492 
FOREST AND ' STREAM. 
[Deo. im. 
Co'i:-,i^h''-^i^t>mj,^ik und Ducks. 
Washington, D. C, Dec. 12.— Editor Forest and 
Streavi: I inclose you a clipping from the Washington 
Star of the lOch that I imagine will interest you some- 
what. I of course refer to the last few lines. The game 
laws and game protection in the District of Columbia are 
in a sad state at present, as two arrests for violation have 
been made within the last few months, both of which 
were dismissed, and the decisions were such that it prac- 
tically wipes all our game laws off the statute books. I 
have often examined quail here in our markets that were 
picked and ready for delivery and found that many show 
no sign whatever of having been shot, no shot marks 
being visible. Practically there is no game killed within 
the district, so that all violation of the game laws is for 
the illegal handling and selling, but as our police court 
decided in one of the above cases that tho statute only ap- 
plied to game killed here, it can be killed elsewhere, 
shipped here and sold at any and all times. It is a sad 
state of affairs, and I regret to say that I believe there is 
little or no hope of the sportsmen taking action to remedy 
naatters. J. D. 
The clipping referred to reads as follows: "The poultry 
and game market is also well stocked, although most of 
the game comes from a distance, for in this section there 
are but few birfis. A great many ducks, however, are 
being killed down the river and on the Chesapeake. C m- 
vasback ducks are about as f:carce as anything in the line 
of game, and the supply is hardly equal to the demand. 
Since Congress convened they have been in great demand 
for big dinners. Mallirds from the Chesapeake are finer 
than ever before, and are more plentiful. These ducks 
are fed on corn to some extent, and the corn is also uaed 
for baiting. Then, instead of being shot, they are caught 
in nets, so that when they re*ch here they are in splendid 
condition. Wild ducks of ordinary varieties are plentiful, 
and low prices rule." 
Those Thanksgiving Turkeys. 
Grand View, Tenn,, Dec. 8. — We have been talking 
over those Thanksgiving turkeys of Mr. Hough's, and 
while sympathizing with him in his various disappoint- 
ments. Antler took occasion to remark that Hjugh is not 
as smart a man SB he had supposed. Said he: "Hough 
might have gone a little way outside the city, built a little 
fire, and roasted a turkey if he'd wanted to." 
To this opinion, born of some four score years' experi- 
ence in cooking all sorts of game under adverse condi- 
tions, I could only reply that it is not now as easy to find 
a suitable cooking place in that region as it was when, 
forty odd years ago, I wandered among the sand hills to 
the south of Lincoln Park. 
i have missed reading one or two numbers of Forest 
AND Stream, but infer that something has been said about 
the correct pronunciation of Col, Fred Mather's name. I 
have known a number of Mathers in New England who 
always sounded the a as in "cat," Should it be pro- 
nounced as in "father"? 
I may add that Mr. Hough would do well to state to the 
public just how his name is pronounced, I have more 
than once found it difficult to persuade people that it isn't 
"How," and I have heard it called "Hew." Kelpie. 
We I take the liberty of adding that the name appended 
weekfy to our "Chicago and the West" budget is pro- 
nounced like the name of the hero of this story in the 
Farrfiington Chronicle: "Shepard Huff last week started 
out hunting. He had not gone far from the house before 
he started up a deer, and, as the track was plain in the 
snow, Mr. Huff followed along expecting to get a shot. 
He noticed every now and then that other deer kept 
coming into the first deer's track and following along, 
aud before night twelve had fallen into line; so at dark, 
when he was obliged to give up the chase, there were no 
less thah thirteen deer ahead of him." 
Turkeys, Deer and Otter. 
AvocA, K C, Nov, 30. — Editor Forest and Stream: I 
send you an account of a day's outing at Avoca. We 
crossed to the Bild Gray plantation, just opposite my 
house, and in a very short time started two deer. Wila- 
fred killed a very large doe. The dogs started another 
deer, and at the same time ran into a flock of turkeys. 
Tom Webb got two shots at these and killed one with 
each barrel. He killed one as they flew up. A second 
lit in a pine tree directly over his head. This turkey was 
so alarmed at the dogs that Webb was enabled to move 
out so he could get an uoobatructed aim, 
We took a canoe to bring the doe home, and, coming 
down the creek, when less than 400yd3, from the Avoca 
residence, we saw four large otter sporting in the water. 
