FOREST AND STREAM. 



259 



I quietly withdrew a little way, and then slipped through 

 the hammock on my left out to another old beach, and 

 then passed by them. I passed from one beach to another, 

 wherever there was an opening in the 'hammock, giving 

 the beaches as careful a looking over as I could. I had 

 proceeded this way for over two miles without a sight of 

 game. I had seen several fresh tracks, but they all went 

 straight across from one thicket to another, so that nothing 

 could be done at trailing them. 



At one place I saw the trail of a sow and five pigs, the 

 latter, by the tracks, three months old. These, most prob- 

 ablv are wild, as no one would be likely to put tame hogs 

 on "an island when* the panthers are so plenty as they are 

 here. On an island about a mile north, called Long Key, 

 there is a fine breed, which were put there thirty years 

 ago, and have never been attended to since. They are 

 now perfectly wild, and have stocked the other islands ad- 

 joining. 



I began to be rather discouraged at my want of success. 

 The sun was now well up, though not in sight over the 

 trees from where I was. Perhaps I may have regretted the 

 fine notions I held two miles further back, about shooting 

 fawns. But it was too late to mourn over wasted oppor- 

 tunities. I must keep on, and hardly had I made up my 

 mind to stick by my principle about shooting does, and had 

 become reconciled to take whatever goods the gods should 

 see fit to send in my way, if any, or none at all, when, as 

 I stepped rather carelessly from behind a stunted cedar, 

 what should be right before me, within 40 yards, but three 

 noble deer! My heart almost stopped beating with the sur- 

 prise, but in an instant more, there was a clear case of 

 palpitation. I was back again behind the cedar bush so 

 quick, that it was a matter of instinct, and not of volition. 

 I peered cautiously through the branches. I had not 

 alarmed them, that was sure, and I took a minute to look 

 them over. All three were bucks; one was an immense 

 fellow. He seemed through my peep-hole, more like a 

 two-year old beef than a deer . His head of horns was 

 more than half grown. The other two were good sized 

 deer certainly, with horns out a little longer than their ears; 

 but they were almost dwarfed by the large one. It of 

 course took but an instant to decide that I "wanted" the 

 large one,. I cautiously pushed my Ballard over a limb of 

 the cedar, cocked it noiselessly, and tried to take aim. 

 I couldn't do it. I couldn't see a sight on my 

 rifle to save myself. I could see nothing but 

 deer, deer, deer. They covered the whole expanse 

 of my vision. I had as clear a case of "buck ague" 

 as the veriest greenhorn. I was ashamed of myself. I 

 who had killed with a rifle 27 deer, have the buck ague 

 now! It was preposterous. What if it was over seven 

 years since, I had looked through the sights at such lordly 

 game? I would not have believed it of myself, if it had 

 been prophesied of me before starting. But it was too 

 true, and the only redeeming feature about it was that I 

 knew it, realized the condition I was in, ar d did not fire. 

 I did not dare lower the hammer of my rifle for fear that 

 in my nervousness, it might slip from my thumb and ex- 

 plode the charge. I sat back quietly upon the ground and 

 took a look around at things in general, just to divert my 

 mind if I could, and give my blood a chance to cool down. 

 In spite of everything, however, back my gaze would come 

 again to those deer. The two smaller ones were at play. 

 They did not seem to care to butt one another— horns were 

 probably too tender— but they would charge up to one 

 another with fierceness, until almost touching foreheads, 

 and then draw back a few feet, shaking their heads and 

 stamping the* ground. The large one was evidently acting 

 as referee; he was prancing around them, shaking his head 

 and pawing the sand in fine style. I became interested 

 iu their antics in a moment. There was nothing ludicrous 

 about the play of the fawns; they were too perfectly 

 graceful; but these grown ones were very comical. 

 Indeed, I fail to see anything very graceful about any of 

 the movements of a grown deer, as to me they seem stiff- 

 legged at any gait. As soon as I became interested in 

 watching their movements, the "ague" began to disappear. 

