May 12, 1900.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
863 
is hunting. A man who has often been in his company 
"f late years., says: "Lige never likes to be seen. When 
1 want to take a short cut across a meadow, he'll put his 
veto on it, and we'll go round among the cedars instead, 
or follow the alders by the brook." 
Postscript. 
■Elijah Simonds died April 3, six months after this 
sketch was written. His intimate friend, Mr. George L. 
Brown, _ editor of the Elizabethtown Post, thus sums up 
some of the salient features of his personality: 
"In many respects Elijah Simonds differed materially 
from the general run of men who hunt and trap for a 
living. In the first place he was modest to a marked 
extent, never bragging about his exploits in the woods, 
and in appearance was the beau ideal of the old-time 
country gentleman, nothing in the nature of uncouthness 
being in bis make up. Visiting him at his home at various 
times during recent years, we invariably found him neatly 
dressed, his white starched shirt and collar being notice- 
able,_a5 few of the old time hunters don such habiliments 
even upon extraordinary occasions. His clean shaven face, 
high forehead and iron gray hair surmounted a form 
slightly bent bent with advancing age and impressed one 
as being extremely unusual accompaniments of a man 
who had killed 3,000 deer, 3,000 foxes, 150 bears, 7 
panthers and 12 wolves, and who had without any reason- 
able doubt whatever catight more mink and marten than 
any other man that ever lived in the Adirondacks. No 
man was ever more attentive to the object of his affec- 
tion than was Elijah Simonds, and no man ever had a 
neater or more faithful helpmate than he. Together they 
labored cheerfully, first to make their home comfortable 
and convenient, and afterward to beautify it. Mild in 
manner at all times, Elijah Simonds was a great lover of 
home and its surroundings, as the gradual building up 
of his place attests. 
"Elijah passed his last 3'ears peacefully in the town 
of his nativity and but a few miles distant from the hill 
that will bear his name to the end of time." 
J. B. BURNHAM. 
The Broad Fording. 
"A WRITER of memoirs," says Taine, "has a right 
to record his infantine impressions. A Latin lesson, a 
soldier's march, a ride behind some one, become im- 
portant events embellished by distance." It is only on 
this principle that the stories of garrulous old age can 
be justified. 
One of the favorite haunts of the youth of my native 
town in my boyhood was the Broad Fording. This Avas 
the crossing of the Conemaugh south of the town and 
about a mile distant. The ford was a curve line along 
the inner margin of a slight dam formed of stones, which 
I should think, from its appearance, must have been 
made at some early date for a fish weir. Such a dam in 
western Pennsylvania is called a riffle. I do not find the 
term in any of my dictionaries, except that Stormouth 
gives the German riiHe as the equivalent to ripple. 
There were several points of interest for a boy at the 
Broad Foi'ding. The riffle, if it did not form, at least 
helped to form a deep pool above, as wide as the river 
and many rods in length. The shore along here on our 
side of the stream was sloping, smooth and sandy. Along 
the shore in the deepest part of this pool grew a great 
profusion of broad-leafed water lilies, which, in their 
season, bore great white-petaled flowers that rested on 
■the surface of the water. Just beyond the line of lilies 
was a famous fishing place. Salmon and perch lingered 
there, and there was a tradition that a pike of fabulous 
dimensions had been caught there at some prehistoric 
date. One thing is certain — ^the large water newt, the 
hellbender, which was locally known as the alligator, was 
there in plenty, and in the fishing season — and nearly any 
time was fishing season in those days — a great fire of 
drift wood was always burning on the shore, into which 
the unfortunate alligator was ruthlessly flung with all 
his imperfections on his head, if he trespassed upon the 
hook that had been baited for other prey. Boys are 
naturally cruel and unfeeling, and the writhings of the 
poor hellbender in the fire were cause of merriment rather 
than of commiseration. Happily a better tone of feeling 
even among boys, to say nothing of a wholesome fear 
of the humane societies, goes far toward putting a stop 
•to such cruelty now. Great buttonwood trees grew about 
here and cast deep shadows upon the water. Just across 
the river was a little house, the home of the ferryman, 
who kept a skiff for the transfer of pedestrians across 
the water. A short distance above this smooth expanse 
was the lower end of the Alum Bank, and the breadth 
of a field beyond the ferryman's house was the Pennsyl- 
vania Canal. 
