"Nov. & 1898.3 
363 
blind and had fine sport until sundown, when we took 
up our decoys and returned to the house. After getting 
out of our long boots and taking off some of our thick 
clothing, we were ready for dinner or supper, whichever 
you call it — it was both, I think. We were both 
tired and hungry and put away a large dish of fried eels. 
We had had good luck, and counted up as follows: 
3 black ducks, 7 broadbills, 13 coots, 2 dippers and 5 red- 
heads; total, 30 head. My chum got two or three more 
birds than myself. Well, he ought to, he is a good shot, 
but I was satisfied. 
The next day was about the same, and the next day 
was Sunday — no shooting. Monday we had but the 
morning shooting, the team coming for us at 9 o'clock. 
We had two bags of ducks — about 58 or 60 in all. We 
had a good time. We did not punish much whisky, al- 
though we had it for proper use, and we did not sit up 
late over cards. 
We met at that time one of the old school sportsmen — 
a gentleman in every sense of the word, and an agree- 
able companion, it was Francis Endicott. We did not 
come across any of the things that you see once. in a 
while at a gunning resort nowadays. One of the things 
with a single eye glass screwed in one corner of his 
eye, a lackey to carry his gun for him, and who, when 
he tries to talk, imitates a foreigner, for the English 
language, as spoken by the American citizen, is not 
known to him. We see too many of these now. Once 
in a while we hear of one pulling a loaded gun by 
the muzzle, and there is one thing less. 
We went back over the same route as we came, ar- 
riving at Jersey City about 8 P. M. 
This is a poor account of one trip. We have had 
many, but I will not impose any more on the reader. A 
few years ago my partner moved away, and we do not 
now live close enough, so that we can enjoy the hunt- 
ing and fishing together. I am lonesome for a partner. 
B. B. B. 
In the Louisiana Lowlands.— VII. 
BY FRED MATHER. 
[Continued from last uieek.] 
Low voices in the next room wove into dreams, and 
the dreams were of guns, filling shot pouches and prep- 
arations for a day with birds, sometimes with the 
ducks, which suddenly changed into plover, and .then 
with turkeys, which somehow vanished before they were 
fairly sighted. One peculiarity of my dreams has been 
persistent from boyhood; when I dream of shooting, and 
the game is there, I pull the trigger, but the gun does 
not go off. I have often wondered if this happens to 
other dreamers. It is the day of the muzzle-loader that 
I am writing about, and as I was thirty-five years old 
before I ever saw a breech-loader, and have but little 
experience with them, it is natural that there should be 
a cap to miss fire in my dreams. 
The voices became louder and the dream more indis- 
tinct. 
» 
"The fisher droppeth his net in the stream. 
And a hundred streams are the same as one; 
And the maiden dreameth her love-lit dream, 
And what is it all, when all is done? 
The net of the fisher the burden breaks, 
And always the dreaming the dreamer wakes." 
So it was; the dreaming came to a point when I 
was conscious, and then a voice said: "I don't care 
if I wake the whole house up, you took more'n half of 
the powder and shot when you filled your flasks and 
turned over what was left to me; here are about a 
dozen wads left for me, while you have your pockets 
full, and I'll make yon even up on the whole lot before 
we start." 
Surely that was the voice of my young friend Jack, 
talking to his older brother. Something in his tone in- 
dicated that he considered himself imposed upon. By 
the light of a match my watch said that the night had 
just turned three, and daylight was more than an hour 
away. Wondering why boys were so enthusiastic, and 
in my sleepy condition forgetting that I had passed 
through that same embryonic stage, I tapped on their 
door and told Jack to go to bed and I would see that 
he had a proper outfit in the morning, but that if he 
should wake his grandfather it might anger him so 
that the boys would not be allowed to go with us. After 
that the stars could not have moved with more silence, 
and sleep came, only to be roused by its enemy, the 
sun. 
At breakfast those boys bolted their food without 
tasting it. How I envy the stomach of a boy. He does 
not know that he has such an organ, or that he is abusing 
it in ways that will present claims for damages in the 
time to come, when he will scan the advertisements of " 
dyspepsia cures which bring promise to his eye, but 
break it to his hope. 
