266 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



l6«t. SS. 1891. 



THE ADIRONDACKS IN 1853. 



A STORY TOLD BY PAUL SMITH. 



THEEE was a period of Adirondack life and adTenture 

 which might be called its prehistoric era, meaning 

 a time before Mx. Murray, or Mr. anybody else, had writ- 

 ten historical romance about it and it had become fash- 

 ionable. In those Acadian days hunters, amateur and 

 professional alike, livtad in the woods in primitive style, 

 and shared the same fatigues and the same humble fare. 

 The whole kit was carried in a canvas bag, waterproof 

 coverings either not having been then invented, or not 

 being, as now. in common use. 



The outfit for an expedition, or tramp, comprised the 

 following articles: A frying-pan, a kettle, a ladle for 

 melting lead for biillets, tin mugs (forks and spoons were 

 a luxury), hard-bred, coffee, flour and sugar, and the in- 

 dispensable salt pork, with pepper and salt in a bit of 

 newspaper. All these and f ome rope went in the canvas 

 bag. One of the party carried an ax. The hunter had 

 his large-bore rifle on his shoulder, and in one of his 

 numerous pockets caps, and in another bullets of his own 

 molding, some lead and a mold. In his belt was a large 

 sailor knife, u=ed, for skinning deer, dressing trout, and 

 for purposes of the kitchen and table; also a hatchet and 

 a tin mug. Slung at his back was a blanket or rug, and 

 his dress was a flannel shirt with numerous pockets, cor- 

 duroy' trousers, large heavy boots, and a slouch hat. A 

 powder flask and haversack completed his equipment. 

 The haversack contained fishing lines, book of flies, a 

 flask, matches, slippers, an extra shirt, and a few toilet 

 articles. In a j-pecial pocket was a compass and a whistle. 

 There were no dogs in the party. Dogs were introducpd 

 later, In those days Poll Smith's way of putting it ex- 

 pressed the whole matter: "I tell ye, boy», a feller must 

 be able to endewer grief that goes on thi se 'ere f xcjusion 

 parties." 



In that golden age, deer could be seen and sometimes 

 shot from the porch of old Martin's tavern at Saranac 

 Falls. Martin was Poll Smith's f ather-'n-l tw. Tiiis came 

 after. But who was "Poll" Smith? No one can ask who 

 has once "interviewed" the sleek landlord of the fine 

 hotel on the lower Sc. RegL". "PoU" went into the woods 

 one winter, many years ago, and "got out'" the timber of 

 which that hotel is built, with his own hands. At least 

 80 "Poll" says. But in the palmy days of which I am 

 speaking Poll kept a little place on Loon Lake, where the 

 humble table was laid in the kitchen, and the venison 

 and trout, of which there was always plenty, were trans- 

 ferred direct from the spider, or rather from the frying- 

 pan, to the plate of the guest by the hands of Poll's 

 excellent mother. The hostelry itself was a shabby 

 10ft. tenement, of two rooms and the kitchen in the L 

 part, un painted, and full of cracks, and the prospect 

 from the front porch was of a field of charred stumps 

 planted with potatoes and a root fence, for the fore- 

 ground, and some ghostly bleached and blasted pines in 

 the near distance. Within sight were no lakes, no moun- 

 tains, no romantic glens, nor savage forest; in short there 

 was no inducement, outside or in, to make you stay 

 another day at that inn, or to come again, however modest 

 the price of entertainment. Yes, there was one, and that 

 was Poll Smith. 