Just below the ford, at our side of the river, was a 
deep pool called "the swirlhole." It was simply an eddy, 
perhaps a couple of rods across in any direction, and so 
deep that the bottom was invisible. "What one can see, 
but cannot see over," says Carlyle, "is the infinite." This 
swirlhole was believed by the boys to be bottomless, and 
that anything that floated into it was at once seized 
by some invisible power and whirled around until it was 
finally drawn under and forever swallowed up. A picture 
of the Maelstrom of the Lofoden Islands on the coast of 
Norway, in "Olney's Geography," the text book we used 
in school, and the description of that wonderful whirlpool 
as given in the book, fully realized to our minds the 
Hwirlhole at the Broad Fording. Anything once swal- 
lowed up there never came to the' surface again. It v/as 
reported and believed "in my day" that a wagon and six- 
liorse teain belonging to Judge Moorhead had been lost 
tliere, and that "yellow Sam," the driver, a red-headed 
darky, whose bite was said to be fatal, had jumped off 
only in time to save his life. Certain it is that at the 
lower side of the whirlpool could be dimly seen in the 
v.'ater certain pieces of timber, which were said to be 
fragments of the lost wagon. They were objects of 
much childish interest and speculation. In all my boy- 
hood I never knew a fellow who had the temerity to 
enter the whirlpool. Even Al Van, who could jump 
from "Sam Patch" and the "Sod" at "the Rocks," drew 
the line at the swirlhole. 
.A.bout yellow Sam, mentioned above, it was further re- 
ported a"nd believed that once a six-horse team that he 
was driving — he seemed to have had a penchant for six- 
horse teams — was struck by lightning, that the horses 
were killed and the wagon burned up on the spot, and all 
that saved Sara from destruction were the leather flaps 
of the saddle. A man whos* bite was said to be venom- 
ous and who had had two such hairbreadth escapes from 
sudden death was always regarded with a good deal of 
awe and wonderment. 
I recall a sweet summer day about the year 1850, when 
I accompanied my father to the river bank, when he 
drew a picture of the Broad Fording. It was the period 
before the kodak. The original water-color sketch has 
all the simplicity and charm of Bewick. I wish it were 
possible to reproduce it. 
In the immediate vicinity of the Fording stood several 
immense black walnut trees. They were too large in 
the trunk for anybody to climb, and we could club down 
only a few of the great golden spheres from where they 
hung on the lower limbs, and were constrained to wait 
for the frosts of late October to bring down the coveted 
fruitage. How pleasant it seems now and was then to 
walk among the fallen yellow leaves and gather the nuts, 
then to sit down by the accumulated heap and hull them; 
and how little we regarded the deep brown stains on 
our hands that would yield to no soap, but only to the 
slow chemistry of time. Here, too. at the edge of Sloan's 
"lower woods," grew finer and better mulberries than I 
ever find nowadays (or else the fault is in myself), rasp- 
berries, occasional mushrooms and black haws in 
abundance, toothsome and rich to the boyish taste when 
the November winds were sighing through the leafless 
branches. 
Not far below the whirlpool, just where the canal came 
out into the slack water, was the mouth of a small stream 
called McGee's Run. The entrance into this run and for 
a short distance up the stream was overshadowed by 
heavy foliage, and the shores lined with thickets and 
underbrush. The backwater from the river filled the 
lower part of the run, so as to afford abundant water for 
skiffs, and I have never seen a more delightful place in 
which to lie at ease in a skiff on a hot summer afternoon 
than under the umbrageous trees along McGee's Run. A 
inile more or less up i:his stream once stood Wallace's 
Fort, one of the numerous small posts of refuge and 
defense that stood along the Pennsylvania border in the 
old days of trouble with the red men of the forest. Some 
traces of the ancient fortification were still recognizable 
in my boyhood. I believe no vestige of it now remains, 
No famous deeds were ever performed at old Fort 
Wallace, yet stirring enough scenes took place there to 
make m_emorable the spot in our local annals. The most 
tragic of these events took place in the last week of 
April, 1778, when the fort was attacked by a band of In- 
dians and Tories, and nine men were killed. Frequent 
attacks were made from time to time upon the fort, and 
many skirmishes were had aronud its walls, in which lives 
were lost and many persons made captives by the In- 
dians. The fate of those taken prisoners was generally 
more dreadful than instant death. 
