302 
FOREST AND STREAM.) 
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[ Nov. 18, 1884. 
Che Sportsman Caurist. 
A TRIP TO IDAHO. 
HE charming weather of October was too great a temp- 
tation to continue my inland cruising to be resisted, 
and I found a partial excuse in a little business ‘“‘out West” 
to make an excursion toward the setting sun. An old min- 
ing friend, who had prospected over nearly every inch of 
California, Idaho and Montana, dropped into my office daily 
tosmoke a pipe, and enthused for hours oyer the scenery 
and the shooting and fishing of Idaho, and especially of the 
Saw Tooth Range and Wood River country. The yarns 
he told of the trout streams, salmon fishing, grouse, deer and 
wild goat shooting were worthy of a genuine sportsman; 
not that I insinuate that sportsmen are given to tough stories; 
we all know they are veritable Geo. Washingtons and are as 
truthful as political newspapers, 
My old friend is not much of a sportsman, even though 
he may have some of their leading habits, and 1 accordingly 
made due allowances, but by degrees I found myself giving 
much “thought to the marvellous stories he told, and my 
night's rest was much disturbed with dreams of large trout 
that obstinately refused to be landed, droves of deer that 
got in my way, and grouse getting up with a whirr under 
my nose. I suspected that my old friend had sinister designs 
on me. I knew he had a mine to sell and wanted meto go 
out and Iook at it. He had discovered my weak point and 
began insidiously to undermine my earthworks. He did not 
talk mine much, but talked fish and game a good deal. At 
last good resolutions to stay at home gaye way, and one fine 
morning last month found my old friend and myself com- 
par stowed away in a West Shore coach westward 
bound, 
By way of eyincing my disbelief in his stories of shooting, 
I declined to take a gun, relying on his promise to supply 
me with as fine a breechloader as I ever put to my shoulder; 
but I did take my well-tried fly-rod, well knowing that it 
would be possible to pick up a gun, but not a split-bamboo, 
I will pass over the details of the trip to Salt Lake, and 
thence by the Utah Northern Railroad to Pocatello, where 
we took the Oregon Short Line to Mountain Home, the ter- 
minus of our journey by rail, merely stopping to remark 
that the narrow gauge road from Ogden to Pocatello is not 
an agreeable ride, crowded as the cars were with Mormon 
families—Mormon babies, and more of them to the square 
foot than I ever met with in all my varied experiences—vyery 
dirty and sour-smelling babies. There were twenty-seven in 
our car, and they squalled in concert all night long. It was 
not cold, but the brakemen fired up until the two stoves 
were red hot—ventilators all closed—the atmosphere some- 
thing fearful, 
From Pocatello the trains were ‘‘mixed,” that is, composed 
of along train of freight cars and one passenger coach 
which, fortunately, was not crowded, but the rate of speed 
was slow, dreadfully so; about fifteen miles the hour, Fora 
hundred nules the course was across 4 dead flat plain of lava 
and sagcbrush, and a more worthless expanse of country 1 
haye néyer seen. The monolony was varied by occusional 
streams that my old friend asserted were full of trout, but 
there wereno settlements where a fisherman could tie up. 
At the crossing of the Snake River at the falls, which were 
grand, and below the falls it looked very tempting to the 
angler. The conductor told me what splendid fishing it was, 
what cartloads of salmon and river trout were caught there, 
but my old friend said, “Wait until we get to Mountain 
Home, and I wijl show you fishing until you can't rest; we 
will tale it all in on our way back.” 
