246 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



LOCT. 15, 1891. 



THE SUMMER GIRL. 



T DON'T linow how it happens, but places I used to go, 



Stealing away for a quiet day or a summer week or so. 

 Have grown unhomellke to me now because of a curious pest— 

 Perhaps that isn't a pretty word, or isn't the very best; 

 I'm only a bluff old-fashioned fisherman anyway 

 And blurt right out the word at hand whatever I seek to say; 

 Bat, fact of it is, in my old haunts which nobody knew before, 

 Are droves of dudes in rainbow clothes a crawling around the 

 shore. 



While fluttering here, -and fluttering there, the summer girl is 

 found, 



Who drives the fishermen away and draws the dudes around. 



No more I meet the brave old lads so long my comrads leal. 

 My bronzed and bearded cronies, my knights of creel and reel. 

 No more I find them in the coves where languid grasses sway, 

 Nor where the combers thump the ledge, nor down the dimpled 

 bay. 



No more across the waters their sails at sundown come, 

 Red in the fading glimmer like sea birds gathering home. 

 No more they fling beside the bar their prizes of the day. 

 And tell betwixt heroic drinks how "big ones" broke away; 

 But swarms of diides, with sashes on, with silken tassels wrought. 

 Sip lemon sodas on the porch and lisp their simple thought; 

 While up the beach and down the pier, in outing flannels gay. 

 Abounds the buzzing summer girl— who drives the men away. 



I've heard it said they're mostly found in places by the shore. 

 Maybe, but this I'm certain of, it never was so before. 

 And there's Bill Pratt, lie tells me that they're bred way back in- 

 land. 



Though why they seek the water so, he doesn't understand. 



He doesn't seek it much himself, which is the reason why, 



Excepting as a chaser or in trout time with a fly. 



But no matter where they come from, there's one I saw to-day, 



A face as fair as lily buds that float upon the bay. 



With lit)s that would have lured a bee and eyes so shyly bright, 



I felt half sad and lonesome, till the bass began to bite. 



Ah, well ! I'll pack my fishing traps and seek another ground. 



Some hidden cove, if such there be, no summer girl has found. 



M. M. Cass, Jk. 



IN THE GREAT WOODS OF WASH- 

 INGTON. 



HUMPTULIPS, Wash., Oct. 8.— Editor Forest and 

 Stream: Your paper often publishes letters from 

 various parts of the country, and so I thought one from 

 this section of Washington might interest some of your 

 readers. 



Since June I have been buried in the forests of Chehalis 

 county, on the east fork of the Humptulips. Such sense 

 of isolation does it give one to go into these woods, and 

 such a feeling of "returning to man" to leave them, that 

 people here use the terms "Going in" and "Coming out" 

 to describe the traveling to and from them. There is 

 something tremendously solemn in their dim lights and 

 far off, muffled noises. A dull, booming roar from some 

 distant falling giant free; the faint, faint echo of a rifle 

 shot; the cry of a bu-d high up in some towering fir, and 

 the thumps from the flying feet of some hidden, startled 

 game— these ai-e impressive sounds enough. But how 

 much more impressive is it when the great trees bow 

 with majestic sweeps to the mighty power of a heavy 

 gale. 



I remember one September, years ago, being camped 

 six or seven miles north of Laramie Peak, in Wyoming. 

 Our camp was in a low draw in the thick pine timber, but 

 not far from a large open park. There were three of 

 us— an old ranchman, my cousin, just out from the East, 

 and myself. None of us were very much used to the 

 thick timber. One gray, windy morning, when a spatter 

 of rain came with every other gust of wind, we shouldered 

 om- rifles and each took his separate course for an elk 

 hunt. I had not been out half an hour before I fomid 

 my nerves and fancies being unpleasantly acted upon by 

 the soughs and moans of the swaying trees and the howl- 

 ing of the wind. After some hesitation 1 betook myself 

 back to camp, and there found my two companions had 

 already returned. We looked, questiouingly and with 

 some amusement, at one another; and after the natural 

 reluctance, each confessed to the same reason having 

 brought him back that brought the others. 



On quiet days, when the wind is not sighing nor the 

 leaves rustling, one can hear the thunder of the ocean's 

 surf. The mighty Pacific, though but twenty miles off, 

 seems at other times to us shut down in these dense forests, 

 an infinite distance away. Occasionally, on a favorable 

 breeze, comes floating a mill's whistle from Aberdeen, 

 quite a score of miles south in an air line. It is hard to 

 realize, with all our primitive life and wild surroundings, 

 that civilization is so near. There are no roads nearer 

 than ten or twelve miles from my cabin; and one has to 

 have a good knowledge of this region— the lay of its 

 ridges, courses of its streams, and other points— before it 

 is safe to strike out on the trails without a compass. 

