586 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



[June 23, 1898, 



RAIDING THE MILL-POND. 



Grand Rapids, Mich., May 3 L — Yesterday morning, 

 immediately after breakfast, as I was enjoying my home 

 journal in the reading room of the Morton House, a hand 

 was gently laid upon my shoulder, while my ear was 

 greeted with a familiar voice that bespoke an intimate. 

 Turning around, the smiling face of Arthur Wood, a time- 

 honored angler of this city, beamed a welcome that made 

 me hastily arise and grasp his outstretched hand with a 

 joyful earnestness. Everything now was of course con- 

 signed to oblivion except the "gentle art," and that we 

 discussed in all its varying phases with the usual inter- 

 polation of angling narratives. 



He unreeled one relative to the opening of the trout 

 season at Shelby, a small town in the central part of this 

 State, that was so enjoyable that I thought it good enough 

 to find a place in your interesting paper, and so at the 

 risk of spoiling Arthur's laughable recital, I will attempt 

 its portrayal in substance as he pictured it: 



"Being at that unromantic little town," began the nar- 

 rator, "on business on the last day of April, I was, im- 

 mediately after my vesperian meal, made aware by the 

 influx of fishermen from far and near, that there was to 

 be a raid made on a mill-pond near by, which was fed by 

 a wandering little brook called Silver Creek. Said mill- 

 pond covered an acre or more of ground, and was noted 

 for harboring the big beauties that had reached their 

 trout-hood in the shady and translucent waters of this 

 sinuous stream. Here in this reservoir of cool waters 

 was the try sting place of the tinted fontinalis that had 

 outgrown the narrow limits of the ribbon-like stream. It 

 was really a place where a trout would love to hide, for 

 its bottom was strewn with water-soaked logs, gnarled 

 roots, drifts of debris, and even tall trees reared their 

 decaying trunks out of the water, standing like sentinels 

 over this famed preserve. It had always been a covetous 

 spot for the fisher lads here, and long before the season 

 opened could be seen numbers of the scarlet-hued moving 

 around with impunity through the tangled labyrinths 

 that afforded them such cosy retreats. Many a noble 

 trout has time and again been poached from these waters, 

 but as the game warden has had bis abode here of late, 

 and is a strict guardian, it is a hazardous business to at- 

 tempt the sly trick now. 



"I was greatly amused at a sight of the rude and cum- 

 brous cane {poles this brigade brought with them, some 

 being fully twenty feet long and almost as stiff at one 

 end as the other, and prepared especially for vigorous 

 yanking. For bait, some had the wriggling angle worm, 

 some log-grubs, some raw beef, and a few knowing ones 

 choice minnows, but not a man nor boy had a fly or the 

 semblance of one. It was to be a pot-hunters' carnival, 

 and as such I felt as if I would like to take it in, and so I 

 prepared for the ignoble inaugural The game warden, 

 a regular thoroughbred, was actively around and amid 

 this noble band armed with a double-barreled shotgun 

 and a copy of the statute, and declared that the first one 

 that fished before 12 o'clock that night would be made to 

 feel the heavy hand of the law as well as a dose of small 

 shot. 



"About 8 o'clock, amid a downpour, and in the dark, 

 chilly night, the fishermen, each with a lantern apiece 

 and their barbarous poles, began to depart in squads for 

 the mill-pond in order to secure a favored spot, there to 

 await the expiring day, the last of April. Early arrivals 

 had choice of seats, but as there was ample room the late 

 comers had no trouble in securing proper places for flop- 

 ping out any trout they might impale on their baited 

 hooks. 



"One enterprising party had constructed a raft and 

 hired the proprietor of the only skiff there was to tow 

 them to the center of the pond, where they could have 

 full sweep over the choicest grounds, as well as an avoid- 

 ance of the crowd. They very soon repented of their 

 isolation, for it rained so hard and continusly, and they 

 were made so exceedingly uncomfortable amid it all that 

 they concluded to depart to their homes near by. They 

 did not just then hanker after any trout, and practically 

 evinced such a disposition, for they shouted and shouted 

 for the owner of the skiff till they were almost hoarse, and 

 then had to listen to the jeers and jokes of those who 

 lined the muddy banks. Their stentorian efforts were of 

 no avail, for the proprietor of the boat desired had locked 

 it up and gone to his home where he could luxuriate in 

 slumber deep. 



"It was, I assure you, a gloomy and disagreeable night, 

 the rain falling with a steady patter, and the wind moan- 

 ing a mournful dirge, and there with stolid stoicism, 

 water-soaked and chilled to the marrow, sat the thirty- 

 five fishermen, according to an actual count, anxiously 

 awaiting the propitious moment when they could cast 

 their bait to the freckled naiads that had their habita- 

 tion in that mill-pond. 



