June 6, 1889.] 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



395 



its foot and concealed by its shadow, ahd with its trunk 

 for a background, 1 slowly raise my head and study the 

 pool. In spite of the volume of water running in the 

 prook its surface, as usual, is still ami glassy. I never 

 had much success in this pond until I began to use the 

 dry fly on it, and fished from below upward, After 

 noting the look of the pool and deciding where I will put 

 my fly — a serious consideration in this still and somewhat 

 shallow water, for if the first cast is not properly made 

 and in the right spot, it is rare that a rise comes to a 

 second one. I first see that the fly is dry and the hackle 

 well spread, and then crawling forward a little on hands 

 and knees and keeping the hemlock between me and the 

 sky hue until I come to a point where I have room for 

 the back cast. 



I .take a preliminary cast or two in the air to get my 

 line of the proper length, and then light as a feather I 

 drop it just at the edge of the little fall and let it float 

 into the pool as though it were an insect caught by the 

 water and floating with outspread wings unable to rise. 

 It has scarcely gone six inches before there is a tawny 

 flash and I strike with a quickness that makes the line 

 sing. Instantly there is a rush across the pool and a pull 

 that puts a good deal of a strain on my 6oz. split- 

 bamboo, but after a turn or two it slackens, and I 

 haul gently to the edge, not the alderman I hail hoped 

 for, but still a respectable trout of some 6oz. in weight. 

 As I rap his head sharply against the metal heel plate of 

 my rod to mercifully kill him and be able to extract my 

 fly a t leisure without mangling it, I reflect he is not much, 

 so far as size goes, like the monsters I have taken after 

 hard fought struggles from the icy flood of the rushing 

 Nepigon, while my sweating Indians held the canoe with 

 quivering poles against the arrowy flood; but after all I 

 think sport is not to be measured by mere size alone, and 

 these trout, with the delicate tackle required to kill them 

 and the extreme caution and skill required for success, 

 give the angler the highest phase of intellectual enjoy- 

 ment the art can afford. It is like a game of chess,' the 

 pitting of brain against brain. You know the fish is 

 there, and provided you use enough skill and intelligent 

 planning to overmatch his fishy cunning he is yours. And 

 this I apprehend is the greatest pleasure to be derived 

 from the exercise of our art. I venture to assert that the 

 angler who has received his education and becomes a 

 successful fly- fisher on the well-fished brooks of Connecti- 

 cutand Massachusetts, will rank respectably on any Ameri- 

 can water and have little trouble in becoming an expert 

 on them , while repeatedly I have seen and fished with men 

 who have been very successful on the waters of the North 

 Woods, the Adirohdacks, or of Canada, but who have 

 given up the fishing on such streams with disgust, declar- 

 ing that they contained no fish. I have been able on sev- 

 eral occasions to give an ocular demonstration of the 

 falsity of this with great pleasure. 



Well, the alderman's heeler is in the basket and I saun- 

 ter on down the stream. Never before have I seen the 

 water in this meadow in better condition. The fish are 

 feeding strongly on the top, for insect life is in full swing. 

 Usually the meadow is not a fruitful place until sundown 

 and after, as the sun shines on the water and it is open 

 and clear. But the sport this afternoon is magnificent. 

 By fishing "fine and far off,'' Flake them one and often 

 two from every pool, returning many fingerlings, which 

 must be handled carefully with a wet hand. In the mid- 

 dle of the meadow I come on a small pond, clear and 

 shallow. Here we repeat the up stream, dry fly tactics, 

 and four fine fellows are basketed. In the old times 

 while a youngster, before I became a fly -fisherman, I took 

 many a trout from this pool by crawling on my knees 

 and elbows carefully to the bank and dropping a lusty 

 grasshopper over the edge, by the bush. 



The trout in the meadow are small, there are no large 

 pools save this; they run from 7 to 9in. in length, but 

 what they lack in size they make up in shyness and in 

 toothsomeness on the table. More delicious fish than 

 these fellows, told by their silvery sides and vivid spots 

 and coloring from their dark-lined brothers of the wood 

 above, cannot be imagined. Eat and lusty are they, fed 

 by the myriad insect life from the tall grasses of the 

 meadows around them. 



In places a bush growing beside the bank leans over 

 into the water. Under the shade are the haunts of fine 

 fish. However, one cannot cast for them; so, standing 

 back, I practice with the fly a plan every grasshopper 

 angler well knows. Shortening my line and keeping it 

 taut, I let the running stream carry it down, and strike 

 all unseen at the slightest touch. In this way I take sev- 

 eral; not as many as I would by the bait, for the fish does 

 not carry my fly, and the inter vaijof striking the unseen 

 fish is of the shortest. Several times a flop in the water 

 and the straightening of my rod tells me of my non-suc- 

 cess; while at others I have to wade in and unfasten my 

 fly from a twig. However, by this plan I am able to fish 

 these spots with a fly, which otherwise I could not do 

 without bait. 