 Even with that the inexperienced often lose their way. 



As yet the lumberman has left these forests untouched; 

 but it will not be many years before the growth of the 

 lumber trade of Gray's Harbor shall force the loggers to 

 come here too. Each year he creeps nearer. Now there 

 is not a good patch of timber for miles about on the un- 

 surveyed lands that is not taken up by some squatter. 

 I doubt if it takes four years to exhaust all the supply of 

 fair public lands in this part of the State. 



Trout are plentiful in the river; and now the salmon 

 are running, it is easy to lay in a stock of them for winter 

 use— a great advantage to us settlers so far from stores. 



Elk are fairly numerous. I have, however, not seen 

 larger herds at any time than eight or ten^ Some ac- 

 quaintances about two months ago happened to stumble 

 on to a herd of fifty or sixty cows, bulls and calves, which 

 leisurely crossed the trail ahead of them. 



Deer are rarely seen right here. Black bears are now 

 and then seen. Cougars at rare intervals. We have a 

 few wolves, too, and now and again a wildcat or lynx 

 prowls this way. I sometimes see their tracks in the 

 sand of the river banks. But all this large game is in 

 the late fall, winter and spring more plentiful nearer the 

 coast, where the country is flatter and more open. Here 

 it is rugged, the ridges being high and steep, and the 

 valleys generally very narrow and tortuous. The soil is 



nevertheless excellent, which accounts for the fine tim- 

 ber. It is no unusual thing to see in this vicinity 

 quarter sections that will cut ten million feet and some 

 more. The timber is mostly fir, with some pieces of 

 hemlock and a scattering of spruce and cedar. There is 

 an undergrowth seen on the top of some ridges of vine 

 maple, and underbrush windfalls, except on these 

 ridges, make traveling very hard work without any 

 burden. With a 401b8. pack it is a tremendous labor. 



ROBT. H. Lawrence. 



BLACK BASS IN JAMES RIVER. 



Editor Forest and Stream: 



Some of your readers may be interested in knowing the 

 resources of the streams of this region. If the dams 

 which at short intervals obstruct the waters of James 

 Eiver were removed that stream and its tributaries would 

 soon become first-rate fishing ground for black bass. 

 And the excellent trout streams that occasionally find 

 their way to it from their sources in the Blue Ridge, the 

 close proximity of the luxuries and refinements of good 

 society to all the beauties of primeval nature in that 

 delightful climate, would render that river a favorite 

 resort of the game-fishing sportsman. 



There is first-rate bass fishing here now — as good as 

 there is in the world — but this is only stumbled upon oc- 

 casionally and results from conditions which rarely exist. 

 Before the dams were built— and since the railroad has 

 supplanted and destroyed the canal they have become 

 utterly useless— shad came up as far as Lexington. The 

 bass is a comparatively recent importation, and the way 

 in which it has fiourished under adverse circumstances is 

 an earnest of what it might do under better. 



The original stock of bass, from which have sprung all 

 those which now fill the waters of this part of the Atlan- 

 tic and abroad, were brought over — by a gentleman whose 

 name I am sorry not to remember just now— in the water- 

 tank of the first locomotiA^e on the B. & O. Railroad, that 

 passed over the divide between the waters of the Ohio and 

 the Potomac, and placed in the basin of the Chesapeake 

 and Ohio Canal. Such is their wonderful fecundity and 

 hardihood that in a few years the progeny of this stock 

 made good fishing in the Potomac. 



It is the small-mouth variety of the black bass which 

 populates the upper James. I saw the first that were 

 caught in that section, and the man who caught them 

 made various conjectures as to the kind of fish they 

 were. 



"Silver perch," or calico bass, before the reign of their 

 cousin, the Micropterus dol., abounded in the long, 

 deep, still ponds above the dam. These calico bass, 

 chubs, catfish and even pike have almost entirely disap- 

 peared before the ravenous tyrant— and we eould well 

 afford to make the exchange. 



About 1880 two old farmers of Rockbridge, as they 

 were returning in their skiff from an hour's fish for calico 

 bass, stopped in the mouth of Elk Creek, a large, clear, 

 freestone, mountain stream, and baiting their hooks with 

 live minnows dropped them into the water. Presently 

 one of the men saw his "cork" go under and felt a tug 

 which made his old veins tingle. After a hard struggle 

 he landed a 3-pound black bass. That was the beginning 

 of the bass fishing in the upper James. In the course of 

 the evening those old farmers had twelve black bass in 

 their boat, ranging in weight from 1^ to 3+lbs. They 

 went home with their fish, in great exultation, making, 

 with moderate excitement, many erroneous and amusing 

 guesses as to the nature of that "new" fish. Since then 

 many big catches have been made by sportsmen famous 

 and not famous. 



