He realized the absolute necessity of skidding and hauling this job before the heavy choking snows of the latter part of January should make it impossible to keep the roads open.
So insistent was this necessity that he had seized the first respite in the phenomenal snow-fall of the early autumn to begin work.

The cutting in the woods could wait.
Left to themselves probably the men would never have dreamed of objecting to whatever privations the task carried with it.

Radway's anxiety for their comfort, however, caused them finally to imagine that perhaps they might have some just grounds for complaint after all.

That is a great trait of the lumber-jack.
But Dyer, the scaler, finally caused the outbreak.

Dyer was an efficient enough man in his way, but he loved his own ease.