Tn due time we reached Mountain Home, and found quite 
a coufortabie hotel for that country. This was the end of 
our railroading, and at 4 o’clock the next morning we were 
routed out to take the stage, so called, which proved to be a 
“dead ax” farm wagon with a pair of very sober-minded 
horses. The air was crisp and sharp, and the road was cal- 
culated to knock spots out of dyspepsia. At sunrise we had 
made the breaktast station. The meal was soon ready for 
us, 2nd we were ready for it. There were venison steak and 
good bread and butter, the coffee was a little dubious, but 
with our appetites everything went. Soon after leaving the 
breakfast station we struck a better country, the foothills of 
the mountain ranges. The first game we saw was several 
large gray wolves, then a couple of antelope, a little later 
three deer, and in descending a sharp hill, we came upon a 
flock of grouse close sowie. nee of the road. We got out and 
threw stones at them; a plump old cock sat on a limb scarce 
twenty feet away, and stood a fusillade of stones for five 
minutes, evidently enjoying our want of skill. Then I 
wanted that gun that I wouldn’t bring, and all day, as we 
rode over hill and dale, and saw deer, grouse, antelope and 
wolves, I wanted it. I could have loaded the wagon with 
crouse, and as I objurgated my stupidity in not bringing it, 
I sailed into my old friend who had said ‘‘No use in bother- 
ing about a gun. Can get youall the guns you want.” I 
wanted one then, but he could not fulfill his promise until 
we to got where the guns were, and that would be at the end 
of our journey. 
After spending a few days climbing over the mountains 
on a mule, looking at mines and enjoying the scenery, we 
turned our steps homeward. Arriving at Mountain Home I 
claimed a day’s fishing, according to agreement, So it was 
arranged that the next morning we should try our skill on a 
stream called Snake Creek. There was not much sleep that 
night on account of the wolves and coyotes that came around 
the house, seeking what they hoped to find, a fat chicken or 
two each, but the dogs kept them at a respectful distance; 
aud what between the barking of the dogs and the howling 
of the midnight prowlers in defiance, there was little sleep. 
The wolves were afraid to come too close and the dogs were 
afraid to venture far out after them, and so they kept up the 
infernal racket until daylight, 
After an early breakfast we got into a wagon, putting a 
substantial lunch under the seat, and drove up the creek 
about tive miles to the cafion and prepared for the sport. On 
our way up we saw eight wolves, all within fifty yards; 
they knew we had no gun and stood calmly contemplating 
us, and I was mad again, P 
When I got out my light tackle and flies there was a guf- 
faw. ‘What are you going to do with those things? Idaho 
trout are not educated up to that sort of thing; they don't 
know anything about flies, Catch afew grasshoppers if you 
want any fish,” I had heard such talk before, and con- 
tinued my note of preparation. When we camein to lunch, 
according 10 arrangement, there was not so much jaughing 
and poking fun at bamboo rods and flies. Idaho trout were 
educated up to the dodge, and the grasshopper party were 
nowhere, Beat’em? Well, I should ‘smile, I had five to 
their one, It was rough fishing though; the cafion and the 
brush was too thick to admit of satisfactory fly work, but 
whenever a hole could be got at, it was lively work. Suf- 
fice it 1o say it was a highly satisfactory day. The fish were 
not large, but ey were all of good size and as gamy as 
Hastern trout. é did not count our fish, but we had a 
backload—more than we knew what to do with. Plate after 
plate disappeared at the supper table, Our performance was 
prodigious, with the sharp appetite consequent upon the 
exercise and bracing air. The weather was superb. The 
air is exhilarating, ahd the amount of fatigue one could en- 
dure in that atmosphere is marvelous. 
Tt would have been a red-letter day in one’s life to have 
been properly prepared and to have cruised around the 
country shooting and fishing in the many streams to be found 
within easy distance of the settlements; but time was up; 
we were due in Gotham on the 25th, so turned our faces 
homeward, well pleased with the excursion—which was 
merely a prospecting trip—marking out the ground for a 
cruise the coming season. And you can hazard your Wel- 
lingtons that I will be there and I will have my tent, my 
blankets and my gun the next time, and fully prepared to 
enjoy all that Idaho affords. Moral, take your gun and 
don’t depend upon promises of guns everywhere. There is 
not a decent gun in the country, and I am mad enough to 
kick myself in being humbugged by my old red-nosed friend 
into leaving mine at home, It was unsportsmanlike and I 
am ashamed of myself. However, we will see what next 
summer will bring forth. lL will stand the Mormon babies 
and the anti-dyspeptic stage wagons willingly to get the 
chance to try it over again. Old nosey was right; there is 
good fishing and shooting in Idaho sure—as well as good 
mines—and hang me if that designing old miner didn’t get 
me on the mining proposition. I think I was induced to go 
in for an excuse to make future perigrenations to that para- 
dise of the sportsman. 
