104 
FOREST AND 
[Feb. II. 1899. 
which rises from Mahmakanta, and its outlet is Polly- 
wog Stream, which leaps down the mountain through a 
savage gorge. It is a wild, rocky stream and a dangerous 
channel through which to drive logs, but the lumberman's 
life is a constant struggle with the forces of Nature. We 
found old Louis at Mahmakanta, and while our guides 
returned to Rainbow for the rest of our luggage he took 
■us up the mountain to the pond. A high dam holds the 
water back, and the gorge which forms the channel of 
the stream falls away from it so abruptly that the force 
of the restrained flood is enormous. Louis said he never 
could get men to go on the dam till the water was shut 
off, it is so dangerous. On the mountain side is another 
lonely grave. 
Ansuntabunt, as seen froiri Nahmakanta, is covered 
with forest two-thirds of the wa}-- up, and then rises in 
great naked cliffs. Its name means, in the Indian tongue, 
"a mountain on a mountain," and it has that appearance. 
Pollywog Stream goes leaping down the mountain, a 
series of alternate falls and pools. We clambered down 
the ledges, pausing at the pools to cast a fly, and at pic- 
turesque points to photograph the wild beauty of the 
cascades. 
We slept in the tent again that night, and made our- 
selves comfortable with a grand camp-fire of old pine 
stumps, for it was the coldest night we had. And now, as 
we have seen the Rainbow Country, and have departed 
froin it, leaving it to its solitude and silence, we will sai'^ 
"good-bye" on the shore of Nahmakanta. 
The story of the remainder of our journey, and of our 
dangerous adventure in the gale on Pamedomcook, has 
already been told. As I write, the maples about the 
house are tinted with the gorgeous colors of October, 
and every gust of wind sends a shower of gold and crim- 
son to the ground. Far away I know that tlie moun- 
tains of Mahnagvvanegwasebem are brilliant with the 
same varied hues, and that the colors splash and float in 
the silver water that laves the feet of the .qreat hills. Now 
it is indeed the Rainbow Country, and the black growth 
intensifies by contrast the gorgeousness of the desiduous 
ttees; And the trout, also with the rainbow spots upon 
their sides, are awaiting our coming at some future day, 
and the little cabin stands deserted and alone in the 
clearing. W. A. Brooks. 
ii 
T. S $." 
It is a gloomy, unprofitable winter day, with human 
companionship scarce and favorite books at a premium. 
At such a time my hand turns naturally to three little 
scrap books filled with ^sketches of nature and outdoor 
sport. The clippings are mostly from Forest and Stre.vm ; 
wherefore the books are labeled on the back F. & S., with 
the numbers i, 2 and 3. There was pleasant entertainment 
in clipping the best things from bulky stacks of the 
paper, to have them more conveniently at hand; in hunt- 
ing up illustrations from among the work of amateur 
photographers in the same columns, and in other places 
where suitable pictures have abounded in these days of 
the universal camera and half-tone ; and in fitting the pic- 
ture to the story or description, and the whole to the 
•'vaiting pages. And there is great satisfaction, of a dull 
day or a dismal evening, in joining one or another of these 
gifted nature lovers in camp, or hunt, or boat, or m some 
woodland, or waterside ramble, merely to see and hear. 
Here are stories true to fact, and others true at least to 
nature, poems redolent of outdoors, naturalists' observa- 
tions, practical counsel in the arts of sport, glimpses of it 
in application, and a general celebration of the joys to be 
captured with gun and rod. 
These books were made up years ago, when some ot 
Forest and Stream's present valuable correspondents had 
written less, if anvthing, for its columns. Many good 
things had to be preserved in other form because of being 
on both sides of the leaf, with no duplicate copy to clip 
from; but the three little volumes hold a great store of 
charming reading, and they are not for sale, and hardly to 
be lent. The reader who can conveniently keep and handle 
the complete file will find some advantage in it ; but if the 
pick of it is good enough for him the old reliable scrap 
book plan will show its good points, and there is the 
pleasure of working it up. If you use a book not intended 
for such service, half or two-thirds of the leaves will need 
■ to be cut out. If you are extra nice, you will cut ott 
from the edges of the clippings the "rule," the line printed 
between columns. A streak of mucilage drawn along 
either edge of the paper fastens it, and does not wrinkle 
the leaf It is easily applied without daubing anything by 
layino- the clipping on the cover of a book, face down, with 
its edge along the edge of the cover. It is part of the 
fun to make the work reasonably neat and shipshape. 
