42 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



[Feb. 7, 1889 



''Sam Lovel's Campn." By R. E. Rubin son. Now ready. 



THE BRONZE BACKS OF SUSSEX. 



AMONG the hills of Warren and Sussex counties, not 

 fifteen miles away from the Delaware Water Gap, 

 or going up to the Pocono Mountains, an hour distant by 

 rail, the eager sportsman still finds a fruitful field for his 

 douhle-barreled Parker, and quiet streams and the swift 

 Lehigh River still abounding in gamy trout. During the 

 early summer I have, for several years, found an attrac- 

 tive resting place near Goldsboro, Pa., on the D., L. & W. 

 R. R., and as I hear the January winds blow cold I wish 

 it were summer once again and I was hunting with that 

 skillful fisherman, Teddy O'Boyle (who was always 

 "dry," however deep the trout holes), among the laurel 

 bushes, for the sacred spots whence I used to draw 100 

 speckled trout before a late breakfast on a May morning 

 when, as Cullen Bryant hath it— 



"The May sun sheds an amber light 

 The new-leaved woods and lawns between"— 



name he proudly acknowledges, and which will linger 

 among his friends and acquaintances till Teddy himself 

 passes. in his checks. Teddy was wont to dig his red 

 worms early in the evening, and his early daylight cry 

 was that his gin bottle should be filled. Much" to his jov 

 I used to compare him to Maginnis's "Tiu.othv Thaddy 

 O Mulligan, who niver emptied his tumbler of punch 

 without wishing it was full again!" 



After many a mornings tramp along the waters of the 

 Lehigh, with a creel full of "speckled beauties," when the 

 sun reached the meridian, poor Teddy O'Boyle would 

 always come to me, as I rested on a flat stone among the 

 laurel bushes, and say, "Mister, it's dry I am. Let's go up 

 to the house;" and no earthlv inducement could stir Mr. 

 O'Boyle to the glory of fishing for trout again till his 

 gin bottle was filled to the brim ! 



It was in Monroe county Teddy aud I once treed a bear 

 with only bird shot in our guns, but. Teddy informed me 

 that he had lost no bears and made a beeline for Simond's 

 Hotel, and I stood not on the order of my going: I went 

 at once. 



But the trout are nearly all gone. The "heinous wing 

 of modem improvement," as Mr. Malaprop would call it, 

 has quietly swept over the land, and the sawdust from 

 the lumber mills has choked the little trout streams and 

 they are gone, all gone, the dear, familiar faces— of the 

 trout. The lumbermen have made such havoc among the 

 big timber that even the gray squirrels have sought fresh 

 fields and pastures new. Jay Gould's old tanyard still 

 remains, sole monarch of the ruined landscape. Here 

 Jay Gould began to lay the foundation of his fortune. 

 He started a tanyard with a gentleman named Leupp 

 near Gouldsboro, and the great financier gave name to 

 the place. An unfortunate quarrel broke up the partner- 

 ship, both claiming possession of the tanyard, armed 

 their respective followers, and manv a broken head and 

 not a few indictments m the Scranton Court House tes- 

 tify to this day the bitterness of the partnership quarrel 

 for domination. Jay Gould won the day. as he usually 

 does, and partner Leupp, in bitter disappointment, cut 

 his throat and died. 



The few pheasants remaining in the laurel thickets were 

 too few, or too shy to tempt a sportsman, so I laid aside 

 my gun and took a train down to Delaware on the D. L. 

 & W. R. R., and via Blairstown, N. J., sought Decker- 

 town, in Sussex county, a quiet little country town 

 nestlmg amid the grand old hills of Sussex. This was 

 the home of that doughty warrior Genera) Judson 

 Kilpatrick, whose whole life was a romance, and whose 

 bravery m battle might justify the poet's lines: 

 "Time was when lie who won his spurs oi gold. 



t mm royal hands must woo the knightly state. 

 But the kneii of old formalities is tolled. 

 And the world's knights are now self-consecrat 



Gen. Kilpatrick, with a magnetic presence, but without 

 any real basis of intellectual culture, was not only a 

 brave and dashing cavalry officer, but essentially a man 

 of affairs. He succeeded in impressing Lincoln's Secre- 

 tary of State, the great optimist, Wm. H. Seward, with 



his powers as a diplomat, and Kilpatrick was twice sent 

 rican minister to Chili, where he wedded a 



as the Amer 



beautiful Spanish girl, who still survives the once cele- 

 brated hero, soldierand diplomat, who was scarcely forty 

 years of age when he died in Chili, about the same time 

 Minister Hurlbut died, while minister and envoy extra- 

 ordinary to Peru. 