 I could look at other things also. Carefully keeping my 

 finger away from the trigger, I tried if I could sight my 

 ntie again. Yes, I could find the sights now, and care- 

 fully bringing them in range of a spot about two inches be- 

 hind the fore shoulder, as he stood a little quartering from 

 me, I pressed gently on the trigger. It was done. Before 

 the smoke obscured my vision I saw him reel, and in an 

 instant afterwards I heard him crashing among the dead 

 cedars and cabbage palmetto leaves in the hammock to the 

 ri ght. I felt sure that he was my venison, for if I had 

 missed, I should have heard him further away as he ran. 

 As the smoke opened, there were the other two, standing in 

 the same spot, and looking wildly about to see what all that 

 sudden interruption meant. They evidently had not the 

 slightest idea of my whereabouts, for they looked in every 

 other direction. Could I get another? The old shell was 

 out, and a new one in instantly. I felt that I was getting 

 excited, but there was no help for it. The deer were 

 getting very nervous, and were liable to make a break at 

 any instant, and twenty feet to either side, could be out of 

 my sight for ever. It must be done. I nerved myself for 

 the effort. I tried to "brace up, and have some style about 

 me, but I fear it was of no use. I almost know I had the 

 ague" again, and I quite know that when I fired, both those 

 bucks bounded into the hammock, passed by where their 

 comrade lay, and "away they flew, over the hills and far 

 away," 



nnli re !° a f ed , as l walked alon £» and was soon beside my 

 w*fc lord of the Island. And. h e was a lord, indeed, for 



after disemboweling him and taking his head off, I pinned 

 his legs together in the usual hunter style, and getting them 

 over my shoulder I tried to lift him, but could not. I drew 

 the carcass up beside a small oak tree, and tried again by 

 holding to the tree with one hand. I made out to straighten 

 up, but as for taking two steps with such a load, I couldn't 

 do it. Perhaps recent illness had left me a little weak, and 

 had I been in more robust health, I might have wrestled 

 with it to some purpose; but it won't alter the fact that 

 it was a very heavy deer. Not only was he large, but also 

 very fat. It was full two hundred yards through a thick 

 hammock to the nearest water. I disliked to leave my 

 game and go home for help, so I set to work to drag him 

 on the ground. It was hard work, but after an hour spent 

 in tugging at my load, in cutting away vines and brush, I 

 landed him at the waters edge, and started back to my 

 first landing place for the sloop, intending to run up along- 

 side in deep water until opposite my deer, and then go in 

 with the skiff to bring him out. As I went back, I fol- 

 lowed the trail of the other two bucks; they had taken 

 back down the island on a beach, parallel to the one I 

 found them on. I looked carefully for some sign of a 

 wound, but no drop of blood was to be seen for the whole 

 two miles. I followed them, and through the whole dis- 

 tance they broke their gate but once. About fifty yards, or 

 a little less, from where the large one fell, they had stopped 

 a little to wait for him, probably, but when I came through 

 on that side they went on. 



"When I reached the sloop, I found the wind had got 

 back into the S. W. for the day, and as this gave me a 

 fair wind, I was soon off the place where my buck was 

 lying. The tide was so high that I could run the skiff 

 clear across the sand flat, quite up to the hammock where 

 he lay, and I soon had him on board and on the way home. 

 My success was appreciated, and I thought I had good 

 reason for feeling proud, certainly, as long as I did not go 

 into particulars very much about the "ague" or my second 

 shot. We had no means of weighing the carcass, but 

 every one said few grew larger down there. He had been 

 under fire before, for just under the skin of one of his 

 hams was a low mould spot, which he had evidently car- 

 ried for several years. Major Sarasota. 

 [To be continued.] 



A CHAPTER ON MICHIGAN FISH AND 

 FISHING. 