Guns and a pair of hounds were in the bow of the boat, 
and before any one could get a gun the dogs sprang over- 
board and chased the otter into their den. Wnile digging 
and scratching to get the otters out Mr. Warrenton saw 
another one coming across the creek. Paddled after it, 
and when he got near the otter dove and rose within 
range, and Warrenton's unerring aim killed him. 
Pretty fair sport for a few hours and but little labor. 
We have four turkey wings, one deer skin and one otter 
hide. W. R. Capehart. 
Florida Game and Fish. 
Gulf Hammock House, Lerry County, Fla., Deo. 7.— 
W. L. Multeer, C. E. Owens, A. H. Deusler, Mr. Little- 
field and D. Wert lett here a few days ago highly pleased. 
They were here four days, and killed two very tine bucks 
and several turkeys. Two of these gentlemen preferred 
to fish. Mr. Osvens caught over seventy black bass 
weighing from 3 to 7lbs. each. 
Mr. J. S. Weeks and G. H. Barker left the house on a 
camp htmt; they were gone three days and came in with 
a tine deer, several ducks, squirrels and black and chau- 
uel bass. 
Turkeys are very plentiful this year, and fishing first 
class. C. B. WiNGATE. 
Curious Tourist — "What are you fi=ihing for?" Farmer's 
Boy— "Fish?" Curious Tourist— "What do you use?" 
Farmer's Boy — "Bait." Curious Tourist — "How do they 
bite?" Farmer's Boy—' 'With their mouths. "—Exchange, 
MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
XXV.— Amos Decker. 
Amos was a raw-boned six-footer, about fifty years old 
when I met him, bronzed with exposure, and tough as 
a pine knot. He had drifted ahead of civilization for 
over a quarter of a century, clearing timber in Michigan, 
breaking prairie in Illinois, taking up claims and selling 
out when the neighborhood became too thickly settled; 
one of those restless men that were always found on the 
beet quarter section within a township awaiting a cus- 
tomer for his betterments. Unlike his class, he was a 
man of fair education, whose memory retained much of 
what had evidently been an extensive course of reading 
in his youth; but his associations had sadly impaired nny 
grammatical rules he might once have known. 
Amos may or may not have been a bachelor. He lived 
alone in a well-built log house on a bank of the Neosho, 
near where Burlington now stands; and it was not good 
form in Kansas in those days to be curious about the past 
of such men as you chanced to meet. What little I knew 
of his early life I have told and gathered from stories that 
he related in the intimacy of camp life. Warren and I 
had been down the Verdigris River as far as Indepsnd- 
ence, and then struck off northeast to the Neosho and up 
that stream. We were looking for land for several E istern 
men who wShted to settle together if certain conditions 
of wood, water, etc., could be found on Government land, 
for they would not buy claims. When we got up as far 
as the cabin of Amos my pony was lame, and we stopped 
and asked if we could rest and see to our critters. We 
spoke enough of the Missouri language, which largely 
prevailed in that part— although occasionally mixed with 
and diluted by the vocabulary of Posey county, Ind. — to 
know that a horao was a "critter," and a cow was a 
"creetur," 
After the usual question, "Whar ye from?" and the 
answer being satistactory, he looked at my pony's foot 
and pulled out a cactus thorn that had somehow got in it, 
although no Indian pony would go near a bed of that 
plant, He said: "I wouldn't ride him any more to-day, 
stop over with me to-night and the pony '11 be better in 
the mawnin'." In the last sketch I referred to the 
troubles that disturbed the Territory of Kansas, and 
strangers were cautious, judging one to be "free State" 
or "pro slavery" by hie nativity. Amos probably sized us 
up long before we had him figured down, but it did not 
take long to decide that he was to be trusted, because he 
could pronounce his r's, that shibboleth of the man reared 
south of Mason and Dixon's line — in those days at least. 
Warren and I had been camping and living on small 
game tempered with salt pork and the occasional pur- 
chase of corn bread, and when Amos suggested that if the 
water was not so muddy after the rain he would shoot 
a pike for dinner, Warren suggested catching one. 
Amos had no fish hooks, but we had a few and some lines. 
I watched him rig for skittering, and remarked that he 
had fished before. 
"Yes," said be, "we used to ketch pike in the Wabash 
an' Massaseep by puttin' on a killy an' slingin 'em out." 
I caught the word "killy" and said: "I s'pose it's a long 
time since you left New York." 
"Never lived in New York," and he gave me a look of 
inquiry. "What made ye think that?" 
"I meant New Jersey. They're close together and I 
made a mistake. I can always tell a man that comes 
from New Jersey, no matter how long he's been away 
from it." 