I found the landlord at Deckertown a most companion' 

 able disciple of Izaak Walton, knowing every pickerel 

 pond, trout stream and lake abounding in black bass 

 anywhere in the two counties of Sussex and Warren. 



I said to the gray-haired, but genial Boniface, who told 

 me he knew every lake where the black bass most did 

 congregate: "I must catch a 4-pound bass in the morn- 

 ing, for I have brought to boat the lordly Esom nobilior at 

 the Thousand Islands, pulled in out of the wet a 10-pound 

 Salmo fontinalis in Lake Superior, bagged a 30 pound 

 salmon in the Bay of Chaleur, but as yet have I never 

 caught a genuine bronze-backed bass of over 21bs." 



Old Boniface laughed me to scorn, and, shaking his 

 long gray mane, he first said: "Jine me, stranger, in a 

 ten-year bottled glass of applejack, which was in wood 

 before the war of 1812." 



I "suspended the discipline," as good old Barclay Haines 

 used to say, and found the old apple rare and radiant 

 with age and strength. 



After the "jack" he called Scipio Africanus, and or- 

 dered him to be out before daybreak after the helgramite 

 or "dobson" bait, not forgetting three dozen crayfish 

 (crawfish they are called in the West). 



Scipio's mouth stretched like a poor man's lease, from 

 (y)ear to (y)ear; and he expressed his delight by an exhib- 

 ition of his ivories, glad at the thought of" a day off, with 

 nothing to do but to lie on the sunny side of Truesdell's 

 Lake while his boss and the guest caught black bass. 



By daylight, behind a Pate he a colt which traveled the 

 turnpike like a "stallion shod with fire." we soon were 

 spinning in a, two-seated wagon, Scipio driving, over the 



splendid turnpike, and paused before Fai mer Carpenter's 

 barn, within a stone's throw of the beautiful lake, lying 

 lovingly between two of the grandest hills in old Sus- 

 sex. 



Scipio hastened to bring out his bait boxes, having 

 added fresh minnows to his helgramites and crawfish 

 and green frogs. I was eager for a four-pounder: the 

 jolly old landlord gave me his best lancewood rod, light 

 as a feather, but supple as a lawyer's conscience. I first 

 tried a cra wfish as bait, and after reaching the middle 

 of the lake in a light birch canoe, made a cast and waited 

 for results. In ten minutes 1 felt a powerful pull; I 

 paused one instant, then gave my wrist a twist, and as 

 the reel whizzed frantically, and the line paid out rapidly 

 a hundred yards, I knew I had hooked the black bass of 

 my piscatorial dreams. I was cooler than I imagined I 

 could be under the circumstances. He sulked. 1 gave 

 a light tap on the polished rod: the telephone reached 

 him and the bronze back was oft" again, jumping high in 

 the air, giving his head a shake to dislodge the hook. 

 But it was no go. In fifteen minutes the bass, kicking 

 the beam at 4Ubs., was lying panting in the bottom of 

 the skiff, and I was conscious of what my lord Roscoe 

 would call the "greatest effort of my life." Nor was 

 this the last. 



Old Boniface seemed to know all the deep holes, and 

 by going on the rocky side of the pond we soon had 

 twenty big bass, the smallest weighing 21bs. It was glory 

 enough for one day, and I cried "Eureka" over the first 

 genuine day's sport in my life among the big-mouthed 

 bronzed-backs. 



The ride home was through a magnificent country, 

 where the barns, always larger than the dwelling 

 houses, were filled with winter grain for the horses and 

 the cattle upon a thousand hills. 



Boniface said. "Stranger, you didn't kn»w what old 

 Sussex was." I admitted that the country with its hills 

 cultivated to their tops was a surprise to me. When we 

 reached home Scipio Africanus cleaned three of the I .in- 

 gest bass, which made a good supper for the house; and 

 as the jolly and warm-hearted landlord remarked after 

 getting 31bs. of bass inside of him, "he felt as the Psalmist 

 said, 'As if a child might play with him.' " Just when 

 the Psalmist said it 1 could not remember. 



He told me many interesting anecdotes of Gen. Kil- 

 patrick, whose farm joined his, near Deckertown, and is 

 still owned by the Chilian widow of the slashing trooper, 

 whose audacity won the unstinted praise of old Gen. 

 William Tecumseh Sherman. There were a hundred 

 kind things said by his neighbors and friends about Kil- 

 patrick; side lights on the character of the brilliant 

 lecturer and soldier, which left a new and pleasing im- 

 pression on my piscatorial mind. 



Many of your New York "cadets of hope and soldiers of 

 endeavor," would fly to the mountains of old Sussex, and 

 in the proper season take a day off among the bass, which 

 do most abound in Carpenter's and Truesdell's lake, if 

 they knew how much sport awaited them. Anyway, I 

 will not soon forget where I had my first and best dav' 

 outing among the "bronze backs " J. M. 8; 



intuml 



SNAKES. 