The Start. 
The setters, Bob and Dan, who were with us on the 
woodcock trip, and who had retired in disgust when 
the horn sounded to assemble all the plantation curs for 
a bear hunt, were on the porch with the boys, licking 
their hands and wagging their tails as if to say: "Why 
do you wait? We are ready; let's start now." When 
the Doctor and I appeared, the intelligent dogs reasoned 
that the wait was past, and we were greeted with an 
effusiveness that plainly said: "So you have come at 
last. We've been waiting for you, but it's all right 
now." 
We mounted our horses; I had ceased to wonder why 
men in the South preferred to mount a horse and have 
their inwards churned into chaos instead of quietly rid- 
ing in some sort of wheeled vehicle, as do" all the 
farmers in the North. They liked it because they were 
not accustomed to the "effete" luxury of the "buggy" 
or the "coach." And then a saddle is cheaper than a 
buggy, and in early times this was an object, but let me 
prophecy: A century hence a saddle will not be in use 
in the United States, except in regions remote from 
the great centers of civilization, in the army and among 
those who take to horseback riding as an athletic sport. 
It is 'an acquired taste that is easily lost by a sportsman 
who once shoots plover or other game from a buggy. 
The horse I rode on this occasion was one of those gen- 
tle-gaited Kentucky horses, and I got along well; but if 
I had choice of a journey through Hades over the 
house tops, or a trotting horse on a level road, the 
horse would be left behind. If the verdict be that I am 
no horseman I will not appeal. Few Northern men 
are brought up in the saddle, and that was the reason 
that the Confederate cavalry were our superiors in 
that branch of the service during the first two years of 
our Civil War. 
In the Berry Patch. 
Years before a fire had run through a patch of tim- 
ber, and some 200 acres of stubs, stumps and dead trees 
bore witness to it, but dame nature will not permit a 
rich soil to remain unproductive, and with the sun- 
light came the berries, few at first from the droppings of 
birds, and next year there was a struggle for life among 
different kinds of weeds, vines and young trees. Here 
was a spot where the cat briers, called "bamboo" in the 
South, had the ascendency, and neither man nor dog 
could pass their stronghold. There the different edible 
berries of the brier kind had possession, and held on to 
the sportsman as death is said to detain a deceased 
African. But. there were arches of these vines here and 
there that the dogs could pass under, and might stand 
on game until Cuba froze over, and the sportsman 
would never know it. Then (here were something like 
avenues of weeds which wound about these patches, and 
through which a man. could pass, the taller ones kindly 
yielding to him and shedding their seeds between his 
shirt and skin, where they seemed to feel no discom- 
fort if he did. The day was warm, for it was Novem- 
ber, the still air and the exercise induced perspiration, 
and the seeds down both front and back on a moist skin 
are still held in memory's locker. 
Jack was with me, and George with the Doctor, as 
before. We had killed a few quail out of many that 
the dogs found, and had a fair proportion of birds killed, 
considering the conditions. The lay of the brier patches 
forced us together, and the Doctor said: "Really, I don't 
care much for this work. What do you think of it?" 
"My dear Doctor," I answered, "you don't care much 
for it; -the boys may like it, for boys are easily pleased; 
the dogs are enthusiastic, although their hides are pricked 
and torn; but since you ask me for an opinion, I will 
say that if this is the only place in Lousiana where 
quail can be found, I am content to leave it to them. I 
have known men who were as enthusiastic as the dogs, 
and who would suffer to be frozen in a sink box to kill 
a few ducks or to wade a cold stream up to their 
waists to kill a trout, or a salmon. We can never meas- 
ure the mind of another man in our quart cup; if I think 
they do these things to brag about, I may be mis- 
taken, because my brain is not theirs. I would not do 
them now, but once would. To me sport means pleas- 
ure, and there is no pleasure in physical suffering, from 
my point of view; yet men have sought the musk ox 
when they had to give their scanty supply of food to 
their dogs as their only hope of reaching civilization 
alive. They deliberately put their lives in the balance 
before starting." 
As we took the nearest route out of the brier patch 
the Doctor said: "Arctic explorers go with a full 
knowledge of the dangers before them, and so do other 
men. There is an old maxim, 'The greater the danger 
the greater the sport.' Did you ever risk your life for 
any reason?" 