It may seem rather unsportsmanlike to fish for trout in 
October, but the seasons in Idaho are quite different. The 
summer does not fairly set in before the last of July, and 
neither the people nor the fish pay much regard to rules or 
law if they have any. Itis a question of convenience, The 
fish are not particular. They are ready any time you are, 
and the way they take the fly would seem to indicate that 
they are anxious to emancipate themselves from the be- 
nighted grasshopper state and adopt the habits and customs 
of their more civilized Eastern relations. 
In the vicinity of Mountain Home, Rocky Bar, Atalanta, 
Haley, etc., there are numerous streams, large and small, 
including Wood, Snake, Boise and Middle Boise rivers, all 
affording splendid fishing. Deer and grouse are plentiful, a 
few antelope, and not unfrequently a bear, There is a white- 
faced bear to be met with occasionally that is not a desirable 
acquaintance, He resembles the grizzly, is equally power- 
ful, and much more belligerent. It is just a question of how 
he feels whether he will waJk off and Jeave you or remain 
and argue the point, As for running, he won't do it; see 
you what's his name first. If he goes away it is seemingly 
rather against his inclination, and he stops and looks around 
at you with ap expression a8 much as to say, “‘What am 1 
walking off for? | ought to stay and chaw that fellow up; 
teach him what kind of bears they raise in Idaho.” The 
hunters give them a wide berth. 
Taking it-all around, a sportsman can have a pretty good 
time in Northwestern Idaho inthe proper season, say Sep- 
tember and October. The country is sufficiently settled to 
enable him to supply his wants easily, and he can ‘‘excurt” 
from any of the towns in various directions, step off from 
stage or rail and be picked up again at hisoption, The fish- 
ing tackle should be strong avd substantial, for the fish are 
large in the rivers. He wants strong, substantial clothing, 
for the bushes in the cafions are terrible on habiliments. It 
heis afraid of shakes, better carry his own remedy, for 
although the whisky in Idaho is enough to kill all the snakes 
in the country if a drop could be got inside of them, if is 
concentrated Creek fire, it is. PoODGERS. 
CROFTERS AND SCOTCH LANDLORDS. 
ite was a worthy, if impracticable, law existing in that 
Utopian island of Sir Thomas Moore’s imagination, 
which decreed thatthe lands of the republic should not 
belong to any members of the commonwealth in particular, 
but should be held by all in trust for the general benefit. 
Other countries, less free of the burden of land disputes, 
may well hold that of them also pity ’tis that tis not true. 
Perhaps, however, a tenet such as this, in which simplicity 
of code claimed place with liberty, equality and brotherhood, 
might, if welded to modern notions, lead to unlooked-for 
and disastrous side issues, and prove a fruitful source of 
new trouble. Yet ever and anon there flickers up in the 
self-esteemed Utopias of Europe a smouldering discontent 
against the great landed proprietors; a clamor of the many 
for the enacting of some such law against the few. As 
the world grows more republican and the masses find 
means to make themselves heard, the war of opinions waxes 
stronger against the unimpaired possession of those huge 
pleasure estates, which granted to court favorites in feudal 
days for trivial services, have drifted down in hereditary 
succession, absorbing their surrounding satellites and play- 
ing cuckoo in anest of hungry farmers, Nowhere is this 
state of things more prominent than in the three portions of 
Great Britain, In England a growing spirit of communism 
germinates in the many trade unions and banded opposition 
against the monopolies of wealth. He that runs may read 
it lurking between the lines of franchise bills, in radical in 
noyations, and in the oft recurring disputes twixt Lords and 
Commons, the wordy smoke of which hardly needs an 
adage to vouch for itscause, In Ireland a chronic enmity 
against the landlords is constantly breaking forth in its own 
ugly form of malcontent, like the throes of some intermittent 
fever. While in Scotland—and it is of that country that I 
would especially treat here—a bitter feeling of ill will is 
shown now and again from the crofters, herdsmen and petty 
farmers who covet the grazings of the mountain lands, 
toward the owners of those huge Scotch estates which are 
so vigorously preserved and guarded from any encroach- 
ments on the part of men or cattle to make a brief-lived 
Saxon holiday. 
