88 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



[ATTO. 22, 1899. 



Sam by taking the biggest niasky were scattered to the 

 winds and he made a few impromptu remarks that are 

 better left out of these chronicles lest they leave the im- 

 pression that his religious training was in a measure lost 

 sight of in his early youth. 



But the villainous old longface made a great fight, if 

 he wasn't a masky, and proved himself dead game from 

 snout to caudal. It seemed as if he would never tire, 

 and the straggle was kept up with a dogged, persistent 

 pull and frequent rushes, that nigh blistered Dan's thumb, 

 till led alongside, when he was knocked on the head and 

 dragged in the boat, where he lay limp and dying, no 

 longer a terror to the timid bluegills and goggle eyes 

 that marie their home in the grass and thickets of bush 

 weeds growing in the bay. 



Old Dan was in his glory, several times we were handl- 

 ing a fish each at the same time, and he was only-induced 

 to bring the sport to an end when the shadows crept 

 away out on the lake, warning us of approaching night, 

 when the rods were laid in the boat and we took our 

 way to camp in a happy frame of mind over our first 

 day out together; and w'ith "peekrils" enough to have 

 kept "SamLovel's Camp" — "Peltier." ' 'Solon Briggs" and 

 all — sortin' bones for a month. 



As we pulled into the dock, we found Knots planted in 

 bis chair under the old flag flapping in the breeze, gaz- 

 ing across the lake at his landscape, over which were 

 lazily drifting great wisps of soft gray mist, the summit 

 lit up with the last rays of the setting sun peeping out 

 from under a bank of clouds hanging over the mountain 

 at our backs, the whole forming a picture of sunset love- 

 liness that would have caused our artist friend Tom 

 Lindsay to go into raptures, had he been there to catch 

 the spirit of the scene with his ready pencil. 



The two kids were in a boat fishing a few hundred 

 yards up the lake, old Sam was taking a quiet nap under 

 a mosquito bar in the warehouse, Louis was busy with 

 the supper and looking after a camp kettle of savory 

 bean soup simmering on the iron bars over a small open 

 fire, while Charley and the Jedge were yet out; the one 

 with the Jedge's rifle looking for a bear he had lost back 

 in the hills, as be had informed the others before starting 

 out, the other with his rod somewhere up the little 

 stream, spying out the hiding places of the wary trout 

 that were hardly plentiful enough to pay for the work 

 of clambering and barking his shins over the rough rocks 

 to reach the few pools where they had their abiding 

 places. 



The Jedge came quietly out of the bushes near the 

 bank of the stream soon after, with a string of five or 

 six fair-sized' trout on a forked twig; and Charley came 

 down the main road a little later carrying his lost bear, 

 which Knots pronounced the "worst shrunk bear in the 

 Dominion," — reminding him once more of his old and 

 napless yarn of the old darky and his "shwunk" catfish. 



Charley's "bear" was a slim-built little animal, hardly 

 as large as a gray squirrel, covered with a coat of the 

 finest and softest lead-colored fur, except a strip of pure 

 white along the belly. We could tell nothing of the 

 form or shape of the head, as he had clipped it off with 

 the rifle ball, as the little fellow peered at him from a 

 cleft in the. rocks, as clean almost as though cut with a 

 knife. None of us knew what to call it. but Louis took 

 a look at it and said, "marten." 



Louis announced that supper would soon be ready, and 

 a resonant solo evoked from the bottom of a frying-pan 

 with a fragment of rock, called the boys in from up 

 shore, and Ave gathered around the table without annoy- 

 ance from the mosquitoes or blackflies, the stiff wind up 

 the lake during the day having blown them high and 

 dry back in the hills. (We found it a good rule, in mak- 

 ing a camp on a lake shore, to select a point, if one is to 

 be found, free of underbrush as possible, on the side of 

 the lake where the prevailing course of the wind is on 

 shore, in which case the flies and mosquitoes are not 

 nearly so troublesome.) 



The two boys had come in with a string of sunfish and 

 perch, two or three "snakes," and a broken rod, the lat- 

 ter due to their limited knowledge of the rush-under-the 

 boat proclivities of the Canada pike: but Harry, the vic- 

 tim of the mishap, was made happy the next morning by 

 the loan of one of Uncle Dan's old reliable Japanese cane 

 rods,tried and tested in many a hard-fought battle with the 

 bass and longsnouts of Upper Michigan, and the worth- 

 less $1.50 stained and varnished wooden fraud with 

 beech-lancewood tops was cast aside as so much useless 

 timber. 



And here a word to the youngsters and beginners: 

 Never buy a cheap wooden rod that is stained and var- 

 nished and painted up to conceal a brittle, crossgrained 

 piece of wood. Buy a good rod or wait till you get to 

 the woods and cut a pole, and you will never have to be- 

 wail the loss of a good fish and the greater— not the best, 

 for they have no best— part of your kindling-wood rod. 



