FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Dec. 15, 1894. 
The perspiration rolled down our faces in big drops, 
plowing little white furrows through the incrustation of 
dirt. We others bore our discomforts with that philosophy 
which is the fisherman's characteristic, albeit Arnold 
occasionally rapped out a torpedo; but Ryan proved him- 
self a veritable Mark Tapley. He was full of jokes and 
stories and puns, and even essayed a song until the dust 
choked him off. He certainly "came out strong" in ad- 
versity. Candor compels me to say that his puns were, 
for the most part, execrable; and Arnold, who, by virtue 
of seniority of age, had been elected captain of the party 
by common consent, finally threatened to throw him off 
the wagon and leave him behind if he should perpetrate 
another. Ryan promptly averred that he himself was full 
of grit and had plenty of sand, and dared him to put him 
off. That was pretty bad, but nothing when compared 
with some of his efforts in the joke-making line. 
The panorama along the way was monotonously alike, 
the country generally level, and covered with fire-black- 
ened stumps and tall, limbless trunks of trees already 
fallen or tottering to their fall. The soil was yellow sand 
— always sand — superimposed with a thin layer of vege- 
table mould, which nourished a scanty growth of wiry 
grass and blackberry bushes. The second growth of tim- 
ber consisted of scrub oaks and scraggy beeches, with an 
occasional clump of jack pines, feeble and worthless pre- 
sentments of the magnificent trees which only a few years 
before had bowed their lofty heads to the onslaught of axe 
and saw. Nature had done her best to rehabilitate herself, 
but with poor success. She had little to do it with. 
The road wound and twisted about among the stumps 
and fallen trunks, without any apparent purpose to lead 
anywhere in particular. I saw the sun now on my right, 
now on my left; and it was only after watching closely 
for some time that I became satisfied that our general 
course was southeast. The highway surveyors — if there 
were any such officers — neglected that road sadly. It 
was barely wide enough to admit the passage of our 
wagon between the stumps, which showed many abrasions 
made by the wheels of vehicles which had preceded us. 
Our own wagon wheels were constantly striking the 
stumps with a force that threatened the craft with de- 
struction and one's spinal column with dislocation. It 
was then no small task to keep our seats on the load, and 
we bounced about and jostled together like kernels of corn 
in a well-agitated corn popper. 
Habitations were few and far between. At long inter- 
vals we saw log-houses, wherein dwelt some courageous 
Norwegians or Polanders, trying to wrest a living from 
the unwilling soil. 
Deer were still tolerably plenty in that section and 
their fresh tracks were constantly seen in the road or 
near it; but of the game itself we saw none. Ryan said 
that they probably could hear Rarus wheeze before we 
got within half a mile of them and fled. Poor old Rarus! 
I felt sorry for him, believing that his suffering must be 
as painful as his wheezing was distressing to my ears, but 
my pity changed to another feeling when on passing him 
in one of the many excursions which I made ahead of the 
wagon to relieve my cramped limbs and to escape the 
awful dust for a few minutes, the old brute caught my 
arm in his teeth and bit it severely. 
We saw cattle everywhere, wandering at their own 
sweet will through the old choppings, their hides stuck full 
of burrs and nettles. Each one had hung from its neck a 
rude bell which gave out a constant clanking as it moved, 
and enabled the owner to retrace it. The deer become 
accustomed to their presence and are sometimes seen 
feeding in close proximity to them. 
My companions told me a story about a certain wealthy 
lumberman who owned many thousand acres of old 
choppings. He conceived the idea of pasturing in them 
large flocks of sheep. There was plenty of good feed for 
them; why should not the scheme be a success? So he 
bought a number of valuable animals and turned them 
out. There was excellent meat then for the hunters and 
mossbacks. The hunter could not tell a sheep from a 
deer in the bushes; and as for the mossbacks — well, what 
would you? The poor devils could not resist the tempta- 
tion which was constantly before them. Why kill a pig 
for meat when mutton was plenty close at hand, and 
nobody to look after it? The few sheep that survived 
at the close of the first summer had left most of their 
wool on the blackberry bushes. Financially, sheep rais- 
ing in the slashes was not a success; and the problem of 
how to utililze the waste lands is still unsolved. 
At noon we ate dinner in the shade of some trees grow- 
ing by a little brook which crossed the road; and after an 
hour's rest we resumed our weary journey. The country 
became more broken as we approached the Manistee 
River, and the watercourses began to cut down through 
the sandy plateau to gain its level. The sand was every- 
where underlaid with a stiff, yellow clay, and the ravines 
which the streams had cut through it were narrow and 
deep, with high, steep banks on either side. The load 
was not heavy; but in ascending the inclines we had to 
put shoulders to the wheels to help the poor horses. 
