June 28, 1888.] 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



461 



shot, uttering the most discordant cries. This was be- 

 coming decidedly slow, and as darkness was fast making 

 we deemed it best policy to leave this spot of mud and 

 snakes and row for our yacht, which we supposed lay 

 near where we had left her. Out of sight, and as we 

 subsequently found, in the most particularly practical 

 manner, she was miles away. To find her was the next 

 question, and now began a search, the impression of 

 which it will take many a day to obliterate from our 

 minds. Fortunately we had one. of the crew on the 

 island with us. and as he knew the way we felt consider- 

 ably relieved for the time being. Divided into two par- 

 ties, the crew and two passengers in one, friend and self 

 in the other boat, we with some effort got the boats into 

 water deep enough to float us and make a beginning. 



Rowing and talking about the miserable place we had 

 just left made us oblivious for the time being of the dark- 

 ness until suddenly it struck us that the other boat had 

 lost us. Here was a predicament, but after shouting and 

 making a great to do generally, we heard a gun fired, and 

 although in quite a different direction to what we had 

 supposed them to be, we lost no time in getting there. 

 This little experience served as a good lesson, and we ever 

 after kept them well in sight and hearing; for were we 

 not out in the Gulf of Mexico in a small open boat, a 13ft. 

 light river craft, seven miles from land, and the night 

 now so dark it was with difficulty that we could discern 

 the others when but a couple of lengths from us? 



As nothing out of the ordinary occurred for some little 

 time we began to feel reckless, rowing our best, when all 

 at once we find ourselves fast on an oyster bar. Fortu- 

 nately no damage was done, but to get off again was the 

 question. By sounding with an oar we discover that 

 nowhere in the vicinity would the water he over our boot 

 tops; so out we get and carry until there is depth enough 

 to float us again. A spell of perhaps fifteen minutes and 

 those ahead run aground. Then came a shouting and 

 splashing and a "Look out behind or you will run us 

 down; back water! pull on your left, quick!"' etc., etc. 

 Patiently bearing all this and a deal more, we end up by 

 getting fast ourselves. After rowing for more than five 

 miles, and getting on and off the oyster bars and coral 

 reefs at least a dozen times, we at last see a small light in 

 the distance, which proved to be our long-sought vessel. 

 Fancy being four or five miles from land and getting out 

 of your boat to carry her over a reef; but then this part 

 of the gulf, known as St. Martin's Reef, is peculiar, and 

 for miles from shore one can go without finding more 

 than five or six feet of water. 



Wet, tired and as hungry as such a row is capable of 

 making one, we climb on board, expecting to find a good 

 meal all ready and the captain sounding the gong. Fully 

 inured to disappointment by this time we say but little 

 until we spy our piece of ebony quietly conversing with 

 a lot of lank specimens of Florida crackers instead of 

 being up and about preparing our much-wished-for meal. 

 Convinced of the error, perhaps in tones and words 

 (short and quick ones) not new to him. but nevertheless 

 quite appropriate to the occasion, he managed to get 

 something for the inner man' in the course of an hour or 

 so. We follow ashore and demolish it. 



Returning on board we undergo another agreeable, ex- 

 perience. Not light enough to accomplish anything by, 

 as one lamp leaked, another required a different kind of 

 oil to that with which it was filled, and the third smoked 

 so that it was next to useless. These surprises were be- 

 coming monotonous, but with the delusive thought that 

 the morrow would bring forth good things in good shape 

 we smoked a last pipe and turned in for the night. Two 

 on each side of the centerboard, packed spoon fashion, 

 so that when one wanted to move the other must per 

 force do likewise, and with the crew on the roof we do 

 our best to worry through the night. About 2 A. M. I 

 am awakened by a feeling of moisture that seems to per- 

 vade everything, but thinking it is the fog that is just 

 then quite dense, try to sleep again. I soon realize what 

 is the matter and that the boat was leaking. Sleep under 

 such conditions was out of the question, so we did the 

 next best thing and remained awake. And oh, how wet 

 and cold water does feel at such times. 



