Hi Don, would that be a sennenhund? My grandfather had a variety of Swiss farm dog that he used as a cattle drover that was very calm, never frightening to cattle, that could move cattle smoothly through a village to reach outer fields.

I would like to return to chisels. My strong preference is for antique laminated chisels for several reasons. Cost, most of my old chisels were under $30, the majority under $15, most from flea markets and antique marts, granted chisels seem to be less common today than a dozen years ago old is still viable. The old chiels used simple carbon steel, are tempered very hard and are easy to sharpen to a very fine edge. Laminated blades have curvature from tip to heel that gives clearence at the handle and equally important produces a counterforce under heavy mallet blows at the tip that helps mitigate the tendency of digging in. Old chisels also have a slight taper in width of the blade that prevents jamming while chopping in deeper mortises.

I differ with Tim, I like the chisel to be equal to the mortise width when chopping out drilled mortises. My local experience is almost wholly with hardwoods and I have found that a chisel will tend to turn and dig in with oak when a smaller chisel encounters thicker wood in the corner of the mortise than at the center of the mortise.

For seven years my only slick was a Barr small slick, short blade, 2 1/2 wide and cranked neck, that I continue to use and love, however, in the past fifteen years I have added other slicks and my favorite is old, long bladed, heavy and 3 1/2 wide, maybe its the oak talking to me.

Anyhow, a carpenter will acquire, shape, tune, retune, sharpen and hone a tool and finally the what carpenter chooses is the right tool. It is all about how the work shapes the carpenter, the carpenter shapes the tool and the tool shapes the wood. I cannot predict what you will find to be most usefull because we, the work, the methods and materials are so varied.

Good luck.