From the mouth of McGee's Run the broad, smooth 
slack water extended on down to the dam, just at the 
lower edge of the town. On one side of this sheet of 
water the banlc was mostly low and flat; on the opposite 
side a high wooded ridge called Coal Hill looked down 
over the towpath, and all afternoon cast a heavy shade 
over that side of the river. The boats gliding along 
there on the dark mirror-like surface were reflected from 
below, and like Wordsworth's swans on St. Mary's Lake, 
"Float double, swan and shadow." 
The whistle of the driver on the towpath, and even 
the creaking of the harness on the laborious mule, were 
echoed afar by the hillside, while the sound of a pike 
pole dropped on the deck of the boat I remember rever- 
berated like the report of a gun. This piece of slack 
water, nearly two miles in length, was famous for its 
beauty, and its shores for its "swimmin' holes" and 
fishing places. 
Two or three years ago I walked with my brother down 
to the old Broad Fording. The winding road had been 
made as straight as a ruler. The ford was no longer 
there. An iron bridge spanned the river. Just over the 
side of the bridge was the swirlhole, but a swirlhole 
no longer— merely a little patch of water and so shallow 
that a child could have waded through it with perfect 
safety. The walnut trees, the buttonwood trees, the 
mulberry trees— all had gone. The canal on the other 
side of the river had been abandoned for many years, and 
potatoes were growing in the channel. The ferryman's 
house and his skiff had both disappeared. A town had 
been built on the spot, and everything had changed, 
Wc canie away pensively enough, feeling tliat we, too, 
had changed, and perhaps thinking of that other greater 
change which still awaited us, and which to one of us 
has since befallen. 
"There was a time when meadow, grove and stream, 
The earth and every common sight, 
To me did seem 
Apparaled in celestial light. 
The glory and the freshness of a dream: 
It is not now as it has been of yore; 
Turn wheresoever I may. 
By night or day. 
The things which I have seen I now can see no more! ' 
■J T. J. Chapman. 
It was at Amsterdam, in one of the canals nearly oppo- 
site the end of the Jews' quarter, and on Sunday. The 
phlegmatic fisherman sat with his legs dangling over the 
side, and arnied with the crudest possible instruments of 
his craft — ^a "rod" made of long willow slip, a hempen, 
not gut, line — and an ordinary hook. He baited the 
hook with what I thought at first sight was a kind of 
white worm, b-ut which I discovered on closer investiga- 
tion to be small "pipes" of boiled potato. To make these 
"pipes" he had a hollow cylinder (cut from the willow) 
about 3 inches long, and a piston of wood made to exactly 
fit it. He filled the cylinder with potato, then inserted the 
piston, and the "stem" or "pipe" of bait came out. — Life. 
The FoKBST AND Stbzau !s put to press each week on Tuesday. 
Correspondeace intended for publication should reach as at Ike 
latest by Moaday aa4-W' mwet cariicr «« pnctiGaMa. 
The Harriman Alaska Expedition. 
X.— The Far Seals of the Prifailof Islands. 
The fur seals, the largest colonies of which are now in 
Bering Sea, formerly had relatives in vast numbers at 
different points along the coasts of South America, South 
Africa, Australia and New Zealand, as well as on many 
of the islands of the Antarctic seas. Most of these were 
long ago exterminated for their fur, but here and there 
at various points small colonies still exist, too inconsider- 
able to tempt the greed of fur sealers; or in two or three 
cages, as on the Auckland Islands, on Lobos Island, in 
Uruguay, and on Ichaboe Island, S. A., such colonies 
are protected by law. The fur seals of the South belong 
to a different genus (Arctocephahis) from those of the 
North {Callorhinus or Callotaria), which at the present 
day inhabit the Pribilof Islands, the Komandorski group 
and an island oft' the coast of SakhaHn known as Robben's 
Reef. Formerly there were other rookeries in the Sea 
of Okhotsk — Musir, Raikoke, Srednoi and Broughton — 
but these are practically extinct. 
The fur seals and their allies — the sea lions and wal- 
ruses, sometirnes known as the eared seals — are consid- 
ered by naturalists to be related to the bears — that is to 
say, they are descended from the same ancestor as the 
bear, but branched off from the main stem long ago and 
became adapted to a truly aquatic life. Thus their com- 
mon name, sea bears, really indicates their true affinity. 
