1B6 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[AUG. 25, 1894. 
AT MARTHA'S VINEYARD. 
Martha's Vineyard seems to be a misnomer or an 
anachronism. There is assuredly no aroma of Tokay or 
Falernian about her wave-washed precincts (the sands 
bear witness), but rather "an ancient and fish-like smell," 
which is perhaps most noticeable when the tide is out or 
the wind blows fresh from the south'ard. Romancers 
may contend that grapes were abundant on the tight 
little islands when Gosnold discovered it in 1602; but 
whatever was then is not so now, No vines are found. 
Prohibition reigns supreme, and there is neither saloon 
nor "speak easy" in the entire domain. As an old skip- 
per declared to me on the Edgartown wharf, "The only 
vintage I ever heard of was balm of gilead buds soaked 
in rum, which the sailors used to take to sea with 'em to 
cure sprains and bruises." Yet, Hudibrastically speaking, 
I fancied I could detect a trace of old port about the har- 
bor, an intimation which the ancient mariner received 
with a sardonic smile. 
And this reminds me of the flush times, fifty years ago, 
when Edgartown was all alive with whaling vessels just 
in from the Pacific or up for the ice, and the ring of the 
jolly "yo-heave-ho" was heard in the roadstead of vessels 
getting under way. Jack Tar was metaphorically in 
clover then, and the atmosphere was heavy with oil. 
Fortunes were sometimes made in a single three years' 
cruise. Hopeful apprentices did not so much mind "cross- 
ing the line," when possible bonanzas were in prospect. 
Like the earlier argonauts from Greece, they came home 
bearing gifts from foreign climes, and every one's sweet- 
heart flew blue peters from her Sunday hat when their 
vessels hove in sight. Even now the older dwellings are 
filled with whilom souvenirs, and dooryards teem with 
introduced exotics. It was the fashion then for resident 
shipowners to build little conning decks upon the roofs 
of their houses between the chimneys, whence they could 
discover their incoming argosies twenty miles away. 
Many of these high perches are conspicuous still at Nan- 
tucket, as well as at Martha's Vineyard, and often the 
summer sojourner will observe thereon a venerable form, 
white-haired, but stalwart, looking seaward over the bal- 
usters, not so much from present interest as force of 
early habit, for the whaling business took a tumble in 
1846, and vessels and captains have long since gone out 
of commission. Most of the old salts lie in the cemeteries, 
with fulsome epitaphs in marble, and of the entire fleet 
only a sole dismantled hulk survives, creaking lugubri- 
ously against the wharf when the waves heave a mourn- 
ful memento of pristine activity and a perennial object of 
curiosity to fin de siecle visitors at the Vineyard. * 
Aye, my mates, things are vastly different now from 
what they were in the old days, when Edgartown was 
essentially the Vineyard, just as Paris was allowed to be 
France, and the rustic islanders used to ride into the busy 
port of entry from the outlying precincts of Chilmark and 
the Tisburys, and even from the land's end, twenty miles 
away, to buy knicknacks and comfits, and get the gossip 
from the main land by the weekly mail boat which crossed 
the sound to Holmes Hole. Excepting those who regu- 
larly "followed the sea," few ever left the island. They 
simply vegetated and intermarried, as all insulated com-, 
munities do, until every one became related ; so that when- 
ever any one unfortunate sailor was lost at sea, the whole 
community mourned. Visitors seldom came, and strangers, 
never cared whether the Vineyard schools kept or not, or 
whether the Mayhews, the Coffins, the Marchants, the 
Butlers or the Aliens ruled the village roost. 
Now Martha has donned a new attire and assumes light 
airs. She has thrown aside dull care and vulgar trade, 
and subsists on souflees and ice cream, like all the rest of 
the giddy world. Perhaps it is just as well, at this time, 
for Martha has naturally a "Cay Head," and attracts 
readily by her blandishments. Not only have the retired 
sea captains made Edgartown their asylum, but the entire 
wave-cinctured island has become a cosmopolitan ely- 
sium — a populous summer garden, where the blare of 
trumpets and the hilarion of the outdoor girl rings from 
Squibnocket to Chappaquiddiek. Sea View houses and 
hotels occupy all the breezy points. Flags stream from 
the high bluffs. Rows of bathing houses line the pebbly 
shores. Steamboats ply to all contiguous points. A noisy 
railway motor industriously weaves its social web along the 
beach between the ancient oil town and the old camp 
meeting site, now occupied by Cottage City and the High- 
lands, with their parks and plazas and asphalt walks, 
their domes, spires and minarets, their parterres of flow- 
ers, band stands and tennis courts, all blithe with flags 
and pennants, and all so gay and jaunty that the scene 
looks more like Vanity Fair than a pious camp ground. 