"Never mind; all these questions which you bring up 
a man will answer differently at different ages, Con- 
sult Shakespeare on that subject: In the fourth of man's 
seven ages he depicts him as 'seeking the bubble repu- 
tation even in the camion's mouth,' but in later years 
he seldom cares for that kind of thing, and life, which 
he was ready to throw away at twenty, becomes the 
dearest thing on earth at four times that age." 
"From this," rejoined the Doctor, "it would appear 
that you study man as well as fishes, ..and your observa- 
tions coincide with mine. You know that Swift said: 
'Every man desires to live long; but no man would 
be old.' See! our boys have the dogs across the road 
and into the corn stubble, while we are philosophizing; 
we must catch up, yet it does me more good to see one 
of those eager boys down a partridge than to do it my- 
self." 
An Accident. 
We spread out again, and I took my position on the 
right of Jack just as he brought down a quail over 
Dan's point, and the setter yelled; his "ki-yis" rent 
the air, and the trouble with the dog was not apparent. 
No gash of cat brier, cutting an inch deep, would extort 
such a yell from a well-bred dog in pursuit of game; no 
shot at a bird in the air could have struck him, but 
there he was at our feet, cowed and trembling. The 
Doctor and George rushed over; the dog still yelled, and 
the Doctor examined its feet for thorns or porcupine 
quills. Jack had gone off to look for his bird, and a 
minute later fired a shot and rushed in with a big rattle- 
snake, shouting: "The snake bit him!" 
The dog was in agony, but was licking our hands as if 
to say: "The trouble is not in my feet, why can't you 
understand?" We understood only after Jack had found 
the angry snake, and had killed it. Then the Doctor 
looked elsewhere, and found the wound. We held poor 
Dan down while the Doctor cut out. a piece from his 
leg, and then cauterized it and put a ligature above the 
wound, for he was the kind of doctor who always had a 
few things in his saddle bags to meet ordinary emer- 
gencies, and had slung them over his shoulder when he 
left his horse to enter the berry patch. 
A Sick Dog. 
The day's sport was over, one of our party had been 
bitten by a snake, and we must go home. The poor 
dog was weak and nauseated, and we carried him on a 
piece of bark to the road, where, the Doctor took him 
in his saddle, a most uncomfortable, way, but the best that 
offered. A short cut brought, us" home in twenty min- 
utes, or about half an hour after Dan was bitten. He 
no longer vomited, but was very .sick. As we laid our 
suffering companion on the porch, he was too feeble to 
acknowledge our attentions in his usual way, but his 
eyes beamed kindly on us. The Doctor had rushed up 
the stairs two steps at a time, and came down without 
noticing that steps were there. He gave the patient 
some whisky to arouse the heart action, took off the 
ligature and made another incision in the leg and ap- 
plied some fluid to the new wound. 
All this was of great interest to me, for it was the 
first case of snake bite that I had seen, and as such a 
thing might come my way some time, it was worth while 
to study it, so for the benefit of others who may be 
exposed to this danger I give the details. 
"Will Dan die?" Jack asked the Doctor. 
"Not if I can help it, but much depends on his condi- 
tion and the amount of poison he received. These are 
the main things on which his life depends. How old 
is he?" 
"Four years old next month," George answered. 
The Doctor looked the dog over and said, partly to 
himself and partly to us: "He is in his prime, and 
his physical condition is excellent; pulse a little better 
since he had the whisky, the general depression seems 
to be passing." Then arousing from his meditation he 
continued: "The next two hours will tell the story." 
"Pardon me, Doctor," I ventured to ask, "that last in- 
cision and liquid application was puzzling to me; would 
it be impertinent to ask the nature of it? My apology 
for asking is that such an accident might happen to 
myself or any companion, canine or human, when no 
physician was at hand, and life was hanging in the 
balance. Of course, I know that there is a popular 
belief that unlimited quantities of whisky will cure snake 
poison,, you used but little on the dog. Will you be good 
enough to tell us all about this matter?" 
