Aug. 17, 1901.] 
FOREST AND STREAM 
be the only consideration, regardless of who approves or 
disapproves. At best, the opinion of the multitude is of 
little vak:e. There will be sufficient diversity of opinion 
in it to prove almost anything. 
♦ 
^ 'Mid Reef and Rapid.-XVffi. 
BY F. R. WEBB; 
I sprang out instantly on to the dam, grasping the boat 
firmly Avith both hands, and straightening her up in time 
to avert the imminent capsize, for once the water begins to 
flow over the coaming in ever so shallow a sheet, the mis- 
chiel is-done, and the canoe is swamped in an instant. 
"Now, see what your monkeying around has done !" 
exclaimed the Colonel in derision, as I swung my boat 
around off the rocks, and into the shoot and slipped her 
easily over. 
''That's all right !" I exclaimed, as I drew Frankie 
around alongside the dam, and, stepping aboard dropped 
into my seat. "Let's see you do it any better ! I'll get 
out of your way," as I spoke paddling around into the 
lee of a big rock to see the Colonel hang up. 
'T can do it," he said, as he veered out from- behind 
the rock where he and Lacy were holding itp and shot 
swiftly out aci-oss the current, as hard as he could drive 
his canoe, for the shoot. 
The heaN^y. sidewise set of the current carried him 
clean past the narrow little gap, and Mary Lou brought up 
with a crash on the rocks alongside, and slid up on the 
dam until her bow projected clear out over the water 
below for over a third of her length, while her stern 
settled down until her after deck was imder water. 
"Yes; that's very good!" said I, as I let go without 
waiting to see the Colonel get out of his scrape and shot 
off swiftly down the narrow little channel below, while he 
porceeded to get out on to the dam, and with much push- 
ing, pulling, tugging and lifting, while Lacy still remained 
quietly in the lee of the reef above, laughing at his dis- 
comfiture, he managed to get his canoe clear, and around 
into the shoot, when she dropped quickly and easily over 
into the deep, rapid water below. 
I found the new channel through the falls below the 
dam by no means as easy as George and I had estimated. 
It was deep and swift, but quite narrow, and, as we were 
in the very heart of the falls, the river along here was a 
perfect wilderness of rocks, mostly of large size and high 
• out of the water, around and among which the channel 
twisted and turned, and wound in and out, to such a 
degree that it was by no means easy to run, and great 
watchfulness and care were required, in spite of which I 
M?ry nearlj' came to grief. 
Indecision and vacillation are not specially desirable 
qualities to possess under any circumstances, and when 
displayed by a canoeist in shooting a swift, rocky rapid, 
disaster is sure to follow. The canoeist must be prompt, 
quick, alert and decided — qualities in which I have not 
iisuallj' been found wanting — but I got rattled at one little 
place and came within a hair's breadth of scoring a very 
clumsy capsize in consequence. 
The channel led over a particularly ugly line of reefs in 
a little, narrow, deep, swift shoot, close to the cliff, and 
two or three boat lengths below a huge mass of rock 
loomed squarely up ahead, dividing the course into two 
channels, a short turn to right or left being necessary 
in order to secure either. 
The one to the right was broadest, but seemed to 
wander off into a mazy no thoroughfare of rocks and 
reefs, while the one next the bank was narrow and 
crooked. Neither, however, presented any special diffi- 
culty, and I am at a loss to understand why, as I swiftly 
approached, I was unable to make up my mind which to 
take. In view of the fact that I was but a couple of 
boat lengths away and bearing swiftly down upon the rock 
■ dividing the channel, it need scarcely be said that this 
indecision resulted in my taking neither. 
I first veered to the right, and then, when the nose of 
Frankie was within a yard of the rock, I threw her sharply 
around to take the left. The canoe would have swung 
around all right and I would have made the left channel 
by grazing the rock with my right gunwale, but the bow of 
Frankie caught on a sunken rock just above, and in an 
instant the swift current had caught the stern and the 
boat was thrown around squarely across the narrow little 
left hand channel, until the stern brought" up against the 
rocks on the left bank, and there she hung. The force of 
the current at once careened the canoe until the water, 
for the second time on this run, rushed over the decks and 
came up just level with the cockpit coaming. 
I well knew what would happen if that stream should 
dash over the coaming, and quickly shifted my weight to 
the other side, which at once went down into the water 
until I was again all but capsized, when I made the un- 
comfortable discovery that my keel at bow and stern was 
firmly hung a couple of inches below the waterline, so 
that the canoe had practically no bearings, and would not 
lie flat in the water, and was liable to go over on either 
side at the slightest motion. Just at this critical and in- 
teresting juncture I discovered the Colonel bearing down 
upon me from above, and a collision was imminent that 
was absolutely certain to involve a capsize for me. 
"Look out, there !" I yelled, in excitement. "Veer off 
to the right 1 Don't run into me ! A touch will swamp 
me! Veer ofif! Veer off!" 
