Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: — all the instruments we should want," said the young surveyor, with his peculiarly bright smile, "would be a foot measure and two strings." " How so ?" said the old man, who could not believe that science was as simple a thing as that. "Why, for instance, we will say the tree A is eighteen feet from the corner you want to find; B, sixteen feet. Now take a string eighteen feet long, and fasten the end of it by a nail to the centre of the blazed trunk, A ; fasten another sixteen feet long to B; then stretch out the loose ends of both until they just meet; and there is the place for your stake." " I declar'!" exclaimed the old man. " That's the use of the tew trees. Banged if I dew see, though, how you're gwine to git along by runnin' a line from jest one." " If I run two lines, as I have shown you, wherethey meet will be the point. Now if I run one line, and measure it, I shall find the point where the other line ought to meet it. We '11 see. Here on my compass is a circle and a scale of degrees, which shows me how to set it according to the bearings. Now look through these sights, and you are looking straight in the direction of your section corner." " Curi's, ain't it ?" grinned the old man. " 'Cordin' to that, my corner is out on the perairie, jest over be- yant that ar knoll." " You 're right. Now go forward to the top of it, while I sight you, and we '11 set a stake there. As I signal with my hands this way, or this, move your stake to the right or left, till I make this motion; then you are all right." The young surveyor had got his compass into position, by looking back through the sights at the tree. He now placed himself between it and the tree, and, sighting forward, directed the old man, who went on over the knoll, where to set his stakes. On...