And in those days Poll, I mean Mr. Apollos Smith, 

 "went a-huntin' " for a living. He was glad of a chance 

 to go as guide, and to provide boats and food, charging 

 each man one dollar a day. For this moderate pay he 

 would follow a blaze line through the forest, or row or 

 carry across, or sit watc oing for deer until the black flies 

 ate him up; at evening he would put up the shanty and 

 cover it \vith bark, haul and cut wood, strip the hemlock 

 boughs and fry the flip-jacks; and then perhaps paddle 

 half the night with a jack-light of smoking fat-wood that 

 his "folks," i, e., the party he was then conducting, 

 might see the ghost of a deer and hear him stamp and 

 whistle. I say Mr, Smith would do all these things for 

 that small price, but truth compels me to add, not unless 

 he could get no one else to do the hard work. For Poll 

 (I beg his pardon, Mr. Smith) was to be most firmly be- 

 lieved when he said he "always was a lazy man," and he 

 was at his best when, stretched at full length with his 

 feet to the fire and smoking his pipe, he saw somebody 

 doing the work, while he talked. Tall and strong and 

 handsome, with a slouch or lazy-streak in his gait, a fine 

 face and the hands of a gentleman, he was every inch a 

 Yankee, but of the best type. The charm was in the 

 merry twinkle of his blue eyes and his fine white fore- 

 head. His forehead has since extended its domain quite 

 over his head, and has gravely compromised the occiput. 

 His yellow hair thinning upon the cranium fell upon his 

 cheeks and chin into a long soft beard, which he pulled 

 and stroked as he talked. His laugh was rare but hearty, 

 and his musical voice had a tone of gravity and serious- 

 ness which reproved any untimely mirth. 



One night is well remembered, when a heavy rain had 

 drenched the canvas bag and spoiled its contents. There 

 were nO flapjacks, the flour was a soggy lump of dough. 

 Blank were the looks at supper time. The air was sultry 

 and heavy. Midges were in great force, and the hateful 

 smudge had been lighted in order to keep them off. 

 Now, the midge, or punky, has made a vivid and lasting 

 impression upon my memory. He is a most pertinacious 

 and voracious blood-sucking- fly, stealing upon you un- 

 perceived in foggy, misty clouds of millions, and of a size 

 so minute that the meshes of the finest broadcloth open 

 to his entrance as wide as a barn door.* The only means 

 known to prevent his insidious and irritating attacks is 

 the smudge — L e , a fire of green wood smothered with 

 turf — which, filling eyes and lungs with its pungent 

 smoke, blinds or suffocates midges and men alike. The 

 undergraduate of Harvard was in misery by reason of 

 his wet cowhide boots, which, his feet being swollen, 

 refused to come off, and mut-t be worn to bed. "Say, 

 Poll," in a tone of despair, "did you ever know any one 

 who had a decent home who was fool enough to come up 

 here twice?" 



"I tell ye, bojs, it would astonish yo' to see the folks 



* To excitable and impressionable natures the midge is to man 

 what the tvetsl of Central Africa is to dumb beasts; butlnfUe 

 pages of some veracious hist-orians of the Adirondacks— who write. 

 It would appear, chietly in the interest of hotel keepers and 

 guides— r,o larger space is given to him tnan might be reasonably 

 claimed for a creature so minute as to be nearly imperceptible to 

 tlie naked eye. 



that come up into these yere woods every summer a-hunt- 

 in'. I don't believe there's the half on 'em knows what 

 they come for anyway. Now, there was a Mr, Sulloway 

 come up here last summer to my place from Philadelphy. 

 Some of my friends sent him up to me; told him to be 

 sure and git me to go with him if he could. Wall, I 

 never knowed just who the man was that sent him, but 

 that man had better not come up to my place and let me 

 find him out, I should go for him.'boys, bald-headed. 

 It would jest ha' made ye laugh to hear that Mr. Sullo- 

 way talk to me when I used to call him Mr. Sillyways. 

 'Oh, pray, Mx. Smith, don't pronounce my name in that 

 way. I "once had a very serious quarrel,' says he, 'with a 

 member of the club I belonged to because he addressed 

 me familiarly as 'Silly,' but it was finally healed up be- 

 tween us by his voluntary admission in the presence of 

 several prominent members and mutual friends that the 

 expression was in very bad taste,' 



