35^ 



^ORESt AND Stt^EAM. 



LOCJT. 2^, 189§. 



The Fish Lwws of the United States and Canada, in the 

 "Game La/ios in Brief,' ^ So cents. In the "Book of the 

 Game Laws" {full text), 50 cents. _ 



CAMPS OF THE KINGFISHERS.*-XIII. 



CARP LAKE. MICHIGAN. 



The Carp Lake Camp. 



[Continued from page 366.] 



Theee's a heap o' comfort in a camp-lire, and the 

 Colonel is never so well contented as when taking his 

 ease in front of one, and he rarely fails to sit it out, 

 saving enough wood mayhap to kindle the next one, 



A few nights after we were awakened about 13'o"clock 

 in our tent near the oaks by some discordant, untuneful 

 noises and howling that sounded a good deal like a newly 

 organized German singing society in full blast, which 

 turned out to be a serenade tendered us by six or seven 

 young fellows from Traverse City who made a camp that 

 afternoon in the edge of the grove above us to fish a little 

 and have a "good time" for a couple of days. 



Kelpie and the Colonel turned Hickory out to learn 

 what the trouble was, while the boys in the other tents 

 snored a rasping accompaniment' to the inharmonious 

 medley of noises filling the air, utterly oblivious, or in- 

 different it seemed, to the intended compliment, or it 

 may be they were only "playin' possum" till I had de- 

 termined the nature of the demonstration, whether 

 hostile or otherwise. 



When I got out the howling match was about in its 

 last throes and I waited at the corner of the fly in the 

 dim starlight till it came to an end, which it did pres- 

 ently with a sort of sporzando jerk that must have scared 

 the little robins overhead out of a couple of weeks' 

 growth. 



"Good evening, gentlemen" — T hastened to remark in 

 my blandest manner, for I was afraid they would start in 

 and grind out another verse— "to what are we indebted 

 for this enchanting music? " — for which lie I ought to 

 have been kicked into the lake. 



One who acted as spokesman proceeded to explain, and 

 wound up by asking me to take a drink with them, at the 

 same time producing a bottle which he said contained 

 beer, and then the others came out from the shadow of 

 the oak, each with a similar bottle in his hand that only 

 needed a corkscrew to open up the festivities. I had a 

 hard time to beg off, but seeing I was firm but respectful 

 in my refusal to "jine," one of tbem at last said, "Well 

 then, bring out the other fellers that do drink." 



This called for another diplomatic prevarication to save 

 the boys from being roused out of bed to help increase 

 the size of the "jag" some of the serenaders were already 

 burdened with, and I told them it was old Sam's birth- 

 day (giving his name), and the boys had been celebratin' 

 with persistency and frequent regularity during the 

 evening till they were all fuller'n geese (I hope the boys 

 will forgive me the lie), and it would be next to impos- 

 sible in their present condition to get them fully enough 

 awake to take another drink, much less to stand up if 

 they succeeded in getting out of the tents. Just there, 

 whether preconcerted or not I never found out, a succes- 

 sion of grunts and spasmodic snorts from the Colonel, 

 and a long drawn, sonorous snore, repeated in regular 

 cadence from the Perfessor's tent below, went a good 

 way toward corroborating the story of the birthday 

 festivities, and pulling me out of a "category," for atone 

 time during the discussion of "to beer or not to beer," the 

 serenaders seemed disposed to be a trifle ugly because 

 they could get none of us to drink with them. At last, 

 however, after a few more hastily constructed lies— white 

 ones — made up to fit the emergency and a promise from 

 me that some of us would come up to their camp next 

 day and get better acquainted, they took their departure 

 in a good humor, smashing a bottle or two of beer on a 

 rock as they went by the cook's fireplace to get rid of 

 some "innard cussedness" as it seemed, and I went back 

 to the tent to find Kelpie and the Colonel wide awake, 

 sober, and glad our midnight visitors had left without in- 

 flicting another "selection" on us. 



I turned in and was soon asleep, and Kelpie said next 

 morning that, with the snoring to the north of him and 

 the snoring to the south of him, he was some time in 

 making up his mind which was the more disciuietina' 

 the snoring match going on between the Colonel and 

 Hickory or the midnight howling match we had been 

 treated to. 



Old Sam and I went up to their camp next day and 

 found them to be a clever lot of young fellows who had 

 come out for a couple of days' recreation, and they were 

 having it. 



