804 
FOREST AND STREAM 
from the lake, and out of reach of the winds, would pro¬ 
duce oranges, lemons, figs, pomegranates, tamarinds and 
other tropical fruits in the greatest abundance. 
The lake literally teems with fish of the finest flavor :— 
pompano. bluefish, sea-trout, slieepsliead. Icing-fish and 
drum, together with green turtle and crabs, while 
oysters arc beginning to grow at the head of the lake. 
Among the pines on the west shore, and on the savan¬ 
nahs bordering the Everglades deer are quite plentiful, 
while bears, panthers and wild cats are common in the 
thickets and brakes, 
The settlement at Lake Worth is in the hammock on 
the east shore, and comprises some twenty-five families, 
mostly from the Northern and Western States, who ex¬ 
hibit an amount of pluck, thrift and enterprise unusual 
in Florida. Finding the saw-grass route to Jupiter inade¬ 
quate to their wants, they cut an inlet to the sea a mile 
or two below the present one, which, however, soon 
filled up with sand, despite their earnest efforts to keep it 
open. They then, at immense labor, cut the existing 
inlet south of the rocky reef before mentioned, which bids 
fair to become a permanent one. They are making speci¬ 
alties of the culture of pineapples, cuooanuts and sugar 
cane, and being practically below the frost line, will be 
entirely successful in their undertaking. Although the 
settlement was but two years old last winter, there had 
been set out nearly one hundred thousand young coepa- 
nuts, together with -many acres of pineapples, guavas, 
sugar cane, etc. Cocoanuts pay about fifteen dollars per 
tree a year,and the trees can he utilized at the same time, 
by judicious planting, as wind-breaks. Pineapples and 
bananas are raised from shoots or suckers, which fruit in 
eighteen months from the time of planting. After fruit¬ 
ing the old plant dies, and is succeeded by several new 
sboots, which in turn fruit the following season. Ten 
thousand pineapple plauts are put on an acre of ground, 
and pay from $300 to 5*3,000 per year. One thousand 
banana plants to the acre pays from $1,300 to $3,000 per 
year. This, it will be seen, is as profitable as orange cul¬ 
ture, and one begius to realize his income the second 
year from planting ; while in the ease of an orange 
grove one must wait from eight to ten years to begin to 
reap the benefits of his investment. Sugar cane produces 
from 1,000 to 4,000 lbs. of sugar, a.nd 300 to 400 gallons of 
syrup per acre, and needs to be planted but once in five 
years, or longer, as the new canes sprout or “l-attoon” 
from the old roots. During Our stay we had green peas, 
green corn, beans, turnips, Irish potatoes and tomatoes, 
while the sweet potatoes were by far the best that we had 
in Florida. 
Lake Worth might truly be called a semi-tropical par¬ 
adise ; the climate is simply delightful; its close proxim¬ 
ity to the sea and its nearness to the gulf stream render 
it peculiarly fitted for the invalid, who is rapidly restored 
to health under the genial influences of the balmy and 
ohlorinated breezes, which temper the heat of summer 
and render the winter one continental season of spring 
and Indian summer. I was informed by the settlers that 
they suffered much less from the heat in summer than 
theV did in their old homes, and in fact some of them 
preferred the summer season to the winters. 
” Among the settlers are Chas. Moore, an old sailor and 
the first settler ; Mr. Skoog, a Swede ; Pat. Lennon, an 
exiled Fenian -, Messrs. Spencer, Dye and Andrews, from 
New York State ; Messrs. Diinmiek, Gear. Moore, Brad¬ 
ley, Brown and Pierce, of Illinois, and others. Mr. Chas. 
Moore has a grove of bearing cocoanuts set out some 
thirty years ago. Mr. Moore lias sailed round the world 
several times and spent many years of his life in the 
Mediterranean ; he thinks the climate of Lake Worth the 
finest in the world, even better than that of Southern 
made our first camp about two miles from the south 
end of the lake, on the west shore, near a clump of cab¬ 
bage palmeltoes and near a small brook of good water. 
It is a delightful camping spot, and we found plenty of 
game. One day Ed was picking up shells on the beach, 
walking with his head bent down nearly to hiB knees, 
when two deer approached within thirty yards of hipi, 
stamping and snorting at the strange object. We watched 
the proceeding from a distance, but Ed was so absorbed 
in bis pursuit that he remained unconscious of the pres¬ 
ence of the deer until Queen went rushing past him and 
alarmed them, when their whistling caused him to look 
up just in time to get a glimpse of their white tails as 
they disappeared in the brush, We often saw deer come 
down to the edge of the lake near our camp. In an hour’s 
trolling we could always secure a dozen fine bluefish, 
-weighing from three to ten pounds each. Thing of these 
it was only necessary to procure Capt. Dimrnick’s seine 
and make a haul or two for a supply of that most deli¬ 
cious of all fishes — the pompano — with perhaps a green 
turtle and a mess of crabs. Frank, one day while deer- 
hunting in the pine woods, shot a large rattlesnake, meas¬ 
uring over five feet in length and four inches in diame¬ 
ter at the middle ; he had but four rattles and a button, 
'liiis, ■with a small one killed on the St. Sebastian, were 
the only rattlesnakes we saw in Florida. Aquatic birds 
of many kinds are numerous about Lake Worth, among 
them ducks, snipe and plover. In the creek at the foot 
of the lake are hordes of alligators and some crocodiles. 