No contributor fills more space in these scrap books 
of mine, and none could deserve more, than Row- 
land E Robinson. Among his little essays, unsigned, but 
unmistakable, are what I take to be his eariiest contnbii- 
tions to the paper, such as the brief series entitled Hunt- 
ing W^ithout a Gun." Here is his longer sketch with the 
came title, describing the writer's pursuit of his borrowed 
boat and full of reminiscence and observation; and in 
similar vein, "Cleaning the Old Gun." Here are our 
Danvis friends, figuring m "The Huntmg of the Wolf, 
and "Sam Lovel's Thanksgiving," and less familiar char- 
acters in the sad but artistic tale of "The Gray Pine. 
Storv and essav, long or short, show how much a man 
can see in nature who has the eyes to see, and m memory 
and fancv when the bodilv sight has, alas, deserted him. 
To this calamity Mr. Robinson alludes in a characteristic 
tone of philosophic resignation in one of the selections 
here preserved, "Voices of the Seasons," a touching specu- 
lation as to how far one without sight may judge the 
progress of the year by bird voices and other outdoor 
sounds. No one has better caught the spirit of the sea- 
sons - How finely is one of them epitoniized in his prose 
poem on the muskrat and his house. Surely the reader 
will like to see these lines again : 
"In the still, sunny days between the nights of its tin- 
seen building, the blue spikes of the pickerel weed and the 
white trinities of the arrowhead yet bloom beside it. 
Then in the golden and scarlet brightness 01 autumn the 
departing wood drake rests on the roof to preen his 
plumager and later the dusky duck swims on its watery 
lawn Above it the wild geese harrow the low. cold arch 
of the sky; the last fleet of sere leaves drift past it in the 
bleak wind, and then ice and snow draw the veil of the 
long winter twilight over the muskrats' homes and 
haunts." 
One of the_ books ends with a scrap of hunter's gospel 
from the lips of Sam Lovel. The reader sniffs the very 
aroma of the forest: 
"It comes nat'ral for me to ttffi in the woods. 'F I 
do get more game to show for it 'n' some does, I get 
suthin' besides 't I can't show. The air o' the woods tastes 
good to me, for 't haint b'en breathed by nothin' but wild 
creeturs. 'S 'n ole feller said 'at useter git up airly down 
in Rhode Islan' where my folks come from, I lufter 
treathe it 'fore common folks has. The smell o' the woods 
smells good to me, dead leaves 'n' spruce boughs, 'n' rotten 
wood; 'n' it don't hurt it none if it's spiced up a leetle bit 
with skunk an' mink an' weasel an' fox p'fumery." 
This paper offered the natural field for Mr. Robinson's 
genius, and it would have been a serious matter to its 
readers if he and they had not somehow met. 
Here, of course, are samples of Nessmuk, among them 
"A Chatty Letter" on some hunting experience in Michi- 
gan, and an extract from "Woodcraft" touching upon 
the same ground ; also canoeing notes and glances into the 
deer runways ifi Pennsylvania and the Adirondacks. They 
fairly represent the mixture of amusing adventure, prac- 
tical wrinkles and fine sportsman sentiment to which 
Sears' sprightly style gave such an inimitable charm. 
Listen to his protest against the game hog — I am sure the 
old man would be glad to have it again laid before us : 
"My sporting friends, will you heed a little logic from 
the standpoint of fifty years' experience? You work 
eleven months in the twelve at desk or bench. All through 
the year you are looking to an outing; a chance to get 
away for one, two or three weeks' vacation. You know 
and I know and we all know that you need it and deserve 
it. But why, in the name of all sense and reason, should 
you boast of 'bags' and 'baskets'? About how much, on 
an average, do you require of animal food, say, in twen- 
ty-four hours? If you kill more, why and wherefore? 
The man who brags to me of 'bags' and 'baskets' just 
tempts me to 'shoot him on the spot.' " 
Here is a copy of the fine bronze tablet which in one 
way perpetuates Nessmuk' s memory. Facing it is James 
Whitcomb Riley's memorial sonnet, and elsewhere Robin- 
son's more poetic prose tribute, written a year after the 
veteran's death. 
I was lucky enough to clip two of the contributions of 
Robert T. Morris. Would there were more. "Watching 
the Brant Grow Big" is ideal material for a sportsman's 
journal. There is nothing better in the books. Take this 
glimpse from the bayside blind: 
■''From out the west a merry flying rabble appears, buf- 
feting the winds, caring naught for the cold. A rabble of 
warm birds that on even line head down the bay with 
hurrying wings and outstretched necks, chanting as they 
go, and in good company. * * * To-night, when all 
is still in the cabin, yoii may hear those voices of the 
morning when nd birds are near. When you are at home 
in the city a strange weird music will come as you sit be- 
fore the grate fire in the twilight. The chimney winds 
have caught the cadence of the voices of the brant, and 
looking into the gloom of the room you will see again the 
moving wings that float adown the ceiling." 
