90 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



LAug. 4, 1893. 



CAMPS OF THE KINGFISHERS.-VIIl. 

 CARP LAKE, MICHIGAN. 



The Carp Lake Camp. 



About this time our "trout tooth" began to bother ub, 

 each and seTerally, and Sam and I laid out a trip that 

 night after the camp fire was built that promised to give 

 ■us relief and some sport at the same time. 



Something over a mile below on the opposite side of the 

 lake was Alexander's Creek, out of which I took a 17in. 

 trout in 1884, and we had taken a mess or two of good 

 ones out of it the previous summer. 



Thither we took our way in the ironclad next morning, 

 Sam and I, with a big lunch wrapped in a paper, for we 

 intended to be out all day for trout and bass. We stopped 

 at Alexander's Point, across the lake, and caught a couple 

 of dozen good big shiners with hook and line for bass 

 bait, as we were goine to cross over to "Cattail Point" — a 

 noted place for bass — and fish along for maybe a mile or 

 two below before turning back for camp. But we would 

 fish the trout stream first, before the noon-day heat made 

 the trout too lazy to bite. 



We pulled down to the mouth of the stream and rowed 

 carefully into a smooth, sandy beach, and when within 6 

 or 8ft. of the shore, with the boat at a standstill, I leaned 

 over the side to scan the bottom for snags, when I heard 

 a 8w-i-s-h, and looking down near the stool on which I 

 sat, there was a stream of water gushing up through 

 another rip in that cussed canvas, this time on the lar- 

 board side nearly opposite the other one. 



The water was not more than 4in. deep under us, and 

 we stepped out with scant ceremony and pulled the boat 

 up on the sand, and then I waded back to look far the 

 cause of the calamity — like that would do any good after 

 the damage was done. 



There, sticking up out of the sand and barely discern- 

 ible, was a snag an inch long of a broken-off limb on a 

 log that the washing sand had covered out of sight except 

 the little sharp point, and when I leaned over my weight 

 had settled the boat squarely on it, from which only one 

 thing could result— a hole in the canvas. Had we pulled 

 in 4in. further to the north the boat would have gone 

 clear. 



Old Sam stood looking at the hole with an air of utter 

 prostration, but he at last managed to give expression to 

 his feelings with,' "Shipwrecked agin, by the great gosh I 

 I wouldn't give a nickel with a hole in it for a whole fleet 

 o' sich boats, I wouldn't b'gosh." 



We had seen an old skiff lying on the bank at the 

 point as we came down and we decided to fish the stream 

 up through the fields as far as the woods and then go to 

 neighbor Schaub, living near the point, and borrow the 

 boat to get back to camp in, first going back after the 

 ironclad. We sunk the bucket of minnows under a root 

 at the mouth of the stream, hid our coats and lunch in 

 some tall grass near by and took our way up the stream, 

 not very much discouraged over the mishap, but I won't 

 chronicle the remarks we made about Brother Osgood, 

 and canvas boats in general, lest it prejudice the reader 

 a trifle against that species of water cratt, and yet it was 

 an accident that might not have been avoided, even with 

 more vigilance in making the landing. 



Next time we would maybe have "boss sense" enough 

 to bring along a needle and thread and piece of canvas, 

 or at least needle and thread, in which case we could 

 make shift with a piece of doubled shirt-tail till we got 

 to camp. 



We fished along quietly up into the last field next the 

 woods pasture without any special happenings, taking a 

 dozen or more good trout on the way, and it was open, 

 comfortable fishing, too, for there was no tangle to 

 bother us and make us warp a certain commandment, 

 albeit old Sam always left it to "Jeems Mackerel" to do 

 the "warping" when occasion required. When near the 

 upper fence I had just picked out a finely-colored 9in, 

 trout from under a big stump under which the water had 

 scooped a deep hole, when I heard a bellow behind me, 

 and looking over by shoulder I saw a big black bull 

 coming toward me not 20yds, away, with a lot of other 

 cattle following to see the fun, as I hastily figured it out. 

 I knew there must be a couple more good trout under 

 that stump, but I hadn't time to stay and have it out with 

 them ; the loss of a minute might complicate matters with 

 the bull. 



I jumped across the stream with an agility that would 

 have made Old Sam smile had he seen the performance, 

 without a thought of the hitch in the rheumatic old star- 

 board knee joint, and before the bull was through with 

 his little preliminary practice in the shape of pawing, 

 bellowing, goring his horns into the soft ground and toss- 

 ing a handful or two of earth over his back — as he was 

 going to do me — I was on the further side of the fence, 

 rod, trout and bait box, with a rent in the rear of my 

 breeches made by an unfriendly knot on a fence rail as I 

 slid over, shouting to Sam, who was coming up a hundred 

 yards below, to "look out for the bull, and make a wide 

 'come around' to the left and climb the fence at his earli- 

 est convenience, or he might run into trouble." 



