April 25, 1866.] 
FOREST AND STREAM, 
337 
city are earnestly requested to corral their stock at dark, 
or else not kick if the bears eat their horses. 
Flint Locks and Ox-teams. 
Commenting on recent mention in Forest and Stream 
of the fact that gun flints are still a staple of meichan- 
dise in Fredericton, N. B,, Mr. Frank H. Risteen of that 
city this week writes me : 
"I think, perhaps, our friend's references to gun flints 
and dynamite, though correct enough as far as they go, 
might mislead you as to the prevalent type of civilization 
down here. I used to know an old bushman who was 
fond of saying that "Civilization runs in streaks." I 
faucy that is true even in Chicago. In all strictly rural, 
farming, lumbering sections, which have been long set- 
tled, ancient habits and implements may be found in 
abundance. I believe that as many flint locks are to be 
found in the back townships of Maine, Vermont and New 
Hampshire per square mile as in those of New Brunswick. 
I know that a few years ago I saw more ox-teams com- 
ing into the city of Hartford than I ever saw in New- 
Brunswick in my life." 
Hartford, as I understand it, is a suburb of Greater 
New York, though I am surprised to learn that the ox 
phaeton of our fathers still obtains there as the chief mode 
of fashionable conveyance. E, Hough. 
1206 Boyce Building, Chicago. 
BOSTON ANGLERS AND ANGLING. 
A brook trout weighing 7+ or 81bs. was taken from the 
waters of Lake Quinsigamond, near "Worcester, Mass., a 
few dayB ago. I nave not heard the particulars of the 
capture, but am surprised, with many others, to learn 
that square tails of this size are denizens of this lake. I 
have neard that Quinsigamond had been stocked at 
different times, but nad no idea that success of this kind 
followed the operation. The story was verified to-day by 
one of Worcester's prominent anglers, and I understand 
the trout is being mounted and will be shown later in the 
window of one of Boston's prominent tackle stores. 
J. M. Niles, of Boston, has gone trout fishing down 
near Willimantic, Conn. This section of the Nutmeg 
State is well patronized by Boston anglers, one party of 
gentlemen having a preserve there, and many others 
going down to fish the different streams. C. D. Sias, of 
the Chase & Sanborn firm, and a friend will start for 
that vicinity in a few days. Mr. Sias spent some time 
there last season and had excellent luck. 
In a letter to a Boston friend a Kentucky gentleman, 
who has fished for many seasons atMoosehead Lake, gives 
some interesting facts bearing on the trout fishing in the 
late summer and in September as compared with that in 
years gone by. With the exception of isolated cases 
during which the trout rise well, owing perhaps to par- 
ticularly favorable conditions of both the weather and 
water, he thinks the fishing is gradually growing poorer, 
and gives several reasons for its decline. Commenting 
on the spring fishing just after the ice goes out, he states 
that many parties go there, hire the little steamers and 
cruise up and down the lake until they find the fish, who 
are therein schools, and kill hundreds of pouuds of them, 
so many in fact as to largely reduce their numbers. 
Again, he says, the minnows and smelt have increased 
so that the trout feed mostly under water, not rising to 
take the fly as formerly, when feed was scare. In the old 
days the trout would drive the minnows into shallow 
water near the shore and would then take the fly readily. 
Now the lake is alive with their food, and such action on 
their part is unnecessary. These little fish abound now 
in water to a great depth, and the trout are scattered 
everywhere. In order to prove the depth of wave agita- 
tion, this gentleman took the temperature of the water 
about Sept. 1, and found it to be as follows: 10ft. down, 
65°; SOft., 64°; 30ft., 63°; 40ft., 56°; 50ft., 46°. He argues 
from this that 30ft. ordinarily shows the depth of the wave 
action, and from these figures it would seem that he is 
right. Not many of the Moosehead anglers have given 
the same attention to these matters, and no doubt some 
will differ with him in his deductions. Hackle. 
Boston. April 20. — What is termed '-The Boys' Party" 
of the Monomoy Brant Club got back to Boston Wednes- 
day. The party was fairly successful, as success in shoot- 
ing goes at the present day. The party of eight got thirty 
brant, while the party preceding them got forty-one. In 
"The Boys' Party" were the following sportsmen: H. D. 
Reed, A. H. Wright, N. W. Arnold, R. S. Grey, Henry 
Colburn, Jos. Noon, Joseph Dorr and George Hopkins. 
The boys complain that brant shooting at Monomoy is not 
what it once was, by any means, Crack shots mention 
having shot 100 brant alone in a day years gone by. But 
now there are too many gunners at Monomoy. The 
Monomoy Brant Club has four boxes, and for years there 
were no other shooting boxes or pits there. Now Capt. 
