8 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



[July 24, 1890. 



where we could find at least half of the small-mouthed 

 variety. 



I had a twelve-year-old boy with me last summer in 

 the camp on Carp Lake (little Ed V., who took to fishing 

 and casting from the reel as naturally as a young duck 

 takes to water), who could and did tell five times out of 

 six when he had on a small-mouthed hass before tbe fish 

 came in view, and on asking how he could tell he said, 

 "They make my arms tireder." And just that is the 

 briefest and most comnionsense reason perhaps ever given 

 for the superiority of the small-mouth— "they make the 

 arm tierder. A. whole chapter of wordy argument 

 wouldn't express it as clearly and forcibly as the 

 inexperienced but observant youngster did in five 

 words. 



I hold up for the small-mouth against all comers. He 

 is not only the coming game fish, but he is the game fish 

 of our Western and Northern waters, right here with us 

 to stay, and in my humble and carefully considered opin- 

 ion he has no superior as a fighter with the just possible 

 exception of "him of the gorgeous fin"— the Michigan 

 grayling.* 



IV. — An October "Controversy." 



The glory of the fishing, however, came with the Octo- 

 ber days and the soft, hazy Indian summer, when the 

 woods were gorgeous in red and yellow, old gold and 

 russet brown, with here and there a fleck of evergreen 

 clinging along the steep sides of "Ballard's Bluffs," over- 

 looking the river above the mouth of Pleasant Run, a 

 noisy, rocky little stream famous for its wide-mouthed, 

 fine scaled minnows. The fall fishing was above the 

 dam in the slack water, which was a matter of seven miles 

 of almost dead water, with an average width of 200yds. 

 and varying in depth from a few feet at the head to 25ft. 

 in places between that and the dam. This body of deep, 

 quiet water was the home of the big fellows of the bass 

 tribe, the old moss-backs that had lived there and kept 

 the minnows and other small fry from becoming too 

 thick, ever since the dam was built. 



Along the western shore, the hilly side of the river, for 

 5 miles up, several little cold spring branches flowed in at 

 intervals, besides the more pretentious "cricks," and 

 around the mouths of these bass from 2 to 71bs. could be 

 taken by still- fishing, or "trailing" as we called it, and 

 the tradition yet lingers in the village, I have no doubt, 

 that old Jess once took one that weighed something over 

 8ibs. However this may be, father and I one October 

 day had a difficulty with one that weighed a little over 

 7ilbs. on the "store scales," and he was taken without a 

 reel, with a pole and line that in these days of fine tackle 

 would have been laughed out o' sight. 



The controversy took place off the mouth of "Troxel's 

 Branch" as we were going in the boat to a strip of bottom 

 land a couple of miles above the dam after pawpaws, 

 walnuts and water grapes, and of course we had taken a 

 pole and line along just to while away the time on the 

 way up and back. Father was at the oars and I sat at 

 the stern with about 40ft. of line trailing behind with a 

 bewildering new bob at the end of it, when a heavy jerk 

 that nearly took pole and boy overboard started the fun. 

 The boat was stopped and for half a minute or so father 

 looked on to see which way the battle was likely to go, 

 but seeing the fish was about to get me he stepped aft 

 and taking the rod from nay nervous hands with, "He's 

 too much for a boy of your heft, let me show you how to 

 do it," proceeded with a deliberation that set me on net- 

 tles to finish the fight after his own fashion and nearly 

 break my heart with disappointment at the same time, 

 for I would have hung on to the rod even had I been 

 pulled overboard. The struggle was short and furious, 

 but the strong line, tough rod and main strength pre- 

 vailed, and he was pulled alongside and lifted by the 

 lower jaw (landing nets we knew not) in the boat with a 

 scrap of advice from father that has pulled me out of 

 some tight places since then, "Always keep cool when 

 you've got a big fish on." When he was safely in the 

 boat we saw what was doubtless the reason the difficulty 

 didn't last longer and why he had not left the water, as 

 the small-mouth bass usually does one or more times in 

 open water. Hanging on to him in different places were 

 5 slippery, slimy, blood-sucking lampry eels, from 5 to 

 lOin. long, the longest one fastened on just behind 

 one of the pectoral fins, although at that time 1 didn't 

 know the difference between a pectoral fin and an oar 

 blade. 