Now I come to a place where the stream, broadening 

 out, flow r s downward over a long stretch of fine gravel. 

 It is remarkably even, and the water, though broad, but 

 a few inches in depth. At its bottom is a long, clear, still 

 pool, and as I look downward I see with regret a fine fish 

 rush hastily down from the foot of the rapid, through the 

 pool to a secure hole under the bank. Had I done as I 

 should, I would have made a wide detour, struck in at 

 the bottom, and fishing it carefully from the end upward, 

 as he lay with his head up stream, I might have had him. 

 In streams of this character both up and down and often 

 cross stream fishing must be employed, according to 

 locality, I find the best plan to be to fish in a general 

 direction downward, but employ them all as needed. 



Speaking of this rippling shallow and pool below, I re- 

 call an absurd adventure that happened to me once at 

 this spot. As I approached it I saw a fine trout nearly 

 at the head of the shallow and trying to gain the top. 

 The water was rather low , and he so large his back fin 

 and part of his back were out, while he was wriggling 

 and worming himself along. The sight was too much for 

 human nature, and into the stream I dashed and en- 

 deavored to bear him ashore vi et armis. Instantly he 

 turned and began to wriggle swiftly downward. I 

 dropped on hands and knees and hunted him all the way 

 down. Sometimes I had him and sometimes I did not; 

 my hands were wet and he so slippery I could not retain 

 him in my grasp. Finally, with one supreme effort he 

 splashed into the pool below, and in his haste and fright 

 described literally one black line to his retreat at the 

 Jewer end f while l in my haste went souse at full length 



into the pool below— a very proper lesson for endeavoring 

 to catch a trout in that style. 



Still on I wander, taking them by pairs from the clear 

 water. The stream runs straight against the sun and my 

 shadow falls in the water behind me, a very great advan- 

 tage and quite offsetting the fact that I have to oast 

 against the southwest wind. However, in this deep val- 

 ley there is but little air, just enough at times to nicely 

 curl the still reaches and not enough to bother me in 

 putting my flies where I wish. 



Now I come to a large, fine-looking pool, from which 

 in all the many times I have fished this stream I have 

 never been able to take a fish, nor, indeed, have I ever 

 seen one in it, and I have finally come to the firm con- 

 clusion it is avoided by the trout. Perhaps it has a fishy 

 ghost and is uncanny, though it does not appear so to me. 

 At least, I can see no earthly reason why it should not 

 hold trout or why they should not be seen and caught 

 like in the pool above and below. But so it is, and no 

 doubt every angler can recall some similar spot he has 

 wondered at. 



Now as I fish downward I approach the rail fence that 

 divides the long meadow from the copse wood. I sit down 

 to take a drink of the sparkling water, and as I take my 

 creel off it feels heavj r , and I pour the trout out on the 

 soft greensward to admire and count them. I have 

 three dozen, and I reflect I have enough and to spare. I 

 have enjoyed the finest sport I have ever had in the 

 meadow; the sun is just sinking beyond the trees on the 

 distant hill, a chill falls on the air. Why should I be a 

 pig when I have had enough both of sport and fish? 

 Enough. I pack my fish carefully in the creel, fill and 

 light my pipe, and wend my way homeward amid the 

 gathering twilight, hearing ever and anon the distant 

 sound of cowbells and the voice of the farm boy as the 

 herds gather to the farm yards. Many goodly pools and 

 stretches and some spots lie below me on the stream , in 

 its course of half a mile before it joins the river, but these 

 we will leave to some later day, and not soon will we for- 

 get our afternoon when we took thirty trout from the big 

 meadow. Percyval. 



WILD PETS. 



I. — A TAME MOUNTAIN SHEEP. 



IT is very seldom that the Rocky Mountain sheep, or 

 bighorn, is seen in captivity. Tame deer are com- 

 mon enough; tame elk are sometimes seen, and so are 

 tame antelope, but tame mountain sheep are very rare. 



I tliink that I have heard ©f only half a dozen cases 

 where these animals were kept in a state of semi-domes- 

 tication. One of these was many years ago in Salt Lake 

 City, and I know nothing about it beyond the bare fact 

 of its existence. Another I learned of from my friend 

 Capt. Chas. E. Bendire. This was a young lamb, six 

 weeks or two months old when seen by Captain Bendire, 

 in the spring of 1876 or 1877 at the home of a ranchman 

 named Davidson in Baker county, Oregon. The little 

 animal had been caught after its mother had been killed 

 in the lava beds on the head of Crooked Creek in Baker 

 county, and was perhaps a week old when captured. 