Gould, of the Life-Saving Station, has three boxes. The 
Bristol Club has two. But the ''Big Four," so termed, 
has what troubles the other gunners a good deal. They 
have a raft, in the middle of which is a sunken shooting 
box. In weather sufficiently mild they can anchor this 
raft whore they choose, and they can move all along the 
beach, even right in front of theothershooting pits. Gun- 
ners there this season say that this raft and the shooting 
from it does more to scare the brant away than all the 
other shooting there is done, with the possible exception 
of the sailboats that are pressed into the service. There is 
a law against shooting from steamers, but none against 
shooting from sail or rowboats; and there are hosts of 
gunners, whenever the weather permits, shooting off 
Monomoy. Then there are the Muskegit shooters, across 
the channel or bay, and, all in all, the brant are shot at so 
much that they are rendered very wild and uncertain. 
At this writing the ice in the Maine trout lakes is as 
strong as ever. Only two or three really warm days have 
been experienced, and very little is done toward thawing 
the solid covering of ice. The native fishermen are still 
fishing through the ice on these waters. A gentleman 
from Ruinford Falls mentioned to-day that he had heard 
directly from the Rangeley waters, and that there could 
not possibly be any fishing for New York and Boston 
sportsmen there till well into May this year. A gentle- 
man just in from Winnipiseogee says that there is fishing 
there yet through the ice. This is unusually late, and he 
does not think that the ice can go out for a couple of 
weeks. 
Mr. John G. Wright is ready for the landlocked salmon 
».t Sebago. His friend Robinson, of South Windham, iB 
keeping him posted. He has no favorable reports from 
the ice in that Jake. 
Mr. Richard O. Harding, for several years secretary of 
the Massachusetts Fish and Game Protective Association, 
has found a new spot for fishing, and one in which there 
are brilliant prospects. Dan Hole Pond, in Ossipee, N. 
H., was stocked with landlocked salmon some seventeen 
or eighteen years ago, and lately it has begun to come 
into note with sportsmen. Last year a salmon was taken 
there with rod and reel that weighed 19Hbs., and rarely is 
one taken that weighs less than 8lbs. Two of Mr. Har- 
ding's party got 13 and 14lb. salmon there last year. The 
pond has a record of salmon speared or taken off the 
spawning beds of over 20lbs. There are also very large 
trout in the pond or lake of three miles in length by 
three-quarters to one and a quarter wide. Several years 
ago Mr. D. H. Blanchard was spending a vacation in that 
region, and some one sent a trout to the hotel, which Mr. 
Blanchard saw. It was square-tailed and weighed 14lbs. 
The theory is that it is a sort of a golden trout or like the 
trout of Sunapee Lake, not yet well classified in the minds 
of fishermen and naturalists. Ex- Commissioner Griffin 
tells Mr. Harding that he has no doubt of the existence 
of these great trout in Dm Hole Pond in considerable 
numbers. 
As soon as the ice is out of that pond Mr. Harding will 
start with a party of his friends and customers. In the 
party will probably be Mr. and Mrs. E, H. Wakefield, 
Edward Brooks, W. B. P. Weeks, Woi. Beggs, G. W. 
Prouty and C. P. Stevens. Landlocked salmon will be 
the principal fish sought for, but Mr. Harding hopes to 
get one of those big golden trout. Reports from the ice 
there do not suggest tbat the party can be off before the 
1st of May, but still the weather has been remarkably hot 
for three or four days, with reports of the mercury indi- 
cating 90° at several points in the backwoods of Maine 
and New Hampshire. The parties interested in Dan Hole 
Pond see good prospects there for angling, if the spearing 
and stealing from the spawning beds can only be stopped. 
Between Dan Hole Pond and the little pond there is a 
sluiceway or river, and here the salmon and trout gather 
in the running water in great numbers at the spawning 
season. It has long been the custom of the natives of the 
town to take these fish almost by cartloads, and enforce- 
ments of the fish laws have been few and far between. 
But of late there is a better sentiment springing up, and 
the people of the town— a sparsely settled one generally 
— begin to see what the advantages from sportsmen com- 
ing there will be to them, and Mr. Harding and his friends 
hope that the stealing of the then worthless salmon and 
trout from the spawning beds will soon be a freak of the 
past. There is one good camp already at the pond, and 
others are likely to go up this season. I understand that 
the land can be had by purchase instead of lease, which 
is much better for the sportsmen in the long run. 
I learn that the new Rumford Falls & Rangeley Lake 
R. R. is to be opened to Bemis, foot of Mooselucmaguntic 
Lake, May 11. This will be a new way to the Rangeleys, 
all rail. There is little prospect, however, that the ice 
will be out of those lakes at that time. Special. 