Six or seven years after that time there was very ex- 

 cellent fishing here, but later, as the bass worked them- 

 selves down below the dams and failed to get back to 

 spawn, the fishing fell ofl' considerably. Recently, how- 

 ever, some of the dams have been removed, and in the 

 longer stretches of open water the good effects are alreay 

 apparent. 



Coming down seven miles of the river one day in 

 August just passed with three companions in two boats, 

 fishing both with the fly and bait, we caught fifty-six 

 bass of good size. 



The most comfortable and profitable work I found was 

 done with a helgramite used just as a fly on a light rod. 

 Bass rise to the helgramite just as they do to a fly, and 

 when they once taste it they greedily devour it, so that 

 , when they strike, you are almost sure to hook them if 

 you give them time enough. The helgramite is in this 

 locality one of the favorite foods of the black bass, and 

 when the tough larva is properly placed upon the hook it 

 is almost as durable as an artificial fly. I have caught 

 ten bass vsdth one helgramite used thus as a fly. 



But one day in the present month all the conditions 

 existed under which I have never failed to have the very 

 finest fishing. After a hard rain for a day and night the 

 river had become high and muddy, and its waters backed 

 up for some distance into Elk Creek. The creek itself 

 was somewhat flushed and just milky enough to render 

 it possible to approach the bank without alarming the 

 fish, which can scarcely be done in its usual crystal clear- 

 ness. 



With a fly-rod, a multiplying reel, a small braided silk 

 line, a gut leader, and a small hook, which, if of good 

 quality, I found superior to large ones, even for large bass 

 —I cast a crawfish under the shadow of a bush on the op- 

 posite side of the stream. When the bait had sunk a few 

 inches I saw the graceful form of a bass as he gently 

 rose, took it in his month, and disappeared. I did not 

 feel him at the end of my line, and yet, in another sense, 

 I felt that he was there. Waiting a moment for him to 

 swallow the bait, I gave a sudden jerk and had him 

 hooked. Then the fight commenced, and I knew that he 

 was a big f eUow. For a long time I did not see him. He 

 went low down and staid there. 



The bass on my hook was not alarmed as yet. That 

 was a good bait, and he was resolved to keep it, though 

 it must have occurred to him that it was wonderfully 

 strong and was making most frantic efforts to get away 

 from him. He was mad, he sulked. But presently he 

 seemed to get scared. A thought suddenly struck him 

 that he had better try to get away from that crawiish. 

 There must be something dangerous back of it. He 

 reared, he plunged. My reel hummed as he went oft' 

 down stream. After a little I checked him, and he 

 started back, and it was well that my reel multiplied, or 

 I would have had too much line on my hands. 



My bass got wild and frantic. I got hiui close enough 



to the top to see him now. He made some beautiful 

 leaps, three or four feet above the water, but I held a taut 

 line. After a half hour of plunging he was tired and 

 sick. He only resisted by his sheer weight and I was 

 dragging him to within reach of my dip-net, I had got- 

 ten him in shallow water when he made his last desperate 

 and splendid effort for his life. Sticking his head out of 

 the water he opened his mouth to its fullest extent, and 

 with a savage jerk he disgorged the whole contents of his 

 stomach, and sent minnows, crawfish, bugs, flies — or 

 rather their remains — flying for yards in all directions — 

 a pint or more — the earnings of a whole morning's vigi- 

 lant voracity. He hated to give them up, but he had 

 swallowed the hook and he knew that the trouble was 

 there. 



He did not disengage the hook, but when he made that 

 sturdy jerk in the air my line snapped just above the 

 hook — it had become rotten in the few days since I had 

 used it, and I had foolishly failed to test it thoroughly. 

 But I had not expected such fish. 



I felt very weak "about the gills." I sat down and 

 rested. That fish "grew upon me." The more I medi- 

 tated upon him and the way he had fought me the larger 

 he became in my eyes. That last time he opened his 

 jaws was very vivid, it seemed to me I could have gotten 

 my head into his mouth. 



"At the very least," said I, "he was a seven-pounder," 



But I did not long sit thus. Breaking off the rotten 

 end of my line I rigged up again. After some little 

 casting I hooked another bass, and my former experi- 

 ences were repeated, with the exception of the last feat- 

 ure. I landed him and he weighed iUhs, 



During the day, varying my bait "between live min- 

 nows and crawfish and casting them into promising spots 

 under the bushes, I killed eight black bass ranging in 

 weight from 2 to 4|lbs. And the crowning and most ex- 

 quisite satisfaction of the whole day's sport was that one 

 of the last fish that I killed was the same one that I had 

 first hooked and lost. My hook with gut attached was 

 BtiU sticking in his gullet. He was a buck, but only 

 weighed S^lbs. 