When the bull had plowed up a yard or two of ground 

 with his sharp horns, he straightened up and took a brief 

 intermission to look in the direction where I had been, 

 but I wasn't there, and I took comfort to myself for my 

 absence, not counting the rent in my breeches. 



He soon spied me shaking my fist at him, which I felt 

 safe in doing as there was a good fence between us, and 

 started with a warlike bellow straight for the fence, but 

 stopped when he got to the stream. 



He eyed me sullenly for maybe a minute, and then 

 started to tear up the ground again with his horns right 

 at the banks of the stream. 



There must have been a friendly root in sympathy with 

 me near the bank, for as I watched him he sunk a horn 

 in the earth, and giving a great surge of his powerful 

 neck the horn did not come up— it had caught under a 

 root, and he threw himself flat of his back and rolled into 

 the stream, at which I rej aiced vehemently and laughed 

 till my sides ached; nor could I help shouting at him, 

 "Goody, you black devil; I only wish you had broken 

 your cussed neck." The water was less than a foot deep 

 where he rolled in, and he was directly on his feet again, < 



the most crestfallen-looking bull I reckon in the whole 

 State of Michigan. 



He shook his head in a dazed sort of way, gave a 

 couple of snorts without once looking in the direction of 

 the cause of bis discomfiture and started slowly back to 

 the other cattle, who not having perhaps enjoyed the 

 turn of affairs as well as I, had quietly resumed cropping 

 the short grass. 



That hidden root was something that he could'nt quite 

 understard, and it had knocked the conceit and "big 

 injun me" air entirely out of him and he went to feeding 

 with the other cattle with a look of humility that moved 

 me to another fit of hilarity. 



I left him to his grass and reflections and turned to the 

 stream again, better satisfied doubtless with the outcome 

 of the "epipodf^" than the black bull. 



Just above the fence was a mass of drift lodged against 

 the bottom rail where the stream ran under ic, and above 

 this I dropped in the freshly baited hook, letting the 

 current carry it under the drift, and in less time than it 

 takes to mention it, I swung a trout out over the low 

 bank that was about equal in size to the one taken at the 

 stump where the black bull came to grief. 



By this time Sam had climbed the fence 50yds. away 

 and came up to "jine me" in another laugh over "gittin' 

 one on the bull," and then he rasped out the introductory 

 lines of old Bill SchroU's favorite ditty — 



"The old black bull came down from tlie mountains, 

 Long time ago: 

 He pawed up the ground an' then he bellered, 

 Long time ago." 



We felt under the drift for another trout, but not find- 

 ing one crossed the lane and climbed another fence, to 

 fish the stream up to the woods a hundred yards or more 

 to the last hole, a deep pool under the roots of a great elm 

 where I fooled the 17in, trout some years before 1884. 



Two years before, little Ed. Vedder— my boy chum— - 

 and I had been chased away from this pool and out of 

 the field "a whoopin' " by a red bull, and when I related 

 the episode to old Sam he said we ought to call the stream 

 "bull crick," 



Fortunately there were no cattle in the field and we 

 had a chance to fish the pool in quiet. 



When within three or four rods of it we tied our fish 

 in the water and laid our plans for fooling a big trout, 

 for I had found in the three seasons I had fished it that 

 there was always at least one big fellow in it that was 

 boss of the hole, besides some lesser ones that were too 

 big, however, for him to swallow, 



I stood back a few yards and let Sam do the fishing, 

 for I wanted him to have a taste of glory if it was in the 

 pool. He crawled up on hands and knees till he could 

 poke his rod over the water and let the carefully baited 

 hook suck under the tree, when it was instantly seized 

 by an Sin. trout and the victim of the wiles of a seduc- 

 tive Kentucky fisherman was as instantly and quietly 

 swung out back on the grass, where I released the hook, 

 adjusted the bait and Sam dropped it in again without 

 changing a muscle or his position. 



Before I had time to put him on the stringer, Sam 

 hoisted out another of about the same size, and he kept 

 repeating the performance till he had yanked out six in 

 twice as many minutes, when they quit biting, and still 

 the big fellow had not made a sign that he was there. 