The eels hung on to their victim with a grip that re- 

 sisted all efforts to pull them loose, and were only 

 removed by severing them with a knife near the bead, 

 when the "sucker" would relax and the head drop off, 

 leaving a round raw spot that determined us not to eat 

 the old fellow, but he was hung over the side of the boat 

 and taken home in the evening with some others to get 

 his weight. 



I straightway "laid up a skunner agin" father for rob- 

 bing me of the glory of that fight, but when a few rods 

 further on he let me handle one about half as large, and 

 two or three more before we got to the pawpaw patch, 

 the "skunner" was forgotten: and when we returned in 

 the evening full to the thrapple of grapes and pawpaws, 

 with the bow of the boat filled with them and a bushel or 

 more of black walnuts, I mentally wished the blue Octo- 

 ber days would last forever. 



Some years afterward a good part of the old dam was 

 washed out, doubtless carrying out with the flood hun- 

 dreds of the old settlers; but in October, 1877, after it had 

 been rebuilt, the "Kingfishers" camped for two weeks at 

 the mouth of Pleasant Run and had some fine sport, 

 taking bass that weighed from 2 to 5^ lbs. : but the glory 

 of the boyhood days had departed ; the rnossbacks of the 

 tribe had sought other waters or died off from sheer old 

 age. 



* I would be pleased to see the Forest amd .Stream publish the 

 opinions of a few bass fishers who have handled a good many of 

 both varieties in the lakes of northern Michigan, as to the meril a 

 of each as a fighter, and to this end would suggest, that they "in- 

 terview"' by letter such aoglers as H. C. Culbertsou, Alex. Star- 

 buck, "Old Knots," B. E. Macauley, H. H. Mailer, T, H. Foulds, 

 B. K. Brant, a former "Kingfisher," Sam ii. Smith, C. C. Furr 

 (Job S. A. Whitfield. Second Ass't P. M. General, State Kish Com- 

 missioner CM. W. T. Dennis (however, [am not quite sure Col. 

 Dennis lias had manv difficulties wilh the big-mouths), "Old Bill 

 Sehroll," who can tell to a nicety the difference between the move- 

 ments of a bass and a "auekermoojen." andlasL and best comrade 

 of them all, "Uncle Dan" T. Sloan, who has had more "pizen dif- 

 nkilties" with the "open-faced" variety, and done more "plain 

 an' ornamental enssin' " at them than perhaps any of the others. 

 If a clean majority of these brethren will say the big-mouth is 

 the equal of the small-mouth in any particular, 1 will stand con- 

 victed as the olis tin ate juror, lay down my rod and give up the 

 sport. 



V.— A Memory of the Tippecanoe. 



Twenty-five or thirty years ago the Tippecanoe River 

 flowing into the Wabash a few miles above Lafayette, 

 Ind., was, without a doubt or exception, the best bass 

 stream in the United States; but of late years giant pow- 

 der, the fish trap, the jig and seine— ye guileless farmers' 

 favorite weapons of extermination— have depleted the 

 once famous stream, till now it is great luck if a camping 

 party can catch enough fish with rod and line to keep the 

 frying pans in good odor. 



