, a dirty gray blotch against the white snow. Once or
twice he caught a brief glimpse of the dogs, as those sagacious animals
trotted around the lead of the band to turn them back. But even though
he stared until his eyes ached, he could catch no glimpse of Two Dog. He
did not guess that the little fellow often crouched within a stone’s
throw of the road where it dropped off the Grouse Gulch hill.
Of the affairs of Jerk Line Smith, Two Dog knew only what his watery
blue eyes told him. That was enough to upset the little fellow, so that
he lay awake far into the night, smoking and thinking and trying to
pray.
Two Dog saw the broken harness, the wheels that needed grease, the
tarnished, blackened bells, the uncurried coats of the horses he loved.
Jerk Line, his lanky frame bent across the hames of the nigh wheeler.
Tossing rocks from the canvas nosebag hung to the saddlehorn. Jerk Line,
bent over like an old man, his tawny hair and beard astonishingly gray.
Mumbling like a man drunk or gone mad. The trail wagon piled high with
powder.
III
A warning chinook wind had melted some of the snow, but before its task
was completed the wind swung a few points north, and smoke-hued clouds
shoved up across the skyline, spreading like a pall across the blue sky.
Snow, fine and hard as specks of ice, filled the air. The mercury
dropped to ten below zero.
The wether band fed into the wind for two hours, then balked. Humped up
in the lee of the rocks, the sheep stood there in stupid, stubborn
bunches. The dogs barked and snapped at their heels. Two Dog hobbled
about, slapping his arms to keep warm. And when he saw the futility of
trying to make his sheep graze north, he gave it up and hobbled over
toward the head of the Grouse Gulch hill. He had kept close tabs on Jerk
Line’s trips and he knew that the freight outfit was about due.
When he reached the grade he stared in scowling silence at the frozen,
ice-glazed ruts. Dangerous at any time, that road was little more than a
devil’s slide this morning. Icy, slippery, treacherous.
“Smith’ll have to put rough locks on his wheels,” he mused. “Them brakes
o’ his needs new shoes. Wore bad, last trip. Rough locks. Hug the bank
clost. Take ’er slow, an’ he’ll make ’er. If them brakes slip on this
hill, he’ll....”
A shudder swept his little frame. He was thinking of that trail wagon,
piled with powder cases.
Out of the gray morning came the distant sound of bells. Clear and
sweet, like Christmas bells. To little Two Dog they were voices. Just
like the voices of fairies. “A-callin’ fer him.”
Two Dog scurried to a brush thicket beside the frozen road, ten feet
above the road level, on the slope of the hill. He could lean over and
spit down on the road.
Then, up over the brow of a low rise, came the freight outfit. Black
Jack and Monte, the two black leaders, leaning into their padded
collars, their bells chiming. The other teams, plodding behind. The high
boxed wagons, lurching and swaying. The dingy tarp-covered caboose. Jerk
Line, walking alongside the lead wagon to keep warm. In grease-caked
overalls and torn, faded mackinaw, his blue flannel shirt open at the
throat. Beating his chapped, gloveless hands across his barrel chest.
His blacksnake hung across his shoulders. Walking with bent-over
shoulders, as if he carried a heavy pack, his bearded chin sunk on his
chest. A little unsteady from too much whisky and too little decent
grub. Mumbling into his matted beard.
Plodding along. The wide tires creaking dismally on the frozen snow.
Coming on at a dogged, sullen pace, slantwise to the bitter wind.
Without a swamper. The trail wagon loaded high with powder.
And when the swing teams were directly under Two Dog’s hiding place, the
wise leaders slacked to a halt. The other teams halted in unison and
stood there. Jerk Line looked up as if waking from a dream; as if he did
not quite realize where he was. He passed a reddened, calloused hand
across his eyes, then reached into the jockey box.
“Reachin’ fer his rough lock chains,” nodded Two Dog.
But when the freighter’s hand came out of the box, it held a jug.
Uncorking the jug with his teeth, he spat out the cork and tipped up the
jug. For the space of ten long seconds, Jerk Line let the whisky gurgle
down his throat. When the jug came away from his bearded lips, he picked
the cork out of the snow and with a sort of fumbling movement replaced
the jug. Again his hand passed across his eyes, as if he tried to wipe
away a curtain or film that clouded his vision. Then he stumbled with a
faltering step back along the wagon.