FAVORED ASHLAND. 
Ashland, Wis. — Editor Forest and Stream; In a recent 
issue I was greatly pleased to note the communication 
from Joseph Cover on trout fishing near Ashland and 
around Chequamegon Bay. I am glad that Mr. Cover 
has so completely voiced my sentiments touching this 
point, as affording facilities for sport found in no other 
city of the same size known to me, and so easily accessible 
as to be open to all who care for them. 
Besides trout fishing, concerning which Mr. Cover has 
so entertainingly written, good sport of almost every kind 
can be had almost within the city limits. During the 
open season last fall I phot mallard, teal, bluebill and 
widgeon on the Ashland Washburn road, at the head of 
Chequamegon Bay, not more than twenty minutes' drive 
from the center of the city. True, I never made large 
bags, single birds each trip being the rule. But where 
else can one leave his home in the city and in so short a 
time reach a point where he is reasonably sure of a kill- 
ing shot by patiently waiting a few moments in the 
morning or evening? 
Last fall I went out back of my house to test the pat- 
tern and penetration of my gun with different kinds of 
powder and diff trent sized loads, and put up a nice bunch 
of plover within easy shooting distance of an avenue on 
which there is considerable travel at all hours of the day. 
One day while driving with my wife I got out of the 
buggy to pick some scarlet leaves, and surprised a whole 
family of partridges within forty rods of the blast fur- 
nace in the west end of the town. 
There is good perch fishing off nearly all the docks in 
summer time within five minutes' walk of the priucipal 
hotels. 
One hour by steam yacht takes one to Kakagon, where 
in the summer the finest kind of pike, pickerel, bass and 
perch fishing can be enjoyed, together with duck shoot- 
ing. Late last fall parties baggeJ as high as an average 
of twenty-five bluebills to each gun in one day's shoot- 
ing. 
Then we have the peerless Apostle Islands, distant 
about eighteen miles, and available twi^e each day by 
steamer during the season of navigation. Madeline, the 
largest of the group, is some fourteen miles long and five 
to eight miles wide. Big Bay cuts into the north shore 
of this island and affords a broad crescent sand beach 
some two miles long. Here are some fishing shacks and 
that is all in the way of human habitation one will find. 
A friend and myself spent two nights on the bay last 
September, and the recollections of that trip are among 
the pleasantest of my camp-fire experiences. We hunted 
ducks on a small inland lake and snipe on the beach, and 
took a sail with the fishermen out to the banks and saw 
them lift the fat lake trout, and saw the screaming, fight- 
ing flock of gulls which gathered to snatch up any tidbit 
that might be furnished by their friends, the fishermen. 
A few hours' drive or even walk with pack on back 
will take the sportsman to the seeming heart of the 
primeval forest and the Manitowish waters (of which 
Mr. Hough leaves nothing to be said as to its aspects and 
sporting possibilities in winter) are but a snip of a 1 rip 
down the Chicago & Northwestern Railway, borne time 
I am going to hunt up a congenial spirit and go over 
those waters in my Peterborough. Wonder if we can 
secure enough flesh, fish and fowl to last two hungry 
mortals during the trip. I shall count the expedition 
eminently successful if we do. We are in the center east 
and west of the famous deer country of northern Wis- 
consin, and taken all around this is a great location for a 
man with a sportsman's heart and a slim pocketbook. 
I would respectfully ask for the opinion of brother 
sportsmen, through the columns of Forest and Stream, 
on the practice of taking fish with hook and line and re- 
turning them to the water. How often we read of land- 
ing a 1 to a 4 or 5-pounder, and after gloating over and 
admiring his maguificent proportions returning him to 
his native element, as we already had more than enough 
for our needs. I have conversed with two different 
owners of trout preserves in this vicinity, and they fully 
agree that this variety of fish when treated as above 
described invariably die. What kills them, the landing, 
gloating or admiring? Geo. W. Mears. 
ON THE METAPEDI A. 
The First Day. 
As the salmon season is again looming in sight, I want 
to tell you of three days' sport I had last August among 
them on the Metapedia River, the largest branch of the 
Restigouche. Having heard that some of our friends 
were putting in a good time — two of them killing twelve 
fish in a week — on some of our pools, I bundled my canoe 
on a morning freight of the I. C. R, R. at Campbellton, 
and in an hour was landed at Mill Stream station, ten 
miles from its junction and twenty-three from Campbell- 
ton. 
For the last three seasons I have angled alone — without 
an assistant — and I would rather kill one fish in this man- 
ner than a half dozen with a couple of guides. It requires 
probably a little more skill, perhaps a little more time to 
land your fish, as well as a thorough practical knowledge 
of how to handle your canoe with only one hand. 