Then there are booths and news stands, and cabs and soda 
fountains, and lines of horse cars that run to Vineyard 
Haven, where multitudes of yachts glide in betimes and 
make the harbor brilliant with their anchor lights at night, 
whose jaunty crews in blue and gilt enjoy to come ashore 
with a nautical hitch of the trousers, and interview the 
old ship captains, flinging their sea vernacular recklessly 
to windward. Everything is animated and restless, like 
bees swarming. Thirty thousand people enjoying together 
the delights of frivolous pastime and keeping cool in torrid 
weather while less fortunate ones are sweltering; for there 
is no spot along the coast Where refugees can be so certain 
of exemption from excessive heat as on this sea-girt isle. 
Oh! it is a beautiful isle, my mates! with its, pictured 
cliffs flashing with chrome and carmine, and its green 
heights crowned with cedar; a plaything of the ocean, 
tossed by the great waves, lashed by tumbling surf, and 
fanned by the soft winds of summer. It is at its best in 
July and August, when the air scintillates with a golden 
haze and gulls hover over the reefs; and I could tell you 
of many a stroll along the shore then, and what the re- 
ceding tide revealed; or of jaunts over land to South 
Beach, where there is delectable surf bathing and feeding 
grounds for snipe; of clam dinners at Katama and ex- 
cursions to Gay Head, with its incidental ride to the light- 
house "In an ox cart driven by an Indian guide," as the 
bills read; or of a flying trip around the entire island on a 
smart smack with a wet sheet and flowing sea; or of a 
morning cruise after mackerel, starting before daybreak 
and returning with a spanking breeze in the afternoon. 
Sometimes the fishing vessels bring in a swordfish, and 
perhaps a sawfish, mighty with their armature, which 
have been harpooned from the surface of the deep when 
the sea was smooth, and strangers are always interested 
to inspect such goodly prizes whenever they are landed on 
the fish house wharf. At least 100 sloops and catboats are 
engaged in mackerel fishing during the season, making 
diurnal trips out and in from the schooling grounds. 
Punctually at noon each day they appear in the offing, 
away to the southward, looking like pearl buttons on the 
selvage of the horizon, and usually by 8 o'clock they run 
into Edgartown harbor with a fair wind and a rap full; 
and it is inspiring to see so many white-winged craft 
bunched up together and swooping down into port like a 
flock of gulls, with their canvas flashing in the sunlight. 
It is a favorite pastime always to fish off the wharves in 
the running tide with cut fish bait and handline. Ladies 
frequently saunter down from the cottages and hotels and 
amuse themselves in this way, and they don't mind the 
gore and the slime when good luck attends. The largest 
plaice I ever saw taken on hooks were caught by a lady in 
this way. One of them weighed 81bs. and another 12lbs. 
I hardly know whether to caU them plaice, flounders, 
flatfish, mud-dobs, turbot or sole. They all look much 
alike. One of the wharf loungers called them "bots," 
which I infer is short for turbot. 
Few places indeed afford a greater variety of landscapes 
or more novel pastimes than Martha's Vineyard, even to 
those who come at the "eleventh hour." And as for food 
and comfort, especially sea food, the fare is incomparable. 
There are all the modern improvements and attractions, 
with nothing lacking, though as a fashionable resort it ia 
not mentioned in the society journals. It is a choice 
between Cottage City and intermittent gayety, and Edgar- 
town with restful quiet. As the local paper says: "The 
town is well laid out in squares, has many shaded streets, 
fine concrete sidewalks, street lights and many fine resi- 
dences and summer houses; also a national bank, U. S. 
Custom House, fine county court house, jail buildings, 
with keepers' residence, three church buildings, two 
school houses, town hall, Masonic lodge, a newspaper, 
good hotels, boarding houses, and stores of all kinds." 
Nevertheless, there is nothing exciting about Edgartown. 
The antiquity of the island is charming. Eight genera- 
tions have passed since Rev. Thomas Mayhew took formal 
possession of.it under a grant from Lord Sterling, in 1614, 
and assumed a suzerainty over the resident Indians. In 
July, 1641, he organized an Indian church, the care of 
which was transmitted from father to son, until 1693, 
when the island was annexed to Massachusetts. The site 
of the first house built in 1630 is easily located, and in the 
old burying-ground on Tower Hill are grave stones with 
legible inscriptions 250 years old. The old Mayhew house 
on South Water street is still tenable, with a record of 180 
years, and away back in the fog and spoon-drift of the 
misty past there are traditions of early voyagers who 
navigated without disaster the intricate channels, sounds 
and "holes," which thread and divide the many islands, 
reefs, banks, shoals and rips which beset the Vineyard, 
where in more recent years far stauncher vessels have 
gone to pieces. Selah! Charles Hallock. 
