tEntered 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. 
NEW YORK, THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 1 1, 1879. 
SOME DAY! 
OOME day when seated by the white shining sand, 
I shall have looked my last upon the sea, 
And death boeide me looking, too, will stand; 
Though I shall know not he is close to me. 
I shall not feel his touch so cold and ohill— 
I shall not hear hiB footsteps creeping- still 
And silent on the hard, wave-beaten beacb. 
Some day the woods I love so well will fade 
Out from mine eyes forever. X shall hear 
No more the birds sing- In the sylvan shade, 
Where woodland fountains sparkle bright and clear. 
I'wlU not know it—but the golden sun 
My raptured eyes no more shall gazo upon— 
No more its rays my upturned forehead reach. 
Some day my wandering feet will slowly tread 
for the last time the winding mountain way; 
For the last time will watch the clouds o'erhead 
Upon the slopes in changeful shadows play. 
The trees will wave in leafy splendor there — 
But I with bird and bee thenceforth will share 
Those quiet hours of peace in life no rnore- 
Some day for the last lime my eyes will close 
To all that can annoy or lead astray; 
The lids will drop alike to friends and foes. 
To open on a brighter, fairer day; 
Shall droop to grief, to sorrow and to pain— 
To weary rack of body, heart and brain— 
To slanderer’s breath and disappointment sore. 
And then with heart at peace within my breast 
And folded hands, my friends shall gaze on me— 
Shall even envy as I lie at. rest, 
What all on earth must come at length to be— 
A sinless shell. But pray, sigh not nor weep, 
God lent me life; He now that life will keep 
Safe in His fold as shepherds keep their sheep. 
Sept., 1879. Franklin IV, Fish. 
|i }enr punting ^annd (fttorgiun^jgg. 
H AUL in your slack! 
Belay !" (Creak 1 crack ! 
creak?) And the steamer Silver Spray ground 
her chafed timbers agaiust the log jetty at Sbe-ba-wa- 
nah-ning, blew off her steam noisily for a moment, and 
then her throttle closing suddenly, let into our ears a 
strange Indian and French patois from the motley, lan¬ 
tern-lit group flocking about the gang-plank, It was 11 
o’clock at night, dark and wet. 
My fellow-voyager, Mr. Arthur Kilburn, jr., and my¬ 
self had come down from Sault Ste. Marie, leaving this 
latter place on the 17th of September. It was our first 
hunting and fishing tour into Georgian Bay. 
“ What place is this, Captain?” asked my comrade. 
‘ ‘ She-ba-wa-nak-ning, sir. Stop about ten minutes, 
just long enough to run up with the ma i l - bag and take 
on six barrels of whitefish. Come, come ! Hurrah, boys! 
Hurrah, hoys! (this latter exhortation to the deck-hands, 
rolling on the whitefish). 
We stood and looked at the half-savage crowd. Fog 
was driving in. The steamer’s red lights aloft showed 
like dingy garnets. 
“ Bon soir, Sue,” called the second mate to one of the 
red-jacketed young women on the jetty. “Seen any¬ 
thing more of that bear ?” 
“ 'Deed, yes sir,” replied the girl cheerily. " It's coom 
round twice sence you's here, Killed two more coos and 
a koog, and coom just the nighest gettin’ Molly-meg’s 
two pappoos out blueberry in’.” 
“ What's that about bears?” we demanded, 
Rather reluctantly the second mate turned Mb atten¬ 
tion from the girl on the wharf. “ Oh, it’s jest a big 
black bear,” said he, “ that's got after them here. Take’! 
hogs, cows, pappooses, anything. Big’s an ox, they 
say.” 
“Why don’t they shoot the brute?” Arth asked, in 
credulously. 
“Well, that’s it,” laughed the mate. 
“What say?" said my comrade, turning to me. 
“ Here’s a bear spoiling to be hunted. Shall we go for 
that bear?" 
That’s what we’ve up here for, hunting,” was my 
reply. 
“ Go it is, then,” exclaimed my adventurous friend. 
To run to our state-rooms, seize our valises, ulsters and 
rifles was the work of a moment, and we jumped from 
the rail to the pier just as they cast off the line. 
“Now then,” says Arth, addressing himself to the 
crowd generally, “ fetch on your bear.” 
But the aborigines did not take the joke worth a cent. 