When it is sport you are after, and not slaughter and a 
big bag, the game between yourself and a 30-pounder (if 
you hook one) is most interesting to its close. The canoe 
I use is a clinker-built Gaspe, 23ft. long, 26 in. wide, llin. 
side, sharp at each end, top deck on each flush with gun- 
wale 2-J-ft., with the usual three seats, weight 901bs. One 
man can pole this canoe at the rate of twenty miles a day 
against the Restigouche current, which is pretty stiff — in 
some spots irom six to ten miles per hour. 
My angling rig is simple. A socket is fitted in this top 
deck within reach of my hand from where I sit, and at 
an angle pointing down stream. At the upper or bow 
end a small metal pulley projects. Through or over this 
a codline runs; to one end is fast a 161b. lead; the other 
end is fast where I sit. When a fish is hooked the butt jf 
the rod drops into the socket, standing at an angle of 45°, 
with reel all clear, and my anchor is at the cat-head very 
quickly. I then have both hands free. If the fish runs I 
can paddle after him (if necessary); if he slackens, I can 
reel up without moving the rod. But as I have a socket 
at my belt for the butt, and a thong above the reel for 
my teeth (to hold on), I generally take out the rod, for I 
think that one of the pleasures of angling is to feel the fish. 
I sometimes surmise that one may tell by the feeLwhat 
he is going to do next; no doubt one can tell when he is 
trying to rule out the hook by grubbing on the bottom — a 
rather dangerous pastime for both hook and cast. 
In low water and late in the season fish don't care to 
leave the pools, so it is much easier for the angler; but 
in June in heavy water, with the fish on his way up, it is 
no fool of a job to follow and keep within 10 or 15yds. 
of a 201b. fish; and I must confess that at this time I 
would not object to another hand at the bellows, particu- 
larly as I am now seventy-five years of age, and getting 
somewhat broken- winded. When a fish runs down the 
river (as often they do) you must overtake him. This 
means to paddle hard, take in line, get below him, and 
help him down before you can get him to face the music 
and turn up. 
I believe that many salmon are lost, particularly those 
which take the fly under water, because the angler does 
not tighten his line quickly, or, as some have it, does not 
feel the fish. I don't mean a strike; if you go in for 
that, a lib. trout or less would snap your tip. Many an- 
glers, when a fish rises and they strike short and miss, 
pull the hook away and wait. No doubt the fish drops to 
where he started from, and does not see that fly. I 
prefer leaving the fly for a little time near the spot, and 
drawing it a little up and transversly across the current. 
Always remember that if the fish chose to take the hook 
in his mouth he would not miss it. The fish hooked foul 
(by the body fins or tail) were no doubt trying to drown 
that fly, or, as Mr. Dean Sage tells us in his valuable work 
on salmon, the feeding time had not come round. But I 
am digressing away off from my starting point — all an- 
glers will moralize when they talk fish. 
I got my canoe into the river, which is quite near the 
station, in fact the I. C. R. R is not a stone throw from 
it for thirty-six miles. Then I had to pole about a mile to 
the upper pool. It was now 9 A. M., my leader and cast 
were in water, rod ready. I felt like having a cup of tea, 
and was in the act of gathering some dry wood when I 
saw a fish break water on the opposite shore. Well, I did 
not boil that kettle. I put on a 12ft. cast, a No. 6 black 
dose having a silver body and tail. As the pool was much 
the deepest on the far shore I dropped my lead well over, 
20yds, above where I had seen the hah break. As the sun 
was behind me I sat low dosvn and tried my best to raise 
that fish. Dropping gradually down, finally I knew I had 
got below where the fish lay and was just thinking about 
giving up when the fish (or another) broke water a rod 
above the bow of the canoe and inshore, more for spite 
than any other reason. I turned half round, shortened 
ray line and threw the fly a yard above the fi3h. As the 
fly sunk a little and the current carried it down, I reeled 
the line in slowly toward me, and at the same instant four 
salmon were coming toward it, one very close seemingly 
determined to have it, but he stopped when within a few 
inches. Then the hindmost fish darted past the others 
and I could plainly see his mouth open when he took it. 
In all my experience I had never seen a fish take under 
water before. I have seen them race for a yard or two 
on the surface when the fly was being drawn from them. 
I have no doubt the other fish following the fly caused 
this fellow to hurry up, or being a later run fish he was 
more anxious. I had no fever on me and I did not forget 
to feel that hook go home. He was a poor fighter and 
would not leave the pool, here about 40yds. wide, nor did 
he ever break water. It was a fair close fight for about 
twenty-five minutes. At last I could lift hia head out of 