Were the total acreage owned by these Scotch lords and 
lairds summed up, it would be found that they constitute 
the major portion of the Highlands, and of this total by far 
the largest part is strictly preserved. Yet few of these land- 
lords spend more than the fashionable two months of August 
and September on their estates, waging the annual warfare 
against the deer, grouse and black game, which a paternal 
oyernment protects under its legislative shield until then. 
uring the rest of the year the moorlands are again left un- 
molested, and only gillies anu gamekeepers wander over their 
lonely wastes, guarding them against the depredations of 
poachers and would-be utilizers, Many of these estates are 
of vast extent, comprising thousands and thousands of acres, 
great tracts of which are, as I haye said, set apart solely for 
the preservation of game, Such proprietors as the Dukes of 
Sutherland, Bute und Montrose, and Lairds like Farquahson 
and Johnson, divide whole counties among them, and main- 
tain grouse moors and deer forests of size that seems fabu- 
lous when their purposes are weighed in the scales of politi- 
cal economy. 
Not long ago Twas in Sutherlandshire, that wild, broken 
county, which stretches its marge of mountain and lake 
across the north of Scotland. I was fishing in Lock Shin 
and its tributary waters, and in my various excursions nat- 
urally had considerable intercourse with the Magnuses and 
Donalds of the neighborhood. Since then I haye traveled 
in other portions of this and the adjoining counties, but 
everywhere I found the same story; to every question I met 
the same auswer, “his Grace wad ’na wish it the whiles,” or 
“°a weel may be his Grace kens t’ wad be gud.” Nothin 
seemed possible to be said, or done, or thought, or dreame 
of in this northern fastness unless “this Grace” should first 
approve, To his Grace the Duke of Sutherland belongeth 
the land, and the people, and the doings thereof. The di- 
minutive railway, which is the main artery of his posses- 
sions, was built by his orders and with his money, and is 
as much a chattel of his as the knocker on 
his front door. The hotels, the roads, the villages 
of all this enormous county are his, and through his agents 
he reigns in this petty kingdom in an autocracy tempered 
only by the prestige of external republicanism. Some twelve 
months since there was a good deal of talk in England about 
certain entire villages in this dukedom having been some- 
what summarily moved on to make room for grouse and 
deer, Mats qu’y faire; theic sheep and cattle had long since 
been forbidden on the hills because forsooth deer were too 
fastidious to range over the same ground as their domesti- 
cated brethren, wherefore the herdsmen soon followed. 
Nevertheless strangely enough some crofter mutterings echoed 
among those deserted hills, and a murmur of discontent 
found its way into the English papers—useless, however, 
save to fan a smouldering fire, for the fiat having gone forth, 
his Grace’s will was done. 
But as with all questions so with the grievances of croft- 
ers, the subject wears two faces, A generalization will 
defeat any argument, and itis not to be maintained that 
the highlands of Scotland are fitted for the support of alarge 
population, or capable of grazing any very extensive herds. 