IN the summer of 184S I began a rather intimate ac- 

 quaintance with snakes, which has been kept up and 

 extended ever since. 



I had found an exceptionally large and beautiful "gar- 

 ter," and as he would not move on, but seemed inclined 

 to fight, I caught him in my bare hands. Of course lie 

 bit me, but these bites cured me of "fear of snakes" for 

 all times. My hands were scratched by his slender sharp 

 teeth, and bleeding, but not very sore, and he had done 

 his level best. 



Since then I have handled many hundreds of the 

 species found in Ontario, and have usually kept a good 

 series of specimens in captivity almost every summer, 

 and often through the winter, and studied their habits 

 very closely. 



During the period of forest clearing, piles of brush, log 

 heaps, rotting stumps, dense growths of epilobium, soli- 

 dagoes and asters were common everywhere, affording 

 to snakes shelter from enemies. Drainage was not thoi igh t 

 of. and swales, swamps, ponds and small rivulets 

 abounded, giving conditions favoring the increase of 

 batrachians, supplying them with abundance of food. 

 Of course, in such an environment snakes were very 

 numerous, notwithstanding many untiring enemies. 

 Among these were hawks, owls, the fox, fisher, mink, 

 coon, skunk, but especially men, women and «hildren, 

 who, with an ever-present, unreasoning, bratal prejudice, 

 cruelly destroyed these harmless creatures. It is far 

 from pleasing to hear a frog or toad expressing fear and 

 pain in an unmistakable language, which speaks directly 

 to the universal heart; but it is the same as the roar of 

 an o\ on the shambles when knocked down by the axe, 

 and the gurgling bleat of the lamb when the knife pierces 

 its innocent throat. A.11 these, like the unheeded protest 

 of the martyr, eloquently evidence a world of wrong. 



W hen not goaded by ill treatment, snakes are very 

 cleanly and docile pots, especially the smaller species, 

 and although low on the scale of mind, the graceful and 

 ever varying curves of their lithe bodies is a pleasure to 

 every unprejudiced artistic eye. 



In our Ontario group of garters we have E. smHta, E. 

 nil-tads xirtalis. E. nirtalis o>dinata, E. sirtali* parie- 

 tah's, and several intermediate forms. In central and 

 northern Muskoka there is a form in which the stripes 

 are almost, or altogether, wanting, being almost uniform- 

 ly black above. 



The largest garter I ever measured was46iin. in length, 

 and 4fin. in girth. It was a typical E. sirtalis miaMs, 

 and was captured in the early part of May, 1883, in the 

 i mmediate vicinity of Toronto. This form is most gener- 

 ally distributed, and is found north of Lake Superior. 



E. sauritais found sparingly about Toronto, and I have 

 captured speennens in Muskoka and Manatoulin, but it is 

 most common along the Lake Erie shore, where it breaks 

 into two or more variet : es. It is the only Ontario form of 

 that slender, graceful and somewhat highly- colored 

 group of garters, of a western fauna. The parietalis 

 form is not generally distributed. I have never met with 

 it, exceplin the extreme southwestern counties, and even 

 there it 4s -not common. In general habits all these 



species of garter are pretty much alike. When anal 

 then- bodies are inflated and depressed, and the wil 

 scales become conspicuous. 



They take to water readily, and are good swimmtl 

 they climb trees fairly well. I have often surprised thl 

 ten feet from the ground, in dense brushwood, and sot 

 times a short distance up large trees having rough b 

 They winter under mud, in swamps and marshes, un 

 piles of logs, in caves or crevices of rocks, beyond 

 reach of frost. 



In captivity they are best wintered in a barrel of wa 

 having bars across toward the bottom to enable then 

 keep under. 



They feed on frogs, toads, salamanders, young bi 

 the smaller species of snake, and sometimes on their < 

 young. The young feed readily on fish worms, ai 

 have fed them on "maggots" carefully washed in ^ 

 water. Garters very seldom seize their prey, unless i 

 alive and moving. I have on a few occasions got then 

 take recently killed frogs and bird*, partially niucked, 

 jerking them about. I have tried them with'house m 

 young rats, arvicolm, and young squirrels, living and de 

 but never could induce a garter to "tackle" one of the 

 Garters do not "constrict," and did they seize sm 

 mammals as they do frogs they would be severely bitt 



Toads, in the presence of snakes, usually remain 

 fectly still, in this is their only safety, for did they m< 

 the least movement they would immediately be caug 

 I have known a hungry snake lie waiting over an h( 

 for a frog to move, and even push with the nose to i 

 him up. This has been called "snake charming," a 

 indeed it looks like it, but the toad is the charmer, 

 snake the charmee. 