"See here, stranger! I was a boy in New Jersey once, 
but you don't know it, you only guessed at it. You may 
be good at guessin', guess ag'in." 
"Well, you lived down along the salt water, about Rar- 
itan Bay or Staten Island Sound. I only want to look 
into a man's eye to tell where he comes from, and didn't 
have to ask where you came from." 
Then I mystified tim with some old sleight-of-hand 
tricks: passed a half dollar through his hat, let him draw 
a card Irom the pack and then after putting it back with 
the rest told him to feel in his coat pocket and find it, 
and several such simple tricks which puzzled him. 
Said he: "Look a-here, stranger^ that's the best I ever 
seed. Oncet, on the old Massaseep, I seed a feller do sich 
tricks, but he had a show on a boat an' a stage, an' we 
wus so fur off we c'u'dn't see how he dun 'em; but I'll be 
durned ef you don't do 'em right here with my own 
keerds. Siy, do 'em over ag'in, will ye? I want to see 
how ye do 'em, Siy, stranger, ef you'll stay here with 
me I'll keep ye six months an' show yo the bes' claims 
about yere." 
I declined to repeat the tricks; all great magicians resist 
such entreaties. I had puzzled this shrewd frontiersman 
by some simple things and didn't care to lose my prestige, 
just as you never wish to make a second rifle or pistol 
shot after a very lucky first one. 
When we were alone Warren said: "Them tricks was 
ail right; I don't know just how you do 'em, but that busi- 
ness of locating the old man in New Jersey is what bothers 
me, and it bothers him. How did you do it?" 
"If I tell you will you keen it?" 
"Betcher! Wouldn't tell him, but it's workin' on the 
old man an' it's workin' on me," 
"Well, it's all based on a word. He called a little bait 
fish a 'killy,' and that name is one left by the Datoh set- 
tlers along the salt waters of New York and New Jersey, 
and is used in no other part of the country. You noticed 
that I guessed New York first, but corrected it on the 
second guessing." 
Amos had turned his back to put some wood on the fire 
and I carelessly opened a book on a shelf and saw his 
name in it. Quickly closing it, I resumed conversation 
and afterward laboriously spelled out his name from the 
lines in his hand. 
"Stranger," said he. slowly, "you ar' sufctenly a gifted 
man. To look at yer no one would ever mistrust it, but 
I've read about how these things could be done, but never 
put no faith in it, but now I'm convinced. Stranger, put 
it tharl" 
"Amos," said I, "I'm a greenhorn from the East, but I 
object to being called 'stranger' by every stranger that I 
meet, I'm no more a stranger to a man I never saw be- 
fore tbaa he is to me aud I won't stand it. If you'll drop 
that word we'll be friends and go a-fiahing. What d'ye 
say?" 
Warren had caught some minnows in a little stream 
and we went down to the edge of the river to fish with 
some heavy pecan poles, which our host pronounced 
"pecawn;" this is a species of hickory which bears the 
nut of commerce and is very strong and elastic, but 
heavy. The water appeared to be so muddy that there 
seemed but little chance of a fish seeing our bait, but we 
kept casting and skittering until I got a rise that took the 
bait off the hook. This was encouraging, Then Amos 
got a strike that was a savage one; it pulled the line 
through the ring on the tip of his hickory switch and 
scorched his hand in checking the rush. We had no 
reels; I had probably seen them in Eastern stores, but 
had no knowledge of them in practical fishing. It was 
evident that Amos knew as much about fishing as I did, 
and that was considerable, I thought. He soon checked 
the fish and landed it, a pike of some kind that may have 
weighed 51b3. Warren struck something, wet his foot 
and lost his line, because it was short and was not fas- 
tened to the butt. 
"Betcher," said he, "that fish would weigh 501b8. It 
was the biggest one I ever hooked. No man c'd 'a' stopped 
him. Did you see how he took that line out? Why, 
lightnin' 'ud 'a' been left away behind in that race," 
Amos suggested that the pike would make our dinner 
and we let the minnows go and went up to his cabin. 
While he jprepared dinner I looked after the ponies, 
which were staked out on the prairie; led them down to 
water and gave them some salt. I wonder if an Indian 
ever wasted salt on a pony? It's doubtful, About the 
only thing that I ever saw them g^va a pony freely was a 
club My tough little fellow, wnich I had named 
"Jimsey," a sort of pet form of "Jim," had become great- 
ly attached to me through the agency of salt and sugar. 
