Page 51 - The Ashley Book of Knots

THE ASHLEY BOOK OF KNOTS

The Climber

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(See pages 6z, 63, and 77.) When climbing a tree without a ladder,

I \{ wear rubber-soled shoes and pass a rope around the tree. Hold the

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I ends in either hand or else bend them together around the cody.

Lean back against the rope and raise the feet, one at a time. Then

swing the body toward the tree and jerk the rope a foot or so higher.

Coconut trees are climbed in this way, a section of vine being used

instead of a rope.

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The Cobbler

See under "Bootmaker ," near the beginning of this chapter

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I I The Cooper

It may appear farfetched to include these split wood joints in a

.22.2. book devoted to knots, but they serve a purpose similar to the bend,

and I know of no other place where they are to be found.

222. This is the ordinary hoop fastening for common commercial

barrels, the average content of which is between thirty and thirty-

three gallons. Hoops are of various kinds of wood. In New England

wild cherry saplings are much used. They serve no other purpose,

and farmers are anxious to be rid of them because of the caterpillars

1 they shelter. Birch also is used and is better than cherry. Hoops are

I made up of green wood preferably, which is less apt to break in

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I I ! bending. The bark is left on, and great quantities are made up and

stored in slack season. When making hoops by hand the cooper sits

on a shaving horse, which has a clamp or vise on the forward end,

operated by a wooden foot lever. The clamp grips one end of the

sapling, and the cooper, sitting astride the bench with his feet on the

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treadle, pulls the drawknife toward him, riving the sapling into equal
" parts. After the hoop is shaped the joint is made, often with draw-

knife alone, sometimes with the assistance of a hatchet.

.223 I 224/ I 223, 224, 225. More elaborate joints are to be found on runlets,

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• • canteens, piggins, noggins, tankards, canopails, and other articles of

, I I f I \ domestic cooperage where the taste of the housewife has demanded

, more style and finish. These require better hoops, which in America
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J are made of oak, hickory, ash, and maple.

Old wooden buckets are now seldom seen. Apparently they were

worn out before the antiquarian arrived on the scene.

For many years a large proportion of the more substantial wooden

hoops have been iron-fastened. According to the logbook of the

Nantucket whaler Beaver, about one quarter of her casks in 1791

were iron-bound, but for small cooperage iron hoops had· made little

headway before the turn of the present century, and today wooden

hoops are still used for many purposes.

Large hoops and hoops that were to be finished on both sides were

225" riven from logs with a froe and then shaped up with the drawknife.

Ash was the preferred wood, as it is the easiest to split.

The holes in evidence in the last three joints on this page were

punched with a gouge and mallet, which is quicker than boring and

if skillfully done requires no further shaping.