The wildness of the country and its poverty preclude the 
possibility of this. Countless storms, and rains, and tor- 
rents, have swept the soil from the mountains to the valleys, 
where farming alone can be done; while the mountains, hid- 
ing their naked crags among the mists, or clad in such 
apology for verdure as the knotted heather or rank 
grasses of the morass can give, have little to offer 
even to the most enterprising of sheep or cattle, 
In some places, of course, the mountains are 
exceptionally fertile, and pasture might be found in abund- 
ance enough to feed the combined flocks of Nathan and 
Jacob, But such rich moorlands are not too plentiful. 1 
have iately been staying in a typical highland valley, as 
barren as beautiful, and where immemorial freedom wonders 
vaguely at the rumors of croftcr claims elsewhere. It was 
situated at the western end of Lock Katrine, that gem of the 
Highlands, and the house of the Laird which formed the 
center of quite a little gathering of dependent gillie cottages, 
had been the stronghold of the famous Rob Roy, to a de- 
scendant of whom it now belongs. Avoiding the gaze of the 
world, it nestled among a thick belt of trees that, sweeping 
down a gorge of Ben Dhu, dipped their shadows into the 
calm waters of the lake. Behind the house climbed the 
ercat moorlands of Perthshire, tumbling in confusion one 
upon another, andin front more mountains reared their gaunt 
barriers between the solitudes of the glen and the outer 
world. In their distant arms they held the waters of Lock 
Lomond und countless smaller lakes and farms, while, join- 
ing forces with their opposite neighbors, they jambled and 
mingled their masses in the blue depths of the far glen, 
where was cradled the small but noisy Gyle stream which 
gives the pass its name. Anda wild lonely place it was; 
wild with the desertion of its fastness by mén for a century, 
and lonely with the overwhelming sense of Joneliness which 
only mountains give. Except near the lake where the Laird’s 
house stood, habitations there were none, but far up in the 
gloomy mazes of the hills showed here and there the erumb- 
ling ruins of ancient villages which tradition tells were de- 
stroyed by Rob Roy because the occupiers failed on one 
occasion to help him in his fights against ‘‘the hireling 
slaves of the king.” These were perhaps the rude fore- 
fathers of the crofters, but in those days there were no 
London papers to moan over their arbitrary expulsion, 
The stones which once formed the homes of these disbanded 
Celts now lie strewn among the moorland grasses, and seek 
to hide their stormy past under a screen of peat moss. The 
wanderer may, perchance, disturb from the silent hamlet a 
wood duck, curlew, or mountain hare, but the place is a Gol- 
catha, tenanted only by ghosts, and the elves and goblins of 
the glen. On the mountain sides are several such memori- 
als of days gone by, the dumb records of unwritten history, 
lonely and deserted, ‘‘imploring the passing tribute of a 
sich.” Few are the feet which ever climb to their scattered 
stones, and fewer the eyes which can distinguish them 
among the juttiug bones of nature. Some wandering sports- 
man, led onward by that mythical nymph of the mists 
who bewilders the steps of the mountain rambler, may chance 
upon them; ora shepherd searching for some strayed sheep 
—for sheep and the ragged highland cattle roam free 
o’er these ‘‘bonnie braces ’0 Balquidder”—mayhap to stumble 
over the broken hearth of an ancester; but the sleep of these 
village graves is long and quiet, and the wind and the rivulet 
are the only faithful mourners. Where are those who should 
rebuild, if the surrounding ground be worth tilling? Is the 
place bedevilled since that wild night when the red-haired 
Macgregor swooped down with his fierce clansmen on the 
sleeping hamlet, and fluttered its dovecots to sudden wake- 
fulness? In truth it seems so, and the legend says well 
that tells how the troubled murmur of the Gyle stream, 
fretfully foaming over its broken bed near by, 1s the wail- 
ing of Macgregor mothers for homes destroyed, and sons 
upon whose grayes now grows the heather and the moorland 
TASS, 
‘ But in spite of factions and the changes of time, itis 
curious to note how strong is the clannish feeling prevalent 
in most localities, and how deeply ingrained in the Scotch 
tenantry is the desire for a chieftain, who shall be the head 
and leader of all the many minor offshoots of the family. 
—— 