The different sexes and ages of the fur seals of the Pribi- 
lof Islands are known by names which are oddly incon- 
gruous. The adult male of seven years or older, which 
weighs from 350 to 450 pounds, and is about 6 feet in 
length, is called the bull. His general color is dark brown 
or blackish, with longer hairs or bristles of yellowish 
white or gray. From his strength and fighting powers 
he was formerly called a beach master, an appropriate de- 
scriptive name. 
The female is much smaller, paler in color, about 4 feet 
in length and weighing about 70 pounds. 
The young male, which up to his third year is similar 
to the female in color and size, is called a bachelor. This 
is the animal which on the islands is killed for his skin, 
and it is at this age that the fur is at its best. After the 
long gray hairs appear on the back the value of the skin 
becomes less, until the skin of the adult bull is worthless 
as fur. In his fifth and sixth year the male grows rapidly, 
and approaches the adult bull in size, when he is known as 
a half bull. At seven years he is ready to take his place 
on the rookery, though sometimes, from lack of strength 
or lateness of arrival at the island, such bulls secure no 
place in the rookeries and rear no families. 
The yearling seals have no place in the rookeries. At 
this age the males and females look alike, and the males 
spend a part of their time associated with the older bach- 
elor seals. The females reach the "island late and spend 
their time on the rookeries with the young of the year. 
The young fur seals are known as pups. At birth they 
are black in color, weigh about 11 pounds, and at first 
are helpless, although after a short time they become 
able to move about and take care of themselves. At about 
three months old the black coat is shed, and its place is 
taken by a new one of gray. By this time the pup has 
doubled or trebled in weight. 
The seals begin to arrive at the Pribilof Islands in May, 
the date of their appearance depending somewhat on 
the movement of the drift ice. This ice packs about the 
islands and does not disappear until the last of April, or 
sometimes the last of May. Cases are recorded where 
the animals have landed on the ice and traveled over it 
for a mile or more to take up their places on the rook- 
eries, which were then covered with snow. In 1895, when 
the ice remained about the island until late in May, 
roads were cut in it through which the animals passed to 
reach their stations. 
The first of the seals to arrive are the bulls. They come 
gradually ; at first one or two on each rookery, but grad- 
ually more and more, until, by the early days of June, 
most of them have arrived and established themselves at 
their stations. Usually the oldest bulls land first, the 
younger following, and the half bulls and idle bulls being 
still later. Among these young animals are no doubt 
many which have now attained their full strength, and 
which may take up stations, driving out the oldest and 
weakest of the mature bulls. The bachelors begin to 
come at about the same time as the buUs. The first drives 
for skins take place about the middle of June, and they 
continue to be made for nearly two months. 
It is about June 10 that the adult cows begin to come, 
at first one by one, but gradually in increasing numbers, 
until toward the last of the month almost all haye arrived. 
They come up from the water with little ceremony and 
establish themselves near it on the station of some bull, 
seeming to choose the place where the greatest number of 
seals are gathered, a hundred cows being sometimes in 
charge of a single bull. The pups are born soon after the 
arrival of the cows, and five or six days later the cow 
returns for the first time to the water, and soon after this 
begins to make her jotirney to the fishing grounds, for 
the cow must eat in order that her pup may feed. 
The bulls, on the other hand, which in May come up 
from the water, extremely fat, and which remain at their 
stations for months without visiting the water, do not 
eat daring all this time. They become less and less fat 
• as time goes on, and by the end of the breeding season 
are very thin, 
The number of cows in charge of a single bull varies 
greatly. We saw one station where there were but two 
cows, and many where there were thirty-five or forty. 
There are recorded instances where a bull has held 150 
cows, by count, and the number may sometimes be even 
greater. A bull is the master of his family. If a cow 
tries to move away, he threatens her at first with his 
voice, and if this is not obeyed he catches her with his 
mouth and perhaps picks Iier up and carries her back to 
her place. Often cows are badly torn and bitten by the 
bulls; sometimes they arc even killed. 
The fighting of the bulls, which takes place at the 
height of the breeding season, is often very serious. Some 
- of these battles are continued until one or the other dies, 
probably more from exhaustion than from the injur ie.s 
inflicted by the teeth, which are their only weapons, the 
thick skins and the heavy coat of blubber preventing 
wounds that would be deadly. Often while two bulls 
