Juby $1, 1884.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
dé 
Sex and Ztiver Mishing. 
CAMPS OF THE KINGFISHERS., 
Black Lake, Michigan.—XII. 
W: still had two days left, and Merrill insisted that be- 
fore we broke camp he and I should have a bear 
hunt and a deer chase with the dogs. 
Accordingly, on Monday he made his appearance at the 
camp with an old musket charged with a handful of bullets 
(something about his repeater was out of gear) and three 
dogs, 'Turk, the black dog, and another pensive-looking cur 
of various breeds, and announced himself ready for the 
grand wind up. I took the rifle, and ‘‘the five of_us” fol 
lowed the beach a hundred yards above when we struck into 
the tangle of swamp to make our way to the hill and out on 
to the plains beyond, 
Before starting he said to the others, ‘‘Boys, get into the 
boats an’ scatter along up the shore fur half a mile an’ Hick- 
ory an’ me'll run a deer into the water before we get out o’ 
the green timber; yes, sir, we'll have onein the water in 
less’n five minutes by the watch, and then you'll see some 0” 
the tallest swimmin’ you ever see in yer life; a deer can out- 
swima duck any day, an’ I'll bet this ole gun that none o° 
you can run a boat over him; look out, now, an’ you'll see 
some fun.” 
In anticipation of seeing some fun the boys did as directed, 
but L may say here that had they waited till we ran a deer 
into the water for them, they would no doubt have been 
there yet. 
Out on the plains, we struck for the ‘‘beayer meadows” a 
couple of miles from the lake, with our best eye peeled for 
bear, but we saw nothing but a half dozen families of “pat- 
ridges” (prouse), ten to fifteen young ones and the two old 
ones in each family, The young ones were nearly as large 
as the old ones, but so tame and silly that they would scarcely 
fly out of our way. Had we-been hunting “‘patridges” we 
might have bagged more than we could ‘‘tote” to camp, but 
we were after bigger game. Near the bank of the little 
stream where we found the beaver meadows, the dogs flushed 
a bevy of twelve or fifteen that flew up and settled on the 
bushes where they remained with necks outstretched and 
perfectly motionless, a half dozen or more in plain sight, 
and two of them nota dozen yards distant, Merrill said, 
“Try au shot at that feller sittin’ on that limbthere with yer 
rifle, an’ le’s see how you kin shoot.” Isuggested that the 
noise of the gun would probably scare the very bear out of 
the vicinity that we were looking for, but he said "Oh! no, 
they'll pay no “tention to that, blaze away.” To please him 
L raised the rifle and fired, but the young grouse never moved 
nor winked an eye. Iam tolerably certain the ball passed 
two feet over its head, “Try him agin!” said neighbor M_., 
and slipping in a fresh cartridge I tired again, and this time } 
Tam sure the bullet flew afoot under it, The bird never 
stirred, ‘‘You can’t hit nothin’!” said Merrill. ‘‘Gimme 
that rifle and watch the ole man clip his head off.” I putin 
another cartridge, and handing him the gun he took a long, 
steady aim, and fired, but at the crack the fool bird still sat 
there on the limb staring at us as though nothing had hap- 
pened. The old man wauted to try again, as he said he 
wasn’t used tothe gun an’ must ‘a’ overshot,” but I had 
only four cartridges left in my pocket, and lest we might 
Tun across a bear, we concluded not to waste another on the 
simple-minded young grouse. 
All this time the black dog and the dog of uncertain 
lineage were tearing around like mad, and barking aimlessly 
up every bush that came in their way; but Turk, who felt 
that his dignity and reputation as a bear dog was outraged 
by these senseless proceedings, had quietly stretched himself 
at the edve of the}water, near the old beaver dam, and was 
gazing with reproachtul eye at his master, and a look of 
supreme disgust on his honest countenance at the ridiculous 
spectacle his canine companions were making of themselves. 