 Sam laid on his beily for half an hour trying all his arts 

 to coax the big one to take the bait — we were of course 

 certain that there was a big one in the pool— but to no 

 avail, and he at last gave it up with the sage observation, 

 "When trout quit bitin', they quit hi tin', an' I reckon 

 there's not nary 'nother one in that hole, nohow." 



We went over to neighbor Schaub's and related om- 

 tale of shipwreck to him, and borrowed his boat without 

 any trouble and went down to the beach and put it in the 

 water, when we found it leaked about a gallon a minute, 

 but we consoled ourselves with the thought that it would 

 swell up after awhile and we could make out to get to 

 camp in it by one bailing with an old basin while the 

 other rowed. The oars, too, were a marvel in their way, 

 handy almost as a pair of fence rails, but the outfit was 

 the best at hand and we felt thankful for it. The wind 

 had risen while we were on the trout stream, blowing 

 down the lake — was it ever known to blow in the right 

 direction when you want to get back to camp? — and the 

 water was rough and choppy. It was no trouble to go 

 with the wind, and we were soon at the sandy beach and 

 had the ironclad apart and loaded in the clumsy skiS, 



While Sam went for the minnow bucket I went for our 

 coats and lunch where we had concealed them in the tall 

 grass. The coats were all right, but some torn scraps of 

 paper scattered around and a "passel o' hogs" grunting 

 and rooting lazily a few rods up the shore told the tale of 

 the lunch. Then it was in order to give the command- 

 ment another violent "warpin'," while old Sam stood and 

 looked a complacent approval. 



The "warpin' " finished to Sam's satisfaction, we pushed 

 oH again and began the real work of getting back to 

 camp. We got along fairly well till we rounded the point, 

 where we got the wind dead ahead in its full force, and 

 then with our utmost exertions the headway was barely 

 perceptible, and sometimes an energetic gust of wind 

 would give us a backset of a few feet. 



I unshipped one of the oars, and standing up in the 

 stern used it as a pole, hugging the shore in shoal water 

 where I could reach bottom, and with Sam alternately baH- 

 ing and pulling at the other oar, we managed to keep the 

 old tub moving. We labored slowly and sweatingly along 

 up the shore till a quarter of a mile or more above, where 

 we could see the old flag whipping straight out in the 

 wind and slanted across with the wind on the quarter to 

 camp, worn out, hungry, out of humor and the command- 

 ment badly w^arped, but with trout enough to satisfy the 

 trout tooth of the whole camp and make up for some of 

 our misfortunes besides. 



The ironclad was again carried up in the shade of the 

 oak, and when we had cleared the table of the lunch 

 Barney set for us, we patched and waterproofed over the 

 slit, and then old Sam made a big vow that he would 

 "never set his foot in another one o' them confounded 

 no 'count tissue paper boats as long as he lived." 



The others had been in camp all day except a while in 

 the morning on account of the high wind which made 

 the lake too roueh to handle a boat and fish, but they 

 had caught more bass than we could use, a fact attested 

 by three or four on a stringer tied to a log lying partly in 

 the water, where they had been left hanging till the surf 

 beat the life out of them against the bottom. 



The sight of the trout Sam and I brought in had "het 

 up" old Kelpie's blood to a point that gave him no rest, 

 and that night around the camp-fire he fidgeted and 

 squirmed around in his chair, and swapped legs so often 

 that we knew there was pometbing serious on his mind, 

 and at last it came out, He must go trout fishing in the 

 morning, and he wanted Johnny to go along and row the 

 boat up to Fonch's landing, from where they would walk 

 to the stream running through Fonch's land and fish it 

 till they got trout enough to "take the conceit out of old 

 Sam and Hickory," as he expressed it. 



Johnny snapped eagerly at the chance of a day out 

 with Brother Kelpie, and from that on till bedtime they 

 became intimate as two old chums as they discussed their 

 plans for the next day's fishing— beardless boy and griz- 

 zled veteran, they were drawn together by the same 

 cord that binds the brotherhood the world over. 



They were off in the morning early and when they re- 

 turned in the evening "Sam and Hickory had the conceit 

 knocked out of them" with thirty good trout as they 

 were counted and laid on the table with a great flourish 

 by Johnny, who spent the better part of the next three 

 days, and the nights around the camp-fire, telling us juat 

 where each trout was taken and just how it was all 

 done. 



The same morning Sam and Charley had taken the big 

 white skifl" and started for Maybert's Creek, three miles 

 below on the same side of the lake as the camp for trout, 

 but they somehow misunderstood the directions I gave 

 them about finding it, and wandered around through the 

 woods two or three hotirs, sometimes within 50yd8, of it, 

 as I learned a few days after when Charley and I made a 

 trip to it, when tired out and disgusted, and pestered to 

 the verge of profanity by "skeeters," they went back to 

 their boat and spent the rest of the day after bass and 

 pirkerel. 