'•Wall, it takes all sorts to make a world and after all 

 there's jest sich. But Mr. Sulloway, 1*11 allow he beat 

 any circus I ever went to. He was the tastiest man 

 about himself you ever see. He had a little knife with 

 scissors into it to pare his finger nails and little tweezers 

 to pull out his eye winkers, and he had tooth pickers 

 and a comb and brush for his mustache, and another 

 comb with a point on to it to part his hair, and no end of 

 such knick-knacks; and all them things had to be toted 

 round with him wherever he went to. Why, boys, he 

 come up here to go into this 'ere wilderness with one of 

 these yere Saratogy trunks, such as women carries, as 

 big as a covered wagon, and I had to back that there 

 trunk through these woods and over the carries and 

 away up the St, Regis River and across the St, Regis 

 ponds and down the Raquette and home agin. And 

 you wouldn't nf'ver guess the things that he had into that 

 there trunk. Why, it was amazin'. The fust day out, 

 when we was cfossing Rainbow Lake, he stopped and 

 hauled up the little canoe we'd fetched along a pur^jose to 

 carry the trunk, and he opened her and took out a little 

 pink umbrella with a top on to it about as big as my hat. 

 He saw me lookin' at him out of the corner of my eye 

 and says he, 'It's very light and easy to carry, Mr. 

 Smith, and this sun is extremely dazzling to the eyes.' 

 He had a great long bag made out of flannel that he used 

 to creep into at night with a string to pull up at the 

 mouth of it. He said that was to keep the insects out. 

 Why, he used to dress himself up in the mornin' to go a 

 huntin' in these yere woods jest the same as if he was a 

 Boin' to a ball. There was a looking-glass sot into the in- 

 side top of the trunk and he'd put the cover up and fix a 

 little cross-legged stool in front and then he'd open a case 

 with a gold top to it, and some gold bottles, and take 

 out his razors, and he'd shave his chin and slick his 

 mustache and whiskers with pomade and part his hair 

 in the middle and rub perfumery into it, and put on a 

 clean b'iled shirt and and a stand-up collar and wrist- 

 bands, and then he pulled on to his legs a pair of loni 

 leather cases with little buckles on the outside edge, ani 

 a purple necktie for his neck with a breastpin into it, and 

 a red velvet waistcoat with pearl buttons. And then his 

 coat! You ought to see that velvet coat. He had two of 

 'em with big metal buttons with dog's heads and deer's 

 horns, and guns and powder flasks stamped on to 'em, 

 and as many as forty pockets. There was so many of 

 them pockets he could never find nothing when' he 

 wanted it. It used to take him more than an hour to get 

 inside of all them clothes mornin's, and then he'd put 

 over his shoulders a powder horn on one side and a tele- 

 scope on the other; and he had the master great knife 

 that ever you see that he used to buckle around his waist. 

 The blade' was as much as 2l:t, long, and covered all over 

 with engravings, and the scabbard to it was all crusted 

 on with gold and sich like. He never drawed it but once, 

 for use, I'll tell ye how that was. Ye see he had a most 

 a beautiful shootin' iron, but Lord! he couldn't hit 

 nothin'. He used to say it was because the boat 

 wasn't steady. That umbrella of his'n would scare 

 any four-footed beast on airth, and when he did 



fet a shot (and I rowed him on to as many as ever 

 see to one man) he took the buck aguey and shook 

 so as he couldn't draw a bead on one of 'em. One day I 

 see a young f ahn that had strayed away from its dam and 

 I rowed him close up and he fired and wounded him some- 

 how so that he sot right down on his hindquarters. 

 ^ 'Now,' says I, 'Mr. Sulloways, there's a chance to blood 

 [ that there big knife o' yourn. Do put that poor little 

 j critter out of his misery. It's too bad. I'll put ye ashore.' 

 I 'Dear me! What is to be done, Mr. Smith?' 'Catch him 

 by the ears,' says I, 'an cut his throat as quick as ye can.' 

 So he drawed out that there scy metar and stepped ashore 

 just like Columbus discovering Ameriky, and he went at 

 the critter to try to catch ahold of his ears, and the fahn 

 he kep' a dodging his head away, and there he stood in 

 front of the little beast with that big cleaver in his hands 

 till I couldn't help laughing. And when he'd got ahold 

 of his ears and was just histen up the battle axe, the little 

 critter opened his mouth and baad light out at him. 'Oh! 

