MISCELLANEOUS. 263 



one has brought in a coffee sack full. Then they all feel dis- 

 couraged and the fish are dumped into the alley. ' ' 



"Why," continued our orator, "one day last winter a 

 man drove down to one of our small lakes to water his horse. 

 He cut a hole in the ice, but the bullheads came up so fast 

 that his horses couldn't drink, so he took a wooden pail and 

 went to bailing them out. He worked away until he dipped 

 out four barrels, and still they were just as thick in the hole as 

 when he commenced, so he got discouraged and drove away. 

 Oh, you needn't wink. It's a fact, for I went down and saw 

 the pile of bullheads on the ice myself. Occasionally the 

 mill boarding-house, down on Clear lake, wants a mess of 

 fish for breakfast. Well, they just send a man down to the 

 lake with a team. He takes out the tail-gate and backs his 

 wagon into the lake till the box is full of bass, then puts in 

 the tail-gate again and drives up to the house. It's a fact. 

 They're so thick in the lake they can't get out of the way, 

 and you dip them up whenever you dip up water. " 



At this stage of the game somebody moved to adjourn, 

 and we all went to bed. The next morning John O'Brien 

 loaded our traps into his wagon, took us out to the Name- 

 cagon river, two miles from town, and we made our camp on 

 a high bank overlooking a bend in the river. It was near 

 noon when the majority of the party got the camp established 

 and ready for business. Mr. Thayer and his son, Mr. 

 Cheeney and myself, went up the river about two miles above 

 camp, Mr. Foster and Mr. Hitchcock about a mile above, 

 and Mr. Powers went below. 



The stream at this point is from thirty to fifty yards wide 

 and from one to three feet deep in general, though there are 

 many deep holes in it. I speak of it as in the spring stage of 

 water. In midsummer it is considerably lower. It is very 

 swift, and there are rapids that will tax all your strength and 