The day Charley and I fished it we took back to camp 

 seventeen that were little over the 6in, limit, and put 

 hack in the water nearly twice as many more that were 

 3, 4 and 5Ln. long. A farmer whom we met told us there 

 had been not less than 1,200 fish taken out of the stream 

 before our arrival. No wonder the good ones were scarce; 

 the count fisher and the trout hog had "got in their 

 work," 



Ever since we had been in camp we had been getting 

 minnows with hook and line, and although there was 

 "lots o' fun" flipping them out, the procpss was some- 

 times tedious when in a hurry to get to fishing. The 

 Colonel and I determined to lay in a supply that would 

 last two or three days or more, by setting the glass trap 

 and filling all the spare buckets around the camp, which 

 would please the boys and gratify our desire to "see the 

 thing work." 



Leaving the "Perfessor" in camp writing some letters, 

 we pulled down to the break of the bar off the birch pointi 

 and drove a small, trimmed sapling in the bottom at the 

 edge of the grass, to which we hung the trap a couple of 

 feet under the surface, baited with pieces of broken 

 cracker, and then anchored our boat 20 or 30yds. above 

 to fish for bass awhile and await developments. 



There were hundreds of good minnows along in the 

 grass around near the trap, and we had no doubt but we 

 could go back in half an hour or so and find it so full that 

 their tails would be sticking out of the hourglass-shaped 

 entrance hole. But we didn't. 



We went back after awhile and saw plenty of them 

 swimming unconcernedly around it, but "nary a one" in 

 it. We moved it down tlip lake a few rods where the 

 minnows were "thicker'n skeeters in a cedar swamp," 

 caught a few good shiners with hook and line and went 

 back to our bass fishing. 



At the end of another hour we paid it another visit and 

 found it full— of water and broken cracker, and nothing 

 else. We began to think the contrivance a fraud, or 

 maybe the bait didn't remind them of anything, and we 

 caught five small shiners and put them in it, thinking 

 that when the others saw them in there they would go in 

 to get a share of the broken cracker. 



This scheme promised so well that we did not stay 

 long at our fishing but went back to see how it bad pan- 

 ned out, ready to shout like a couple of boys at the suc- 

 cess of our ruse. But the best laid schemes o' mice an' 

 men, etc. There was a barred perch that could little 

 more than turn around in the trap, who had crowded in 

 through the hole, and one of the five shiners was missing. 

 We were both amused and surprised and made a few re- 

 marks to suit the occasion. Here was a new way to 

 catch perch, and we felt duly thankful and passed a vote 

 ©f thanks to whoever invented the trap. 



While we sat in the boat a few feet away, studying 

 the case over, the big perch gave his tail' a sudden flirt, 

 closed his jaws on another of the helpless minnows and 

 proceeded to swallow it with the greatest complacency, 

 and then we were convinced that the first one had not 

 made his escape by the entrance hole of the trap. 



In the next ten minutes that cannibal deliberately 

 swallowed the remaining three right before our eyes and 

 then turned lazily two or three times in the narrow con- 

 fines of the trap looking for more. 



As we had not set out to catch minnows to feed a big 

 lazy perch that was too shiftless to skirmish for them 

 in a legitimate way, we raised the trap, and taking his 

 pot-bellied smartness out, pitched him 10yds, out into 

 the lake, for which he doubtless thanked us, for with all 

 his cunning in getting in he hadn't sense enough to find 

 his way out of the hole through which he went in. 



We set the trap again and did not return to it till 

 toward evening, when we found three small perch in it, 

 but no minnows. 



We had heard and read a good deal about the merits of 

 this trap as a minnow catcher; some of our friends had 

 used them of the same pattern with success, but our ef- 

 forts with it resulted in total failure; none entered it 

 only the five little ones we put in— to furnish a square 

 meal for the big, lazy perch. 



A day or two after we took it across the lake to Alex- 

 ander's Point, where there were always hundreds of good 

 minnows along the edge of the bulrushes and grass, but 

 it remained empty from day to day, although we could 

 sit in a boat a few feet away and catch with hook and 

 line all around it as many good big shiners as we wanted, 

 sometimes within a few inches of the entrance. 



We lost faith in it altogether, but it may have been our 

 own fault in not knowing how to manage' it, and some of 

 the brethren who have used them may be able to tell us 

 the reason of our failure. 



At any rate we got no minnows with it, and if it per- 