Their camp equipments consisted principally of beer- 

 there were several kegs protected from the sun in the 

 bushes near by— however, there was a big tent, a rude 

 table of boards with some dishes and cooking utensils 

 on it, the simplest pattern of a box-stove of sheet iron, 

 some more beer in bottles, a gun or two, a few cane fish- 

 ing poles, and some more beer. Then they all had some 

 beer, old Sam "jinin' 'em" in three or four cups full and 

 pronouncing it "a mighty fillin' sort of a beverage, but 

 lackin' in essentials." 



One of the party, Mr, Al Petertyl, was an amateur 

 photographer and had his camera along, which reminded 

 us that we would like to have some pictures of our 

 camp. 



He kindly agreed to come down and 'take us,' and in 

 the afternoon, about an hour by sun, he got three views 

 but from some cause they turned out to be nothing but 

 some streaks and blotches on the glass plate. The second 

 morning after he came down again about 10 o'clock and, 

 with the sun at his back, took a snap shot at the camp, 

 which, however, did not produce a very clear cut picture! 

 but old Sam explained it clearly by saying, "He had on 

 a leetle too much focus when he tetched 'er off." It was 

 rather a misfortune that the picture was not better, but 

 we had no cause to complain, as he would take nothing 



* ^ the reader will let me down easy for the gapa that have oc- 

 c^^f a the letters for the past couple of inoaths my conscience 

 JTJi A '■^■^^ strained, and I will promise "not to do so any more." 

 Other duties, and some unavoidable interruptions havB kept me 

 m a state of mind" and prevented me from finishing the series 

 sooner, which I trust will pass for a valid excuse.-K. 



for his trouble, and besides, it was the last plate he had 

 and it was that or nothing. 



He gave us the negative as we passed through Traverse 

 City on our way home, and from it we afterward got a 

 lot of copies, one of .which was sent to Forest and 

 Stream to finally be transferred to its pages, and if the 

 reader " gits jest the right focus on it " he may be able to 

 see the little robins in the oak with their mouths agape 

 " waitin' fur a worm to drap in anyhow, he may see 

 the "Perfessor" (No, 5 in the picture) wrastlin' with a 

 snarl in his line and polishing up in his mind some old 

 chestnut to spring on his comrades as a new joke. 



The days began to slip by at a quicker pace than usual, 

 it seemed, and we could look ahead and see the end of 

 our vacation not very far away: in fact, old Sam and 

 Charley were to leave us in a few days to be back at their 

 business at a time agreed on before they left home. 



The rest of us didn't " let on " much, but we felt that 

 we would miss them more than we cared to say, for two 

 better, kindlier, more unselfish comrades never drove a 

 tent pin or swapped lies around a camp-fire. 



One morning, four days after friend Petertyl took his 

 last shot at the camp with his " picter box," they climbed 

 into a spring wagon that had been sent out from Traverse 

 City after them and their baggage, and drove off, after 

 an exchange of hearty hand shakes and good-byes, wav- 

 ing their hats till a turn in the road hid them from view, 

 and we turned back to the camp to sit or wander aimlessly 

 around fnr half an hour or more, something after the 

 manner of a lot of bees that have been despoiled of their 

 hoard. (" That dandy flag pole I cut" was the last we 

 heard from Old Sam.) 



We could hardly persuade ourselves that they were 

 really gone till Kelpie and I walked over to take a look 

 into the vacant tent, ostensibly to see if they had forgotten 

 anything, and then we realized the void they had left in 

 the camp, and what a space the two old Kentuckians had 

 filled in our hearts. Verily, the loss of a tried and true 

 old camp companion is a calamity that depresseth the 

 spirit, and we sat around most of the afternoon, and 

 smoked in a perfunctory, absent-minded sort of way, and 

 said little : even the Perfessor's choicest and stalest 

 " chestnuts " fell flat, and his most caustic witticisms lost 

 their smart, much to his discomposure and our peace of 

 mind. 



Toward evening Kelpie and I got restless and took a 

 boat and pulled down and anchored off the birch point to 

 fish awhile, not that we wanted fish to eat, but as Kelpie 

 said, "because it wouldn't look well for the camp to be 

 without fish for breakfast if we took a notion we wanted 

 fish." 



We fished till near sundown and went back with some 

 goggle-eyes — we could always catch these— and a couple 

 of bass, besides losing a "whopper" that tangled up in 

 the long grass and went off with the hook in his jaw, due 

 to a faulty place in the line near the gut, but then, who 

 ever heard of a line breaking anywhere else than at a 

 faulty place? 



Kelpie and I conferred together and figured it out to 

 our satisfaction that the bass that got away was certainly 

 heavier than the combined weight of both the others, but 

 we didn't think it worth while to mention it at camp lest 

 the "Perfessor" inflict on us some new-fangled version of 

 the time-worn platitude about "the big fish that always 

 gets away." 