 Captain Bendire wrote me that "it ran loose about the 

 house and seemed to delight in getting on the kitchen 

 table, cooking stove or on shelves and running along the 

 edges of them, keeping as close to the edge as it could 

 without falling off. It was badly burned while running 

 on the hot kitchen stove once, and died shortly afterward 

 I was told." 



Another living specimen, and the only adult that I 

 have seen in confinement, is the one captured a number 

 of years ago by "Bony" Ernest in the mountains of 

 Wyoming, and which afterward passed into the hands of 

 "Buffalo Bill," and for a year or two and perhaps Ion 

 ger formed a part of the Wild West Show. This one, 

 was reared on a ewe in a flock of domestic sheep, 

 and he grew to be a large ram. When 1 saw him several 

 years ago, he was apparently five or six years old, and 

 was very tall with a fine heavy head of horns. He was 

 then miserably thin and in wretched condition. This 

 was explained to me as the [result of ill-usage, for it was 

 said that he was so cross that the only way to handle 

 him when he escaped from his pen, as he often did, was 

 to rope him and drag him back again. 



There were some years ago two of these animals for a 

 short time at the Cincinnati Zoological Gardens during 

 the period when Mr. Frank J. Thompson was its intelli- 

 gent and successful superintendent. These did not belong 

 to the gardens, but to the traveling menagerie and circus 

 known as the Robinson Show. This show had made a 

 tour west of the Rocky Mountains, and in its wanderings 

 had picked up these two sheep. One of these animals 

 survived nearly two years confined in a close traveling 

 cage. 



No doubt there have been other sheep in confinement, 

 but I have never heard of tlfein. The last one that has 

 come under my notice is the one now at Washington, 

 D. C, in the codection of living animals belonging to the 

 National Museum, and in charge of Mr. W. T. Hornaday, 

 the well known taxidermist of the Smithsonian Institu- 

 tion. The history of that specimen is as follows: 



Early last summer I learned that a Piegan Indian 

 named "Took-Gun-in-the-Night" had in his possession a 

 young female mountain sheep. The little creature was 

 said to be very healthy, perfectly tame, growing finely 

 and likely to live and do well in captivity. From the 

 beginning, the collection of Jiving animals now being got 

 together by the Smithsonian Institution has greatly in- 

 terested me, and as soon as I learned of the existence of 

 the little sheep, I communicated with Mr. G. Brown 

 Goode, Assistant Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 

 who expressed a strong desire to secure it for the national 

 collection, and urged me to obtain possession of it if 

 possible. It was not difficult to do this. "Took-Gun-in- 

 the-Night" is an old friend of mine, and when I sent him 

 a message that I desired to purchase the sheep, if he 

 wished to sell it, he replied that he would keep it for me, 

 and that when I wanted it I could come or send for it. 



Last autumn I found myself in Montana, and my 

 route led me past my friend's cabin. There I saw the 

 little sheep, sturdy, well-grown, healthy and fearless. 

 By day and night it cropped the grass of the prairie near 

 the house, loafing about the door, or even pushing its way 

 into the kitchen at meal times, in the hope of getting a 



crust of bread or a handful of potato skins, of which it 

 was very fond. I had quite a long talk with Took-Gun-in- 

 the-Night — whose short name is John — about the creature, 

 of which he seemed very fond, but at which also ho swore 

 with some bitterness on account of the amount of glass 

 which it had broken. With a sheep's usual fondness for 

 lofty places and insecure footing, this little animal had 

 taken to jumping on to the ledges of the windows in 

 John's house, which ledges are about five feet above the 

 ground. As they are extremely narrow, the animal each 

 time it jumped up would strike the glass with its nose or 

 shoulder, and either crack or wholly break out the panes. 



That the animal was in good condition except m one 

 point, was evident; that it was entirely tame was equally 

 so. At the call "Seep, seep, seep!" it would come delib- 

 erately toward me, and, walking up to my side, would 

 thrust its cold muzzle into my hand in search of a bit of 

 bread. If it did not find this, it would try to get a finger 

 into its mouth, and suck on this as long as was per- 

 mitted. 



John told some amusing stories of the sheep's doings. 

 One day in summer, while it was yet a little thing, it was 

 standing just outside the. door near the corner of the 

 house. Close to the door stood a large pan containing 

 dough, which had been set aside to rise before the bread 

 was baked. This pan was covered with a newspaper to 

 keep the flies out of the dough and the dust from blowing 

 into it. The sheep was standing near the pan half asleep, 

 when suddenly one of the dogs rushed around the corner 

 of the house close to it. The sheep, startled by the dog, 

 bounded high into the air and came down squarely on 

 the newspaper covering the bread pan. Of course its 

 feet went through, and it was fairly "mired down" in the 

 soft dough. Some one saw the absurd occurrence and 

 helped tlie animal out of the pan and on to terra Jir ma, 

 and for the next day or two it lunched off the dry dough 

 which clung to its legs. 