For Aveeks afterward I ruminated with delight over 

 the events of that day, and still have an agreeable picture 

 impressed upon my brain of the bronze and old gold sides 

 of a magnificent bass glinting in the sun as he rose like a 

 cork through the nile-green water under the green bushes 

 and seized my hook— and then the heroic struggle. 



There is a statute in Virginia to protect black bass 

 during the spawing season, but it is enforced badly or 

 not at all. Miles Poindextee. 



Glenwood, Va., September. 



FREEMASONRY OF OUTDOOR LIFE. 



BY W. H. H. MURRAY. 



WHAT a splendid freemasonry this is of outdoor life! 

 How gentle and generous its rivalries! Which 

 head shall dive deepest in the cool depths or speck the 

 white surf furthest from shore? Which rod shall lift the 

 heaviest trout or gun show to its credit the fullest bag of 

 game? Whose deck shall shine the cleanest, or whose 

 white sails shall lead the fleet to evening's anchorage? 

 Whose table of bark shall boast of the tenderest venison 

 or lodge front display for ornament the noblest spread of 

 antlers? Whose rifle is truest to the camp when food is 

 scarce, or is silent longest when game is plenty and the 

 larder over full? These are the generous and healthy 

 rivalries of the outdoor life which stimulate but never 

 fret, and leave both victor and vanquished healthy and 

 happy still. Compare with these the scramble for 

 wealth; the rivalries for gain; the suicidal despair of 

 some; the vain and boastful bearing of others; the bitter- 

 ness and ruin of those who lose; the arrogance of those 

 who win; the sneering envyings and rankling jealousies, 

 ripening to hatred as the years go on, which characterize 

 the lives men live in store, ofiice and street, and note the 

 contrast. Who of us frank-spoken and kind-hearted vaga- 

 bonds of tide and field, of deck and camp, are envious of 

 any? Each man we meet is comrade, fellow-picnicker, 

 brother-man, partner of ours in the sweet profits of our 

 healthy, happy, natural life. Mild-mannered and light- 

 hearted wanderers; boys with smooth or wrinkled faces, 

 gray-headed some of us, but boys still, thank God; 

 canoeists, campers, yachtsmen, our fires are lighted on a 

 thousand shores, and our evening song floats over a 

 thousand lakes and island-studded rivers. We are a 

 family of nature's saints. Our spirits have been touched 

 and softened by the sweet grace of nature. We have 

 been indoctrinated in the truths that shine out of stars 

 -and which the blue heavens declare at noon and night. 

 The leaves of the catechism we have studied have been 

 the flowery meadows, the voiceful slopes of mountains, 

 the shining beaches, the whispering leaves of trees, the 

 thunder-shaken firmament or the star-lighted depth of 

 level waters. From these un-Calvinistic text-books we 

 have learned sweet lessons of God, whose gentleness we 

 saw in the very leaves we studied. Our souls have drank 

 the waters of life, fresh from native fountains, and our 

 spirits have bathed their scars in rivers which flow from 

 Him whose voice is as the sound of many waters. All 

 hail! Ye healthy-bodied, healthy-minded, kindly- 

 hearted, gentle-mannered saints of flood and field, of hiU 

 and river, of oar and sail, of deck and camp; your smiling 

 faces rise befor^ me in thousands, and your voices, in 

 happy talk, in joke and song, come from afar and stir the 

 silence around me into laughter. Joke, laugh and rest 

 on, ye thrifty vagabonds and gentle loafers; into each 

 hour you are storing the honey of health, on which in 

 future days of toil and strain your strength shall feed and 

 fill itself with vigor. I hail you, fellow saints, in this 

 lower heaven of God, where each happy one is his own 

 priest, each pure mind its own creed, and the gentle 

 wishes of each heart its only "sum and substance" of 

 doctrine. 



Adirondack Deer.— North Woods, N. Y., Oct, 13.— 

 Few deer have been killed by parties leaving this place. 

 Mr. White, of New York, shot a doe four weeks ago. 

 His guide killed a doe also. A few days ago a doe came 

 and put her head throueh the board fence f oiu- rods from 

 Mr. Roberts's house. Mrs. Roberts stood in the door of 

 the house a few minutes, then the deer walked through 

 the lots a quarter of a mile to the garden of Mr. Quack- 

 enbush. The last seen of it, it was walking toward the 

 woods. The next day Mr. Roberts found a doe dead in 

 his pasture, The hide will be preserved. — Ray Spears. 