The squat, dark-skinned group regarded us in distrustful 
silence’, indeed, that to land in the night at one of these 
remote, outlandish little hamlets of half-breeds, Indians 
and French Canadians, where the English language is a 
rarity, is not a nice thing to do, we came near finding out 
to our cost. The people, whom we had landed to deliver 
from the bear, were very slow to receive us. Hotel there 
was none, and so far as we could learn nobody ever put 
up anybody, nor wanted to, for love or money. It be¬ 
gan to rain hard, too. At length we heard of a man who 
once put up a government inspector. He lived about a 
half-mile off. His name was Thomas Methot. An In¬ 
dian showed us his light, and we steered for it over log 
fences, stumps and the wrecks of old canoes. Luckily 
Methot was indoors, and, after some parley, let us in, 
too. His house was built of squared timber. There were 
two rooms. His wife, Dollie, was a “monster," with a 
back as broad as a hale of hay, and there were two little 
Methots, pale, “peeked” and dirty-nosed. 
They gave us the spare room. One end of the old 
stove stuck through the partition into it. There was a 
bed, or rather a hunk, consisting of a mass of old blan¬ 
kets and coverlets, with tow and linen sheets, spread on 
creaking boards laid across two “horses.” The pillows 
were of swingle tow in wads. 
Yet we could have stood these little eccentricities very 
.. ell if the bunk had been all right. But we found it full 
of, heaven only knows what sort of savage beasts, that 
attacked us with the ferocity of Bashi Bazouks. After a 
terrible contest of about half an hour we re-dressed, 
litched the bed into one comer and lay down on the bare 
wards. It was not quite so bad after this, and about 
idnight we both fell asleep. 
In the morning the fat woman gave us for breakfast a 
fried whitefish and a small loaf of something which up 
in that section managed to pass itself off for bread. We 
had just sat down to it when the Methodist minister came 
in to breakfast, We had to divide with him ; and short 
division it was, at least our individual quotients were 
short enough. However, the good man asked a blessing 
upon it, which, as Arth remarked, helped fill up a little. 
We then went out to hunt the bear, taking Methot 
along with us as guide : and the minister went too, though 
he had no gun. 
It is a fearful country all about Sbe-ba-wa-nah-ning. 
Up to the north and northeast there is along rocky moun¬ 
tain, covered with thin shrub, which but half conceals 
the weathered ledges. The whole country looks remark¬ 
ably desolate, and the blackened stumps of the trees, 
where fires have destroyed the forests, heightened the 
aspect of desolation. 
Overledgy mountains and bushy hills, through tangled 
tamarack swamp and rocky blueberry fells, we hunted 
bear for six or seven hours assiduously, Methot leading 
the way. We visited the scene of the Molly-mog calamity 
and the spot where a cow and several sheep had been de¬ 
voured. Everything hereabouts was very quiet now. 
Not a sign nor token of the bear was anywhere dis- 
cemable. 
Toward night we returned to Methot’s much fatigued. 
During this whole day we had seen absolutely nothing in 
the way of game, save one red squirrel. 
It would be five days, possibly six or seven, before an¬ 
other steamer would touch at this point: a fact we had 
not taken into consideration on landing. We had got 
hunting enough, such as it was, the first day. But Me¬ 
thot now suggested a bear trap, intimating his belief that 
the hear was, for the most part, nocturnal in his habits. 
The sort of trap which our friend Thomas suggested was 
a pit-fall delusively covered over with leaves and dry 
sticks and earth, the same to be baited with the carcass of 
a sheep—Thomas to furnish the sheep at four dollars, a 
price we afterwards learned to be a somewhat exalted 
one in that region. It was a very poor old scab of a sheep, 
but as Thomas remarked, it would probably be just as 
good for the bear, as one of his best ones ; and the man 
had but nine in all. 
We employed two half-breeds, named Doc and Ebe 
Molosse, and set them to dig a pit, a mile distant in the 
woods, They sank it to the depth of six feet about ten 
feet square at the bottom and set with stakes, sharpened 
at their upper ends and about three feet Mgh. These 
were to impale the bear when he fell into the pit. The 
hole was then covered with slender poles, fir boughs and 
a light coating of dirt and leaves. To a maple branch 
which projected out over the pit, was suspended the car¬ 
cass of the sheep. 
This job consumed nearly a whole day. 
‘ 1 We’ve got him! ” Arth exclaimed on co ningin sight, 
for the sheep was gone and the pit broken into. 
We ran up. But the bear was not in it ; some of the 
sharp stakes were upset, however, and there were what 
looked to be his tracks about the place. How he could 
have fallen on those stakes without injury was rather re¬ 
markable, we thought, to say the least. 