"Ever and anon some dissatisfied fisherman would 

 change his position as he thought for a better one, but as 

 he picked his way along the declivities and slippery bank 

 would forget its treacherous condition,and into the pond he 

 would go, lantern, pole and all, with a sudden splash that 

 evoked a roar from the crowd. Such little incidents broke 

 the monotony for the nonce, but the only thing that 

 would wholly satisfy that impatient crowd was the 

 whistle of the warden, who had promised to blow it at 

 precisely the last expiring moment that was to open the 

 season. 



"Although I was wet, cold and hungry, the sight of 

 the crowd that lined that basin of pure water, which the 

 flickering lanterns plainly disclosed, was a sight that 

 would have provoked laughter from the most sedate and 

 serious — I smile whenever I think of it, and as a novel 

 opening of a trout season it should be awarded bo insig- 

 nificant premium. 



"Ten minutes before 12 o'clock I tried to steal a march 

 on the warden by dropping in my line, but his ever- 

 watchful eye and acute ear discovering the attempted 

 larceny, he instantly brought his gun to his shoulder and 

 demanded a withdrawal of the offending line and hook. 

 Of course I complied, for I feared being mulcted in a 

 heavy fine and costs more than the threatened fire from 

 his gun, for that I considered mere bulldozing. 



"At last the cheerful sound of the whistle rang out, 

 and around the circumscribed shores of that mill-pond 

 and with a wondrous unanimity thirty-five baited hooks 

 from the thirty-five fishermen fell into that identical 

 mill-pond with a splash and spatter and the opening day 

 at Shelby was duly inaugurated, after which the warden, 

 conscious of having done his entire duty oh that provok- 

 ing occasion, pocketed his whistle and shouldering his 

 gun, trudged homeward through the rain and darkness 

 with a world of care lifted from his broad shoulders. 



"It was now a steady fish by all hands for hours with- 

 out a single nibble, and not till the dawn began to peep 

 over the eastern hills, was a single trout caught. I 

 laughed till my sides ached to see the big trout they 

 yanked out without a particle of play. It was a strong 

 pull and a pull altogether, and a three-pounder came 

 from his element in the same sudden manner as one of a 

 few ounces." 



Seventy -five trout were caught during the day, the 

 largest being 3*Ibs., and the average fully lib. So much 

 for the opening at Shelby's classic mill-pond, and all 

 honor say I to that warden, who held that army of pot- 

 hunters down to the strict letter of the law. 



Alex. Starbuck. 



"SPORT" IN FRANCE.-II. 



We had left the Boulevards and got as far as the Quaia 

 of the river I remember because we had begun on the 

 old books which decorate several miles of the parapets on 

 either bank. Just below these parapets is the stone- cased 

 margin of the river and along this in the summer season 

 is always to be seen a close serried array of fishermen 

 ardently yet patiently angling from morning to night. 

 They must number thousands of rods, for the line is 

 formed on both sides of the river and around the two 

 islands, and extends for miles, and there they sit and sit, 

 and fish and fish from early morning till late at night, 

 from spring to fall, and never, never, never catch a single 

 thing. I can never make myself believe they are really 

 fishing; they might be writing poetry, for their faces have 

 quite that expression. But I am afraid I have been be- 

 trayed into an exaggeration with regard to their success 

 as fishers, for in spite of the unanimous negative testi- 

 mony of scores of my friends here, I can adduce one mite 

 for the affirmative. I did one day see a proud angler drag 

 out a helpless fingerling. And what a commotion there 

 was; how the crowd cheered, and how the hero blushed 

 and raised bis hat in graceful recognition of the "viva's." 

 The crowd continued to gather about him till the steamer 

 on which I was, took me out of sight. What happened 

 afterwards I cannot say, but I must confess that I do not 

 believe the report that the excitement spread until it got 

 beyond the police control so that the military were called 

 out to prevent a general uproar. 



Further down the river, after passing the Pont des 

 Invalides, one sees a curious little ark by the water's edge. 

 It is like a small house-boat, and its inhabitants prove to 

 be two men, a woman, a magpie and a cat, also a dozen 

 or so of dogs as transients. This is in short the dog- 

 washing establishment of Monsieur Marie. I took an 

 early opportunity of visiting it to observe the manner of 

 operating. The proprietor was very willing to talk, in 

 fact I think he always did all the talking, leaving all the 

 work to his wife, and I learned from him that he clipped 

 from ten to thirty dogs per day, that he got from four to 

 eight francs (80 cents to $1.60) apiece, and that the large 

 breeds of dogs paid the best, while the poodles gave the 

 most work and were paid only as small dogs. Then 

 followed a dialogue which will, I am sure, interest those 

 of our dogmen who have taken a stand on the Pasteur 

 question: 



"I see you do not muzzle the dogs, do you never get 

 bitten in consequence?" 



