330 PRAIRIE AND FOREST. 
son to be the end of May—the time we should advise to 
be selected for your visit—delightful brook-fishing may be 
obtained beneath the dam in the Little Cambridge River, 
which flows within fifty yards of the hotel. Many and 
many a morning and evening I have taken here three or 
four dozen beauties, some of them over a pound, and all 
game to the last. 
I know no river better suited for the increase of trout, 
and doubtless at the present time it would swarm with 
thousands all along its course, but that a selfish being 
named Abott projected and erected a dam about twenty 
feet high, to collect water.to drive a mill; and worse, had 
the inhumanity not even to leave a fish-way ; consequently, 
Izaak Walton’s. disciples have to walk many a wearisome 
mile up this brook before fish can again be found abundant, 
and then they are so poor and badly fed that they are al- 
most unfit for the table. Now the difference between those 
beneath the dam and those above is doubtless caused by 
the unfortunate denizens of the upper water being prevent- 
ed from making their annual visits to Lake Umbagog to re- 
cruit, or enjoy the cool retreats afforded in its deep waters 
at that portion of the season when the summer sun pours 
down its refulgent, heated rays upon the unprotected water. 
Persons who resided in this locality years ago informed me 
that, before this impediment on the Cambridge was made, 
trout swarmed all the way up to the source in ten times 
the quantity they do now. But why grumble or find fault 
in this particular instance? Are such shameful structures 
not to be found in every section of this and my own land— 
a glaring example of want of forethought, or selfishness, or 
worse? But, thank goodness, such abuses in America -are 
about to be stopped; State legislation has taken the matter 
in hand, and is determined to enforce such severe penal- 
ties, that I hope, ere long, to see the temporarily-deserted 
