THE AMERICAN SPORTSMAN'S JOURNAL. 
[Entered According; to Act of Congress, in the year 1879, by the Forest and Stream Publishing Company, in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. 
Terms, 84 a Tear. 10 Cts. a Copy. I 
Six Mo's, *2, Three Mo's, *1. f 
NEW YORK, THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 4, 1879. ] No. Ill Fulton°Street^Now York. 
For Forest and Stream and Bod and Qun. 
A NORTH WOODS IDYL. 
BY NED BUNTWNE. 
B Y the camp-flre’s blazing light, 
In the cheerful early night 
We were sitting, hunters three. 
With our smoking pipes alight, 
Throwing dreamy clouds of white. 
Far away upon the lee. 
" Bennett, tell ns all about 
The time you, for a gray wolf sought, 
In its dismal rooky den, 
Up where Raquette's wavelets break 
Upon the shore in snowy flake 
Beside the gloomy panther glen." 
“I will," Uesaid, with quiet look, 
And from his lip the amber took; 
“ I will, for I've no mom’ry wild 
That equals this of that dread night; 
My hair turned silver gray with fright. 
Don't smile, it did, indeed, my child 1 
“ The snow was light as brewer's yeast, 
In it with ease I tracked the beast 
Up to his rocky hiding place. 
I looked within, 'twas dark, you bet. 
But sparks like Are told where he set 
By their blue uncanny gaze. 
" I had a rifle, made in Troy, 
By Lewis, and 'twas good, my boy, 
At eighty rods in turkey time. 
I raised and sighted for them eyes, 
And blazed away, then came surprise. 
Sudden, like a camp meetin' hyme! 
“ Fd overshot. Or something so. 
For out came wolf and no way slow. 
He mounted me, I, under went, 
And rough and tumble was the game. 
Lord knows how long—that's why I’m lame, 
And why this leg is thin and bent. 
“ He gnawed and chawed and ripp’d and tore, 
While I for life did battle sore I 
I think he'd won that little game, 
If Lon Wood hadn't happened 'round, 
To give the'tyke a fatal wound. 
I thanked my God, and Lon the same! 
“ 'Twas o’er, and there Ijhelpless lay, 
As crust-locked hounded moose at bay, 
While Lon bound up eaoh bleeding vein, 
And then, as limpsy as a pack 
He piled me on his broad strong back, 
And thus I saw my friends again. 
“ Where George Dawson wields his facile pen, 
In what he calls hiB * Journal Den,’ 
A wolf skin lies upon the floor, 
'Twas off the hero of that fight! 
That’s all, so now, old boy, good night— 
Don't think my tale a stupid bore." 
Faults Nest, Aug,, 1879, 
|p \ni flag ot[ tho jgekmwr^ 
I T is astonishing how many people escape serious in¬ 
jury in the abuse of firearms. Not one out of ten exer¬ 
cises good, judgment or anything like reasonable care 
while handling and charging guns or pistols. I can recall 
over a dozen acquaintances who have been so near death 
that the additional weight of a feather or the breadth of 
a hair would have turned the scale, and yet most of them 
are alive and well to-day, though the larger number do 
not stand any danger of being drafted for a defense of 
the State. 
It may not be amiss to preface this article with a brief 
description of two or three noteworthy examples by way 
of warning, for carelessness is so universal that every 
sportsman needs cautioning now and then. 
The worst accident which occurs to me at this moment 
happened to a neighbor of mine some years ago, and his 
affliction is all the harder to bear from the fact that it 
resulted through the carelessness of another. He was 
s erving as sponger and loader for a piece of ordnance 
which had been in use to fire salutes. The man who 
served the vent was endeavoring to perform the duty 
without a thumbstall, and just after a cartridge had been 
rammed home—while the ramrod was yet in the gun— 
heat or fire in the vent burned his thumb and he lifted it 
without any warning; a premature discharge was the 
consequence, and the loader was thrown heels over head 
a considerable distance and picked up for dead, He was 
laid on a table in the Court-house, when a skillful but 
thoughtless surgeon did all he could to save what was 
left of him—not quite all, either, for he said it would be 
impossible for the poor fellow to live, and so he was left 
all night alone, lying on his back, upon that table. Nev¬ 
ertheless he lives, and deprived of both forearms as he is, 
still he does more work every day than nine-tenths of 
men who have both hands. 
Just before the war a schoolmate of mine was hunting 
gray squirrels in a grove not far from his home, using 
one of those deadly guns—a smooth-bore rifle—which had 
a long, heavy barrel and a stock reaching to the muzzle. 