In September, 1867, four of us made a camp on an 

 island in this river a few miles above Monticello and a 

 mile above Norway, a small settlement of half a dozen 

 houses, a flouring mill, a woolen mill and sawmill, to fish 

 the slack water above the dam, which my brother, then 

 living in Monticello, had written me was "chuck full o* 

 big bass." The first day was spent in fixing up the camp 

 and seining a couple of hundred young pike (the best bait 

 we ever found for Tippecanoe bass) from Pike Creek, a 

 little cold stream running into the river a hundred yards 

 or so below the dam. One of the party, George V., a 

 young fellow built on the ground plan of a, dude— brains 

 in his feet— wore a new pair of $13 boots, which somehow 

 got full of water while we were after minnows, and in 

 the evening after supper he laid them on a log against 

 which we had built the camp-fire, to have them dry for 

 morning. During the night the end of the log on which 

 they lay burned, and all that was found of his prized foot 

 gear in the morning was a fragment of one heel. This 

 calamity so disgusted George that it struck in on him, 

 and two days after he packed his grip and struck out for 

 home, thoroughly satisfied with his first experience in 

 roughing it in a camp, which left Charley L., Col. W. T. 

 Dennis (Old Grizzly), the present zealous and worthy Fish 

 Commissioner of Indiana, and the writer to do the rough- 

 ing and dry our boots without the precaution of placing 

 them on a burning log over night, A day or two after 

 this Charley gorged himself on water grapes, buttermilk 

 and whisky, a combination that soured on his stomach 

 and made him "sicker n a boss with the botts." When 

 the dark red mixture had been laboriously disgorged he 

 was firmly convinced that hemorrhage of the lungs had 

 set in on him bad, got scared, and next morning packed 

 his big valise, got me to take him down to Norway in a 

 boat, caught the mill team going to Monticello, where he 

 took the train for home (Richmond, Ind.). leaving only 

 Col. and "Jeems Mackerel" to run the camp, do the cook- 

 ing and fishing, and have the best time for five weeks 

 that ever fell to the lot of two ardent disciples "on the 

 face o' this livin' airth." 



All this may be set down as introductory to a personal 

 difficulty with a big bass, a mile or more above the camp, 

 the forenoon of the day Charley was taken with the 

 ' 'hemorrhage." We had been fishing a strip of deep water 

 a couple of hundred yards long at the mouth of "Kean's 

 Creek," the better part of the morning with good success, 

 having on the stringer a dozen or more bass that were 

 good for weak eyes, none under 3 and some up to 51bs., 

 when we found that we ^had but one minnow left, a big 

 pike that was too long to straighten out in the bucket, 

 and concluded to start back to camp for another supply. 

 Just below Kean's Creek was a shallow rapid a hundred 

 yards long, and at the foot of this more deep water that 

 extended nearly down to the island. More to kill time 

 than anything else, the big pike was hooked on the troll 

 down to the camp, but as we passed a big boulder, partly 

 naked, lying in a couple of feet of water a short distance 

 below the riffle, the place looked so "enticin"' that I 

 stood up in the boat and cast 50 or 60ft. back in the eddy 

 below the big rock, with a request to Charley to "hold the 

 boat just a minute for luck." (I had learned the knack 

 of casting from the reel, "Henshall style" (?), by watch- 

 ing old Joe Goff, a noted angler of Connersville, Ind., who 

 had practiced this style of cast for some years before 

 Doctor Henshall or his style was ever heard of.) 



The big pike had barely time to get the kink out of his 

 spine, brought on by long confinement in the bucket, 

 when a swirl in the water gave notice that there was at 

 least one bass in the river that had an eye to quantity 

 rather than quality, when it came to the matter of a 

 square meal; and instantly the line began to ran rapidly 

 off the reel up stream past the boulder toward the foot of 

 the riffle. When 8 or 10yds. had run off, the thumb 

 tightened the line and a smart twitch of the rod pulled the 

 pike out of the fish's mouth ; I had struck too soon. In- 

 stead of reeling up for another cast the bait was allowed 

 to sink to the bottom, and before we had time to make a 

 few "appropriate remarks" the line was running off up 

 stream again. Another strike, after a reasonable time 

 had been given, resulted in another failure to hook him; 

 the pike was too big for him to swallow readily, and the 

 "sag" of the line in the current and a trifle of hurry and 

 eagerness on my part probably had something to do with 

 the second miss. 



Again the minnow was left to drift along the rocky bot- 

 tom, but before Charley could take a "consoler from a con- 

 venient wicker contrivance reposing under the seat, the 

 line was again going toward the mouth of Kean's Creek. 