The sheep seemed to be on excellent terms with every 

 living creature about the house. The hens walked about 

 its legs without paying any attention to it, and the dogs 

 did not notice it, except now and then the puppies, which 

 constantly tried to play with it, chasing it about and nib- 

 bling its hind legs. It enjoyed its games with them 

 greatly, but when it got tired, or when they hurt it, it 

 would make an effort to stand them off wish lowered 

 head and threatening gestures. The puppies, which were 

 perhaps about the same age as the sheep, were often, 

 when they became excited, very rough with it, and occa- 

 sionally drew blood. On one occasion the animal was 

 made seriously lame by a bite high up on the inside of the 

 thigh. 



The only point about the condition of the sheep which 

 was unsatisfactory was the excessive growth of its hoofs. 

 It is well known to most people that the mountain sheep 

 spends its life among the rocks on high mountains, and 

 as it is constantly running over these rough surfaces, its 

 feet are subjected to a constant and very severe wearing, 

 which wearing is compensated for by a very rapid growth 

 of the hoof. The little sheep at John's, however, had no 

 opportunity to wear down its hoofs. Its life was passed 

 on the prairie, and it had never trodden the rough rocks 

 of the mountains thirty miles away. So its feet grew 

 out so long that at times it became lame, and it had 

 several times been necessary to pare down the surplus 

 horn, a proceeding which the sheep did not at all relish. 



The little animal seemed to realize that the life it was 

 leading was not altogether a natural one, and to long for 

 exercise. Although John, tried hard to keep it about the 

 house as much as possible, yet it would seize every oppor- 

 tunity to follow him on his hunting excursions or when 

 he was out looking up cattle, and although he was usually 

 able to drive it back or tie it up, yet sometimes it would 

 circumvent him and not make its appearance in his wake 

 until he had got so far from home that he could not well 

 return. It would trot or gallop along behind his wagon 

 or his horse in most sedate and business-like fashion, and 

 even if its jaunt led it over twenty or thirty miles of 

 country, it was always fresh and ready to go further. 



My journey led me on, and it was six weeks before I 

 again found myself at John's, and had an opportunity to 

 talk with him further about the sheep. I then heard in 

 detail the story of the animal's capture. 



It was in the month when they plant potatoes (May) 

 that John and two other men drove their wagons up to 

 the mountains, to cut timber for fence posts and poles. 

 The prairie was bright and green and the young leaves of 

 willows and aspens were growing, but upon the range the 

 far-reaching fields of snow seemed scarcely to have begun 

 to grow smaller, and the nights were still cold. The men 

 worked hard, chopping and hauling, but one day John, 

 thinking that fresh meat was needed, left his axe in 

 camp, and taking his gun instead, started out to hunt. 



It was still early in the day when he reached the foot 

 of the great buttress-like shoulder that juts out from the 

 range on the south side of the stream. As yet he had 

 seen no game, and no very fresh sign, but here he sud- 

 denly came on the tracks of two mountain sheep, which 

 had passed along late the day before, after the surface of 

 the snow, softened at midday by the rays of the sun, had, 

 as night drew on, begun to freeze again. He followed 

 these tracks for some little distance, and at length as he 

 looked over a low ridge, saw far ahead of him on the 

 upper edge of an extensive snow field two sheep, and at 

 their feet two tiny dark objects, which he knew must be 

 two yottng ones. They were too far off to shoot at with 

 any reasonable prospect of hitting them, and over the 

 smooth white snow there was no possible means of 

 approaching nearer without their taking the alarm. 

 More in order to see what they would do than with any 

 idea of hitting them, he guessed at the distance and fired 

 a shot. 



The two old ones ran off and were soon high up on 

 the rocky ledges, looking back anxiously now and then, 

 but always going higher and higher, but the very voung 

 ones remained where they had first been seen. Then it 

 occurred to the hunter to see if he could catch one of 

 them. He toiled along over the snow and was soon close 

 to the little lambs. One of them was lying down, but 

 the other was on its feet, and seemed to regard the strange 

 object that was approaching with some fear. John had 

 no difficulty in placing his hands on the one that was 

 lying down, but all his endeavors to get hold of the other 

 were futile. It did not seem greatly alarmed, but was 

 too shy to be touched. After tying the feet of the cap- 

 tive with his neckcloth, John made up his mind to at- 

 tempt to run down the little tottering creature, hardly 

 larger than a rat, which insisted on keeping just out of 