The brake poles, made of seasoned birch, were equipped with ropes. To
set the brakes you pulled the rope taut and tied it to a steel brace up
forward. Jerk Line set the two brakes in a haphazard fashion. Instead of
a bowline knot, he merely gave the ropes a couple of half hitches and a
twist. Two Dog, watching every move, choked back a little groan. And
when Jerk Line mounted his wheel horse, the little watcher clapped a
mittened hand across his mouth to smother the cry that came to his
throat.
“Tighten up, thar!” roared Jerk Line. Chains rattled taut. Brakes
creaked. The wagons lurched forward.
Two Dog shivered in terror, a thin, whispering scream tearing from his
tight throat. But Jerk Line did not hear. Two Dog saw the front brake
rope give, slacking off under the strain. The second rope jerked loose.
The heavy wagons rolled forward toward the brink of the hill. Jerk Line,
loaded with powder, was starting down that pitch with no brakes!
Two Dog, pasty white, leaped like an animal, landing in a heap on the
first wagon. Half crawling, he scrambled across the load to the brake
rope, just as the wagon reached the pitch of the hill. The rear wagon,
still on level ground, held it back. Two Dog reached for the rope as the
wagon rolled against the wheel team. The horses, sensing danger, jumped
a little, then leaned back against the breeching.
Jerk Line seemed to wake from a stupor. He stiffened in the saddle, cast
a swift, furtive look back at the towering load that was not holding.
Then he roared a hoarse, screaming shout at the horses. His blacksnake
cracked like pistol shots. The long team, frightened at the terror in
the man’s voice, leaped forward.
In split second movements, Two Dog swung his weight on the brake rope.
The brake shoes smoked, screamed, then held the wide tires in a tight
grip. Two Dog, with deft, swift hitches, made fast the rope and knotted
it. Then he leaped to the ground, was saved by a miracle from death
under the wheels of the second wagon, and scrambled up over the end gate
of the trail wagon, grasping at the dangling rope.
“Gawd! Gawd! Gawd!”
No prayer of man ever held more pitiful entreaty, more blind faith, more
stark terror. And as if in answer to his screaming prayer, his hands
found the rope.
The little fellow’s weight was puny against the strain of the load that
was rolling the huge wheels. He cast a panicky glance about for some
object that was solid. Something to throw a hitch around and take up the
slack. His eyes fell on a thick iron brace that spanned the sides of the
wagon-box. Two Dog threw a hitch about it, then threw his weight against
the rope, his feet braced, every muscle straining.
Jerk Line’s blacksnake spat and popped. His hoarse screams goaded the
terrified horses. They broke into a trot. Faster. Every second courting
a pile-up. For if the long, jointed bars that served as a wagon tongue
ever slacked and a horse became tangled in the stretchers and lead bars,
the whole outfit would pile up in a snarl of mangled flesh. Wagons,
horses and men broken and smashed, jerked over the edge and down that
hundred feet of boulders. And the trail wagon piled with high explosive
powder.
Then, with a horrible squeal the brake blocks of the trail wagon took
hold. The momentum of the loads slacked. And as the stridor of the brake
shoes smothered to a low moan, Two Dog’s voice traveled out of the
rattling chains, along the line of fear stricken horses.
“Steady, boys. Easy, babies. Whoa, babies. Whoa, now. Whoa!”
Crooning, calling, talking to them as a mother soothes the fright of her
children.
* * * * *
Jerk Line heard it and thought that he had gone clear mad. But he felt
the horses slacken to a walk. He knew that some miracle had checked the
momentum of the wagons. His hand, shaking as if with palsy, made that
queer, brushing motion across his eyes. Then something inside him seemed
to break and he swayed in his saddle, tears streaming down into his
matted beard, sobs shaking his big frame. But the hands that handled the
jerk line were mechanical, sure, skilled even after the man’s brain had
quit. And so Jerk Line Smith rode down the Grouse Gulch hill. And when
the outfit was again on level ground and the horses stood quiet, he
still sat in the saddle, sobbing and laughing. Crazy. Crazy from pain
and liquor and lack of decent grub. And blind. Snow blind since the day
before yesterday.