I remember one day I dropped a toad in the midst o 

 pit of snakes I had in my back yard. He at once becai 

 perfectly still, though surrounded by more than a doa 

 hungry snakes. There was a circle of fierce heads 

 glaring eyes around him, but he would not move. . 

 circle narrowed, until the protruding tongues aim 

 touched him, yet he was immovable. Just then I < 

 called away for over half an hour, but on retun 

 found the toad, in grave dignity, still holding the 

 by most masterly inactivity. This lowly helpless cov 

 ure, strong only by adherence to a natural faith, tb 

 baffling enemies ntrmerous and powerful, brought Dan 

 before the mental vision, more vividly than Rivier 

 celebrated picture. 



The senses of seeing, hearing and smelling are v 

 defective in garters, they can see but a few yards 

 most, and even at short distances of but a few inc' 

 they are often at fault. 



A snake was seen pursuing a frog, a half -grown Ba„ 

 halecina, in a sawmill yard; the sawdust and open sp 

 were greatly in favor of the snake and against the fr 

 The frog made long jumps and the snake made a dii 

 line to the spot where he alighted, but before reachin 

 the frog had again jumped in another direction, and 

 the hunt went on for about half a minute; the sna 

 quite unable to trace the frog in his aerial progress, 

 directed only by the disturbance made in alighting, 

 last the frog, more by accident than design . alighted on 

 flat surface of a rough board which stood leaning again 

 a pile of lumber at an angle of about 60°, and sat p 

 fectly still, about lOin. from the ground. The snake w 

 quite puzzled : he looked, listened, sniffed and poked abo 

 for several minutes, passing close to the end of the boa 

 several times, but the hunt was an utter failure, and 

 slunk away toward the brushwood, a very mad and 

 gusted specimen. 



Hundreds of similar cases could be cited, all shown 

 the defective character of the special senses of thegarte 

 On feeding snakes, where several are kept together, ji 

 will often find two or more seize the same frog, when 

 lively contest for possession ensues, which sometim 

 ends in the larger swallowing the other contestant. fr< 

 and all. I have known them on several occasions, wh 

 hunting a frog, seize and swallow dekayis and young 

 their own species. Frogs are often first caught by < 

 hindleg, but the snake soon gets hold of the other, a 

 lioth go down together: otherwise the free leg would 

 an obstacle to entering the mouth when the abdom 

 was readied. Toads "are often seized by the side 

 shoulder, when the snake, by a peculiar 'movement 

 the flexibly articulated jaws, moves his hold round 

 the nose, when the act of swallowing begins. 



Garters feed greedily for a few days, it may be a we 

 or two, then seek a resting place, and remain inact 

 for a time. During this period the blood and nervo 

 energy seems to be centered in the digestive apparat 

 and the functions of digestion and assimilation go 

 with great rapidity, and when completed, moulti 

 usually takes place. I have known moulting to occ 

 five times in one season; three and four times are 

 unusual. 



Snakes drink freely, and in the absence of food m 

 sustain themselves on water only for at least one seasoi 

 While drinking they put their nose in the water and 

 slight movement of the throat and jaws may be observe* 

 somewhat like that made by a deer. 



There is no singing in the love-making of garter 

 nevertheless it is as chaste and poetical as that of bird 

 In the pairing season, the male fondles and caresses h 

 lady love with much tenderness, accompanying h« 

 everywhere, and if not disturbed and separated, thev ai 

 true to each other for a season. Where they are mime 

 ous and where the males outnumber the females, the 

 are sometimes found in a bunch of a dozen or more rnah 

 firmly twisted together, embracing one female. I 

 pairing they are usually stretched side by side, with tl 

 tails crossed, aud remain in the act often for a day. an 

 sometimes it is repeated at intervals of a day or two' 



As in birds, the egg is full size before it is fertilize) 

 but incubation is effected within the body of the mothe 

 In Ontario, pairing occurs in August, and the ova i 

 mature in three or four weeks. When laid, the ova a 

 irregularly oval shaped, flattened, about an inch 

 length. The average of 35 from a medium-sized moth 

 was 25x15.4 mm., measured immediately after bein 

 laid. The shell is a delicate transparent membrane, an 

 the young snake is doubled up several times. A fe^ 

 seconds after the egg is laid the occupant begins to mov 

 when the membrane is ruptured, and breathing begir 

 at once. & 



The fragments of the shell are soon broken off, an 

 when dry the young gaiter is about five inches long, 

 average of 20 gave 51. They are quite active and u 

 ' mediately commence life on their own hook, moving ( 



