"I've heard tell," said Tom, continuing his employment of cutting off the limbs, "that the Britishers and the Mounseers don't use no such axes as ourn. You've been across the Big Pond, and can tell a fellow all about it." "It is true, they do not. The European axe is somewhat differently shaped from your effective weapon." "The poor, benighted critturs!" exclaimed Tom, in a tone of commiseration. "I saw one of them Parleyvoos once, try to handle an axe, and I be darned, if he didn't come nigh cutting off the great toe of his right foot. If he hadn't been as weak as Taunton water--that, folks say, can't run down hill--as all them outlandish furriners is, and had on, to boot, regular stout cowhiders, I do believe he'd never had the chance to have the gout in one toe, anyhow. Why, I'd as soon trust a monkey with a coal of fire, in a powder-house, as one of them chaps with an axe." "We have the best axes, and the most skillful woodmen in the world," said the Judge, not unwilling to humor the harmless conceit of the wood-chopper. "It's plaguy lucky we have, seeing as how we've got so many thousands and thousands of acres to clear up," said Tom, with a sort of confused notion, that the skill of his countrymen was a natural faculty not possessed by "furriners." "But, Judge," he added, "I'm astonished at your cutting down the trees at this season of the year, and it kind o' goes agin my conscience to sling into 'em." "I know what you mean. You think they ought not to be cut when the sap is rising. I suppose, the fire-wood is not so good?" "Not half. Turn the thing as you choose, and you'll see you're wrong. In the first place, the wood ain't nigh as good; then, you lose the growth the whole summer, and, lastly, you take away a fellow from business that's more profitable." "How?" said the Judge. "Do I not give you full wages? Can you get higher wages elsewhere?" "No fault to find with the pay," answered Tom; "that's good enough. But, that ain't the idee. What I'm at is, that when I work, I like to see something useful come to pass. Now, every time I strike a blow, it seems to go right to my heart; for, I says to myself, this ain't no season for cutting wood. The Judge don't understand his own interest, and he's only paying me for injuring him." Judge Bernard was too well-acquainted with the honest independence of Gladding to be offended at his uncomplimentary frankness. Nor, indeed, looking at it from Tom's point of view, could he avoid feeling a certain respect for that right-mindedness, which regarded not merely the personal remuneration to be received, but, also, the general benefit to be produced. He laughed, therefore, as he replied-- "You do not seem to set much value on my judgment, Gladding. Perhaps, I have objects you do not see."