I saw a stuffed specimen of the latter in the possession of 
^A^few days after our arrival at Lake Worth Sandlin 
and his passenger started back to Jupiter and Indian 
Bivor. Sandlin sailing the Hero and the passenger walk¬ 
ing tlie beach. The wind,•which had been west, backed 
up to the uor'east Boon after the Hero put to sea and be¬ 
gan blowing hard. Sandlin attempted to put back, and 
by some means the mainsail gibed suddenly, twisting off 
the rudder head. Although the boat was fitted with a 
scull-lock in the stern, Sandlin carried no oar, having 
carelessly left both oar and anchor on Lake Worth ; con¬ 
sequently, the gallant little Hero was beached and knock¬ 
ed to pieces during the night, a sacrifice to carelessness 
and stupidity. J. A. Henshall. 
—The American News Company, which provides good 
things innumerable for the mind, has now undertaken 
the task of providing for the smokers’ comfort as well. 
TUev supply the “Manhattan” and other brands of fine 
eigars, which are much cheaper- than the usual tariff' 
and of very superior quality, as we can testifyi 
—It is evident, says the Kingston Freeman., that Court¬ 
ney and Hanlan have not as much roe in them as a last 
year’s shad. 
TROUTING I N THE B LUE RIDGE. 
^ FIRST PAPER, 
E LEVEN O’clock upon a hot sunny day, with low 
water, is a poor time for a trout fisherman to open 
his attack. For almost always—even upon the most 
likely of days—the fish, we all know, stop feeding for a 
period during midday. But, under the existing circum¬ 
stances, the outlook was so generally dismal, that it was 
rather from a sense of duty Ilian any other consideration 
that we sallied forth to the river bank, leaving our horses 
and traps to the care of the hospitable Yack. 
The northern part of the stream requiring a little pre¬ 
vious diplomacy to ensure an Immunity from interrup¬ 
tion on the part of the riparian owners, we confined 
our attention on this first afternoon to the southern 
fork, which contains about six miles of fishing. Over 
this distance we spread ourselves ; the racing, bungling, 
jealous system of pool, alternate pool, fishing, that 
some people are idiots enough to pursue in the face 
Of common sense, not being in favor with any of our 
party. There is always a fascination to me in following 
up the course of a fresh stream, more especially when 
at every bend the ever-changing glories of mountain 
scenery present to the eyes some fresh delight. Such 
stimulants were indeed badly needed on this particular 
day, for I don’t think one of us rose a fish till 5 o’clock in 
tho evening. Splendid pools in long succession succeeded 
one another ; but it was in vain that, with an enthusiasm 
and diligence natural on the renewal of a long discarded 
and much loved sport, I dropped my cocb-y-bondee and 
and March brown upon every possible spot in which a 
trout could be : not a rise, not a touch, not even the yel¬ 
low flash of a coquetting Iroutlet beneath the surface 
that so often restrains the ardent angler from actually 
Consigning his rod to its case. Old Sol glared down upon 
our heads, and gave us a mild foretaste of the benefits he 
was going to bestow upon us in July, till, for my own 
part, I cried “Enough!” and, winding up, sought the 
shelter of the forest shade, there to cogitate upon men 
and things piscatorial, and drive away the flies with 
fragrant clouds of Mr, Carroll’s famous Lone Jack. Ah ! 
those anglers’ noon-day hours, when solitude is our lot; 
lunch stowed finally away, the flask emptied; the branches 
waving above our heads; the ceaseless rush of the water 
in our ears—what wonder if the present and the future, 
be they bright or the reverse, are apt to give place to 
memories of the past that hold so dear a place in every 
true angler's heart. The brookjtrout knows no differences 
of race; wherever you find him, his surroundings arc 
much the same ; the same familiar music falls upon your 
ears as you approach his home. In every quarter of the 
globe he responds to the same changing conditions of the 
atmosphere ; and as the frequenter of Scottish streams 
puts up bis rod upon the banks of New England or Cana¬ 
dian waters, a qiuet smile of contemptuous pity will play 
round the corners of his mouth when some well-wishing 
but narrow-minded son of the forest offers to show him 
•• where the trout lie,” None of the local genii had as yet 
appeared upon the scene. Here and there, high up on 
tlie mountain slopes, lank figures could now and again be 
descried struggling and scrambling behind still ianker 
mules, and the cries of these ethereal beings would re¬ 
mind one from time to time that tlie destroying hand of 
man was still round us. At length a change came 
over the face of all things : that indescribable change 
that in hot dry weather tolls the long suffering angler 
that his time is come; that he must be up and doing. 