Finally, about the middle of the afternoon, we found our- 
selves looking down from the summit of a ridge into a 
broad, deep valley, at the bottom of which a sinuous 
line of green timber marked the course of a stream of 
some size. Our destination lay just before us. Arnold 
put the gad to Rarus and Maud and the sand flew in all 
directions as the clumsy brutes plowed down the hill at 
their best gait. 
After an exposure for ten long hours to a pitiless sun, 
with faces scorched, lips blistered and throats parched, 
how grateful was the change from the heat and glare of 
the old choppings to the cool, damp shade of the primeval 
forest, into which we presently rolled. Huge hemlocks, 
maples and beeches arched their thick tops over the nar- 
row road, beneath which reigned a semi-twilight, shot 
here and there by a stray sunbeam flitting through the 
branches. Pounding over a stretch of worn out corduroy, 
a sudden turn of the track brought us out upon the bank 
pi the creek but high above it, where there was a "roll- 
way." The rollway is a place on the banks of a stream, 
usually well elevated above it, where logs are brought by 
teams and rolled down into it. The elevation makes the 
operation very easy. 
In Michigan, and, for that matter, all over the West, 
any stream which is not a river is a creek; why a creek I 
cannot understand. The common pronunciation of the 
word is "crik." There was the same physical formation 
here that we had seen further back, whenever we ap- 
proached a watercourse, only that it was on a larger scale. 
The banks were clay beneath the Band, but higher and 
steeper. Sometimes these clay banks were close together, 
confining the creek to a narrow space, then they retreated 
some distance, leaving between them a wide, level bot- 
tom, thickly clothed with cedars. The creek always took 
advantage of this elbow room to make haste slowly, run- 
ning from one side to the other, with many a twist and 
many a curve on the way. As illustrating its propensity 
to turn back on itself, it is interesting to note that if one 
of us had descended the bank at the rollway, where we 
first caught sight of it, and had gone straight to the oppo- 
site bluff, he would have waded the creek no less than 
eight times, and that in a distance of about 150yds. 
Leaving the rollway the road turned sharply to the 
left and descended the bluff through a lateral ravine, the 
sides of which were clothed with monster hemlocks. 
Near the bottom of this ravine another sharp turn to the 
right brought us out upon a log bridge which spanned 
the creek at an elevation sufficient to protect it in times 
of floods. Above, on the left, was another high, steep 
rollway. On the opposite side, filling an indentation in 
the bluffs, was a small semi-circular piece of level ground 
on which grew some fine maple trees, forming a pretty 
grove. The creek hugged the foot of the rollway, leav- 
ing a wide curving beach of clean sand at the edge of the 
grove. 
Stealing noiselessly around a sharp bend above the 
grove came the dark, smoothly-gliding current of the 
stream, changing to silver as it emerged from the shadow 
of the trees into the sunlight. Striking the foot of the 
rollway, it was thrown back upon itself, broadening out 
into a pool, where it dallied for a moment and then came 
sweeping downward to the bridge, flowing beneath this 
with a gentle, swishing sound, to swing around another 
bend and then to be swallowed up in the cedar swamp 
below. 
If I have made you see the place as I saw it you will 
agree with me that a prettier spot for a camp could not 
be asked for than the grove of maples. 
After a bath in the creek all hands fell to work to get 
the wagon unloaded, the tents pitched and everything in 
good order before dark. We had two 9JX14 wall tents, 
one for a house tent and one for a kitchen. The house- 
tent was provided with four folding cots with mattresses 
and pillows for each. In the kitchen tent was a "Cree" 
stove — the best camp stove I ever saw — and a folding 
table, also folding camp-chairs. When I saw the outfit 
all in order "I was glad I had come," and never was I 
more comfortable at home than while in that camp. The 
mosquitoes were a little troublesome at times, but each of 
us had his little bottle of dope, which, well applied, kept 
them at a respectable distance. 