K ingfisher . 



Sceantok, Pa., Aug. 10.— I took a 41b. 19in. black bass 

 from LakeWinola last week with an lloz. lancewood rod. 

 This was my first experience. It was great sport, for he 

 fought long and hard. I attribute the successful capture 

 of him to the instructions got from reading fishing arti- 

 cles in your columns. I have reason to think there are 

 landlocked salmon there, though none have ever been 

 taken. Can you give me instructions how to get them ? 

 What do they bite, when, deep or shallow water?— W. 

 [We doubt that there are any landlocked salmon in the 

 lake above mentioned, and our correspondent must refer 

 to the lake trout (S. namaycmh). During the summer 

 months the lake trout makes its home in deep water, and 

 may be caught with the spoon trolling on or near the 

 bottom. It is a ravenous feeder, and most any kind of 

 fish makes good bait. A good way to attract the fish is 

 to scatter pieces of bait (fishes cut into small pieces) over 

 the waters to be fished a day in advance. A rod and reel 

 and one hundred to two hundred yards of fine strong 

 fine, with a ten-ounce sinker on the end for deep fishing, 

 a gut leader of ten or twelve feet, tied to the fine about 

 its own length from the sinker, makes a good outfit. 

 Dealers furnish numerous contrivances for the capture 

 of this fish.] 



Skints, Nets of every description. American Net & Twine Co., 

 Mfrs., 34 Commercial st., Boston, or 199 Fulton st., N. Y.—Adv. 



The revised and abriged edition of the A. O. U. Check List of 

 "North American Birds, including the additions and changes made 

 rattle supplement, will be aant post free on receipt of 50at».—Adv 



CHICAGO AND THE WEST. 



AS stated in my earlier letter, life at the little town of 

 Middle Inlet, deep in the pine woods of northern 

 Wisconsin, could hardly be expected to furnish any 

 thrilling excitement, yet I managed to put in several 

 A-ery pleasant days here, spending most of my time in 

 trying to get Dan Seaby to go out fishing with me, or in 

 trying to find out the secret of the ineffable peace and 

 content with life which seems to brood over that commu- 

 nity. So far as I could learn, Middle Inlet toils not, 

 neither does she spin, but she lives and is happy, and 

 thit is more than many of us can sav for ourselves. 

 We might accept Dan Seaby as the typo of Middle Inlet 

 philosophy. ' The difference between me and you is 

 right here," said Dan, "as soon as you've had your sup- 

 per, you begin to worry about whether you're goin' to 

 have any breakfast er not. Now, ef I just have the sup- 

 per, I aint worryin' about the breakfust at all. That's 

 me!" 



No one knew how Dan managed to get the supper, but 

 he seemed somehow to find enough for himself and his 

 girl wife. He was the happiest man I ever saw, and I 

 like to think about him. Barely 18 years of age, he 

 stood over 6ft. tall and was very strongly built. It is 

 said that he can lift 3501bs. from the ground and put it 

 up over his head. He is valued on the logging ''drive," 

 and is skilled in all the wild accomplishments of the 

 North Woods. He can stand erect upon a slender log 

 which his weight sinks 2ft. beneath the water, and pole 

 it where he likes as rapidly as one could run a canoe. 

 Even the little boys came and told me how Dan Seaby 

 could spear the pickerel, and the older members of the 

 community all acknowledged that Dan could catch trout 

 where nobody else could, and when others fishing at this 

 side could not get a bite. The country thereabouts is un- 

 speakably rough and hard to traverse, yet I found that 

 Dan took it with all ease, whether in log jam, windfall, 

 cedar swamp or tamarack bog, and never missed his 

 footing, no matter how slippery the log or limb. He is a 

 typical son of the forest, and knows every foot of ground for 

 50 miles about his home. He used to live on Lake Noque- 

 bay where he was well-known as a guide. Once his sail- 

 boat upset in late November, and he was in the water for 

 two or three hours, at a season when the lake was fringed 

 with ice. " Oh, 1 didn't mind it much," said he. " The 

 boat she was upside down, so I just dove under her and 

 come up inside, and crawled up under the seat-boards. 

 I wasn't only two or three inches over the water then, 

 and down on the bottom I cotild see the fish as plain as 

 day. I never saw so many fish in my life. There was 

 plenty of air in the boat, and I just took it easy. It was 

 a lot warmer inside than it was out. Bimeby'l see the 

 water get shallower, and 'fore long I struck a bar and 

 waded out. It seemed a good while 'fore she drifted 

 acrost the lake." 



