Clinton by Walter Aimwell

Soon after Oscar left Brookdale, Jerry's father, who was interested / in the logging business, started for the head-waters of the Penobscot / river, to be absent several months. Large parties or gangs of loggers, / as they are called, encamp every winter in the forests of Maine, for / the purpose of cutting timber. After the trees are chopped down, the / logs are hauled by oxen to the banks of some stream, where they remain / until the ice breaks up in the spring, when they are rolled into the / water, and floated down the swollen river, to the mills. Such was the / business which kept Mr. Preston away from his home nearly half the year.

Jerry's conduct had never been very dutiful toward his mother, nor / very affectionate toward his little sisters, during his father's long / absences from home; but now it was soon evident that he was going to / give the family much more trouble than ever before. He obeyed his / mother only when her commands happened to be perfectly agreeable to him.