Just beyond comes "The Autocrat of the Eddy, in 
which clever prose and verse preserve some of the delight- 
ful things that the angler sees and does. More power 
to the elbow of Dr. Morris. Long may he wave the fly- 
rod, the double-barrel and the pen. 
Robert B. Roosevelt is another who here celebrates the 
attractions of the Great South Bay. He wrote charming- 
ly of fishing and bay bird shooting years before the 
Rough "Riders" footed it up to Santiago and made Teddy 
a bigger man than his uncle. And among the briefer bits 
is still another, "Mv First Wild Goose," by Bay Ridge, 
that takes one to the same favorite waters. "Shinnecock 
Lighthouse loomed up cold and gray way down over the 
rough water of the bay, and as we were looking that way 
we spied two geese slowly forging up against the wmd, 
low down, close to the surface." There is a picture calcu- 
lated to stay with the reader, as it doubtless did with the 
writer. . , , 1 
T. S. Van Dyke was writing oftcner m the days when 
these sketches were clipped, and he got into one of the 
scrapbooks, to its enrichment. Here is his account of 
"Lassoing the Grizzly," that unique style of California 
sport, and here are his reminiscences of the duck hunters 
heaven at Senachwine Lake, where the big birds came 
only too thick and fast. No writer has a surer place m 
American sportsmen's literature than Van Dyke, 
My shears and mucilage captured some of Wilmot 
Townsend's short but sweet recollections of the woods 
and waters, and a couple of Paul Pastnor's. Seneca is 
here with "Leaves from a Log Book." interesting to me 
partly because I too had boated on the waters where the 
log book found its material. On another page a friend ot 
his and mine tells about Seneca's traits and his outmgs, 
winch bore fruit in "Canoe and Camp Cookery." I har- 
vested also certain of Kelpie's camp-fire sketches, and 
some of the brightest "flickerings" from that other "Camp- 
Fire" into which the jokers tossed their merry memories 
and inventions from time to time. Orin Belknap tells 
with "ghoulish glee" how "In Territorial Days" he cir- 
cumvented a flock of geese in the gloaming, and m an- 
other "Chapter of Hunting History" how, after killing 
some deer, he bent the deadly old Sharps by an accident, 
far from gunsmiths, and was disconsolate until he found 
he cound straighten it at the ranch by his own gumption. 
There was darky dialect in Forest and Stre.^m before 
Maior Mather's, and here are a couple of clever bits by 
The General, namely, "Uncle Isiah on the Hammerless, 
and "A Story of 1864." Brother Hough of "Chicago and 
• the West" (and East and North and South) dropped into 
it in an unguarded moment, and the result fills out very 
pleasantly between some longer selections. He had not 
then given the clipper so many chances as he noAV has, and 
his only other representative in these collections is one 
of the "Singing Mouse Stories," the one containing the 
fine "Atlantis" poem. If Brother Hough were not so 
much absorbed in purveying the serious information which 
the public necessarily yearns for, and could oftener give 
flight to his genius, he would be inore clippable. if less 
useful. , , , A 
Fishermen's yarns, of course, have place here. ^ Among 
them are the remarkable narrations of A, W, s 'Chance 
Acquaintance," with special reference to pickerel, and 
Fred Mather's story of "Cooking a Trout in Camp." The 
redoubtable Major was not then running the yarn mill 
on so full time as in later years, but one suspected from 
a mere sample what he could do if he tried. Wayway- 
anda in "What Luck?" points out beautifully the things 
that the angler catches without rod or line, and elsewhere 
discourses more practically of black bass fishing. I could 
not forego such a complete little bit as "Kellup's Trout," 
by Jefferson Scribb, and I would not have missed "The 
Last Trout," by the champion of all the trout story tellers. 