Warren came out and put a bobble on his pony and I 
turned mine loose. I urged him to do likewise, but he 
said: 
"That's all right; J imsey will stay here with Pete be- 
cause he's hobbled, but, betcher, you let 'em both loose 
an' you'll never see 'em ag'm." 
"Let Pete loose, an' if he goes away I'll give you my 
claim. The ponies will get better feed if they can range, 
and a stranger can't catch 'em. We're goin' to stop here 
all night, and if our ponies go off you can have my claim 
and its betterments." 
"It's a go; Pete wouldn't fetch more'n $30, an' your 
plaim, with house, well and ten acres of broken prairie 
all fenced is wuth more'n ten times that." 
His pony was relieved from the hobble, and we wont 
in to dinner. The pike had been boiled and had a dress- 
ing of drawn butter, a most unusual thing in that region 
of plain living and high thinking. But Amos had cows 
which are well enough in their way, but have a habit of 
giving milk as a raw material and leaving its manufac- 
ture into cheese and butter to other hands. The ques- 
tion was: Whose hands? If I had puzzled Amos with a 
few simple tricks of legerdemain, such as are published 
in many books on the subject, he presented the problem: 
"Who milked his cows and made the butter?" Of course 
he could do it, but he was often gone for weeks, and 
cows must be milked twice each day, He had butter, 
and that is all we knew. 
After dinner and pipes Warren went out, and they re- 
ported that bur ponies were not in sight. "Gone down 
in the, timber to browse on the mulberry bark," said 
Amos. "I'll tell you what it is, you fellers make a mistake 
in thinking them animiles 'ud druther have corn shelled 
or on the cob than to browse. They'd druther git down 
in that bottom timber an' eat hazel brush an' young mul- 
berry an inch thick 'an to have all the corn 'at you c'd 
set afore 'em. Let 'em go; they'll look out fer you ef 
you give 'em salt an' sugar, es Fred says he's done. Don't 
you worry," 
Morning came and after breakfast we went to the edge of 
the woods; I gave the shrill whistle with the fingers and 
called my pony's name. Soon he answered, and both 
animals followed us back to the cabin. Here I will say 
that I am not a horseman and have no liking for horses. 
Few men like horses. They will tell you that they "like 
a good horse." That means that they like him while he 
is young and stylish, but when all that is past he may be 
sold to pull an ash cart. Out on such love 1 Compare it 
with the love that the sportsman has for his dog, that has 
worked the fields with him in heat and cold, his skin torn 
by briefs in summer and his feet frozen in the winter's 
snows. Is the old dog sold into drudgery in his old days? 
"Not on your lifel" as the phrase of the day goes. There- 
fore I do not believe that the average man loves the horse 
for more than he can get out of him. I have a regard for 
the horse as a most useful animal, just as I have a regard 
for a locomotive as a bit of useful machinery ; but I think, 
with Charles Dickens, that the head of a horse, at its 
best, is not a handsome thing, admitting that some horses 
may have comparatively handsome heads by some modi- 
fication of that long nose. I am wondering what Dickens 
would have thought of the head of a moose I There is no 
doubt but Mr. flloose sees some most delicate lines of 
beauty in the facial contour of Mrs, Moose, but we are 
not educated up to their standard, that's the trouble, and 
a moose is^the homeliest animal that my eyes ever gazed 
upon, take head, body or legs, or in "the altogether." 
Before we left the breakfast table Amos had arranged a 
buffalo hunt for the next week, and we agreed to go with 
him. His idea and that of his neighbors w^s to take ox 
teams and bring back loads of beef for present use and 
for salting for winter, as well as to get the skins for robes 
to use or to sell. 
The week rolled around and our arms were cleaned and 
oiled, knives sharpened, the covered wagon packed with 
camping necessities and all ready to hitch the cattle to 
long before the train of ten wagons hove in sight. By the 
time they reached my cabin we had the ponies haltered 
and tied behind, and the two yoke of oxen hitched and 
ready to fall in the rear of the procession when it passed, 
We went off to the southwest and in a few miles struck a 
well-broken trail near the head of the Verdigris, which 
they had left some distance back to go out of the way to 
pick us up. We were out four nights before we reached 
the Arkansas River, some eighty miles from our place. 
The country was rolling prairie with timber along the 
frtquent streams, and on the third day out I saw the first 
live buffalo, a herd of several hundred which pungled cff 
like porpoises when we came in sight. I wondertd why 
the men did not chase them, but learned that they were 
not going to kill a buffalo until there wm a chance to 
I 