THE FETISH OF THE PIPE BOWL. 
Baby has ceased her chatter, and worn out by play, has 
journeyed to the land of dreams. Her curl-framed face 
is pink-hued as the fairest rose that blooms. The quiet 
patter of the rain outside on the summer's leafage weaves 
strange fantasies 'mid the curling smoke rings that drift 
upward; and under its conjuring influence my mind 
wanders back to the time when mayhap my face too was 
soft and pink as baby's is now. Ah, well, that was before 
the prairie winds and mountain snows had combined with 
the scorching sun of the alkali plains to give me the boot- 
leg complexion I now show. Well, the face goes With 
the experience which begot it, I suppose, and I would not 
give that experience for a dozen pretty faces, and I like 
personal beauty, too! 
Somehow the light in the room seems to dim. Has it 
stopped raining, too? Well, what of it — bound to stop 
some time, isn't it? 
That smoke has a queer smell. What is it? Pine trees? 
No. Salt water? No. Sage? Ha, that's it; sage brush. 
I knew I had scented that before! 
Well, well, how came I here? I've been here before 
and know the spot well. This is Wyoming, and over that 
hill about fifteen miles west are Pumpkin Buttes. Do 
you remember the first time I was here? No, of course 
not; pshaw, I know now I was alone! Come, I will take 
you to that little knoll yonder and show you what I saw 
there. Now, so: do you see that white thing yonder, and 
this one and this? There are twenty-six altogether. Don't 
you know what they are? Skulls! Skeletons, man, meat- 
less bones and eyeless skulls, that lay there shining in the 
Bun; twenty -six of them, and almost within pistol shot, 
that's all!. Who killed them? Come and see. See, the 
bones are all here, none missing, not even a skull. 
No Indian killed them then, for he would have left but 
little to the coyotes and buzzards. The Indian uses all 
the carcass, and cracks the bones to get the marrow. No 
soldier here pieced out with buffalo meat the rations for 
his pack train, or wagons would have taken the quarters 
and the humps at least, and the leg bones are not missing. 
No hunter killed them; there are too many. And do 
you see, it was a cartridge ball, one that crushed and 
splintered where it struck, one that killed by the shock, 
and not the round ball of the hunter's muzzleloader, that 
makes a smooth round hole through the shoulder blade 
and stops the buffalo's life pump! No, I know his work; 
I'll show you a shoulder blade down on Wildhorse Creek 
that he drilled. Don't you see the tongue still in that 
hairy old skull? This wind of the sage plains does not rot 
anything; it dries it, mummifies it; and there you see this 
old fellow's tongue still in the jaws, though he has been 
dead for many moons. The old hunter would never have 
left that there. 
Nor did the foreign nabob, who has helped exterminate 
our buffalo herds, have a hand in this. He would never 
have left all these heads here. ' Why, man, look at that 
one; I doubt if you could lift it when it was first killed. 
He almost always hunted on horseback, too, and these 
animals saw no horse on their trail before they fell; they 
were still-hunted, killed while feeding. Don't you see 
plain enough that they lie too close together to have done 
much running. 
Who did do it? Ah, don't you know that nondescript 
who sent the river steamers from old Fort Benton to St. 
Louis loaded to the gunwale with buffalo robes? The 
hide hunter and no other is responsible for these twenty- 
six skeletons bleaching in the sun! 
Come, we will climb to the east rim of the valley and I 
will show you how it was done. This will do. Now, you 
must picture the men and buffalo and all as though they 
were there now, and were alive, and I will show you a 
hide hunt. Notice first the formation of this valley, 
bowl-shaped, with high, steep bluffs all around, except to 
the north, where it runs into the canon head. The wind 
is from the northwest. See, the knoll is in the center 
and the buffalo are to the north of it. Some are standing 
about the muddy margin of the little alkali pool, some are 
lying down, some are feeding; but all in the valley. See, 
here come the butchers, there on the mesa to the south. 
They have seen the herd ; they ride up to the south side 
and dismount just out of sight behind the valley rim and 
picket their horses. Now they drop into the ridges and 
furrows of the valley edge and creep down like an epi- 
demic on the unsuspecting animals. The buffalo are to 
windward and have no thought of danger in this peaceful 
place. The men reach the valley, drop like snakes down 
among the sage brush and bunch grass, and work across 
toward the knoll. They are "ornary -looking cusses," too, 
blear-eyed, with hair and beard that never knew a comb, 
a hang-dog air of general meanness about them that says 
they are not sportsmen. I don't want to get to leeward of 
them, for I'll bet they smell of green hides and trading 
post whisky, worse than a Piute Indian. I wish one of 
those bier yellow rattlesnakes would spring his little music 
box and scare them up out of the grass. 
