66 AX ANGLER'S RKMINISCKXCE'S. 



yards and you catch trout and bass. Indeed, the entire Allegheny range from 

 Ronceverte to Dunlap is one continuous game preserve, abounding in deer, bears, 

 turkeys, partridges, rabbits, squirrels, possums, coons and the rest, where I would 

 sooner take my chances for a bag full or a back load than in Dr. \Yeble's or 

 Austin Corbin's expensive preserves. The heart of the Alleghenies and Blue 

 Ridge, with their stupendous subdivision, is almost a duplicate of the Catskills, but 

 with more cultivation in parts and a greater diversity of products. Its canyons 

 are deeper and wilder than the Cloves, and at Covington, for instance, the land- 

 scape is more extended than at Haines' Falls or Hunter, with inclosing mountains 

 even higher. Corn fields and log cabins alternate with princely villas and up-to-date 

 hotels. Wild mountaineers with guns and pocket pistols board the trains at the 

 way stations much after the fashion of cowboys in Texas, but with much better 

 behavior, and the experiences of a tenderfoot are likely to be quite as racy and 

 stimulating as in Wyoming if he will only drive away a few miles from the rail- 

 road. All winter long, until March, there is sport for the gunner and bear hunter. 

 Deer are as plenty as wolves in Montana. One party started sixteen in three days 

 and got four of them, lately. Turkeys can be had for the baiting. Quails rise in 

 all the pea patches and green fields. Possums swing from the sweet gums and 

 'simrnon trees at the full of the moon. Coons come down from their perches at 

 command when treed, and sport in the forest runs free all through the winter 

 months, till March. About the middle of May, when the mountain streams clear, 

 trout fishing begins ; and from that time on, for nine full months succeeding, there 

 is fulsome enjoyment with rod and reel. Selah. 



And now, having delivered up the keys of the fastnesses and keeps of the 

 forest, I come to the pivotal part of my narrative, and relate my experiences in 

 the road-cut at Kanawha Falls : 



By some strange and happy chance, we had been reading that very morning of 

 an accident that had happened to an army officer and two ladies who were caught 

 in a similar trap the previous day with fatal results, and our conversation was 

 upon that catastrophe as we wended our perilous way along the railroad track. 

 Our objective point was a jutting ledge which overlooked the falls, where we 

 expected to make some shore casts for bass. The cut was narrow, the track single, 

 and the curve so sharp that we could see but a few rods ahead. I was just saying 

 that it might be well to get out of the cut as expeditiously as possible, when the 

 premonitory rumble of the approaching train caught our ears. At first it was 

 muffled ; then rose to intenser sound. I had heard falling water do the same way, 

 alternating in the cadences, and it seemed not unnatural. But I was not satisfied. 

 Had we not been on the alert we would certainly have been run down. As it 

 was, the shave was close. 



"Is that the roar of the falls?" I asked apprehensively, with an ear to wind- 

 ward. 



''Ye-es? No by heaven, no! Look!" 



The big bullseye of the locomotive shot into view like a torpedo from a 

 Zalinski gun. Quick as thought, by that fortuitous prompting which enables the 

 mind to formulate expedients on the jump, without forecast, I caught my loved 

 wife from the track and almost flung her against the face of the side wall, where 

 I pinioned her with arms extended clutching desperately to such projections as 

 had been left in the blasting. I never hugged her so hard before! Fortunately 

 there was a depression at that point, though it did not form a deep enough niche to 

 accommodate the living statuary with comfort. The train whizzed by like a rocket 