But out of that babbling delirium and red black of snow blindness Jerk
Line recognized Two Dog and clung to him, sobbing like a baby. While Two
Dog, laughing through tears of sheer happiness, put his partner to bed
in the caboose. Ten minutes after Two Dog had Jerk Line’s clothes off
and had put him to bed, the freighter dropped into a heavy sleep.
Two Dog unhooked the teams, chuckling and talking to each horse as he
unbuckled their harness and fastened on nose bags and hobbles.
“Yep, by gravy, it’s ol’ Two Dog come back, babies. Gol damn your gosh
darned hungry hides. Know me, don’t you? I’ll tell a wet hen. Quit
nibblin’ at a man’s duds. Here’s grain till hell’s no more. A extry
hatful. An’ I’m tellin’ you, ponies, tomorrow is gonna come Sunday.
We’re declarin’ ’er a holiday. Gotta nuss ol’ Jerk Line. He’s got ’em
shore bad this time. Loco as hell. Gotta lay over an’ touch up this
harness some. Looky at them bells! Gawd A’mighty, what a mess!”
When the camp tender came along, Two Dog turned over his sheep.
“Got a sick man in yonder caboose. I’m quittin’. Yep, goin’ back to
freightin’.”
“What’s them cases you’re unloadin’, Two Dog?” asked the camp tender who
had replaced the Swede a few weeks ago.
“Powder,” said Two Dog grimly, as he carefully carried a case away from
the wagons and placed it gently on top of a pile fifty feet away.
“What’s the idee in unloadin’ it here?”
“Me’n’ Jerk Line has quit haulin’ powder. I aim to tell him so when he
comes outa it.”
But it was none other than Jerk Line himself who grinned weakly out of
his delirium, and made the flat statement that he’d never haul another
ounce of powder.
“Fu’thermore, Two Dog, I’m tyin’ you up so’s you can’t quit me, never no
more. I’m makin’ you half owner. Half owner, hear that, you gosh darned
li’l ol’ son of a gun?”
* * * * *
Two weeks later the freight outfit was again in Chinook after a load.
Dutch John and Big Fred and the others had held a conference. The six
horse outfit was taken off the road.
“All that was wrong with Jerk Line, he was just nacherally homesick fer
Two Dog. Who’d uh guessed it? Homesick!”
Once more Jerk Line Smith addressed the crowded bar at the Bloody Heart
Saloon, while outside the freight team, bells and buckles shining in the
sun, waited lazily.
“Mud? I’ll tell a stranger! I see’s a hat layin’ on top o’ the mud. Good
hat. When I picks ’er up, danged if there ain’t a man under it.”
“‘Mister,’ says I, ‘I’ll git my shovel an’ dig you out.’
“‘You needn’t bother,’ says he. I’ll be out directly. I got a stout hoss
under me!”
Jerk Line turned to his swamper.
“Recollect that day?”
“I’ll tell a man I do, Jerk Line. It was the summer of ’81. The summer
o’ the blue snow.”
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Transcriber’s Note
This etext was produced from Adventure, August 15, 1928.
Obvious typographical and printing errors have been corrected without
note. Period spellings, inconsistent hyphenation, and the author’s
punctuation and dialect have otherwise been left as printed.
Italic text is shown _like this_.
*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POWDER ***
Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will
be renamed.
Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright
law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works,
so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United
States without permission and without paying copyright
royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part
of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project
Gutenberg™ electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG™
concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark,
and may not be used if you charge for an eBook, except by following
the terms of the trademark license, including paying royalties for use
of the Project Gutenberg trademark. If you do not charge anything for
copies of this eBook, complying with the trademark license is very
easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose such as creation
of derivative works, reports, performances and research. Project
Gutenberg eBooks may be modified and printed and given away—you may
do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks not protected
by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the trademark
license, especially commercial redistribution.
START: FULL LICENSE
THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG™ LICENSE
PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
To protect the Project Gutenberg™ mission of promoting the free
distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase “Project
Gutenberg”), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full
Project Gutenberg License available with this file or online at
www.gutenberg.org/license.
Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg
electronic works
1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg
electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all
the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or
destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg electronic works in your
possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a
Project Gutenberg electronic work and you do not agree to be bound
by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person
or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
1.B. “Project Gutenberg” is a registered trademark. It may only be
used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few
things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg electronic works
even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See
paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project
Gutenberg electronic works if you follow the terms of this
agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg
electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below.