 This time I was determined to allow him ample time to 

 swallow the big pike, tail and all, if it took him a week, 

 and to this end Charley began to back the boat upstream 

 to give me a shorter line when it was time to strike with- 

 out so much sag to take up. When right up to the foot 

 of the riffle the fish stopped, the line was carefully tight- 

 ened, and instead of the regulation twitch he was treated 

 to a genuine, old-fashioned "Watterson wipe"— a "sure 

 enough jaw-breaker"— as old Sam Smith calls it— and 

 the hook this time struck something and held, and ye 

 gods and brethren of the rod at large! the fun we had 

 right there for the next twenty or thirty minutes set us 

 to thinking that the average span of life is all too short 

 for them who angle for the love of it. 



The instant the hook struck the fish turned and darted 

 down stream x>ast the boulder, which we were now a 

 little above, turned into the eddy below, flashed around 

 it and headed up stream again so suddenly that we were 

 dazed for a moment; but by keeping the rod tip well up, 

 the line had been kept from fouling around the rock, 

 thereby narrowly averting a calamity that would have 

 ended the difficulty before it had well begun. When a 

 yard or two above the boulder he changed his mind and 

 shot off quartering down stream toward the west shore 

 into deep water, the line running out from under the 

 thumb with a velocity that soon heated it to near the 

 sizzling point, although Charley was following up mean- 

 time as fast as he could pull the boat. I was using a one 

 piece, close-jointed Japanese cane rod (the best of all rods 



to trust in a tight place) and with 100yds. of new braided 

 silk line on the reel I felt no fear of the final result if the 

 hook didn't tear out; aoid yet a second or two later, when 

 the bass went 5ft. in the air over near the shore, with 

 the big pike thrown out and dangling (:i or 8ft. up the line, 

 my heart came up in my throat like old Dave Edwards's 

 in his first battle after he enlisted for the war, "with a 

 thump that knocked the chaw tobacker out o' my 

 mouth." 



This was the first sight we had of him, and truly he 

 was a prize worth a whole week's patient angling for; 

 a long, slim, trim-built, green-sided pioneer, agile and 

 wiry, and full of fight as a Tennessee wildcat. Then the 

 difficulty began in earnest. When he struck the water 

 he started with a rush down the river, but the pull of the 

 rod swerved him around till he soon was going for the 

 opposite shore like a stray dog that had been cajoled 

 into the belief that he can outrun an old. oyster can when 

 securely fastened to his tail. When half across the river 

 he took a notion to air himself again and get rid of the 

 hook that was worrying the life out of him, but it was. 

 there to stay, and the effort only resulted in another fail- 

 ure and a fiercer rush to make up for the time fooled 

 away in the air. This time he struck the water head up 

 stream about 30yds. from the boat, and made a straight 

 wake for the boulder, where a few minutes before the big 

 pike minnow had disturbed his meditations and got him 

 into a "catagory" that had evidently unbalanced his 

 mind; but the trusty rod bent to its work and he was 

 stopped before reaching the eddy. Bewildered and dis- 

 couraged, he turned and came back past the boat into 

 deep water again, when after the third flying leap in the 

 air he fell back again into the water with still fight 

 enough left in him to nearly double the rod in the effort 

 to hold him away from a patch of long, wavy grass grow- 

 ing up from the bottom over near the west shore. 



The relentless pull of the rod at last began to tell, and 

 after a few more aimless rushes he was carefully reeled 

 toward the boat, tugging feebly and rolling from side to 

 side with wide open mouth, when as he came within, 

 reach Charley deftly landed him in the boat: and then we 

 let out a combined yell that was heard by the Colonel at 

 the camp below. 



