110 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



[M Alton 10, 1881. 



the wings j bring the two eyelet holes together, make the 

 cord fast, attach a weight (sinker) and throw out the sinkers 

 far enough apart to keep the ducks separate. Ah soon us 

 they are lu the water they will commence washing and play- 

 ing". You can sleep in your blind, for as far as the eye can 

 reach they will see ducks on the wingand will call them — the 

 she one with a loud quack! quack 1 q\i>ek! the drake will 

 do the same, Moored, as they will he hy this means, they 

 ride like a boat breasting the sea, and they will live through 

 any sea. Secured by the foot, they will drown in five min- 

 utes. I invented the duck bridle; use it for the benefit of 

 sportsmen.— J- B. J. 



[The bridle sent by our correspondent is a hit of canvas 

 one inch wide and fourteen inches long, with eyelet in each 

 end and a slit six inches long in the centre ] 



Desk Killed with No. 10 Shot— Tara, Iowa, Feb 27.— 

 In your issue of Fob. 17 I see that Mr. G. L. Appleton, of 

 Brvau County, GeorgiB, tells of killing a deer on the run 

 with No. Oshbt, T spent the winter of 187!) SO in Marion 

 County, Florida. A gcntlemau from Connecticut also passed 

 a portion of the winter in the same vicinity. One morning, 

 while walking in the woods, I '-'eard a shot near me and soou 

 the Connecticut gentleman appeared with his gun iu his 

 hands. He said that he had just jumped a deer in some pal- 

 metto scrub and had broken tier right hind leg with a charge 

 of No. 10 shot. She got up about twenty feet from him. 

 He then tired his left barrel at her body j this was also No 

 10. She. however, got away. A few days afterward we 

 passed near the same "spot and found the deer, dead. She 

 had got out of his sight in the thick scrub and he had not 

 gone after her, as bo supposed that his shot was too small to 

 have killed her. H. R. E. 



Aitxn.TAi'.Y Bakrbl— Bcllvilie, O.— I purchased one of 



Shelton's auxiliary rifles some months ago, with which I 

 have doue some excellent shooting up to three hundred 

 yards, which is as far as 1 have tried it. Having failed to 

 find a rear sight that would give good satisfaction in thick 

 timber I have a sort of a peep sight which I made myself, 

 but do not think that it would do for game as well as an open 

 or sporting sight. Probably some one enn give us somei 

 ideas or experience in the matter. The winter has beer 

 severe here that quail shooting nest fall will not be very 

 profitable. I knew of half a dozen coveys last fall, but it is 

 impossible to find a single bird. Huffed grouse, seem to have 

 stood the storms execedinclv well; plenty of squirrels and 

 rabbits.— W. S. C. • 



Goon Heoouds. — Pittsburg, Pa., has a very 1-rge and 

 active sportsmen's association'; and is a centre for sporting 

 matters. Am mg other evidences of this fact is the huge 

 sporting goods eslablislunenl of Messrs. .1. Palmer O'Ncil 

 & Co., "who are displaying most commendable enterprise in 

 providing for the demands of their trade. Mr. O'Neil not 

 only knows what a good gun is. but understands as well how 

 louse it. As a proof both of the excellence of the gun 

 and the skill of the man, we refer our readers to the scores 

 published elsewhere, which were made with the Wes'ley 

 Richards hammerless gun. The gun, the man and the firm 

 have good records, 



The Noromisega Bpojitsmes's Club, of Bangor, Me., held 

 their annual meeting February 2-3, and elected the following 

 officers for the comine vear ; President, Join; P. Tucker ; 

 Vice-President, 11. N. Fairbanks ; Secretary, Charles York; 

 Treasurer. Fred T. Hall. Executive Committee— John P. 

 Tucker. Charles York, Fred T. Hall, H. W. Durgin, G. A. 

 Abbott.' The club is prospering and in good financial stand- 

 ing. We have twenty-four members and soitv applications 

 for membership now "of good men. We propose to seethe 

 game laws of the State carried out to the letter. Bangor. 