“Durn ye, PU histe ye off’n that limb, see if I don’t,” said 
neighbor M., and, selecting a club to his pleasement, he 
tiptoed up to within four or five yards of the bird and blazed 
away. Theclub passed close to its head, but it did not fly; and 
picking out another, he took careful aim, and this time struck 
the limb a terrific whack a couple of inches from where the 
bird stood, knocking if a yard into the air, and, whi-r-r, it 
was off like a shot, the others following in quick succession 
till all were out of sight in a flash. 
“Tf Vd a hit that patridge ’'d a knocked him clean out, 0’ 
his fethers,” said the old man, and then he broke into a great 
“hoss laugh” that seemed to come up from the very lowest 
cavity im his broad chest. 
For a minute the two foolish dogs tore around worse than 
eyer, but a sharp ‘“‘shet up that yelpin’, will ye?” silenced 
them, apd when the noise was all over Turk got up, slaked 
his thirt in the waters of the dam, and looked around at his 
master with an expression in his eye that plainly implied, 
“Tf you're done with all this tomfoolery we'll go on and look 
up something that’s not beneath my notice.” 
We walked down to the stream and followed Turk’s ex- 
ample in the matter of slaking our thirst, but I was so full 
of laugh at the neat manner in which Merrill had ‘‘clipped 
that patridge’s head off,” that there was barely room in the 
old tank for more than half the regulation drink. 
_ The old beaver dam was a solid looking-structure reaching 
from bank to bank of the narrow ravine, and looked as if it 
might have been built away back in the days of the red man. 
Tt was three or four feet high and nearly as broad, and was 
_ covered with a growth of moss and grass and weeds, and the 
backwater above was grown up with rushes and grasses, all 
having the appearance of having been unused by the intelli- 
gent builders for years gone by. It was a lonely, quiet scene, 
the only sounds breaking the stillness being the soft rustle of 
the aspen leaves, and the faint iinkle of the wuter as it found 
its way through the old dam, and it was a relief when Merrill 
‘shouldered his gun and said, ‘‘You’d better foller the crick 
this is the same crick that runs into the lake where I first 
picked out yer camp—toller the crick down about a mile to 
a high knoll—the highest you’ll see anywhere—and set 
down on the knoll an’ wait till you hear from me. Me an’ the 
dogs ‘lI strike across into the green timber an’ jump a buck 
| in less *n a half an hour an’ he'll be certain to cross the erick 
| an’ come up the pint right past where yowll be settin’, Take 
| my pocket compassan’ if you get lost yer can find yer way back 
to camp,” and taking off the cap he pointed out the direction 
| of the camp and said, ‘‘foller that mark,” indicating a point 
yer eye on the pint comin’ up from the crick; that’s one of 
the deer’s old runways an’ you'll see a path along there as 
plain as a hog path in a woods paster. Ho! Turk, look 
alive now,” and springing lightly across the narrow stream 
he and the dogs scrambled up the low bank and were soon 
lost to sight in the green timber. (Green timber, to dis- 
tinguish if from the plains.) ' 
followed the stream down to the high knoll overlooking 
the ravine, which was here deep and wide, through which 
it flowed, and sat down with my back against a hemlock 
where I could command a view of the point, and waited to 
hear the old man shoot or holler. I had sat there perhaps 
half an hour, when hearing a slight noise in the pine needles 
down to the right, I looked that way and saw the black dog 
come tipping up the hill with his tongue out and wet, as 
though he had been cooling himself off in the stream below. 