"Certainly; we have no secret nostrums, but here is 
the Colonel's messenger, who says that dinner will be 
served in fifteen minutes, and we must prepare for that 
event. Poor Dan is lying quietly on his rug, and will 
remain there. We will talk about snake bites in the 
Colonel's room to-night." 
"Well, Jack," the Colonel asked, after the soup was 
served, "how were the partridges to-day?" 
"They were plenty in the brier patches, but the dogs 
couldn't follow 'em, and they ran off, but we got eleven 
brace and lost a lot in the thickets. Then we crossed 
the road, and had just got. nicely to work in the corn 
stubble, when Dan was struck by a rattlesnake, and we 
had to quit .and get him home. It was too bad. We 
couldn't see Dan die, but the birds were plenty, and we 
might have killed fifty brace if the snake had let Dan 
alone." 
The Colonel told his grandson that he did not want 
fifty brace of partridges brought in, as he did not intend 
to feed his negroes on them. "Bring Dan to my room 
to-night," said he, "and we two invalids will console 
each other." 
Dan, the setter, had not seen the Colonel since the 
bear hunt, and feebly tried to recognize him as he was 
brought into his room. Dr. Gordon gave the dog an- 
other small dose of whisky, which gave him strength, and 
he licked the Doctor's hand as soon as the fiery liquid al- 
lowed him to do so. That action decided the case: Dan 
would live. 
Treating Snake Poisouing. 
"Now, Doctor," said I, "redeem your promise and tell 
us about poisoning from snake bite. Don't be so 
technical that we can't follow you, but give it to us in 
a way to be of use." His talk on this subject was so full 
and interesting that I make no apology for giving i.t 
here as memory retains it, and I was wide awake on 
this subject, for, while most of the harmless snakes are 
kindly treated by me and often made pets, the poisonous 
ones have ever been dreaded. 
The Colonel lay upon his bed, and the snake-bitten 
dog was lying by his side, with his head on the Colonel's 
arm. Two crippled companions; one deprived of speech, 
but fuller of intelligence than many a man, and as we 
gathered there the Doctor said: "Snake poison acts 
in different ways, but there is no internal antidote that 
is efficient. The quart of whisky theory has believers 
because men have taken it and recovered, but they would 
have recovered without it; for rattlesnake bite is seldom 
fatal to man, while a small portion of the poison will 
kill a dog. The bite of the cobra, of India, is often 
fatal, for the reason that they are generally larger than 
our venomous serpents, and their poison is more po- 
tent. It has been proved that any animal can be 
rendered immune to snake poison by being subjected to 
small and increasing injections of it, but this form of poi- 
son is harmless when taken into the stomach, therefore 
you need never fear to suck the poison from a wound 
unless the skin of your lips is abraded. A quarter of a 
drop of rattlesnake poisotT in the veins of a pigeon will 
kill it, but pigeons have been fed twenty drops of it a 
day for a week, and have been unharmed. 
"The effects of snake bite are divided into local and 
general, the local being immediate and the other re- 
mote. In the case of Dan it was local, perhaps be- 
cause I was present and confined the trouble to his leg 
as far as it was possible to do so. He was depressed and 
his heart action was feeble, that's why I gave him a 
J^oz. of whisky just to increase the heart action and give 
him strength to resist the poison, and the ligature above 
the wound prevented a clot from reaching the heart, for 
that would be fatal, and snake poison tends to form a 
clot. If the early depression passes quickly the animal 
either recovers soon or passes into the second stage, in 
which the blood cannot clot, and every tissue is de- 
graded, and bleeding from the mucous membranes be- 
gins and foreshadows a fatal end. 
"You will notice that I first bandaged' the leg above 
the wound, then enlarged the cuts to promote bleeding 
in order to get rid of such venom as might not have 
passed into the circulation, and then cauterized the 
wound. That was the best I could do in the field, where 
my supplies were limited, but when we reached the 
mansion I reopened the wound, took off the ligature and 
applied a solution of permanganate of potassium, which 
destroys the poison and is the best of all remedies. 
"Woodsmen have faith in tobacco, but, like the whisky, 
the man would have recovered without it. If no remedy 
is at hand, all local dressings are useless. Open the 
wound to encourage bleeding by washing, or soaking in 