The Bridgeport Got Ci.tth re-organi/,' d Feb. 1, 1881, 

 formerly the North End Club. The law. as it now stands, 

 prohibits pigeon shooting in Connecticut ; but a bill is now 

 before the Legislature which will repeal it. If repealed, a 

 three days' tournament will be inaugurated, under the 

 auspices of the club, to come off some lime in the spring. A 

 drag fox hunt will also take place on each day of the tourna- 

 ment. The tournament will lake place at Sherwood Park. 

 Officers; President. Charles Greather; Vice-President, James 

 Scott ; Secretary. F. Symington ; Treasurer, John White. 



The Kennedy Rifle has of late won many friends be- 

 cause of its excellent performances. The weapon is manu 

 factored by the well-known Whitney Arms Co., of New 

 Haven, Conn., and the makers are among the men of the 

 day who believe in building up a reputation for their rifle 

 by its own record and merits. Those who are not familiar 

 with the Kennedy rifle will do well to send to the manu- 

 facturers for a description of it. 



Pjiof. Hall's Got.— Prof. "Wm. B. Hall, of Indiana, Pa., 



is to be congratulated upon the recovery of his valuable gun, 

 the theft of which was noted by us some, time ago. 



£$x and §iver ^gishinq. 



*ISU IN SEASON IN IUAKCH. 



FBESH WATER. 



l'lekerel, Ii»ci rrliculalus. I White L'.us=, liorr.ux chrysopn. 



Pike or Pickerel, lixnx Indus. I Koek Bass, AmMoplim. (Two 



Plke-pereli (wall-eyed pike) species). 



Stizolrlhium aniericaniim, .S'. War-mouth, Chmwbryttus rjulnsus. 



inimuni:, etc. Crapple, J-^thoxvs ■>n<3-r-:.r,<fic-u!a(-'.i. 



Vf'liillV IVrell. /V.r.-.J .I,;; l\:. ■:".';.■.. I I '., 1 I ' 1 I '■ 1 < M , 1 '. : , , d J Kl «l . 'I ■'■.{ f 1 /, 



Striped Bass, lli:r.ai* linmtus. I CliuD, San„liUs corportdti. 



SALT WATEE. 



s;.;' isass. o.'jiovi). !•/,,,<!.,. c.lrnriw. I Smelt, Osmerux mordax. 



Striped Bass, /;.'«-u.v limatitn. ; roltoelr. /WiaW-iu* cnr>muiriut. 

 While Perch, Jlforo 



Akoiiery.— The Executive Committee, of the National Arch- 

 ery Association of the United States is now in session at the 

 office of the Corresponding Secretary. Mr G. F. E. Pcarsatl, 

 No. 208 Fulton street. Brooklyn, prepared to receive applica- 

 tion from archery clubs in any State of the Union for admis- 

 sion into the National Association, As the grand annual 

 meeting of the National will be held in Prospect, Park, Brook- 

 lyn, during the second week of July, at, which none but mem- 

 bers of the National Clubs will be allowed to compete, it is 

 advisable that applications for membership tic made, immed- 

 iately to the Corresponding Secretary, who will afford all 

 necessary information, with copies of the constitution, by- 

 laws, etc. 



We have received a copy of what is perhaps the smallest 

 newspaper published in the world. It is the School News, 

 edited by a Pawnee boy, who is one of the pupils at the 

 Indian school, Carlisle, Pa., and the pages— there are four of 

 them— measure four inches by three inches. The editor ad- 

 vises his subscribers to keep their undershirts on and to study 

 hard. Napoleon is said to have feared a newspaper much 

 more than a hostile army ; if the young Carlisle editor 

 learns his business he may yet play an important part in solv- 

 ing the Indian question. 



Tb-bfokeitost name In the retail clothing trade Is that or Baldwin, 

 the Clothier. He Has the largest establishment In New York and 

 Bly one Drench Btore— " Baldwin Building," Brooklyn. 



THOUTING ON THE UNKNOWN. 



" T 1 VES there a man with soul so dead " that has not 

 I 1 somewhere way over the hills and down into the 

 valley a choice little hit of woodcock cover that nobody else 

 in all this world knows of, or some trout brook hidden in the 

 depths of the forest, where no one drops a worm or casts a 

 fly but lie to whom alone the brook is known 1 



The woodcock cover may bo shot over by a dozen others, 

 who each cherish the same delusion, still you hug the fond 

 fancy to your breast that you alone pull trigger there, and 

 that for you the brown cock wait in sweet anticipation of 

 being shot exclusively by yourself. 