"Bitten!" said he, "look there," and he showed me his 

 hands and arms slashed and scarred up to the elbows with 

 innumerable old scars and one or two recent wounds. 

 Then his wife showed me her hands and arms, and the 

 assistant did the same. Each of these persons had been 

 bitten once or twice a week for years, and yet were in 

 perfect health. 



In amazement and some horror I asked, "Have you no 

 fear of hydrophobia, or perhaps you take ample pre- 

 cautions?" 



"Never think of such a thing," said he. "If the wound 

 is a bad one we tie it up, if not we take no notice and it 

 heals in a few days." 



Further down the river we come to the Bois de Boulogne, 

 wherein is the Jardin d'Acclimatation, another interesting 

 place for the dogmen, for here are always kept in stock 

 a fine breeding stud of all the best races of dogs. I never 

 realized what the words "big dog" mean till I saw the 

 great Danes there. They certainly look over 3ft. at the 

 shoulder, but I won't run the risk of a guess. They are 

 like yearling calves, and have enormously muscular legs 

 and chests, but I must say that their teeth were not of the 

 size that 1 expected to see in such an enormous head. I 

 am informed, too, that one of them is not a match for an 

 ordinary wolf . There is a wolf at the London Zoo just 

 now that, though he has not quite the size or weight of a 

 great Dane, has teeth twice as large and jaws that could 

 engulf and crush the big dog's head at one chop. At 

 least one could almost believe it on seeing him. 



In another part of the Bois is the bull ring that was 

 established at the time of the great exposition of '89. It 

 has been continued each summer since in spite of the 

 opposition of the Humane Society. The company is per- 

 mitted to carry on the sport on condition that the horns 

 of the bull be padded, the horses thoroughly protected in 

 leather armor, and nothing or nobody killed. Although 

 thus shorn of its more revolting features, I was warned 

 that twenty minutes of it would be enough for me. But 

 it wasn't; after the first twenty minutes I became yet 

 more interested and stayed to the very last, three hours 

 in all, and saw some fifteen or twenty bulls baited. Each 

 bull was in ten or fifteen minutes, and each made it his 

 first business to charge the mounted man, who had a long 

 pike wherewith to protect the hors°. This he usually 

 succeeded in doing without much difficulty, whereupon 

 the bull went off savagely in pursuit of the men on foot, 

 generally clearing the ring by forcing them to vault over 

 the barrier. I never before realized the enormous strength 

 of a bull's neck, for though these are of a small breed I 

 more than once saw one lift up horse and rider together 

 from the ground on his horns. One of the horses was a 



tremendous double kicker, and his rider amused the 

 crowd again and again by turning him rear on when 

 the bull charged. The tremendous whacks of that horse's 

 heels on the bull's head and shoulders resounded afar and 

 yet did not seem to have any effect on his horned, majesty. 

 The safety of the men on foot lay in the fact that the bull 

 will always charge the cloak in preference to the man, 

 and it was common for these latter to lead the infuriated 

 animal right round the ring in a series of mad charges at 

 the fluttering red cloth, while his real enemy stood 

 calmly by at one side. After the bull was pretty well 

 blown, there appears the great bull fighter, he who in 

 Spain would kill the bull. He sits calmly on a chair and 

 tempts the bull to charge him. At the last moment, when 

 within half an inch of the horns, he adroitly plants a 

 ribboned dagger in each of the bull's shoulders and avoids 

 the charge like a flash. At length he takes a hollow 

 sword and plants another ribboned dagger that it con- 

 tains just on the spot where, if in Spain, he would thrust 

 to kill the bull. 



After several bulls had been teased in the ordinary 

 way, one was turned in and men without cloaks en- 

 tered to tease him. This is particularly dangerous and 

 very popular, as it gives the men some rare chances 

 to show their parts. One little fellow took a long pole, 

 and tempting the bull to charge he vaulted up on the 

 pole, and just as the bull struck it he let go and passed 

 over the bull's back to the ground beyond. Ho did this 

 several times and won several bouquets, but the crowd 

 got tired of it and wanted something more, so he stood 

 empty-handed, and, to the surprise of every one did not 

 avoid the bull, but at the last moment seized the horns 

 in his hands, and turning a somersault as he was tossed, 

 came down behind on his feet. 