He came up wagging his tail, and lay down by me, looking 
as “tired asadog.” Soon he got up and trotted down the 
point afew rods and stood looking wistfully across the 
ravine into the woods beyond, as though expecting some- 
thing, and I fully looked to see Merrill come walking up the 
point; but nothing came in view, and after snuffing the air 
a minute or so the dog came back and stretched himself 
again inthe shade near by. But he seemed uneasy, and 
eyel'y now and then would make a short excursion down the 
hill, snufile a few times, and come back and lie down again 
for a short time, 
Tt finally ‘‘crep’ into my nolledye box,” as Ben would have 
said, that neighbor M. was hid in the woods somewhere 
across the ravine, watching me to see how I would perform 
in the woods alone; bul in this I may be doing the old man 
an injustice, and if so he will please accept my apology here 
for the suspicion. At any rate, after waiting a couple of 
hours longer and hearing no shot or shout, and not even a 
yelp from the dogs, I concluded to go back to camp, and 
consultmg the compass to be sure of the exact course, I 
started for the lake, the black dog ranging from side to side 
forty or fifty yards ahead, with head und tail up as though 
well pleased with the move, (N. B.—I saw no game going 
back except two or three families of grouse and—huckleber- 
ries. ‘N. B.,” in every-day use, stands good for nota bene, 
but in this case it means ‘‘No Bear.”) Of£ the berries it was 
no trouble to make a good bag, and by the time I reached 
the hill at the edge of the swamp I had loitered along, strip- 
ping a bush here and there, till I was ‘‘jest chuck full o’ 
huekleberry juice.” Dovyan the hill and through the tangle, 
I struck the beach only a few rods above where we had left 
it, which the old man would no donbt have considered a 
good ayerage guess for a tenderfoot, even with the aid of his 
poeket compass, The boys had waited in the boats for half 
ab hour or more for us to run a deer into the lake to see some 
fun, but were now in camp packing up odds and ends, and 
getting ready to break up in the morning. 
The old man came in an hour later looking fagged and 
sheepish, and the same load in his gun that he started out 
with, but he could not pass the opportunity to fire a parting 
broadside into us in the shape of a highly nickel-plated 
story about a big buck he had jumped in the green timber 
shortly after ieaving the beayer meadows. *‘He was the big- 
gest buck Ive see this year,” he went on, ‘‘an’ had a reg’lar 
rockin’ cheer on his head, an’ when the dogs jumped him up 
I thought sure he’d strike for the crick and go up the pint 
where you was, but stid 0° that he went sailin’ over the 
bushes to’ards Black River, an’ that’s the last I see of him.” 
He had evidently forgotten the fact that while waiting on 
the knoll I had not heard the dogs give tongue once, which 
they certainly would have done had they jumped a big buck 
or 4 medium-sized buck, and it struck Ben that ‘*bucks don’t 
always carry 4 first-class cheer fact’ry on'their headsin July ;” 
but in street Arab phrase the old man had ‘‘got his work in 
on us,” and this wound up the grand wind up. 
The next morning he came down to the camp with three 
of his boys and neighbor Stewart to help us across the lake, 
and by 9 o’clock we were off for the landing below the sand- 
bank, where Bush and one of Stewart’s boys were to come 
around with the wagons. Fortunately, the lake was quiet, 
the first morning for three or four cae and we made the 
landing without trouble. The wagons loaded, we said good- 
bye 10 neighbor Merrill and the boys, waved our hats in 
adieu to the lake of the dark waters and were away for Che- 
boygan, one of the party at least full of regrets at the move. 
We took but few bass during our stay at Black Lake. I 
believe it to be one of the finest bodies of water for this 
prince of game fish in all North Michigan, and [ attribute 
our lack of success with them to the fact that we were there 
too early in the season. ‘The latter half of September and on 
into October would, I think, be a better time for bass in this 
lake than when we were there in the last half of July, Mr. 