There was a gap in the circle around the camp-fire that 

 night where the Kentuckians usually sat that seemed to 

 grow wider as the night waned, and the fire burned less 

 brightly, we fancied, because "old Frigid" and "Snake- 

 root" were not there with their familiar figures outlined 

 in long drawn, grotesque shadows against the adjacent 

 hillside. 



It was getting near breaking up time for the night. 

 Talk had died out, and the Colonel sat with legs out- 

 stretched, gazing dreamily into the fire, as was his wont 

 when the last two chunks had been "poked" together for 

 the final fitful blaze, pufling an occasional cloud of smoke 

 to keep his pipe alight, and saying nothing — only think- 

 ing, and planning mayhap his next winter's campaign in 

 Florida. 



Johnny lay stretched on the grass, slanted up hill with 

 head propped up in open palm and elbow resting on the 

 ground, bobbing at the fire with sleepy jerks; the keeper 

 of the fryin' pans, with more experience with stiffened 

 joints from lying on the ground, was snoring on a board 

 a couple of yards from the fire, dreaming doubtless of the 

 trim colored chambermaid with whom he had furiously 

 flirted at the Fountain Point House, and even the "Per- 

 fessor" had somehow unaccountably run out of wormy 

 old chestnuts and edge! ess jokes with which to entertain 

 US, and sat dozing and nodding on his carapstool, with 

 down-hanging chin, happily unconscious of the comfort 

 and rest we were getting out of the fact that he had at 

 last run down. 



Kelpie and I had been industriously fighting smoke and 

 taking over an intended foray on the trout of Cedar Run 

 next day, and as our plans were now maturfd and the 

 fire getting? low, we 'roused the sleepers and turned in, 

 leaving the Colonel to his reverie and his pipe, to come 

 when the spirit prompted. 



It was after 8 o'clock next morning before Kelpie and 

 I were off in the ironclad, headed straight for the mouth 

 of the bayou, and for a wonder we had no head wind to 

 contend against. For the first time in many days at that 

 hour in the morning the lake was quiet except for a faint 

 ripple on the water, and the pull was hardly good exercise. 

 On reaching the mouth of Cedar Run we found an old 

 wood scow moored to the bank in such a way that there 

 was little of the cedar to be seen from a boat passing along 

 up the bayou, and this was doubtless the reason why 

 Kelpie and Johnny had missed it the day they were look- 

 ing for it. 



We followed the stream around to where Sam and I 

 had run against the log jam the year before, but it was 

 now clear and we kept on up without interruption. 



The water was very clear and cold, although the bot- 

 tom for a quarter of a mile up was soft black mud, 

 changing to sand and gravel where the stream became 

 narrower and the current stronger. The banks were low 

 and marshy— scarcely any banks at all — and grown up 

 with tall grasses and cat-tails and clumps of small low- 

 growing bush that we didn't know the name of, and off 

 to the right, as far as we could see, were hundreds of 

 dead trees, desolate and grim and leafless, that were 

 killed by the backwater when the dam was built across 

 the outlet at Leland a good many years before. 



The year before we camped on Uncle Jimmy Nolan's 



place, a canoe might have been paddled almost anywhere 

 over the swamp, but some planks, or the gates at the 

 head of the sluicewav at the dam, had been removed by 

 the defunct Leland Mining Company, who still owned it 

 —causing a good deal of grumbling from the people up 

 and down the lake and some threats of litigation— and 

 now the water was about 3ft. lower than the usual stage, 

 but still a few feet higher than the original level previous 

 to the building of the dam. 



("The bayou," the swamp, the lower end of Cedar run, 

 and a very small and very shallow lake lying just back 

 from the mouth of the Cedar, taken altogether, is a 

 famous resting and feeding place for thousands of wild 

 ducks and geese in the fall of the year as they go south. 

 This for the information of the brethren of the gun.) 



Kelpie and I pursued our way up the winding stream, 

 so crooked that the sun was first over one shoulder and 

 then the other, till it became so narrow and shallow that 

 we unshipped the oars, and standing, one in the bow and 

 the other in the stern, used them as poles to push the boat 

 up the now rapid current that in places ran with the 

 swiftness of a mill race. 



After awhile we got out of the deadened swamp where 

 there were green trees and bushes on either side and well 

 defined and higher banks, and from there on up the 

 stream was a mass of roots and snags and sunken logs, 

 hard wood saw logs that had refused to float, with barely 

 room in places to work the boat between without deadly 

 peril to the canvas (It would have been a calamity in- 

 deed to have been shipwrecked in such a pisce), and 

 Kelpie was kept busy picking out the channel from his 

 lookout in the bow, and fending the boat off the count- 

 less obstructions that infested our way, while I furnished 

 the heft of the motive power at the stern. 