 Mr. Smith. Did you ever hear such a piteous sound? I 

 can't do it, Mr. Smith.' 'Wal,' says I, 'Mr. Sillyways, 

 you and me'd better go home, your feelin's is too tender 

 to go a-huntin,' 



"He was the moderatest softest-spoken man that ever 

 you encountered. Mild as a May mornin'. But he was 

 the master sot crittur that ever I took a-huntin'. Things 

 had to be jest so or he couldn't go nowberes ntr do noth- 

 in'. At last it got to be nip and tuck between me and 

 that there trunk. It was death or life. The fust crisis 

 come when we tried to run the rapids of the Raquette, 

 The canoe got away from us— wall, somehow — and the 

 last we see of it that ere canvas-roofed trunk was a-rush- 

 ing down among the rocks and whirlin' round and round 

 in the eddies like a caravan of raging tigers, Bimeby 

 we passed it stranded on a rock right in the middle of 

 the stream. Waal, we had to hev a reg'lar Boston town 

 meetin' about it, I argueyed that it warn't no use tryin' 

 to save it. But he took on so about it that next day I 

 waded out and brought the cargo ashore. We discussed 

 the question pretty well that time, but there was a divi- 

 sion of the house and the ayes had it. 



"After that Mr. Sulloways and me was done. I was the 

 sickest of him I ever was of any man I ever took into the 

 woods. One day I see my chance. I showed him a deer 

 standin' in a medder. He was dressed out, Mr. Sulloways 

 was, in full tog that mornin'. He had his sword on and 

 the teleFcope on his side, and a fresh b'iled shirt and dia- 

 mond studs and the umbrella and everything. There 

 was a place where the water was all covered over with 



this floating morss and grass and stuff and looked just like 

 land, so I rowed right up to it, 'Now,' says I, 'Mr. Sullo- 

 ways, is your chance. You can't hit nothin' from this 

 little shaky boat. I'll put ye on terry firmy.' He had 

 his eyes on the deer, and as soon as we touched the bog 

 he stepped right out. 'Look eout 1 Look out where you're 

 a goin' to!' I sung out. But it warn't no use and down 

 he went. There was a mountaineous splash and a scream, 

 More'n four acres of the stuff shook and swashed around, 

 and the black mud bubbled up out of the bole just like 

 ink. The deer, he Mowed his whistle and h'isted his flag 

 and departed. For as much as a minute there was an 

 awful silence, and I thought the mylennium had come, 

 and then I see his head all trailing with slush a comin' 

 up, I caught holt on to him by the collar and hauled him 

 into the boat. He was the blackest looking cuss that ever 

 you p'inted at, 'Oh! oh! Mr. Smith!' says he as soon as 

 he could catch his breath, 'this is tremendose, this is per- 

 fectly awful. I beg you to take me home at once.' 



"'Wall, boys, that was the last of Mr. Sulloways' huntin'." 



Poll knocked the ashes out of his pipe, pressed it down 

 with his finger and pulled at it until it smoked. 



' 'Some nice men has been up here sence, that he knowed 

 and recommended, and I hear that he always gives me a 

 first-class certificate of character; so it's all right," 



"Do you suppose he'll ever come up here again?" in- 

 quired the Harvard student. 



"Wall, no, boys, I guess Mr. Sulloways had about all he 

 could endewer." Zab. Boylston Ax)AM8. 



THE SAC AND FOX OPENING. 



SATURDAY, Sept. 19, at 3 P. M., I got my daily paper 

 saying that the Sac and Fox Reservation was to be 

 opened for settlement on the 22d at noon. It took me an 

 hour to fix my business so that I thought it was reason- 

 ably safe; and at midnight I went east on the train head- 

 ing for G uthrie in light marching order — two blankets, a 

 change of underclothing, an extra flannel shird and a 

 .45 Colts six-shooter. Changed cars at Newton, and at 2 

 A. M. Monday morning in a train of twenty passenger 

 cars rolled into Guthrie. The town was boiling full of 

 peeple, so Bruff (my comjpanion) and I hunted a bed and 

 finally had to pay 50 cents to sleep on a table in my 

 blankets. 