Charley Ramsey, a newspaper man in Cheboygan anda 
relative of Old Ben, told us that he had seen strings of small- 
mouthed black bass brought down from Black Lake in Sep- 
tember, many of which would weigh six, seven and eight 
pounds, and one that weighed nine pounds ona reliable 
scale. This sounds very much like a big fish story, but as 
newspaper men are, asarule, ‘‘voracious,” we had bo rea- 
son to doubt his statement. J asked Sid Merrill one day 
while in camp, about the thirty-one-inch string his father 
sent me as the measure of a bass, as 1 was Inclined to think 
the fish must have been a pike-perch, but he said it was a 
true bass, found dead in the ice when it broke up in the 
spring. The lake affords the finest pickerel, and any one 
fond of this branch of the sport may get a surfeit of it here 
with either spoon, minnow, or frog. All along the south- 
west shore from our camp around to Sturgeon Bay we took 
them till we were tired of knocking them on the head, and 
had we stayed another week Merrill would have run short 
of bar’ls to put themin. As to the mascalonge, I can only 
speak of the three monsters we saw, but Lam convinced that 
there are many others in the lake that, if not so large, are 
yet powerful enough to part an F line ona straight pull 
Without making an extra flirt of the tail. If some brother 
will go up there this fall and capture the great fellow Dan 
and I saw off Pickerel Reef, 1 am sure it will be a joy to 
him forever, and we will promise to relinquish all claims on 
him and to not feel a pang of envy over his downfall at other 
hands 
While on Black Lake we had a pleasant time, a good 
camp and ‘‘stacks o’ fun,” as Ben said. Iwassorry to leave 
“Camp Hilarity”—the Deacon’s name for it—and was only 
reconciled to the moye by the fear we were in that Dick 
might at any time take a notion to construct another huckle- 
berry roll, but then Dick is a kind of ‘‘vegetinarian,” as he 
puts it, and is not to be blamed, perhaps, for preferring 
huckleberries concealed in tough dough to fried fish and 
plain side meat, 
And now a few words to any of the brethren who may 
wish to make a camp ou Black Lake; Write to O. §. Merrill, 
Cheboygan, Michigan (Black Lake box) for boats, He has 
enuugh to accommodate a party of cight or ten, and they are 
very fair boats to fish from, being dry and seaworthy. Have 
him meet you with the boats on any specified day at the 
sandbank, and from there you can go to any camp you may 
select. The camp we had is as good perhaps as any on the 
lake, but there are three others that would probably suit as 
well, one at the head of the lake, near the Deacon’s spring, 
the Hughes camp, and another good one nearly opposite the 
mouth of Little Black River. Deer and bear are very 
plenty in this region, and 4 party of hunters might have 
great sport with the rife in the proper season, When we 
were there the plains were aliye with families of grouse, 
which later in the season would likely be found along the 
hillsides surrounding the Jake and in green timber, Alto- 
gether itis a locality that will please the sportsman, be he 
4 lover of the rod or the rifle, or both. The lake may be also 
reached by boats from Cheboygan by going wp the river and 
making the portage at the rapids. or teams, write to Mr. 
Wm. Spencer, of the Spencer House, Cheboygan, and he 
will engage them to be on hand at any time wished, The 
charge is $4 per day for double tcam and driver. 
Arrived in town, we drove to the Spencer to separate the 
baggage, as only four of us were going over to Central Lake to 
the old camp, the others intending to spend a day or two at 
Mackinaw Island and Petoskey, and thence home, Frank 
and I went to the depot with the wagons to see our traps 
properly disposed of till train time, four or five hours later, 
and here we eacountered the second hog it has heen our mis- 
fortune to run across in Northern Michigan. This specimen 
in bristles sailed under the name of H. BK. Worcester, local 
agent at that point for the M. OC, R. R. He was uncivil and 
ungentlemanly from the first word we said to him when ask- 
ing about the disposition to be made of our things till train 
time. We usually expect civil answers to civil questions, 
but Mr. W. appeared to be entirely lacking in two things so 
desirable in one placed in a position to serve the public— 
civility and courtesy—and from his manner we were led to 
believe he owned half the town, at least’ a huudred miles of 
the M. C. road, and most of the rolling stock. It is not 
necessary to enter into particulars, enough that we were 
snubbed and insulted till he probably found out he had made 
a mistake, when we were graciously allowed to place our 
trunks and rods in the baggage room, to be locked up until 
train time in the evening. I promised to “‘curl his hair,” 
and if this serves the purpose, it will have done the brother- 
hood a seryice in warning them hew to demean themselyesin 
the presence of this swell head, should any of them ever 
chance to have dealings with him. But it would be much 
more to my pleasement to learn that the management of the 
M. ©, R, R. had found it to their interest to vive him the 
grand bounce. All T have said will be substantiated by Mr, 
Frank Frantz, of Bellaire, Mich., else L would not have 
written it, and I wish Mr. W. to understand, too, that the 
FOREST AND STREAM is at liberty to furnish him my name 
at any time, and the names of party if he desires tiem, 
That’s all about Mr. H. E. Woreester, and I trust it may 
teach him to be more courteous to civil people in the future, 
After a good supper at the Spencer—not counting the 
inevitable huckleberry—old Dan, the Deacon, Ben and the 
writer said good-bye to the others and boarding the train 
were off for Mackinaw City, where we arrived justin time 
to transfer our baggage to the G. R, and I. train in a driving 
rain which continued nearly all the way down to Mancelonu. 
