TROUTING ON JESSUP’S RIVER. 507 
be seen, and to this day they have remained remarkably 
scarce. 
This story seemed very strange to me, but one day I shot 
a young red squirrel, the first I had killed since I came—for 
lack of opportunity—and I found it covered by this same 
warty disease, which had been described as causing their 
extermination so long ago. The pustules were quite small 
upon it, and not so thickly placed as in the time of the 
plague, when they were as large as a pea of good size, and 
there was not the space of a pin’s head any where between 
them! This accounts for their not having increased more 
rapidly—since the fact shows that the disease continues to 
linger with them, preventing, as I suppose, their arriving at 
maturity, in the majority of cases. 
But I have gone a good way aside from my theme to 
narrate these curious facts, and must get back to the ‘Bridge’ 
again, at which we arrived about the middle of the afternoon. 
There we found an old field just across the bridge. It was 
called Wilcox’s Clearing, and like all such places I had seen 
in this fine grazing region, was still well sodded down in 
Timothy, blue grass, and clover. Our luggage having been 
deposited in the shantee, which consisted nearly of boards 
torn from the old house, which were leaned against the sides 
of two forks, placed a few feet apart, we set off at once for 
the Falls, a short distance above. This was merely an initial 
trial, to obtain enough for dinner, and find the prognostics 
of the next day’s sport in feeling the manner of the fish. 
At the Falls the river is only about fifteen feet wide, 
though its average width is from twenty-five to thirty. The 
water tumbles over a ledge of about ten feet, at the bottom 
of which is a fine hole, while on the surface sheets of foam 
are whirled round and round upon the tormented eddies—for 
the stream has considerable volume and power. 
We stepped cautiously along the ledge, Piscator ahead, and 
holding his precious flies ready for a cast, which was most 