We were up at 7 Monday morning, and I managed to 

 get a team at $7.50 a day. Bruff engaged a driver and 

 guide, who said he knew every foot of the surrounding 

 country for 100 miles, but got lost after we came to the 

 second fork out of Guthrie, I got a third man to go with 

 us and bear a third of the expense. Bought grub till 

 Bruff declared that he was not going to set up a erocery 

 store out there. The guide had a fry-pan and coffee-pot; 

 and away we went eastward at noon. 



At 10 A, M, Tuesday we were on Deep Fork, a stream 

 dividing the Kickapoo Reserve from the Sac and Fox, 

 It was only four miles west of the Government town site 

 (Chandler). About 5,000 people in wagons, on horses and 

 afoot were assembled, strung along the creek for miles. 

 The creek was a deep ditch with a little water at the bot- 

 tom of it. One could cross anywhere on foot; and the 

 people cut down the bank and made half a dozen cross- 

 ings. Many more would have been made, but no one 

 dared cross and make the going out place, for to cross the 

 water made you into a "Sooner,'" or to be plain, you would 

 be in the Sac and Fox before it was thrown open by the 

 Government, and that debarred you from taking land or 

 lots. 



I found the crowd of men that I had been hunting. 

 They had a good crossing made, and though there were 

 1,000 wagons ia line I was squeezed in as fourth from the 

 ford, much to the disgust of a pompous old land agent 

 with mutton chop whiskers and a high-priced and high- 

 colored whisky nose. The colonel swore and yowled, but 

 his team was shoved up and I was shoved in. At 11 a 

 land agent man blew a horn and lectured to about 1,000 

 about a town that he and his directors were going to 

 start on a certain school section. It was to enrich us all. 

 So we hollered hurrah! and all forgot him and his town, 

 I believe he got a negro and a prohibitionist to follow 

 —on the ground that colored and cranky people would 

 have a fair show. 



At 11:50 A,M, 300 horsemenwereafcmy ford on the west 

 edge of the water. All the horses crazy. Men ditto. I 

 put my driver in the carriage and told him to drive 

 across and never mind me, for there was such an excite- 

 ment that I was afraid of a jam in thenarrow cut, I ex- 

 pected to see people killed right there, so I stood at the 

 ford by a jack oak, ready to climb if the crowd got too 

 thick. 



At 13 "boom," went a distant cannon, a bugle sounded, 

 and as the cannon sounded "Meddler" Bill Tilghman's 

 sorrel race horse sunk his hindfeet in the bank and 

 landed at one grand spring SOft, into the promised land. 

 He was gone like a sorrel flash for a race for the banner 

 claim ; and the horsemen were across and gone too in 

 two seconds. Then came a noise of crashing trees, of 

 horses' hoofs, of guns going off, shouts. Then a roar, as 

 thousands of wagons commenced to cross. At our cross- 

 ing the first wagon (a road cart) got jammed ci-osawise 

 by the second going up the further b^nk, and it was liter- 

 ally pulled to fragments in two seconds. The driver 

 knotted up his traces, jumped on his horse and disap- 

 peared like a flash, without a word of protest. My car- 

 riage crossed, I ran through the water and piled in as it 

 ascended the bank, and off we went through the jack- 

 oaks. I grabbed the reins, and the first thing I saw was 

 niggers and white men on foot, men on horses, men on 

 mules, men in road carts, men in buggies, men in and on 

 everything, streaming east like maniacs, through the 

 woods, A white man and a nigger took the fii'st claim at 

 the crossing. They were disputing as I passed them 

 about who was there first, I know the white man was 

 there first, for I saw him drive his stake, but it's not my 

 funeral. His name is Henry Garris, Then I passed a 

 broken buggy, then four or five. Then a horse with a 

 broken or dislocated leg, saddle on, rider gone on to seek 

 his fortune, I drove slowly, four in a top carriage and a 

 camp outfit make a big load. Hundreds passed me, but 

 at 1 o'clock 1 was camped in a nice open oak grove 

 200yd8. south of the Government town site. It was a 

 tract of 320 acres, surrounded by soldiers and U, S. 

 marshals, and was being laid off into lots by a large force 

 of surveyors. Men were fitill running around like mad 

 cats hunting claims. As Bruff and I didn't want any we 

 got dinner and ate it. 



I will now, that I have got my breath after the first 