In his next performance, however, a little later, he 

 came to grief. He tried to avoid the bull, but just too 

 late, one horn just caught his right thigh, and in another 

 instant he was tossed high in the air. The bull waited 

 and received him again on his horns, but he clung on 

 this time, and how he escaped I know not, but his com- 

 rades arrived in time to distract the bull's attention. To 

 the surprise of every one he was able to continue in the 

 ring, though he did not play any more pranks that day. 



On the other bank nearly opposite the Bois de Boulogne 

 is St. Cloud, with its famous chateau and park. The 

 woods in the park I found interesting, being the first 

 French forest I had the opportunity of exploring. It is a 

 characteristic one in at least one particular, viz., its 

 gieat extent in spite of the great value of land here, for 

 it is in the suburbs of Paris and overlooks the whole 

 city. The wooded part of it is much like other wood- 

 lands in France and England, and may serve as a basis 

 of comparison with those of America An American is 

 at once struck by the total absence of dead or fallen 

 timber and the great rarity of large timber of any kind. 

 The scarcity of evergreens, and the paucity of species are 

 also noticeable. I was much struck also by the curious 

 fact that every trunk at least at Sf. Cloud has a piece of 

 ivy twined about it. There are numbers of large forests 

 scattered over France, they were formerly royal proper- 

 ties, but have reverted to the nation. They are carefully 

 preserved and yield a considerable revenue by the sale of 

 timber and the letting of shooting privileges. The 

 largest of these is Fontainebleau, it is about twenty-five 

 miles long by 15 miles wide. It is famous for its large 

 game, among which are found red deer, fallow deer, 

 roebuck and wild boars. The fact that this otherwise 

 useless tract of sand is by judicious forestry made to 

 yield a fair revenue as well as serve for a national 

 pleasure ground, is worthy of notice in connection with 

 American forests. 



The birds of this region correspond closely with those 

 of the Middle States, and the voices of jays, crows, wood- 

 peckers, titmice, creepers, thrushes, etc., may all be 

 readily recognized by their resemblance to those of their 

 American congeners. In the thick woods, however, 

 there was one great want that I felt continually, that 

 was the ruffed grouse. Why has he not been introduced? 

 I am certain he would more than bold his own in the 

 vast wildprness of Fontainebleau. 



I am told that an attempt was made to introduce some 

 American game and the failure of this deterred any one 

 from further experiments. But clearly the importers 

 had themselves to thank, for they selected the Califor- 

 nia quail and turned out some twenty-five couples on a 

 low-lymsr, boggy, heather-grown moorland; then were 

 surprised that the birds were no more heard of. 



I am quite an enthusiast on the introduction of new 

 species and would like to see both nightingale and sky- 

 lark established in America. Of the nightingale I have 

 no notes of importance excepting the fact, pretty well 

 known, that it is one of the last birds to begin singing 

 and one of the first to cease, while, as with most birds 

 here so far as I have seen, there is no fall song period. 



But the skylark is the most faithful of songsters; not 

 even our own song sparrow can surpass him in the 

 assiduity with which he sings in and out of season 

 while his song itself is remarkable almost to uniqueness 

 for its uninterrupted earnestness from beginning to end. 

 The skylark risiog from the open field sings continu- 

 ously as he soars, and at length high in the wind he 

 hovers and still sings without the slightest break or in- 

 terruption, till wearied and still singing he again floats 

 downward, only to cease as he nears the earth and drops 

 like a stone. A Missouri skylark {Anthus spraguei) which 

 I once timed on the prairies of Montana, sang for an hour 

 before he dropped, and with a view to making a com- 

 parison I timed a number of European skylarks at dif- 

 ferent times in England and France and got the follow- 

 ing: H, 1, U, 6, ii, Si, 14, 3* minutes. These are the 

 respective durations of each song from beginning to end 

 and usually represents also the duration of the flight 

 though occasionally a bird would hover a minute or 

 more after it had ceased to sing. 



The skylark is here regarded as a game bird, of course 

 and immense numbers are killed and marketed in the 

 winter. They are taken in a peculiar way; they seem 

 irresistibly attracted by a strange flashing object and 

 will come in numbers to hover over a revolving wheel 

 set with bits of mirror, so that the gunner hidden near 

 one of these decoys may kill numbers at a shot. One 

 man told me he had seen between 200 and 300 killed at 

 one discharge of a double-barreled gun. I am quite 

 sure he was romancing, but I believe great ba°-s are 

 often made in this way, and his story may have been 

 correct with a cipher off each of the nurnherA givpn. 



B. e, Thompson. 