With no small amount of satisfaction did we welcome 

 the first light of day, and as soon as the sun was up 

 sufficiently had the' bedding, etc., on the roof to dry. 

 Upon investigation, and under threats of dire vengeance, 

 the captain acknowledges having ran on a reef in coming 

 up the river. He said nothing to us about it the night 

 previous, because he didn't think she was "hurted." As 

 there is generally a lack of wind in these latitudes during 

 the forenoon at this season of the year, we poled up the 

 river to where our men assured us we would find good 

 camping ground and plenty of fish and— yes. they had 

 seen turkey when there before. 



Arrived at the place, we anchor opposite a small mound 

 called a camping island, and after the crew have set the 

 whole place on fire in their endeavors to start our camp- 

 foe, we succeed in getting our coffee and a few things 

 cooked. Imagine now our utter disgust at finding that 

 those having the matter in charge at the "sportsmen's 

 paradise" had failed to provide either cups, plates, forks 

 or spoons, but fairness forces the admission that they did 

 f urnish one knife for six. 



The fishing, with the exception of perhaps half a dozen 

 sheepshead of about 31bs. apiece, was scarcely an im- 

 provement on our shooting experience of the eve before, 

 so we were about ready to give up and go back. 



As for alligators, they were there galore, and regular 

 mossbackers too, but so shy that it was impossible to 

 get near enough to secure a single specimen. And what 

 a river ! Desolate, almost beyond description. Saw- 

 grass on all sides as far as the eye could reach, and, as if 

 to relieve the monotony, it was burning in a dozen differ- 

 ent places. Notwithstanding all this we were again pre- 

 vailed upon to go still further up the river near its source, 

 and we would assuredly not be disappointed. Of course 

 this meant another night on the boat, and having stopped 

 the leak to a certain extent we passed a tolerably good 

 one. Of course no better success attended us at our new 

 quarters, so the next morning we poled the best part of 

 the way to the gulf again, and with glad hearts bid adieu 

 forever to that will-o-tlie-wisp of a river. 



We find a light wind stirring at the mouth, and as it 

 was dead ahead we had as yet a deal of hard poling to 

 to do before we could set our course in the desired direc- 

 tion. 



When going through one of the narrow passes between 

 two islands we noticed a school of porpoises in very shoal 

 water, feeding on what appeared to be salt-water trout. 



So ravenous were they that our close proximity was not 

 noticed, and had it not been for a rifle ball sent among 

 them we probably would have passed quite unnoticed. 

 The channel taken after their being so unceremoniously 

 disturbed was not deep enough to cover their dorsals, and 

 it was a rare sight to see these big fish tear along, per- 

 fectly heedless of the fact that they were seriously injur- 

 ing themselves on the sharp coral bottom. They con- 

 tinued in tins way for about a mile, following the tor- 

 tuous channel with mi erring accuracy until deeper water 

 hid them from view. 



At last we are in the Homosassa River again, and when 

 within about a mile of the hotel the wind died com- 

 pletely out, so that with the ebb tide, which was running 

 strongly, it was impossible to hold our own against it. 

 The half dozen guns on board were fired simultaneously 

 to notify our friends that we were near, and soon by the 

 aii I of a couple of boats were towed to the dock, two days 

 behind time, sadder but wiser men. Bio Reet.. 



SAM LOVEL'S CAMPS.-XI. 