To get a better sight of his game, which had “squatted" 
on a large limb of an oak, he set the gun down carefully 
and climbed upon a big pine stump ; then, with his head 
inclined to the right and his eye on the squirrel, he caught 
up the gun by the muzzle. The lock hit the stump and 
the charge of shot passed in one lump through the mus¬ 
cle and bones of his left arm. But for the inclination of 
his head he would have been instantly killed. The wound, 
after causing him intense suffering through the hot 
months, healed but left a frightful scar, and his arm be¬ 
came as strong as ever, so that he served through most of 
the war and came out of it without a scratch. 
A keen old sportsman, an uncle of mine, one accus¬ 
tomed to the use of guns all his life, had an unaccount¬ 
able accident happen to him while bee-hunting one mild 
but not warm day many years ago. He laid his gun down 
on the grass and went down on his knees to examine a 
tree, and while so occupied, moving about some distance 
from the gun—which was not cocked—he chanced to get 
in range and the charge exploded on the instant, striking 
him in one knee with such effect as to destroy it for ever. 
This might be called a genuine accident, and. shows how 
slight an amount of thoughtlessness is necessary to pro¬ 
duce wounds that will maim one for life. 
I might go on citing similar incidents, for there is no 
end to them; but these will suffice to exhibit the average 
lack of care with which guns are used. As for accidents 
with pistols I have generally found them to result from 
overloading on the part of those who carry them. In 
other words, a pistol is safe enough if the owner is not 
loaded! Whiskey is worse—more dangerous and more 
deadly—than Dittmar or any other powder. 
A party of three enthusiastic sportsmen were camping 
on the Delaware in November, 1859, in pursuit of deer. 
They had a handsome birch canoe of ample capacity, in 
which they had floated from Deposit, N. Y., designing to 
proceed as far as the Gap if the weather was favorable 
and return by rail. But in the vicinity of Narrowsburg 
a little incident occurred which necessitated a radical 
change of programme. 
For several days they had drifted among the maguift- 
cent rocks, devoting each pleasant morning to hunting 
and the balance of the day succeeding a 3 o'clock dinner 
to a prosecution of the voyage. It was delightful experi¬ 
ence, for game abounded and fish could he captured al¬ 
most anywhere for the trouble of “ dropping a line” into 
the deep pools with which this tortuous but magnificent 
river is interspersed. The weather was most propitious, 
a week of Indian summer having been vouchsafed, and 
the hazy atmosphere robed the mountain tops with azure 
while nature'herself seemed pausing in a contemplative 
mood over the fallen leaves. The sun looked like a mem¬ 
ber of some down-town club smoking at the expense of 
the nation, filling the air with interlucent clouds and 
dressing the gorges in mezzotint. 
Makeriskittonl* the home of the peaceful Lenapes.f is 
formed by the Oquago and the Popacton, two beautiful 
streams which rise on the western slope of the Catskill 
Mountains in New York, and mingle their waters on the 
boundary line of Pennsylvania and the Empire State. 
From this point to the Water Gap no wilder or more di¬ 
versified scenery exists in either state. The energetic 
hand of man has been mocked for a century by perpen¬ 
dicular walls of rock which dwarf the proudest efforts of 
masonary, and afford the nimble, sure-footed deer an im¬ 
pregnable fortress. There are boulders which three of the 
most powerful locomotives on earth could not move, 
while stones of every shape and color, many of them 
festooned with forest moss, defy the plough and shelter 
all kinds of small game. To look upon these unfrequented 
defiles one might easily imagine himself a thousand miles 
from the habitations of men, and travel days together with¬ 
out encountering any evidences of civilization except a 
thread of pale blue smoke curling upward from some hun¬ 
ter’s camp which only renders the solitude more tan¬ 
gible. 
It was a scene of this description which met the eyes of 
* Or Maolc-er-isk-lskan, acoording to Lossing's “ Field Book of 
the Revolution." 
tLenni Lenapes, the Original People, whom Lord de la Wave 
found inclined to agriculture; light of heart and affectionate, 
characteristics which Penn also records of them. 
our adventurers one morning as they turned out of their 
blankets to seek the misty river and watch for a shot at 
some thirsty roe. 
A quick breakfast having been disposed of and a lunch 
dropped into each one’s empty game bag the three separ¬ 
ated just as the fog began to rise and disclose the black, 
unrippled water which flowed along the shore almost 
noiselessly. 