The sun has crept nearer the tops of the mountains, 
and his rays fall flickering on the pools and shal¬ 
lows broken by forest trees. A cooler and damper at¬ 
mosphere begins to pervade all things ; a gentle breeze 
eomes rustling through the aspens and poplars and scat¬ 
ters the cherry blossoms like flakes of snow upon the 
gradually milling pools. The long wished for flop, flop, 
sounds from beneath yonder rock, and draws our atten¬ 
tion to a bite of flies that come sailing down through the 
golden light, and slipping on a coachman for our coch-y- 
hondee, are soon fast in a half-pounder. 
Little, however, was done by any of us in the short 
space of daylight that was left, and I don’t think Mrs. 
tack had more than thirty fish iu all to clean that 
njglit, tnougii it must be said that there were thirty trout, 
and not, as is generally the case iu mountain brooks, ten 
trout, and twenty that hope to be some day. My experi¬ 
ence that evening was quite enofigh to convince me that 
the river was most assiduously fished. As evening ap¬ 
proached figures armed with long saplings issued from 
the woods, and with bare feet skipped over the rocks. 
They were the riparian owners; the legitimate proprie¬ 
tors'of the fishing. I had been told that the present of a 
worn out fly would attach them to you for hie, and had 
a page in my book decorated with ancient feathery 
friends on which the teeth of many trout in many lands 
had left their mark. Influenced, perhaps, by the hope 
of such magnificent gifts, I found these gentry not 
merely unai.(agonistic, but civil; nay, even m some 
cases, almost brotherly, including the lenderest inquiries 
alter my relatives, my business, my full name, and the 
uumber of children X had, but invariably culminating 
in a fly, and a blessing on the one part, and a lordly wave 
ol* the hand on tho other, indicating that I was at liberty 
to fish were I pleased. . , . , 
Our talk over the welcome fire that night was of trout 
and red hackles, of split bamboos and Kendal gut, ot 
creels and landing nets, aud many other such like topics 
that half a dozen years ago would have been in those 
mountains but mere empty sounds. Betoie midnight 
rain began to fall, and the morning, though not actually 
a >vet one, liad a promising look about it that cheered 
considerably, and as we sallied forth, after despatching a 
hearty breakfast, it was, I think, with more buoyant steps 
that we brushed the rain drops from tho spriices aiH 1 ce¬ 
dars that lined our path up tiie stream, andLthou|h tho 
water was still as low as before, it was with a moiehOpe 
ful feeling that facing up stream I made my nvst cast. At 
that very instant a heavy bite of flies came saihng down 
the very pool on which I commenced operafions, audffiojfi 
it I drew in three casts three trout weighing a pound aud 
a halt' bltween them, which for an over fished srieam was 
not a bad beginning. For an hour they roserightmeralj, 
and I took in the course of that time Bums twelve ot ioui- 
teen short plump game little fellows ranging 
ten ouncesfbut did not see or touch as far as 1 could tell, 
a fish under a quarter of a pound, 
About ten o’clock down came a miserable thin misty 
drizzling rain, not the good honest downpour that starts 
fish feeding, nor the light sunny showers that bring tlie 
surface of the water to life, but a dark, cheerless mist, 
which experience has taught me associated with low water 
is generally undesirable. So it proved on this occasion ; 
the experience of the day before returned, after an hour 
or two of which, C - appeared with a face of woe and 
an empty basket, having failed somehow or other to take 
advantage of the early feed, and with unmistakable vis¬ 
ions of “ home sweet home ” glancing through his brain. 
We oomforted one another for a time, however, and dis¬ 
cussing our lunch once more, started forth, and had barely 
wetted our lines again before the clouds settling lower and 
lower on the mountains and rolling in black masses from 
every side, began to pour out their contents in a very de¬ 
termined manner. The forests above our heads began to 
roar, the surface of the stream to churn, and the trout at 
the same time began to rise in a manner they had not hith¬ 
erto favored us with. It was simply a question of how 
long before the water thickened. I turned my facedown 
stream, lengthened my line, and let them have it. 1 hap¬ 
pened to be without my landing net, and bitterly did 1 
repent it. At every throw a fish fastened, and'nearly 
every fish was large enough to make me feel thankful 
that I was still young and active. I have before, brother 
angler, called your attention to the folly of despising half 
pounders in a "dear mountain stream at the end of May. 
