152 I GO A-FISHING. 



however, you will bear in mind that black flies and mos- 

 quitoes increase as the fishing improves. 



On Monday morning before breakfast I killed nine fish 

 near the house, at the mouth of the Weller brook, which 

 weighed eleven and a half pounds. I can not learn from 

 any one that a speckled trout has been taken in these 

 Adirondack waters for many years weighing over four 

 pounds. There is nothing in size to equal our Maine 

 waters, where the brook trout grows to weigh eleven 

 pounds, and where seven and eight pound fish are as 

 common as three-pound fish elsewhere. It is not a very 

 common thing in the Adirondacks in modern times to find 

 a trout over two and a half pounds. I saw one taken out 

 of Cold Brook, a branch of the Osgood, which was a little 

 short of three pounds. But it will prove difficult to find 

 a comfortable hotel and home like Paul Smith's any where 

 in the world with plenty of good trout within ten minutes 

 of the door, and in the later season a reasonable number 

 of three-pounders. My camping days are pretty much 

 over, and I prefer now a good roof, a good table, a good 

 bed, and some of the refinements of civilized life in the 

 evening after a day's sport, and here one has all that is 

 needed. 



My camping days are pretty much over, I say, and yet 

 I slept on the balsam boughs one night. John and Frank 

 were very anxious to have me revive old memories by 

 going to Follansbee Junior for a night. I yielded to the 

 temptation, and on Wednesday morning, while Frank went 

 in on foot across the woods, John and myself went down 

 the St. Regis River fishing, till we came to the junction of 

 the Follansbee outlet, and up that to the pond. The St. Re- 

 gis is a wild stream, now pouring down rocky rapids, now 

 gliding swiftly under dark pine groves, now lounging slug- 