The trout stream mn.y be fished by half the urchins in town ; 

 you won't believe it, but stealthily take a devious path 

 "through the woods to reach the sanctuary, known to none 

 oilier among the sons of men. 



Away in the vast forests of the North I know a lake, walled 

 in by virgin hills, flooded with the sunshine of summer. 

 Down through the woods a foaming river pours its swift 

 current into the lake. There leap the great red trout ; there 

 you hear the partridge drum as you oast the fly, and there 

 the caribou looks curiously at you from out the thickets. 



Where is that river ? AlasI my friend, for you it is no- 

 where ; it is Utopia ; it is the great Unknown to all the 

 world besides, for I alone know of its existence. It is my 

 sanctuary. And I am sure 1 cannot disclose it to you until 

 at least you tell me truly the exact locality of that new alder 

 run where you shot a dozen cock one afternoon last fall, 

 where no one else ever shot a cock before. But I will tell 

 you of a day's fishing I once had on the Unknown. 



We pushed out upon the lake at "5 o'clock in the morn- 

 ing," just as the bell on the little frontier church was ringing 

 matin's. Our boat was a light cedar, lap-streak canoe, twen- 

 ty-three feci long My guides, Jim and George, pulled a 

 leisurely stroke, while I trawled with two light rods from the 

 stern. 



1 soou reeled off a long line from each rod. On one hue I 

 trolled a cast of three brilliant flics ; on the other an enor- 

 mous trolling fly, with yellow body and red wings. 



Out upon the* great lake we rowed. The only ripples that 

 broke the surface came from our boat, and reached away to- 

 ward the receding shore in long, diverging lines. The lake 

 was yet asleep iu the lap of her wooded hills, the morning 

 sun 'Shone brighly from a clear, blue sky ; a great quiet filled 

 the air, broken only by the distant dying peal of the church 

 bell calling to early mass. It, was 



The rarest lhli« or all the year— 

 A nerreet day tu June. 



Ah I there's a rise— a tug on the line, the swift click of the 

 reel and a swirl in the smooth water a hundred feet astern. 



How it thrills one to be among the trout again. The little 

 fellow fights gamily as 1 reel him in. Ziz-zag he rushes with 

 the line and gives a pretty curve to my nine-ounce pliant 

 rod of toughest greenhearl. In he comes, the first trout, 

 with more pluck "than weight, for he falls two ounces short 

 of a pound. 



Three miles across the lake we pull. As we near the far- 

 ther Bhore there comes a sharp jerk on the trolling fly. My 

 larger rod, of eleven ounces, buckles to the strain. I 

 pass my disengaged rod to George, who reels in the line out 

 of the way, and, standing up, I fight a large, determined 

 fish. He seeks the bottom ; the rod bends so sharply I am 

 forced to give him line. Now he slacks and I eagerly reel in 

 great lengths of the silken cord. He shoots under the boat. 

 Why will trout be so disagreeable ? What anawkward bend 

 it gives your rod and what a miserable, strain it puts upon it 

 to have a big fish run under the boat, double up your little 

 strip of wood, bring the tip to the water's edge and then tug, 

 tug, tug, like the extra leader on an overcrowded horse-car 

 stuck on a slippery, uphill grade 1 But. now he gives a swoop 

 out from under the stern and breaks water for the first time, 

 flinging himself into air, shaking the drops from him. "A 

 beauty, boys, a beauty 1" 



The tip of the rod drops a bit, the hook does not tear out 

 and the big trout falls into the lake « ith the hook still fast. 

 Again and again he leaps into air, then seeks the depths once 

 more, but this time so feebly that I snub him short, then reel 

 him to the surface. A few faint rushes. Ah ! he lies over on 

 his side. What a picture on the surface of the water, his side 

 all mottled with gold, gleaming with crimson points, his 

 white throat and his red-tipped fins I 



Bui it won't do to stop and admire till he gets his second 

 wind. Jim stands ready in the bows with the edge of the 

 landing-net just dipping "in the water. Smoothly I slide my 

 prey along tic crystal surface of the lake, Jim gives a sudden 

 dip" with ihenet'and aboard flops master trout. Placed on 

 the steelyards he weighs down just, two pounds and three 

 ounces. It is wonderful how the simple act of carrying scales 

 with you reduces the weight of trout. Now, my guides and 

 I would all have sworn this trout weighed seven pounds at 

 the least, calculation had he broken away. 