Never since have I taken a bass that made a longer or 

 harder fight, and the memory of it is as fresh now as 

 though it happened but yesterday. When he was safely 

 on the stringer and we had celebrated the victory after 

 the fashion of our Kentucky brethren, we made our way 

 down to the island to make glad the heart of Old Grizzly, 

 who had stayed in camp to concoct a toothsome stew 

 from a young goose he said he had "bartered" for that 

 morning; but happily for him our farmer neighbor after- 

 ward laid the disappearance of his goase to the "var- 

 mints." 



The big bass was just 27-Mn. long and weighed 61bs. and 

 12oz., and was the finest specimen of the family I ever 

 saw taken from the Tippecanoe River, although we fished 

 it annually for more than ten years afterward. We tied 

 our fish out along the island, each secured with a piece of 

 cord to a springy twig driven in the sand at the edge of 

 the water, and kept the surplus down by giving them to 

 our neighbors as they would come after them day by day. 



After Charley left us, the Colonel and I remained on 

 the island over four weeks, and when we broke camp he 

 nailed a piece of board on a tree near by with the figures 

 "384" cut in it, which stood for the number of bass we 

 had taken, of which the Colonel had kept count from 

 the first day; and four years afterward it greeted us as a 

 "That reminds me," as we passed the island in a boat on 

 our way up to the mouth of Kean's Creek, We have 

 been in many pleasant camps together since, but some- 

 how t hat old camp of one tent on Grape Island seems the 

 best of all, and the memory of the happy days spent 

 there and the great sport we had will never die out. 



VI.— Luck in the Night. 



Bass are not usually night feeders, but a few years 

 after the camp on Grape Island I took a 5-pounder at the 

 big dam at Monticello at 10 o'clock on a moonless night, 

 with a dead, dried up frog that had lain in the boat since 

 the night before. 



I had occasion to go up to the town that evening to ma i I 

 some letters, and falling in with some of the "old boys" 

 of my acquaintance, had incidentally "histed on a big 

 jag," which proved somewhat of an impediment in fol- 

 lowing the path through the woods back to the dam 

 where I had left my boat and rod, a matter of a mile and 

 a half below the town. (In those days beverages in camp 

 ranked as necessities, same as bait and. side meat.) When 

 crossing the river to get over to the camp, a notion struck 

 in on me to pidl the boat up on the apron of the dam at 

 a spot where no water was running over it and fish for 

 blue cats, but on looking for the minnow bucket I was 

 surprised to find it had mysteriously disappeared — and all 

 the time it was hanging in the water at the stern where 

 I had left it. In the absence of other bait the dead frog 

 lying on the seat was hooked on and dropped at the edge 

 of a line of swift water running over where there was a 

 trifling sag in the dam, and before I had time to get my 

 bearings in the gloom, a difficulty was in progress that 

 called for a clearer head than I was just then possessed of. 



At the strike the fish swung out into the swift water 

 and by the way the rod doubled up I was sure I had 

 "hung" at least a 251bs. catfish. The conditions for stand- 

 ing up in the boat were somewhat unfavorable, owing to 

 certain misgivings I had as to the reliabihty of my legs, 

 and the battle was fought out sitting. 



Three or four times during the controversy the fish 

 would get into the swift water and run off 30 or 40yds. 

 of line down stream, despite the stubborn protest of the 

 rod, before he could be pulled back into the dead water, 

 where the advantage was slightly on my side, and I could 

 reel him at "memorandum" in the darkness back toward 

 the boat, when he would somehow again get in the swift 

 current and swing around the circle till I began to think 

 the performance would last till morning unless one of us 

 gave out. Finally I held him away from the spot where 

 he usually started on his circuit, the strain on the rod 

 eased up and he was pulled near the boat, but it was so 

 dark that 1 couldn't see the line and had to feel for it. 

 This required a mighty fine job of "balancing" to keep 

 from going head first into the river, but at last I found 

 the line, and running one hand down it — holding the rod 

 in the other — grasped the fish by the lower jaw and 

 lifted him in the boat; a clean built 51bs. bass, as regist- 

 ered by the pocket scale a few minutes after at the camp, 

 instead of a 23lbs. catfish as at first supposed. Then I 