WHILE Ins friends' attention was divided in watching 

 the progress of their own haul and that of their 

 neighbors, Sam departed in his canoe, paddling up the 

 lower readies of the stream, where the dipping willow- 

 tips scarcely bent to nor rippled the slow current, and the 

 reflections of trunks and leaves stood motionless on the 

 glassy stream till the boat's wake set them a-quiver, as 

 its slanted bars of golden light climbed rashes, ferny 

 shores and gray tree trunks and then dissolved in green 

 and gold among the sunlit leaves, or a gar-pike, watching 

 with wicked eyes the advancing prow, stirred them with 

 the slow ripple of his sullen retreat. Then a muskrat 

 voyaged from one shore with a freight of weeds trailing 

 from his jaws and undulating with his wake, then sank 

 with it to the underwater doorway of his home and left 

 his wake fading in slow pulsations above him. A green 

 heron, startled from an overhanging branch, went flap- 

 ping awkwardly along the narrow lane of sky while his 

 distorted double flapped more awkwardly along the lane 

 of water. 



There was no sign nor sight of the outer world but 

 the frayed stripe of blue sky overhead , one glimpse of 

 Camel's Hump set in darker blue against it, and seen for 

 an instant through a break in the green and gray wall of 

 trees, Mt. Philo's crown of pines and shorn sunlit slopes. 



The solitude was very pleasant to this simple lover of 

 nature who in certain moods was happiest when alone, 

 yet not alone, for he felt a perfect companionship with 

 the woods and their inhabitants close about him. There 

 were other fishers than he but for whose busier plying 

 of their craft he might have forgotten why he had come, 

 so satisfied was he with the lazy voyaging. A heron 

 stood with poised spear in an outlet of the marsh wait- 

 ing for luck with an angler's patience. An alert mink 

 slid from the bank, cleaving the water with an almost 

 noiseless plunge as if he were a brown arrow shot into it. 

 Not so a kingfisher, who proclaimed from afar his com- 

 ing, just swerved from his jerky course for the boat, 

 then hung for a moment in quivering poise and dashed 

 down so close that the spray of his noisy plunge fell in 

 splashing drops not twice the canoe's length from her 

 prow, then he flew to a raft of driftwood and perching 

 upon its topmost stick bragged as loudly of his ininnow 

 as Antoine might of an eel. 



Sam had passed one landing which showed in its forked 

 rests for poles, brands and ashes of fires, heads and scales 

 of fish, much use as a fishing place. Now he came to 

 another where the stream bent from north to west, just 

 above a litttle islet, whose, willows, great elms, water 

 maples and one noble buttonwood were bound in a tangled 

 cordage of grape vines. Here were the same signs of 

 frequent fishing. An old boat that had long since made- 

 its last fishing and trapping trips lay rotting at the bank, 

 with fish at home under its sunken stern and remnants of 

 muskrats' recent feasts on its mossy thwarts. Landing 

 here he fished from the shore, and having no bait but 

 worms, for a while caught only perch. These bit vigor- 

 ously enough to raise high expectations, sadly disap- 

 pointed when the brief spurt of resistance was over and 

 the fish came swinging ashore. But when such trivial war- 

 fare ceased for a while and there came at last, after a brief 

 toying with the bait, a downright tug and then a strong 

 up-stream sweep of the line that made it sing and the 

 cedar pole trembled to the shrill song as it bent in his 

 grasp, Sam felt assured that he was contending with a 

 oass without the proof presently given. The water was 

 smitten underneath, shivered into crystal drops as the 

 gallant fish shot thrice its length above the surface, rain- 

 ing crystals from every fin till the circling wavelets of 

 unburst and plunge met. Though Sam's weapons were 

 of clumsy strength, he fought his antagonist fairly as he 

 often had large trout with lighter tackle, not heaving him 

 out over head as boys do sunfish, but tiring him out with 

 the long, uncertain struggle which, if we are to believe 

 the only testimony that we ever hear, is as much enjoyed 

 by the fish as by the scientific angler. 