Having landed him, had we only fortunately forgotten our 

 steelyards we should have taken our solemn oaths that he was 

 a five-pounder, but with that miserable little exact coutrivauce 

 for reducing the weight of trout we find hia weight to be just 

 two pounds and three ounces. "You'd better take river 

 weight," once said an old guide to me. "What's river 

 weight f" quoth I. 



"Oh. that's what we guides set the fish at without weighing 

 'em. It's always much more satisfactory to gentlemen, sir." 



But I took my scales along, weighed every fish and entered 

 I he weight, in mv note-book. There were no five-pounders 

 that the guidebad promised me. At last he took up my steel- 

 yards with a contemptuous sneer, and looking straight at me, 

 said, oracularly, "You'll never catch a big fish as long as you 

 carry that d— d thing along with yer." 



True enough ; I have al ways carried that d — d thing along 

 with me, and I have never caught one-half the big trout that 

 most of my brother piscators who take river weight are ready 

 to swear to. 



"Show me agunner and I'll showyou a liar," was one of 

 glorious Cale Loring's brevities. Ah, me ! must we also in- 

 clude fishermen. But my guides are pulling up the lake, my 

 linos are scarcely reeled out before I get a strike on my little 

 rod, and after fine sport bring to basket a trout of a pound and 

 three quarters. 



We hear a gurgling sound ; a little rill stealthily creepsout 

 of the forest and trickles into the lake ; Jim and George rest 

 on their oars, and reeling in my line to twenty feet I make a 

 cast and drop three flies fluttering down through the air to 

 the margin of the lake just where the brooklet ripples in. 

 Jove, how the little, trout leap for the gaudy deceits, I hook 

 and land one of three quarters of a pound, then another the 

 same weight, then three more Weighing, respectively, a half 

 pound, six and five ounces. 



The trout were still jumping in expectation of more flies, 

 but the catch was getting too small, so we pulled away and 

 soon reached the mouth of the Unknown River. Here I took 

 the middle of our cedar canoe, andreeled in and stowed away 

 my larger rod. Jim stepped into the stern, then the guides, 

 taking their iron-tipped setting poles, forced the canoe steadi- 

 ly up the foaming Tapids of the Unknown. Here we caught 

 a few half-pounders ; next we paddled through two miles of 

 dead water with never a rise. Now, we come to a deep, 

 broad, still pool. Great ash trees lean far out over the water. 

 Jim and George cease paddling. Stealthily the canoe forges 

 ahead with its old momentum. 



1 swing my rod back, and with the most gingerly turn of 

 the wrist of which I am capable shoot my choicest, cast of 

 flies out into the air, then let tbem drop like fluttering butter- 

 flies upon the smooth surface of the pool. At the first cast a 

 ruddy trout jumped perpendicularly clear of the water, miss- 

 ed the fly and dropped back stiff as a stick. At the second 

 cast I hooked him - a pounder 



Next a bigger fellow rose to the lure. He weighed a pound 

 and a half. Then a monster swirled up and quietly took the 

 fly, but as he was fat and lazy, Jim soon netted him— a very 

 haudsome fish weighing full two pounds and a half. 



It is true that one needs to be very quiet and circumspect 

 in trout-fishing; yet it is equally true— ami this I did not rind 

 out for years — that in a large pool it is not well to anchor 

 your craft or cast all tho time from one spot, even ir that 

 spot commands the whole pool. 



I fancy that the trout, after a while, get accustomed to 

 seeing the flies drop in the same way and pulled everlastingly 

 in the same direction or toward the same point and so get 

 educated up to your little game. Or perhaps trout need to 

 be stirred up a bit to give the quickest sport, and a boat mov- 

 ing slowly and quietly around a pool, with an almost imper- 

 ceptible dip of the paddle, may stir them up just enough, 

 without frightening them. 