If you are on the top of a high rock, and in that position 
hook a gentleman of the above mentioned calibre, and if 
you are using as fine tackle as you ought to be on such an 
occasion, you will, unless you choose to pay out line, which 
is uuadvisable in a broken and narrow water, most decid¬ 
edly have to “ git out from tbar,” aud that remarkably 
quickly when tlie said party turns his head down stream. 
Many a good fish 1 lost on that luckless afternoon in the 
landing, and much of that precious hour and a half that 
the water took thickening did I waste in endeavoring to 
“ drown " golden bellied fellows whose vigorous vitality 
seemed unquenchable. I had, however, unaccountable 
luck in encountering no obstacles in the shape of other 
ardent fishermen, and managed, after arriving, drenched 
to the skin at Yack’s, where the river- was raging pea soup 
color past the doors, to lay about on the table thirty-three 
trout weighing eleven pounds, none, oddly enough, over 
half a pound and none under a quarter. That this is my 
first and as yet sole day's fly fishing in the Blue Ridge, I 
have only myself to blame ; and as I think of it there in¬ 
voluntarily rises out of the mist of old schoolboy days the 
well worn line : O mild preetentos referral si Jupiter 
annos. Ringwood. 
SPORT IN DAKOTA. 
Editor Forest and Stream :— 
The question, can the Indian he civilized, is no longer 
an open one, at least so far as one “ noble red” is con¬ 
cerned, for a few days since he rode through this city 
in an open wagon, drawn by a pair of ponies, sitting flat 
on the bottom of the wagon, dressed as a white man, 
holding over his head a lady's parasol; while for a coach¬ 
man, his wife, or squaw, sat on a seat in front, with a 
blanket wrapped close about her head, holding the reins. 
Now. that fellow showed plainly that he recognized the 
fact of the equality of woman, a.nd must have been more 
than civilized—in short, fashionable. 
At Saratoga, Long Branch, and Gape May the squaws 
drive the fashionable turnouts, and the footman (who 
sometimes fills the positions of both husband and foot¬ 
man), sits behind, without even the protection of a 
“ parasol,” 
Out here the sunshade has taken the place lately held 
by the tomahawk and knife, and, joking aside, the 
Indians are rapidly becoming comparatively good citi¬ 
zens. They still delight in getting themselves up in all 
tlie fancy rigging they can beg, buy or steal, and parading 
through our streets; but these sights are beco mi ng rarer 
each year, and will soon only be remembered as a 
pleasant reminiscence of the early settlement of Da¬ 
kota. 
We have other and more pleasant reminders, however, 
that this is a new country, in the game that is so plenty 
all around us. Of course, the buffalo have left this sec¬ 
tion, although several have been killed this fall in east¬ 
ern Dakota—one only a few miles west of Watertown, the 
western terminus of'the Winona and St. Peter Railroad ; 
others west and north of Fargo. The deer are gone to the 
Black Hills and the country of the Yellowstone ; but the 
antelope remain—much like the Frenchman’s flea, and 
about as bard to catch or shoot. Antelope steaks are 
plenty during the winter months. 
Now comes the feathered game—geese, sand-hill cranes, 
ducks, prairie chickens (some of the sharptailed fellows, 
too), quail, snipe and a few woodcock. 
It would do an Eastern sportsman’s heart good to see 
the millions of geese and ducks that cover our prairies iu 
the fall, not to speak of the chickens. 
By the way, the latter are now “ flocking,” as we call 
it—that is, they assemble along in Oetobev in immense 
flocks, and exercise such wonderful vigilance that it is 
almost impossible to approach near enough for a shot, I 
was so fortunate as to kill three on Saturday last, return¬ 
ing to town from a country trip, They are fat and good, 
and grain-fed. 
The- boys capture lots of geese (with shot) going to and 
returning from their feeding grounds to the sand-bars in 
tlie Missouri River here. They fly put to and from the 
grain fields at morning and night, crossing the railroad 
just below the city in large numbers. The boys take 
cover iu the willows along the bank, and shoot them as 
they fly. The fusilade sounds like a skirmish line. 
For pinnated grouse look near the settlements, especi¬ 
ally near wheat fields. Very few, comparatively speak¬ 
ing, are found out on the open prairies, away from the 
settlements. 
It is of but little use to attempt to shoot wild geese on 
the large lakes. Up North they rear their young. You 
must wait for their autumnal flight South, and shoot 
them, as we do here, when they halt for food and' rest. 
We have good shooting here for weeks after the waters of 
northern Dakota, Minnesota and Michigan are closed by 
tiie ice king, 
I can advise sportsmen wishing a good, long season, 
with plenty of feathered game, to come to the vicinity of 
Yankton, We pride ourselves on having the prettiest 