"There," said he, when he had gently lifted the ex- 

 hausted bass ashore, "you didn't git away, did ye? It 

 mos' seems as if you'd orter, but I guess I'm glad you 

 didn't. By the gret horn spoon! You're harnsome as a 

 pictur' an' you fit like a coon!*' If there were other bass 

 here they scorned such humble fare as worms, and after 

 offering in vain the finest in his box, Sam re-embarked 

 and voyaged further up stream. There was a stronger 

 current to make way against, running between higher 

 banks, overhanging in a fringed network of roots of old 

 trees that shaded them, elms with great buttressed trunks, 

 water maples so nearly like them in form that it needed 

 a second glance to assure one that they were not elms ; 

 oaks that had showered down mast to feed woodducks in 

 a hundred autumns, clumps of bass wood, lusty sons of 

 the dead giant whose moldering stump they stood around, 

 and here and there towering button woods, shining 

 spectre-like among the shadows, more like ghosts of 

 other departed giants of the forest than like living trees. 



Stream and banks beautified each other with shadow, 

 with mirrored greenness of leaves, graceful bend of 

 trunks and limbs, with quivering rebound of sunbeams 

 from ripples again and again repeated till they flickered 

 out in the translucence of pools or the gilded green of 

 leaves. Every reach disclosed new beauty and promised 

 more beyond when the glitter of the stream flashed forth 

 from the shadows of a bend. 



One who sees it now for the first time, can hardly im- 

 agine how beautiful Sungahneetuk was then. One who 



saw it then and now beholds its abomination of desola- 

 tion, the shrunken current crawling between banks 

 avariciously shorn of all their trees, of their last green 

 fleece of willows, worthless dead, but priceless to him 

 who loves the beauty that the hand of God has wrought, 

 can but wonder why some awful retribution has not 

 fallen upon the spoilers, nor can he withhold his own 

 feeble curse, wishing that he had the power of God to 

 enforce it. 



A railroad in Vermont was almost undreamed of then, 

 and there was no shadow of coming destruction brooding 

 over the peaceful woods and waters, nor did the thought 

 enter Sam's mind to mar his enjoyment of the sylvan 

 scene, that it ever would be changed but by growing 

 older, nor lose anything but: by the natural decay that in 

 some way compensates for all it takes. 



Now and then, where the bottom faded out of sight in 

 a swirl of dull green under tangled threads of sunshine, 

 he invited the bass to taste his worms, but they would 

 not, though he frequently saw them hanghig near his 

 bait on waving fins, then moving away in leisurely 

 disdain. 



Presently he descried on the bank above him another 

 angler who was just slipping a fine bass on to the withe 

 that already held a dozen or more. When he had again 

 tethered them in the edge of the stream, he took: up his 

 pole and stole cautiously^ along, carefully scanning the 

 water. Sam landed and followed, watching him in the 

 hope of learning something from one so successful, if he 

 were not so by sheer luck. As Sam drew near the man 

 saluted him with a nod given over his shoulder, showing 

 a face beaming with good humor, for how could a man 

 who had caught a dozen bass wear a sour visage? 



"I kinder wanter see haow you du it," Sam said 

 in a low voice. "I never ketchedbut one 'Swago in my 

 life." 



The fisherman looked at him in pitying wonder, then 

 laughed a little and beckoned him nearer. He pointed 

 to a little basin scooped in the sandy bottom and cleared 

 of every large pebble and water-logged weed and stick. 

 A bass hovered always near it and sometimes over it, and 

 now charged furiously upon a perch that had intruded on 

 the sacred precints, pursued it out of sight, and in an instant 

 returned. When a sodden water weed drifted into the 

 precious basin, she seized it before it could lodge there, 

 and, carrying it beyond the down stream rim, dropped 

 it where it was borne away by the current. 



"That ere 's a bed," said Sam's new acquaintance. 

 "Naow, see here," and sheathing his hook with an un- 

 looped worm, he dropped it quietly a little above the bed 

 and let it drift down on it. The fish rushed at it, seized 

 it and darted, away with it, but before she had time to 

 drop it the angler struck sharply, and almost in the same 

 instant landed her on the grass behind him. 



"Thet's the way tu du it," the fisherman said, as he un- 

 hooked the fish. 