ABOUT five years ago, the interior of the northern half 

 of the lower peniusula of Michigan was penetrated 

 by a railroad, leading from Saginaw northward, and since 

 that time health-seekers and sportsmen have found it an 

 easy matter to reach the plateau which lies between the 

 two great lakes— Michigan and Huron. Once there, a more 

 healthy region can nowhere be found. It was in Sep- 

 tember, 1872, that 1 first found the way into that place, by 

 traveling upon the construction trains which passed and re- 

 passed over the track as suited the convenience of the con- 

 tractors, who were grading and laying iron about mid- 

 way between Saginaw and Mackinaw. With my nervous 

 system shattered, with my stomach worn out, and in the 

 hourly fear of paralysis and all its attending trains of evils, 

 I took the advice of a sensible physician, threw "physic to 

 the dogs," and inquired for a more healthful region than was 

 the one I was in. The Encyclopedia told me of the high- 

 lands, out of which the Au Sable and other waters ran 

 down to the lakes, and a friend told me about the railroad, 

 and with my little boy as a companion, I sought out the 

 country, and on the shores of St. Helen's lake shot ducks 

 and "partridge," and recovered my lost health for three 

 weeks. The time was not very long, it is true, but a growl- 

 ing Bar (jailed me back to my daily routine of motions and 

 demurrers, and since then, with an annual pilgrimage 

 during the summer vacation to that region, 1 have been 

 able to perform forty and two week's toilsome labor in the 

 court-room each year, and to become stouter and stouter 

 all the time. But I did not sit down to write to the read- 

 ers of the Forest and Stream so much about the health- 

 giving influences of the country as about its game, although 

 I can scarcely refrain from calling upon the tired brain- 

 workers— those, in a word, who can say of themselves "the 

 whole head is sick" — to procure tent, shot gun, and fish- 

 hook, and go at once to the woods. I know something 

 now of the great number of these invalids in every com- 

 munity—editors, lawyers, judges, preachers, teachers— for 

 sympathy brought them tome, and I know, moreover, how 

 prone they are to suffer and endure in silence, for of all 

 diseases not the result of shame, one is least apt to publish 

 a brain trouble. If all such would only go to the woods in 

 some elevated region where the air was pure, and spend a 

 few weeks in roughing it— in fishing and hunting for 

 "meat" as well as sport— I believe those sad announce- 

 ments which we so often see to the effect that so-and-so 



editor, lawyer, doctor or preacher, as the case may be— 

 "was stricken down this morning with paralysis, and no 

 hopes are entertained of his recovery" would be seen 

 much less frequently than they are now. 



The lower peninsula of Michigan resembles a huge fiat- 

 iron about as much as anything else I can liken it to, with 

 the point terminating at Mackinaw. In the interior the land 

 rises to a height of from 600 to 700 feet above the level of 

 the lakes; and the Thunder bay, the Au Sable, the Au 

 Gres, the Muskeegon, Manistee and other little rivers of 

 Michigan, fret and foam their way down the si(?e3 of this 

 plateau into one or the other of the two great lakes which 

 lie upon either side of it. This highland was once covered 

 by a thick growth of pine timber, hut during the past I 



hundred years, as I imagine, millions of acres of it have 

 been swept away by the fires, and to-day there are vast 

 areas covered only by the bush pine, and sometimes not 

 even that. The places denuded of the timber are known 

 as "plains," but no plain is so ancient as not to contain 

 an abundance of pine knots and other evidences of the 

 formerly existing forest. 



The entire region is dotted over with little" lakes^'and 

 ponds, and with the fish found in these, and also in the 

 running streams, together with the deer and bear in the 

 woods, I know of no more profitable sporting ground ac- 

 cessible to the western man. Some of these lake3 are 

 land-locked, having no apparent inlet or outlet, while 

 others are the sources of streams which ultimately find 

 their way to the great lakes. Most of them are irregular 

 in outline, and nearly all have their greatest length from 

 north to south, from which last circumstance the geologist 

 might argue that the great force which ploughed out these 

 lake basins was moving in a north and south direction. 



The principal fish found in the lakes are the pickerel, the 

 black bass, the rock bass and yellow perch. In the Muskee- 

 gon, Manistee, Au Sable and Au Gres rivers, I know from 

 report in part, and observation in part, that the grayling 

 abounds, and from report worthy of belief, I conclude it 

 may be found in other streams also, and so may the brook 

 trout in the vicinity of the Grand Traverse region. A few 

 little towns have sprung up along the railroad, and an oc- 

 casional lumber camp may be found along the stream; but 

 beyond these, the tourist may spend weeks in the woods 

 and never come within sight of the smoke from the chim- 

 ney of a Mossback's cabin, as the few denizens of these 

 parts are called. 