It is said of Dan that he never goes to bed without 

 getting bis feet wet, and that he can't sleep well if his 

 clothes are dry. Another peculiarity, which may or 

 may not be connected with the above, is that I never 

 happened to see Dan have on two stockings of the same 

 color. But, taken as he is, I would not change a line of 

 Dan, even if I could make him all over, nor have any 

 one think I hold him one shade less than a generous, 

 open-hearted fellow, simple and hearty as the breath of 

 the woods that raised liim, ready to share his last crust, 

 and ready to go out of his way tc accommodate even a 

 stranger. I like such men infinitely more than I do the 

 knock-kneed fools in cap, belt and blazer, we sometimes 

 see about the edge of cities, posing as apostles of the love 

 of outdoor air. 



One day Dan and I went up the Middle Inlet stream 

 about three miles, but found that stream so full of logs 

 and sand that we turned back. Had we kept on three 

 miles further, to the upper dam, we should have found 

 good fishing in the deep water above there, as I after- 

 ward learned. All these streams are logged and 

 dammed. That is the most dammed country I ever saw. 

 In the early season, the fishing below these dams is mag- 

 nificent, but by this time you can hardly find anything 

 but chubs in the great, beautiful pools below the dams. 

 It is a mystery where the trout get to. It is probable 

 that they run up into the small or brushy streams, or lie 

 in the deep water far out in middle of the back-water. 

 In either such locality, they are nearly inaccessible, and 

 the fly is utterly worthless as a lure. If we except the 

 pools between the railroad and Lake Noquebay, the Pike 

 River, the lower Thunder River and the rapids of the 

 Peshtigo, it is fair to say that the angler cannot use the 

 fly, and can hardly use a fly-rod, so unutterably tangled, 

 dense and thick-grown is the wilderness along the narrow 

 and hidden little streams. The short, stiff rod. the short 

 line, heavy sinker and big bait, are unquestionably the 

 best and almost the only practical tackle. 



The Milwaukee and Northern Railway has put several 

 hundred thousand trout into its streams in the past three 

 years, and has this season planted nearly 100,000. This 

 is certainly a wise and commendable action, and is indeed 

 the only thing to do if the company wish to have any 

 fishing left near their line., I lately met Mr. Sheardown, 

 general passenger agent, and Mr. Tabberner, the general 

 agent of this road, located at Chicago, and they both 

 laughed at me when I spoke of the danger of their 

 streams being fished out. "Why, didn't you catch any 

 fish?" they asked. It ts true I did. But so does every- 

 body else up there, and the result is the streams will not 

 stand it. There is no restraint practiced and no limit 

 placed. The result is already apparent. The railway 

 company will do well to keep up its planting, for the 

 harvesting is continuous, and by and by it will be only 

 gleaning. 



Lake Noquebay, five miles from Ellis Junction, or 

 Middle Inlet, is a great water for bass, pickerel and wall- 

 eyed pike, or "dore," as the latter fish is called in that 

 country. These fish run up into the inlets and get into 

 the great pools under the logging dams, where they lie 

 in numbers. The pool at the Forks, or junction of the 

 Middle Inlet and the North Branch, was full of these 

 fish, and sport at them was common. Even so high up 

 on the Middle Inlet as the second dam, I was told, one 

 might be pretty certain of striking a big dore and per- 

 haps a big trout or two. As this was only a mile or so 

 below the railway station, I walked down one morning, 

 declaring my intention of landing a dore on the little 



fly-rod. This, of course, excited laughter from the vil- 

 lagers, who declared "that thing'd break." Yet, using a 

 big bunch of angle-worms, I did hook and land a three- 

 pound dore. It was not very much of a fight, and the 

 result was no trick at all. 



Speaking of angle-worms, any one going into this 

 country to fish should take the worms up with him if he 

 cares for that bait. Except where they have been planted, 

 there is hardly a worm to be found in all that country. 

 We found trout-fins much superior to worms for bait, 

 however, and it will hardly pay any angler to bother 

 much about a can of worms to take along. The fin is a 

 much tougher and more lasting bait, and quite as at- 

 tractive as any for trout in those waters. 



One day I went up the Lower Inlet, where so many 

 large, trout had been taken. It was said that over 2,000 

 trout had been taken in this water within 60 days, and 

 the average was very heavy, a pound, pound and a half 

 or larger being nothing uncommon. The dam being shut 

 down, there was back-water running up nearlv a mile 

 and covering many of the best fishing points, yet by dint 

 of wading and floundering waist-deep through the 

 treacherous grassy bog covered by the overflow, we man- 

 aged once in a while to get out to the creek bank, and 

 then nearly always got some good trout. The local 

 market- fishers said that nobody knew where all the trout 

 came from in this stream. If left unfished for a week or 

 two, there seemed to be as many as ever; and after the 

 water had run down, upon opening of the gates, the fish- 

 ing was always extremely good. I think the trout lie 

 in under the banks and work out from time to time. 