For the horse tent there was a big hemlock tree, which 
answered the purpose nicely, as there was not a drop of 
rain during our stay. They ate their oats from a couple 
of soap boxes, brought for the purpose, and minded the 
mosquitoes not a bit. The pestiferous deer flies, how- 
ever, managed to pierce their tough hides and caused 
them to swish their stubby tails most viciously. Supper 
over, we lit our pipes and sat down upon the bank of 
the creek, where the grassy slope dipped toward the 
water's edge. The grayling were breaking in the pool at 
the foot of the rollway, but we were too tired to try 
them. Naturally the subject of conversation was fish, 
and Arnold gave us quite a little dissertation concerning 
it. Said he: 
"I have a greater love for the grayling than for any 
other fish. It is less gamy than the brook trout, far less 
beautiful and not nearly so good on the table unless 
cooked as soon as caught. There is no fish that deteri- 
orates with keeping like the grayling. If you ask me 
why I prefer the grayling to the trout I must confess my 
inability to give a reason that would be satisfactory to 
you unless you have the same preference yourselves. I 
suppose it is because the grayling is my 'affinity' among 
the finny tribes. 
"It is now over a quarter of a century since Prof. Cope 
identified the Michigan fish as a true grayling. Before 
that time it was known as the 'white trout,' though many 
considered it only as a species of sucker. It is not very 
many years since the grayling in this creek and other 
tributaries of the Manistee River were called 'Manistee 
fish.' A friend of mine told me that he logged for several 
winters on the Little Manistee River, and used to see the 
grayling lying on the bottom in great numbers, but he 
never thought of catching them because he supposed them 
to be suckers. He has since become fond of angling, and 
never ceases to lament the golden opportunities of those 
early days, lost through hi3 ignorance of what the 
'suckers' really were. 
"I have studied the habits of the grayling and the con- 
ditions which govern its existence with some care, and I 
am afraid that it is doomed to become extinct. The trout 
can be propagated artificially, and the streams constantly 
stocked, but with the grayling artificial propagation has 
never been successful. Once very plenty in the Hersey, 
Muskegon, Pentwater, Pere Marquette, the two Manistees 
— Little and Big — the Jordan and other rivers which flow 
into Lake Michigan, it is now rare in all of them except 
the Manistee. The stream where such sport as Thaddeus 
Norris enjoyed when he visited Au Sable and Manistee 
cannot be found to-day, at least not to my knowledge. 
"I attribute the disappearance of the grayling to three 
causes — man's reckless prodigality, the destruction of the 
pine forests, and the planting of brook trout. When it 
became known that the true grayling existed in Michigan, 
anglers came here from all over the country. The 'fish 
hog' came, too. The laws for the protection of fish were 
then, and are still, openly defied. Nets, lime and dyna- 
mite have been constantly used, with the most disastrous 
results. 
"The grayling loves clear, cold water, flowing swiftly 
over sand or gravel. You will waste your time if you try 
for it where the water is sluggish and the bottom muddy. 
"Logging operations affect the fish in this way: In a 
small creek there is seldom water enough to float logs, 
and the logger throws a dam across it, holding it back 
until he gets head enough to carry them out with a rush. 
One or two such floods will exterminate the fish in that 
stream, either driving them out into the main river, where 
pike, bass and dogfish prey upon them, or destroying them 
outright in the mad rush of the logs. 
"Let the timber be cut off along the streams, and the 
forest fires finish the destruction begun by the axe and 
saw, and what is the result? The sun is let into the 
swamps and dries them up; the volume of water is dimin- 
ished and its temperature is raised to a. point which ren- 
ders it uninhabitable by the grayling. The Little Man- 
istee River is a case in point. Ten years ago grayling 
were still abundant in it, even ab its mouth; to-day it is 
necessary to ascend it thirty miles before they are found 
at all, except in the early spring, when the water is cold 
everywhere. It is evident that the temperature in the 
lower part has become too high, as the conditions are 
otherwise identically the same, except that the timber on 
the banks has been cut off. 
"I know that there are some streams which have con- 
tained both trout and grayling; but in all cases the trout 
was the late comer and has multiplied steadily, while the 
grayling has as steadily decreased. The Jordan formerly 
contained both, but I am informed that the grayling are 
now all gone, except an occasional one of large size. My 
opinion is that the trout eat the small grayling, but others, 
who perhaps know more" about it than I do, say that they 
do not. 
"From all the information I have gathered from the 
Indians, lumbermen and early settlers concerning it, I 
opine that the grayling was indigenous in all the streams 
in which it was found, the trout having been planted in 
those waters in recent years. The trout are found to 
thrive and increase. The greater part of the old pine 
choppings, worthless for cultivation, will grow wild, and 
grow wilder year by year. The creeks which run through 
them will soon flow unvexed by the annual log drives, 
become clogged with fallen trees and brush, and furnish 
the trout secure hiding places, in which they will increase 
in spite of man and their natural enemies. Probably nine 
out of ten anglers will think that they have gained some- 
thing by the exchange of the grayling for the trout; but 
the day which sees the gentle grayling eliminated from 
this and the other streams I am in the habit of fishing, 
will be an unhappy day for me. Let's turn in." 