They reach the mound, sneak to the top and ambushed 
among the rocks, push their murderous repeaters toward 
the herd. Two reports mingle as one, and two buffalo go 
down. The herd bunch around them; they hear the 
sound, but know not where it comes from. Two more 
shots; one down, another wounded. The herd breaks, 
circles, sees the smoke cloud and starts toward the canon. 
Ah, those devils in the rocky knoll know how to shoot! 
Faster grows the firing; here and there an animal drops 
or staggers out of the thundering herd and stands with 
feet braced far apart, sorely wounded, done to death. At 
last the herd is gone, there is nothing left for the hot guns 
to belch at save the wounded; and the men need the 
horses to keep their cowardly skins whole, when they 
venture among them. Back to their horses they go; and 
now they ride among the slain. A shot rings out as some 
poor brute is finished. One starts away to the left. Two 
shots and he is down, broken back and broken hip, any- 
where to get him. 
Here comes another of the human hyenas driving a 
wagon around the valley edge. He finds a place to get 
in. Pity he didn't break his neck doing it! The horses 
are unhitched and taken care of. Now for the skins; 
they are worth whisky, and powder and lead that, get 
more skins. 
Right merrily they work while the sun sinks down in 
a golden glow, twilight glimmers and a hideous, goulish 
howl floats out on the evening air, for the loafer wolf is 
about and will feast ere break of day. Darkness settles 
down and a camp-fire of buffalo chips glows red against 
the bottom of the valley. We have seen the tragedy. 
Come away, let us — What? Eleven o'clock? Where is 
my pipe? Well, I'm getting chilly, [too! Wonder if it 
has stopped raining? 
"Bring baby a drink and come to bed?" All right. 
Gracious, my neck is stiff; wish I had gone to bed long 
ago. El Comanoho. 
AN AUGUST-OCTOBER REVERIE. 
Boston, Aug. 10. — A beautiful, crisp and cool morning, 
with just a suspicion of autumnal haze in the atmosphere, 
such a morning as really belongs to September or October, 
but which has come this 10th of August, has made at least 
one disciple of Forest and Stream clank his chains. 
What visions such a morning brings to the memory of the 
lover of woods or mountains, or outdoor life in general, 
after having suffered for weeks with the oppressive heat, 
intensified by the heaps of bricks and stone which go to 
make up a great city! Sweet reminder of days to come 
which delight the heart of the man of whom Forest and 
Stream ironically asks: "Chained to business?" "Yes, we 
are," with an extra yank at the iron fetters! 
The maple tree in front of my house seemed hardly 
natural with its green foliage, when I turned out at day- 
break to drink in the beauty of the autumnal morning. I 
felt myself involuntarily looking for the red and gold 
leaves of a later season. Up in the haze there forms a 
mirage, and I mentally perceive the dark outlines of the 
distant mountains, and see their darkness fade into a 
lighter blue as old Sol awakens them from their slumber. 
The blue gives place to the violet, then a scarlet coat is 
theirs; and so develop the evolutions of a matchless moun- 
tain sunrise, until at last they stand before us in their 
everylday dress of green and yellow, with the flashes of 
a thousand diamond dewdrops set in the emerald of the 
surrounding pines. The brooklet at my feet gurgles and i 
bubbles as if it too had caught the poetry of its existence 
in the protecting arms of the silent virgin forest. I tread 
noiselessly along the mossy banks, not to desecrate by 
vandal sound the handiwork of the Creator, when — 
B-r-r-r-r! ahead of me one of the princes of the ruling 
house seeks protection from his arch-enemy among the 
thick foliage of a century pine. But these are day dreams 
from which I am rudely awakened by the clank, clank! 
of that merciless chain calling me to my duty. Farewell, 
mirage and beautiful morning together; the fierce August 
sun will soon remind me that you were only forerunners 
of days which are not yet, but soon will be. 
It is in just such moods, when the chain which binds 
you to your business seems to increase to an enormous 
weight; in just such a place do we most appreciate and 
enjoy the privilege of turning to the pages of a paper 
such as Forest and Stream submits to us. Who is it that 
can tell the number of chafed ankles healed by Forest . 
and Stream in its weekly work of mercy? When the 
chain has been hurting me I read Forest and Stream 
and get. well; I do it to-day with as happy effects as I did 
ten years ago when I used to be a boy among the Swiss 
Alps and had to study Forest and Stream with the aid of 
dictionary and translate it for my grandfather, who was 
as fond of Forest and Stream as he was of chamois' 
hunting, which means very much indeed. 
Matterhorn. 