"Adirondack" Murray. In this he is at his best, as again 
in a rhapsody on "Outdoor Life," in which he salutes the 
fraternity: 
"Mild-mannered and light-hearted wanderers, boys with 
smooth or wrinkled faces, gray-haired some of us, but 
boys still, thank God, canoers, campers, yachtsmen, our 
fires are lighted on a thousand shores, and our evening 
song floats over a thousand lakes and island-studded 
rivers. We are a family of nature's saints. Our spirits 
have been touched and softened by the sweet grace of 
nature. W"e have been indoctrinated in the truths that 
shine out of stars, and which the blue heavens declare at 
noon and night. * * * All hail! ye healthy-bodied, 
healthy-minded, kindly-hearted, gentle-mannered saints 
of flood and field, of hill and river, of oar and sad, ot 
deck and camp. Your smiling faces rise before me in 
thousands, and your voices, in happy talk, m joke and 
=ong come from afar and stir the silence around me into 
laughter. Joke, laugh and rest on, ye thrifty vagabonds 
and gentle loafers; into each hour you are storing the 
honey of health, on which, in future days of toil and 
strain, your strength shall feed and fill itself with_ vigor. 
Writers for sportsmen are not usually so happy m verse 
a'^ in pro«e, but I found some such poems worthy of 
their company. A few satirize the trout fisher who comes 
home with purchased fish or none. In one Nessmuk re- 
lates his tribulations with an uncatchable big one. ^ iwo 
or three from the Atlanta Constitution smg the praise of 
"Fall Time in Georgia" like this: 
Fall time in Georgia 
Comes but onct a year; 
Ketcli the possum by the tail. 
Or ketch him by the earl 
But ketch him, 
O, ketch him, 
• An' 'crost the griddle stretcli him; 
Be certain that you fetcli him, 
For it's only onct a yeart' 
Or this: 
O, the meller, yeller aatuinn, or the MI, or what you please. 
When the gold is in your pocket and is growin' on the treesi 
An' you hear the partridge whistle, an' you hear the rifle ring. 
An' the doves they come a-tumblin' as you take 'em on the wing. 
Let 'em riml 
Get your gun. 
An' you'll fetch 'em every onet 
It's fall time in Georgia, 
An' the boys are havin' fun! 
Bret Harte's "Grizzly" follows Van Dyke's article above 
mentioned. One of the books is introduced with some 
good lines from McGaffey's "Poems of Gun and Rod," in- 
cluding these: 
And leaps my blood again, as one by one 
The old days rise, while nature's Circe-strain, 
That lures men on mid sun and wind and i-ain. 
Comes back to me o'er harps of tangled grass, 
And sets me dreaming of the rod and gun. 
Then comes a ringing poem by Maurice Thompson : 
Ho! for the marshes, green with spring, 
Where the bitterns croak and the plover pipe; 
Where the gaunt old heron spreads liis wing 
Above the haunt of the rail and snipe. 
For my gun is clean and my rod's in trim, 
And tlie old wild longing is roused in me. 
Ho! for the bass pools cool and diml 
Ho! for the swales of the Kankakee! 
' Next appears the one lapse into poetry which Mr. 
Robinson has attributed to Sam Lovel, 'and which to be 
sure has the Lovelian twang, as where he says: 
When the wild goose arrer is a-shooting from the cold, 
'Tain't the time o' year 'at a hunter grows old; 
When the crickits creaks slow an' the nights grows cold. 
The selections here mentioned are chinked in with many 
minor bits almost as good, each with its own claim of 
literary charm, or fidelity to nature, or essential interest 
of subject, or wholesome humor, to justify its preserva- 
tion. It is rather aggravating when other men sneak oflc 
and do our hunting and fishing for us while we are 
"chained to business," but we may forgive them and even 
thank them when they tell us about it so well. 
Bristol Hill. 
Stupidity of the Ruffed Grouse. 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
Many of your readers have perhaps heard that a whole 
covey of grouse can be shot out of a tree by each time 
selecting the lowest bird. But this bird's stupidity while 
on the ground was proved to be no less surprising by 
Thomas Newton, who lives two miles from Central City, 
W. Va. He discovered five of these birds under a cedar 
tree eating the berries that had fallen. At the time there 
was a few inches depth of snow, but the ground was quite 
bare under the tree. He shot five of them successively 
with a rifle at 50yds. distant. He took "rest" to make 
sure, aiming with perfect deliberation. When one would 
be in the throes of death the others would exhibit excite- 
ment very similar to that of domestic fowls over a de- 
capitated companion. N. D. Elting, 
Lynx in Essex County, New York. 
Eliz.\bethtown, N. Y., Jan. 31.— -Editor Forest and 
Stream: A large Canada lynx was shot and killed within 
two miles of this village at i o'clock P. M. to-day. The 
animal was shot by Robert Hays, near the residence of 
A. L. and E. G. Jenner in the town of Lewis. 
George L. Brown. 