Frank Asa Mitchell. 
ANGLING NOTES. 
"Are Things What They Seem?" 
Seated in the smoking car of a train between Albany 
and my home on the evening of Thanksgiving Day, I 
think I must have been giving thanks, mentally, for the 
good dinner I had enjoyed in the Capital City, and cer- 
tainly I was in that contented frame of mind which comes 
with about the third after-dinner cigar, when I was 
rather suddenly aroused to the fact that there is one class 
of subjects that I have always with me. 
There have been occasions when I thought that I would 
like to be a hermit, and in my mind's eye I have a place 
selected for a hermitage. But I was aroused! The gen- 
tleman in the seat in front of me did it, and he did it by 
turning around and remarking that he was very glad that 
the open season for lake trout in Lake George had been 
changed to make the fishing begin on the 15th of April. 
"But it has not been changed; it opens on May 1, as it 
has for years past." 
"Yes, it has. I consulted a lawyer, and he says that the 
season now opens legally on the 15th of April; and I have 
had my steamer made ready to put in the water on that 
date; and a New York gentleman has contracted for anew 
steam yacht to be ready on the 15th; and the game pro- 
tector says the law opens the fishing on that date; and 
everybody says the same thing; and you are the only man 
who disputes it." 
I suspected at once that the loose language of Section 
105 was responsible for the misinterpretation of the law, 
and such, I find, is the fact. This hybrid section reads: 
Trout of any kind shall not be fished for, caught, killed or possessed 
between tne first day of September and the first day of April follow- 
ing, except in the waters of Lake George and except in the counties 
of Lewis, St. Lawrence, Franklin, Fulton, Clinton, Essex, Warren, 
Hamilton, Herkimer and Saratoga, where they shall not be fished for, 
caught, killed or possessed between the first day of September and 
the fifteenth of April. 
That is what the law says, but it does not mean what it 
says, and I am quite sure that I have explained the matter 
in Forest and Stream within the year, but I find that 
some of the fish laws have to be explained about once a 
month. Section 105 really refers to "trout of any kind," 
except lake trout, or, as they are generally called in the 
statutes, "salmon trout," which have a close season pro- 
vided under a separate section, 108, as they have always 
had. 
The old law which Section 105 amends read, "brook 
trout, speckled trout, California tmut or brown trout," 
and when the game law was codified all these shallow 
water trout were grouped under the present phraseology 
of Section 105, and the deep-water fish, lake trout and 
landlocked salmon were put into another section. But 
how does Lake George, which contains only lake trout, 
happen to come into what, for convenience, I will call the 
brook trout section? Years ago a special law was passed 
for Lake George to prevent fishing for trout through the 
ice (this was before the ice fishing clause in trout waters 
was added to the general law), and the season was made 
to open in that State on May L 
Through an error of the law makers the special Lake 
George law was added to the brook trout section, and 
there it has been ever since, and up to 1892 the language 
of the original special law was used, thus, "and except in 
Lake George, where the same shall not be fished for 
between the first of September and the first of May." 
Last winter, when the brook trout law was again 
tinkered, whoever it was that framed the section changed 
the Lake George season to conform to the balance of the 
northern waters of the section, probably without know- 
ing that the lake contains no "speckled trout, brook 
trout, California trout or brown trout," and that there is 
no longer need of a special law for Lake George, and has 
not been since the ice-fishing clause in trout waters was 
added to the general law. As the law now stands Section 
105 apparently conflicts with Section 108, and this history 
of the legislation on the subjects of the sections will ex- 
plain why it does, and will also show that it was not the 
intent of the law as it now stands to open the lake trout 
fishing in Lake George before it opens elsewhere in the 
State. If further evidence is required that "trout of any 
kind" does not mean lake trout, one has only to read sec- 
tions 106, 107 and 109, where this language is used: 
"Trout of any kind, salmon trout or landlocked salmon," 
showing that a distinction is made on the lines that I 
have indicated. 
Hindsight and Spotsight. 
Readers of Forest and Stream will doubtless remem- 
ber that a few years ago, when the saibling of Sunapee 
Lake, N. H., were discovered, quite a number of the old 