Here we were met. by our old friend Charley Persons of the 
Mancelona House, looking ‘‘purtier’” than ever, who tucked 
us away for the remainder of the night, In the morning 
while loading our traps on the wagon for a start we had the 
pleasure of making the acquaintance of un old time eorres- 
pondent of Formst anpD Srream, Mr. W. D. Tomlin, 
(‘‘Norman”) who was just ready to start with his family and 
a small party of friends for a camp near the mouth of 
Spencer Creek, where they proposed spending a couple of 
weeks with the trout. We found brother “Norman” to be a 
pleasant, kindly gentleman, and we were sorry the time at 
our command did not allow us to sit down on some conven- 
ient log and have a genuine old-fashioned ‘‘fish talk.” We 
gave him a “good luck” shake and watched him till out of 
sight hurrying to overtake his wagons which had driven off 
and left him, That the lines of brother ‘‘Norman,” his good 
wife and the irrepressible youngster, may always fall in 
pleasant places is the sincere wish of the “Kingfishers,” and 
we trust we may meet again, with more time to spare in 
which to exchange fish lies. 
We left a good part of our camp furniture in charge of 
the gentlemanly station agent, A. J. De Larme, who took 
care of it without charge until we returned that way on oni 
road home (i mention this only as a contrast to the treat- 
ment we received at Cheboygan). 
We mounted the wagon and before noon were at Bellaire, 
where we hired boats and by nightfall were snugly in our 
old camp at the mouth of Sweeny’s Creek on Central Lake, 
where we spent two weeks in solid comfort and content, 
which I may take a notion to write about some time in the 
future when the spirit moves me. 
And now with a few turns of the reel, these chronicles of 
the camp will be wound up, for another trip to the North 
Woods is ripe, and by the time these (fish) lines reach the 
readers of Formsr AND Strwam the “Kingfishers” will be 
winging their way northward to a new camp, 
If, in writing of the waters and the region about Black 
Lake, I have given any information that will be of future 
benefit to any brother of the rod, lam content, but if the 
letters have served to amuse and comfort any longing soul, 
yearning for a sniff of the odors of the pines and the balsams 
and the hemlocks, the time will have been well spent, 
With good wishes to all the brotherhood and the rest of 
mankind, I gladly lay aside the pen to grasp in a few short 
days the more familiar and congenial cormpanion, the well 
beloved old rod. KINGFISHER. 
CrncInnati, O., July 14, 1884, : 
OpposED To THe Fuask.—Seville, Ohio, July 25.—Hditor 
Forest and Stream: In reading your valuable paper I see a 
growing tendency toward the abolition of the pocket flask 
from the ‘‘kit’” of the ordinary sportsman. ‘‘AJl hail the day,” 
say Il. Now 1am no prohibitionist or temperance fanatie, 
but this I do know, that the less liquor and the more spring 
water we drink the better for usall. I have tried it for years 
both ways, and 1 know whereof I speak. I wish I could 
just get one good drink out of that spring that “Old 
Hickory” tells us about on Black Lake. I wonld walk five 
miles any of these hot July days for a cool draught of its 
waters, Don’t laughat the oldman. Heis right. Lots of 
bass in Chippewa Lake to any angler that can catch them. 
The large-mouth are natiye, smallanouth, | introduced.— 
CHIPPEWA, 