It is no exaggeration to say that the lakes, as well as the 

 running streams, fairly swarm with fish, but in the vicinity 

 of the towns the waters have been cleared of their living 

 treasures with a rapidity that is truly astonishing. The 

 inhabitants of course go to the "nearest lake," but the 

 destructive work is done by the outsiders, who come in 

 for a few day's sport, and with spoon and hook catch and 

 kill from very wantoness. In 1878 I spent some four or 

 five week's at Bradford's lake, a beautiful sheet of water, 

 lying some two and a half miles south of Otsego, which 

 was alive with rock bass, weighing from a half pound up 

 to two pounds. The railroad had been opened to that 

 point a little over a year, and there was a constant stream 

 of visitors coming and going throughout the season. Most 

 of them went on to Otsego lake, but enough stopped at 

 Bradford's to keep the waters disturbed all the time. My 

 boat was convenient, and so was my landing place, and 

 daily I had to go and bury from a peck to a bushel of fish. 

 The poor things bit savagely, and the greenhorns who 

 came with hook and line imagined they were fishing, and 

 fairly took boat loads of them to let gasp and die and then 

 throw away. The result was, that two years after it was 

 rather slow work to take enough rock bass out of Brad- 

 ford's lake for a supper. 



A half mile to the east of Bradford's lake there was 

 another — a small, deep lake, covering some forty or fifty 

 acres — and which was known as Banta lake. This was 

 land-locked, and it contained a large supply of black bass. 

 There were no minnows in it, and I do not remember to 

 have ever seen but one yellow perch. The bass fed prin- 

 cipally upon the frogs, that were very numerous along the 

 margin, but when a lively minnow was dropped in there 

 was sure to be a lively scramble for it. During the season 

 already mentioned, I fished almost daily in Banta lake, and 

 I never failed in taking eight or ten bass that would weigh 

 from two and a half to four and a half pounds. But others 

 got at it also, and by the next year, fishing in Banta lake 

 was unprofitable sport. The bass were all gone, and its 

 waters were a solitude. 



But back from the railroad a few miles the bass may 

 yet be found swarming in the waters. Five miles east o"f 

 Otsego lake there is a cluster of small sheets of • water, 

 known as the Chub lakes. Two of these are forrnedjby 

 the widening and deepening of Chub creek, and they lie 

 the one above the other, being connected by a natural 

 canal. I once pushed my boat through this canal, and at 

 the outlet of the upper one there was a cordon of large 

 bass lying in an arc at different depths in the clear blue 

 water, with heads to the outlet, ready to pounce upon any 

 unlucky chub or shiner that might venture within reach. 

 I did not stop to count the hungry rascals, and cannot 

 say how many there were, but it seemed to me at the 

 time that there must have been fifty; I only know that I 

 took seven in less than as many minutes, and wanted no 

 more. 



A few days after that I visited a lumber camp at no 

 great distance from the Chub lakes, and was shown a 

 barrel half full of cleaned bass salted down for future use 

 which the lumbermen told me they had caught in a neigh- 

 boring lake "one day last week with a spoon." The sup- 

 ply in these lakes is truly amazing, and back from the 

 railroad a few miles it will not soon be exhausted. Those 

 who will wantonly destroy fish by wholesale will seldom 

 find their way very far out into the woods, and for all the 

 legitimate purposes of food and sport the supply is inex- 

 haustible. Last August I visited a legion up near the 

 headwaters of the Thunder bay river. How many lakes 

 there may be scattered throughout one or two townships 

 up there I do not know. I was not hunting for lakts after 

 the first one was found, but I remember to have run across 

 eight within a very few miles' range from camp. The 

 largest of these would cover some twelve square miles, the 

 next some nine, and so on down to an eighty-acre tract. X 

 fished in one oaly, aa4 1 had uo trouble in taking a megs 