That a canoe and paddle do not always scare the trout I 

 know full well. Indeed, I think the reason so many trout, 

 . when hooked, rim under the canoe is because they mistake it 

 for a log and seek shelter beneath it. 



An old trapper told me that once when propellinghis canoe 

 with a red paddle slowly across a remote lake a large trout 

 shot up from astern and bit his paddle as it quietly moved 

 through the still water. 



So after landing the three trout we paddled cautiously 

 around the pool. Now a ruddy hero catches the fly and 

 bravely fights ; run after run he gives. The sharp click of 

 the reel makes sweetest music as the line whizzes out. But 

 Jim's laudimr-net stands ready and open like the doom of 

 fate and gathers him in. The fish weighs two pounds six 

 ounces, but he was a male, and these light, hardest, Another 

 rose ; he weighed one pound ten ounces. Then, as we 

 slowly moved about the pool, a grand old red-bellied male 

 broke" water and took the fly iu air. What sport he gave ! 

 lashing the pool with his tail, swirling around, the tight gut 

 cutting the "water -with a twang like the string of a violin, 

 then diving to the bottom, bending the little rod to a keen 

 tension, almost to breaking. Jim landed him at last and he 

 brought down the scales to two pounds and ten ounces, but 

 the scales did not do him justice. Nothing but river weight 

 meetB the requirements of such a plucky trout as this. 



We had taken six trout from this one pool in 1*88 than half 

 an hour, each weighing a pound or more and the six weigh- 

 ing eleven pounds and three-quarters. May this pool forever 

 be unknown. We paddled on. Just above in a whirlingrapid 

 we basketed a trout of two pounds and two ounces. At the 

 first catch after landing him a dappled monster took the fly, 

 cut across the rapids from shore to shore and fought me on 

 every inch of line I reeled in. He was the biggest trout yet. 

 How anxiously I watched the scales as the great, fellow hung 

 pendant. Whv didn't he pull them down to three pounds! 

 "Hold on ! hold on ! " 1 cried to Jim, who held him, for the 

 trout flapped his tail and the index on the. scale.-, seemed to 

 move down a bit. But it was no use. No friendly hand was 

 near to drop a charge, of shot into the trout's gullet or stuff a 

 stone into his jaws,"so the scales remained inexorably at two 

 pounds and thirteen ounces. 



But our sport here was not ended, for iu the rapids we 

 took two more which weighed two pounds seven ounces and 

 two pounds one ounce respectively. Then we poled on, 

 catching a trout wherever we chose to whip the stream 



Soon we hear a dull, distant roar that grows louder and 

 louder as we pole up the rapid river. Rounding a bend wo 

 catch sight of a white wall of foam stretching across the 

 streamfrom hank to bauk. Thcseare the Unknown falls. The 

 wide river pours over a ledge of rock and tumbles down a 

 rocky incline for thirty feet or more. The wienie fall is not 

 more than ten feet vertically, but the rapid water is dashed 

 into foam, and the white, tumbling line forms a pretty con- 

 trast with the dark pool beneath and the high, green woods 

 on either bank. At the foot of the falls we land for dinner. 

 I count the trout ; there are thirty. The twelve largest 

 weigh twenty-five pounds and two ounces. I layout these 

 dozen two-pounders in a row in the bottom of the canoe and 

 a pretty sight they were as a fisherman may care to see. Two 

 red-bellied, big-headed males had a whopper-jawed, horny 

 beak projecting upwa r ds from the point of their jaws which 

 fitted into agrooveat the end of their noses when their mouths 

 were shut. 



Meanwhile George had built a fire, hung the kettle and got 

 ready the frying-pan. Jim lays violent hands and a sharp 

 knife on one of my two-pound pets. The frying-pan sizzles 

 and sputters, and fragrant odors are wafted from the tea- 

 kettle. Soon, sitting on the bank under the shad? of the 

 forest looking out on the foaming falls, we ate a royal wood- 

 land meal. , _ 

 After dinner I tried the fly at the foot of the falls. I 

 hooked a very lively fish, that, gave great play in the broken 

 water, and ran out more line than any trout of the day. 

 Brought in at last by Jim's inevitable n-t ; he proved to be an 

 even two-pounder. Quickly I catch thirteen little fellowB in 

 the spray of the falls. Then the guides set me ashore and I 