That day we deepened the'pit two feet, reset the stakes 
more firmly and bought another sheep of Thomas, for 
bait. We were determined to have that bear if possible. 
Next morning the bait was gone again, lots of the stakes 
jammed down and lots of black hair, too, on several of 
the points. This was rather exciting : we bought another 
sheep and put in numbers of other sharp stakes. 
Just at nightfall, we went out to the pit once more, 
only to find the bear bad not only taken this third bait, 
blit hail upset more than half the stakes in his straggle 
out of the pit. 
Evidently this bear's hide was proof against sharpened 
stakes. It'was simply ridiculous to go on furnishing Mm 
sheep on these conditions. 
Thomas now recommended a log-trap. The Molosses 
were set to work with axes ; and a small log hoiiBe tMr- 
teen feet by eleven, and six feet high, was built of fir- 
timber, near the site of the pit-fall. This structure was 
roofed over with heavy logs and a drop-door, with a spin¬ 
dle attachment, rigged for it, Another sheep had to be 
bought of Thomas to bait it. 
But this laborious contrivance fared no better than the 
pit-fall. We found the bait gone and the drop-door torn 
down next morning. In short the whole structure was 
grievously maltreated and bore marks of dreadfully 
rough usage. 
“Altogether too much bear for the trap ! " my friend 
remarked. 
But there were several little circumstances about the 
matter which made us very uncomfortable, not to say 
suspicions. Wo both agreed that to buy more sheep 
would be folly. In fact, we were not a little disgusted 
with the whole business. To crown all, bad weather kept 
the next steamer from putting into the narrow difficult 
channel and harbor of Shebawanahning. We were still 
cooped up at Mothofs and fed on white fish and Frencli- 
Canadian bread. Fishing for trout in a stream four or 
five miles back to the northeast of the landing was now 
our only vestige of sport. The fishing was good. The 
stream was full of trout, now confined to the deep holes 
on account of the drouth. It was no difficult matter to 
catch all we could both carry home ; and these f ormed a 
very agreeable change from the white fish. 
On either the third or fourth day we fished there, we 
followed the brook farther up amoiig the mountains than 
oil the previous days, to where the channel was very- 
rocky aud broken into falls by ledges. Here were some 
enormous boulders under which the water worked its 
way, often completely hidden by heaps of drift-bush and 
We were fishing lazily out of* a pool, a little below a 
considerable bend of the stream, sitting on a projecting ■. 
rock, when we heard a noise as of some animal splashing 
in the water above : some large creature, too, it seemed 
from the sound. We sat listening a moment. 
** It may be an otter,” Kilburn said. 
We had brought only one gun along with us, and that 
I had left nearly two miles below under a log beside the 
brook ; for it was a great bother to carry it while fishing. 
We had never seen anvtMng there worth shooting as yet . 
But Arthur had his loaded revolver with him, a good, 
serviceable weapon, bought by Mm m London, having a 
bore of .42—almost half an inch. 
Eager to get a sight of the game, if nothing more, we 
jumped up and ran through the intervening bushes along 
the bank. Working through a thicket of little firs, we 
came out plump upon a high ledge, overhanging a deep 
hole in which the stream lay enclosed by the. rocks. 
For Moses’ sake !” muttered Ariher, “what is that? " 
At second glance I saw it was a bear, and a big one. 
“ It’s our friend !” I exclaimed ; “or an own brother to 
him ! And he’s up here fishing, too ! ” 
For at that instant I saw the bear Beize and chow up 
something. The hole was full of trout. 
“No gun!” Kilburn groaned. “Here's my pistol, 
though 1 ” he exclaimed, and pulling it out of its sheath 
in Ms belt and reachmg down over the rocks, fired, 
The crack of the pistol was the bear’s first warning of 
our presence. When that slug-bullet struck Mm he gave 
a leap to one side, wMrled round with a terrible roar, 
and, all dripping, glared up at us. 
Kilhum let another ball go Mto him; at which the bear 
made a savage bound to get up out of the pool : then 
another, and another, its great claws scratching on the 
rocks, and he uttering some of the most terrific roars I 
ever heard. But the place betwixt the boulders where 
the water ran into the pool, on the upper side, was not 
more t han a foot and a half wide ; and the lower end of 
the hole was filled up with a vast hoap of drift stuff be¬ 
neath which the water worked out. A large hemlock 
log had fallen over the rooks into the pool a little below 
Early next morning we walked out to the site of the where we stood. The bear, seeing the fish, had scrambled 
trap pit, rifle in hand. 1 down the trunk of this hemlock into the water; go at 