The Judge shouldered his rifle and strode away up the 
river at a quick pace. The other legal gentleman went 
overthe ridge to the north ward, where an outline of timber- 
land was barely discernible, while the Doctor, whose turn 
it was to keep an eye on camp and prepare dinner, took 
his blanket to a convenient log, only two or three rods 
down the stream, and with his gun across his knees, the 
blanket over his shoulders — for the fog made the air feel 
chill — he brought out a handsome briar-wood pipe which 
was soon smoking like the funnel of an ocean steamer. 
Slowly the vapors thinned and curled away, allowing the 
sun a glimpse of the river here and there, while toppling 
cliff and ragged crag turned to shining tower and mist- 
hidden minaret which, by some optical illusion, seemed 
of gigantic proportions, hanging in the air like palaces in 
the Voyage of Life, as depicted by Cole, or shooting out 
of cloud-land andjehoas into the blue and gold of sunrise. 
The Doctor put his pipe in his pocket, left his blanketon 
the log and walked half way up the slope of a mountain, 
which flanked the ridge, and looked eastward to get some 
idea of the weather. The inspiration of the sunlight was 
manifesting itself everywhere. There was a clear sky 
and the warmth that permeated the air intensified the 
glowing splendors of the rock maples’ fire-red foliage, the 
chestnuts’ yellow leaves and the dark green luxuriances of 
hemlock and pine, the needles of which drifted down on 
the light breeze along with the silvery and light green 
leaves of the forest birch and mountain ash. 
While the Doctor was lost in admiration over this mag¬ 
nificent panorama the sharp crack of a rifle resounded 
through the forest above him, and in a minute or two a 
wounded buck bounded down the ridge toward the river, 
apparently making a bee line for the log which the Doctor 
had left only a few minutes earlier. It was a splendid 
specimen, Ms dark flanks and red sides shining like silk 
in the sunlight as the Doctor raised his trusty smooth¬ 
bore with the deliberation of an old sport, and drawing a 
bead sent an ounce ball tlirough the Jungs of the animal 
at a distance of forty or fifty rods. 
The blackbirds were assembling in solemn conclave 
south of the river when the Judge returned to dinner, 
with one lone canvas-back to repay him for his long morn¬ 
ing tramp. He reported having heard the Counselor's 
shot-barrel several times at short intervals before noon, 
since wMch notMng of Ms whereabouts could be deter¬ 
mined. The Doctor found one of his long balls in the 
young buck’s right shoulder, and conjectured that lie 
must have fired hastily or at very long range, the 
former proving correot. 
Nearly an hour slipped away, during which the Doctor 
and the Judge were at their dinners, and just as the first 
was filling his pipe for the third time, two rifle shots 
were indistinctly heard a long distance down the river. 
The reports were not close together, two or three minutes 
intervening. Remarking that the absentee would “soon 
be in,” the Judge threw away the stump of Ms after-din¬ 
ner cigar, slid the canoe into'the river, and proceeded de¬ 
liberately with some prel im i n ary arrangement of camp 
equipment, in order to get afloat as soon as possible. The 
Doctor cut a few fresh slices of venison, gathered some 
dry fuel, and settled himself to await the coming of Ms 
“ second boarder.” Five o’clock came, but no Counsel 
for the Crown was there to answer, and the Doctor 
thought " his watch must have stopped.” The sun was 
dipping dangerously near the low western hills, and the 
blackbirds were at vespers. From among tbe things in 
the canoe the Judge produced a bugle and blew three 
long, loud blasts—the signal for abandoning camp. No 
response; and hastily putting the remaining stores, etc,, 
onboard, they paddled away from the shadows along 
shore, and swept down stream in advance of the current, 
blowing the bugle at every bend and listening intently. 
After going about a mile they heard shouts some dis¬ 
tance back and further down the stream, which came 
more distinctly as they passed a ledge of rocks jutting 
into the river. Landing, they began a search winch re¬ 
sulted in finding the missing sportsman just before dark. 
In pursuing a deer toward the river he had slipped on a 
wet spot, slid down a bank of soft earth and over a nearly 
perpendicular rock to the sand and table-rock below—a 
sheer fall of ten or twelve feet—demolisMng the stock of 
his rifle, wMch was discharged by the shock, one barrel 
only bavrng been loaded. The lock on the empty barrel 
was broken and left behind, as the poor fellow was badly 
wounded in the right leg, the hall having passed clean 
tM'ougli the middle of the calf, dose to the bone. Though 
badly bruised, many portions of Ms body being black 
and blue, especially Ms left arm and hip, no bones were 
broken, and after they got Mm to tbe canoe a rainful 
and difficult task, owing to the condition jl lie d£ff— Ufa 
wound was carefully dressed, and she r 1 " 1 Minded pu fa 
Narrowsburg by moonlight. 