"Wal, it does take the rag off'm the bush for quick 

 work," said Sam; "but I don't ezackly git a holt on' t. 

 Does these ere 'Swagos live in them places all the time?" 



"Laws a massy, no! Them's the spawnin' beds, where 

 they lays the' aigs. Don't you see this one's just ready tu 

 lay hern?" and Sam now noticed that the bass was pro- 

 f uselv voiding spawn in her struggles. 



"She'd stick tu it like teazles till they was hatched an' 

 a spell arter, an' not 'low nothin' on it. Then they clear 

 aout, an' arter the middle o' July you won't see a 'Swago 

 bass in the crik till 'long airly in the fall. Then the' '11 be 

 some little fellers not bigger ' rock bass." 



"Wal," said Sam, with a sigh of disappointment. "I 

 allers thought it was a pleggid mean trick tu ketch traout 

 on the' beds, an' I guess this haint no better." 



"But it ketches 'em, an' that's what a feller wants," 

 argued his companion. "Come along an' we'll find an- 

 other bed, an' vou try it once, just for greens." 



"Wal, I do' know but I will jest once to see 'f I can," 

 and they went slowly along the bank till another bed and 

 its guardian were discovered. 



Sam did exactly as he had seen his instructor do, and 

 soon was fast to a good three-pounder. This, however, 

 was not torn from the water as the other had been - 

 though the guide shouted, "Slat 'er aout! You got 'er 

 hooked good. Slat 'er aout!"— but was vanquished in a 

 fair fight and then drawn gently to the shore. Sam un- 

 hooked her tenderly without taking her from the water, 

 then watched her as, lying on her side, she feebly waved 

 her fins, then stood still a moment as if dazed by the 

 recovery of freedom, and then, as she surged away and 

 vanished in a flash, he addressed her: 



"Good bye, marm. Nex' time you see a worm m your 

 nest you poke it aout wi' your nose.'" 



"What in thunder d'd ye let 'er go for?" his companion 

 demanded in a vexed tone, when his astonishment found 

 other expression than a blank stare. 



"That's the way t' du it," Sam answered quietly, "I 

 jist wanted tu show you haow." 



"Wal, I swan ! you mus' be a darned fool !" 

 "That's what I've tof myself a hundred times," Sam 

 replied rather sadly, but with perfect good nature, "but 

 I can't help ifr, an' so I haint tu blame for it. Wal, 1 

 guess I'll be goin'. I'm 'bleeged tu ye for what you've 

 showed me an' toF me. Good bye." 



Looking back as he turned the first bend he saw the 

 bass-catcher still staring after him in motionless amaze- 

 ment, but could not hear him saying to himself, "Some 

 poor crazy creetur 'at orter be in Brattleburrer ! Nex' 

 thing he'll be draowndin' hisself !" 



Past landing, island and quiet shores the canoe slid 

 down stream in greater solitude than it had voyaged up- 

 ward. The kingfisher had ceased his clatter, the full-fed 

 mink fished no more, the heron had flown to his mate in 

 the tall pines, and the muskrat was asleep in his burrow. 

 There was a sluggish stir of life when the turtles Slid off 

 the logs with a clump and an unctuous splash, and in the 

 lazy float of myriad insects drifting against the sunlight 

 like a veil of gauze in the unfelt wafts— a suggestion of 

 life somewhere in the boom of a bittern far away in the 

 marshes, in bird songs sung in distant meadows. Smooth, 

 even swells from the lake barred the channel of the last 

 reach with glassy undulations, that slowly heaved up and 

 down the broken reflections of clouds and trees and stirred 

 the rushes with a whispering rustle. Now an azure band 

 of the lake was disclosed, and Garden Island sliming 

 againt the shadowed steeps of Split Rock Mountain. 

 Then the talk and laughter of the seining party was heard 

 f aintly, then louder as he drew nearer, and presently Sam 

 landed and was with them. 



The later draughts of the net had not been quite so sue- 