 There are many places along these streams where the 

 water runs directly underground, as I noticed on the 

 Medicine Brook, and the whole country is honey-combed 

 with water chambers invisible from the bank." It is in 

 such places that the largest trout lie, only coming oat to 

 the nieuth of their caverns when tempted by some ex- 

 ceptional bait. I found several such holes while wading 

 the Medicine Brook. 



This fishing on Lower Inlet was only about three miles 

 from the station. Indeed, one does not need a team to 

 get at pretty fair fishing for small trout close to the rail- 

 way. Shepherd's Creek, a brushy and difficult stream, 

 affords good fishing at little ones, within three miles from 

 Middle Inlet. The South Branch, between the railway 

 and the Forks, offers some difficult but paying water. J 

 caught six trout one morning under the dam, right in the 

 village of Middle Lilet, where no one thought any trout 

 were left In fact, I never made a trip that I did not 

 catch some trout, and I kept Station Agent Dropp and 

 his family supplied with trout all the time I lived with 

 him in his freight-car home. The only drawbacks in the 

 fishing were the smallnes of the run, the terribly rough 

 going in the country, and the exteme sluggishness in 

 biting of the trout in these streams; at this season they 

 bite much more like suckers than like trout, and the 

 bigger the trout, the more timidly they bite. 



Wausaukee is six miles above Middle Inlet. A nine 

 mile buckboard ride brings one to good fishing from that 

 point. The trout run a little larger. The stream is so 

 rough that a fly-rod can hardly be used. Bait is best for 

 that water. 



Pembine is about thirty miles above Middle Inlet, 

 There is good fishing in the river there, anywhere from 

 two miles to six miles from town, earlier in the season. 

 There is an infernal old market-fisher here who keeps the 

 trout pretty well skinned out of these waters. He usu- 

 ally catches from 6 to 151'bs. a day. Everybody in town 

 knows he breaks the law. The law is universally broken 

 all through that country. If you raise your voice against 

 that, you are safe to hear some loud talking, and the 

 natives will bulldoze you, if they think they can. An 

 example or two is very much needed in that country, and 

 would have a swift and salutary effect. A game warden 

 with a backbone is needed. Let the railroad company 

 get one such appointed. Tt will be money in their 

 pockets. 



I met an old, rough-spoken, kind-hearted character by 

 the name of Van Keuren at Middle Inlet, our first ac- 

 quaintance being during a little circus we had over his 

 shutting down the dam so that he could cut hay on the 

 marsh below. I reasoned with him that a little paltry 

 hay didn't amount to anything compared to the trout 

 fishing he had spoiled, and he remarked that he would 

 remove the interior machinery of anybody who dared 

 raise the gate, which remark disposed me to" go and raise 

 the gate. We finally compromised the matter by going 

 fishing together over to Medicine Brook, about sixteen 

 miles from the village. Van Keuren drives a clinking 

 good team, and is the best woods driver 2 ever saw. The 

 way we cleared stumps, logs, trees and brush wood was 

 a caution, and we went over country where 1 should not 

 have thought it possible for a wagon to go. If any one 

 is going into that country he cannot do better than to get 

 Van Keuren to take him. He will go flying, and if the 

 wagon holds together will get to the good fishing. Our 

 trip was made directly after a heavy windstorm and the 

 road was in a bad shape from "cross timber." We had 

 to cut through nearly a dozen fallen trees, some of them 

 2ft. in diameter. At this work Van Keuren and his com- 

 panion, Charlie Chelsey, proved themselves mighty 

 handy. It was always a pleasure for me to see a genuine 

 woodsman handle an axe. No writer has ever described 

 this as well as Cooper, I think in his novel "The Prairie. '' 



None of us knew the way over to Medicine Brook, and 

 we got lost out in the 'Flats, 7 ' and in our wanderings 

 discovered a beautiful lake, Elbow Lake, as we learned 

 later. Saw moccasin tracks in the road, and knew the 

 Indians had come in after huckleberries — a very scarce 

 crop this year in that country. We finally found our 

 stream, at first a tiny, crooked driblet, almost hid in the 

 grass and brushwood. We followed down over the most 

 treacherous and boggy country imaginable, finding a 

 spring in every bog, until the creek grew rapidly bigger 

 and deeper, and became a. very good trout stream indeed. 

 The fishing was very rough, as is usual on all these 

 streams, and the art of it consisted in dropping your bait 

 in between the branches into the deepest and blackest 

 holes; but we caught a lot of beautiful trout, a number of 

 which ran over a pound. I have rarely seen fish so plen- 

 tiful and so large in so small a stream. I caught one 

 rainbow trout, a half-pounder. Large numbers of this 

 variety have been planted in these Wisconsin streams. 