In places the water was shallow, with only a couple of 

 inches or so to spare between the canvas and the bottom 

 of the stream; in others the water had scooped out deep 

 places against the bank from a rod to 4 and 5 rods long 

 and 2, 3 and 4ft. deep. At places the stream was from 

 20 to 30ft. wide, but most of the way it was so narrow 

 that we could not have used the oars in the rowlocks, and 

 everywhere were snags and roots and logs, logs and roots 

 and snags. 



Occasionally a trout would flash out from under the 

 bank or a log, and seek a quick hiding further up or 

 down the stream, and then our palms itched to grasp our 

 rods and "do a little inveiglin' jest to satisfy the innard 

 cravins o' natur," as old Sam once said when he started 

 out to "hive a passel o' bluegills," 



But we had started out to go to the head of navigation 

 before doing any fishing, and we kept resolutely on, only 

 promising to stop on our way back and have it out with 

 each impertinent trotit that "sassed" us as we went by. 



At last we came to a dilapidated bridge of rough logs 

 spanning the stream, too low for the boat to pass under, 

 but it didn't need this to tell us we had reached the head 

 of navigation, for above it as far as we could see— and that 

 was but a short distance— was a mat of fallen trees and 

 limbs lying in every conceivable direction that almost 

 hid the water from view. It was jilain that this part of 

 Cedar run had never been "logged out." 



We secured the boat a couple of rods below the bridge 

 and got out with our rods to look around and get our 

 bearings. 



Across the stream a short distance from the bridge was 

 an old deserted logger's cabin, and along the banks for 

 two or three rods in an open space were some skids where 

 the loggers had been at work; a great quantity of dpcay- 

 ing, weather-beaten strips of white cedar bark, "skin- 

 nings" from the railroad ties that had prevented old Sam 

 and I from ascending the stream the year before. 



No sign of life greeted us, not even the familar click of 

 a kingfisher's reel as he wound himself up with a pre- 

 paratory chatter for a cast in the stream from some 

 neighboring dead limb overlooking the water: however, 

 I had nigh forgotten a few straggling, sluggish deer flies 

 and some half famished skeeters that appeared to have 

 been expecting our arrival, and were 'a-layin' fur us" 

 with their billsready sharpened to exact a tribute of blood 

 for trespass on their territory. 



It was a dreary, lonesome place, made more lonely- 

 looking, if possible, by the deserted cabin and the old 

 bridse, with the sills bare in places, and had it not been 

 for the ceaseless murmur of the stream that found its 

 way with a soft melody through the logs and limbs above 

 the bridge, the dead stillness of the eurrounding forest 

 would have been oppressive. We picked a few mou'fuls 

 of red "rozberries" that tempted us at the side of ihe 

 disused old log road, and sat down on a log near the 

 bridge to get our tackle ready for the expected sport and 

 to rest a few minutes, for the push up the swift, devious 

 current of the last mile had tired us somewhat, although 

 the ironclad drew so little water that it was scarcely more 

 than child's play to handle her. 



I strapped on a bait-box of barnyard hackles and 

 crossed over to fish up the stream, leaving Kelpie to try 

 at the bridge where there was a deep hole just below with 

 some sunken logs and snags in it, that promised a good 

 trout or two, but I didn't go 50 yards till I gave up the 

 attempt to fish the stream from that side, as the tangle 

 was 80 dense that it was like trying to crawl through a 

 hedge, and I could see so little of the water on account 

 of the prostrate trees and limbs — some dead and others 

 with foliage alive and green — through which it found its 

 way, that I could hardly find open space enough wherein 

 to drop the baited hook. 



With much sweating and some subdued cussin' — to 

 blaze the way for the next lunatic that might take a 

 notion to fish that side of the stream — I worked my way 

 back and out to the old road near the cabin and crossed 

 back over the bridge to try the other side awhile, for my 

 "Scotch was up." Kingfisher. 



Jamaica Fisheries. 



Mr. Edward M. Earlb is managing director of a com- 

 pany formed for the development of the fisheries of 

 Jamaica. Readers of Forest and Stream are aware that 

 Jamaica has a wonderful wealth of food and game fish 

 as well as other useful marine animals. Among the ob- 

 jects of the company are to catch, cure and sell fish, to 

 supply the local markets and o' hers outside with fish, 

 mollusksand their products, to plant and cultivate oyster 

 beds, and to establish and protect turtle nurseries. Mr, 

 Earle has labored long and persistently to develop the 

 Jamaica fisheries and he certainly deserves a generous 

 reward and Buccess. 