1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation (“the
Foundation” or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection
of Project Gutenberg electronic works. Nearly all the individual
works in the collection are in the public domain in the United
States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the
United States and you are located in the United States, we do not
claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing,
displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as
all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope
that you will support the Project Gutenberg mission of promoting
free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg
works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the
Project Gutenberg name associated with the work. You can easily
comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the
same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg License when
you share it without charge with others.
1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are
in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States,
check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this
agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing,
distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any
other Project Gutenberg work. The Foundation makes no
representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any
country other than the United States.
1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other
immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg License must appear
prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg work (any work
on which the phrase “Project Gutenberg” appears, or with which the
phrase “Project Gutenberg” is associated) is accessed, displayed,
performed, viewed, copied or distributed:
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg™ License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you
are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws
of the country where you are located before using this eBook.
1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg electronic work is
derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not
contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the
copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in
the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are
redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase “Project
Gutenberg” associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply
either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or
obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg
trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg electronic work is posted
with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any
additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms
will be linked to the Project Gutenberg License for all works
posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the
beginning of this work.
1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg
License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg.
1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
Gutenberg License.
1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including
any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access
to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg work in a format
other than “Plain Vanilla ASCII” or other format used in the official
version posted on the official Project Gutenberg website
(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense
to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means
of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original “Plain
Vanilla ASCII” or other form. Any alternate format must include the
full Project Gutenberg License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg works
unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
access to or distributing Project Gutenberg electronic works
provided that:
• You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
the use of Project Gutenberg works calculated using the method
you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed
to the owner of the Project Gutenberg trademark, but he has
agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid
within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are
legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty
payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in
Section 4, “Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg
Literary Archive Foundation.”
• You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg™
License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all
copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue
all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg™
works.
• You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of
any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of
receipt of the work.
• You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
distribution of Project Gutenberg™ works.
1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project
Gutenberg™ electronic work or group of works on different terms than
are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing
from the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the manager of
the Project Gutenberg™ trademark. Contact the Foundation as set
forth in Section 3 below.
1.F.
1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project
Gutenberg™ collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg™
electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may
contain “Defects,” such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate
or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other
intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or
other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or
cannot be read by your equipment.
1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the “Right
of Replacement or Refund” described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
Gutenberg™ trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
Gutenberg™ electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
DAMAGE.
1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you
received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium
with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you
with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in
lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person
or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second
opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If
the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing
without further opportunities to fix the problem.
1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you ‘AS-IS’, WITH NO
OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT
LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of
damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement
violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the
agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or
limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or
unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the
remaining provisions.
1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
providing copies of Project Gutenberg™ electronic works in
accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the
production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg™
electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses,
including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of
the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this
or any Project Gutenberg work, (b) alteration, modification, or
additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg work, and (c) any
Defect you cause.
Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg
Project Gutenberg is synonymous with the free distribution of
electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of
computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It
exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations
from people in all walks of life.
Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg’s
goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg collection will
remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
and permanent future for Project Gutenberg and future
generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see
Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at www.gutenberg.org.
Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non-profit
501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
Revenue Service. The Foundation’s EIN or federal tax identification
number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by
U.S. federal laws and your state’s laws.
The Foundation’s business office is located at 41 Watchung Plaza #516,
Montclair NJ 07042, USA, +1 (862) 621-9288. Email contact links and up
to date contact information can be found at the Foundation’s website
and official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact
Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
Literary Archive Foundation
Project Gutenberg™ depends upon and cannot survive without widespread
public support and donations to carry out its mission of
increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
freely distributed in machine-readable form accessible by the widest
array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations
($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
status with the IRS.
The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations
where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND
DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular state
visit www.gutenberg.org/donate.
While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
approach us with offers to donate.
International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
Please check the Project Gutenberg web pages for current donation
methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other
ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To
donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate.
Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg electronic works
Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project
Gutenberg concept of a library of electronic works that could be
freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and
distributed Project Gutenberg eBooks with only a loose network of
volunteer support.
Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed
editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in
the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not
necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper
edition.
Most people start at our website which has the main PG search
facility: www.gutenberg.org.
This website includes information about Project Gutenberg,
including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