"I will if I can !" the Colonel shouted in reply, as 
he swept the water into swirls and eddies with powerful 
strokes of his big 8ft. paddle. He slipped by to the right 
and passed on down, just grazing my bow with the bilge 
of his big, heavy canoe as he passed. 
This danger over I addressed myself to the task of 
getting out of my predicament. The most strenuous push- 
ing and poling with paddle and pike pole failed to pro- 
duce any further results than to tilt my canoe down into 
the water, first on one side and then on the other, with 
the imminent risk of a capsize at each and every tilt. My 
keel was too firmly wedged at each end. 
Very cautiously I attempted to step over into the water 
on the down-stream side, leaning my body up stream as 
I reached my leg over to preserve the delicate balance of 
mv canoe. 
'The entire length of my leg failed to develop any bot- 
tom. I then cautiously put down my 7ft. pike pole and 
found the bottom about 4ft. below. Securing a firm bold 
on the rocky bottom with my iron-pointed pole, I carefully 
rose, and, 'steadying myself with the pole, placed my 
foot on the coaming of my back hatch, and grasping the 
top of the pole firmly with both hands, sprang lightly out 
on the rocks astern, landing knee-deep in the water on a 
proiection of the rocks. 
Once firmly established here, it was an easy matter to 
lift the stern of Frankie off the rocks which held it, when, 
after drawing the bow off the rocks also, the canoe at once 
swung round into the little channel, and lay docile and 
obedient at my feet alongside the rocks, when I stepped in 
and seating myself and was Avhirled swiftly away toward 
the foot of the fails, whither George and the Colonel had 
preceded me. 
The falls ends with a particularly ugly and intricate 
piece of water. A huge, broken ledge extends clear 
across the river,* covering a space of rooyds. in length, with 
a fall of several feet, down over which the Avater rushes 
and roars with great force. 
At the bottom it is worn into somewhat of a horseshoe 
shape, and is peculiarly ugly and hazardous on the left 
side. The massive line of cliffs ends here in a bold 
stone promontory which juts out into the seething waters 
at the foot of the falls, which whirl and moan unceasingly 
around its base, while it towers aloft imposingly, until 
lost in the dense, encroaching forest which crowns the 
brow of the cliff, a couple of hundred feet above. The 
falls w^ould be easily passed on the right, but that a huge 
fish dam juts out from this bank, and extends over into 
the reefs on the left in a long, sharp, V-shaped line, with 
the apex of the V down stream, of course, where a 
passage might be made at a good stage of water, but at the 
present stage this shoot is impracticable, and the only 
passage is to portage the dam or run the reefs and falls. 
This latter George had succeeded in doing as Lacy and 
I approached, while the Colonel had shot down through 
the reefs and was lying up under the cliffs on the left above 
the final plunge of the falls, upon the rocks and reefs of 
which George had landed from below, to warn him of the 
dangers of the shoot, and was now coaching him as to 
the best place to go over, as the falls from his position 
were peculiarly ugly and hard to shoot. 
Lacy and I held back, in the little piece of slack water 
above the dam, to see the Colonel get out his scrape. 
"I don't like that place," said Lacy, as we surveyed the 
piece of water the Colonel had before him, the inner basin 
of the horseshoe below the encirchng line of falls being a 
perfect chaos of reefs, rocks and foam crested waves. "I 
am afraid the Colonel is going to get himself into a 
scrape down in that ugly hole. Suppose we portage the 
dam." 
"That's all right," said I; "I know a trick worth two 
of that. Let's see the Colonel get out of his scrape and 
then just you follow me and I'll guarantee that we'll go 
through without striking a rock." 
The Colonel got under way with a few vigorous sweeps 
of his bid paddle, and took the falls with a rush. 
"Look out ! Look out !" yelled George and Lacy in the 
same breath, as his boat landed in the suds below the 
falls and made straight for a broad, flat mass of rock 
which lay directly in his course, and whose upward sloping 
edge was above water on our side, while it sloped down 
under the surface on the down-stream side, and the 
v.'ater shot out across it in a smooth, flat sheet, falling 
over in a little cascade in mid-open. 
"By JoVe, he's gone!" exclaimed Lacy, as Mary Lou 
ran bodily up on to this rock. "That's no way to run a 
place like that! The Colonel's too brash, entirely!" 
The force with which Mary Lou slid up on to the rock, 
however, together with her headway and the powerful 
set of the current, carried her pretty well across, and she 
slid easily down the sloping side and over into deep water, 
and after careening dangerously close to the water's edge 
she passed safely on down. 
"I tell you that was a close call !" said Lacy, as he 
dipped his paddle into the water to follow me. 
"It \vas that!" I replied. "Now follow me closely, and 
we w^on't have a bit of trouble." 
I dropped my canoe cautiously down around the open, 
left-hand end of the big fish dam, back-paddling gently all 
ihe time, down among the ledges to the upper verge of 
the falls. I then drew her gently, stern first, back, close 
up under the rocky wall of the dam, into a clear little 
channel, but a couple of yards wide, which led close along 
down the long, left arm 'of the V formed by the dam, 
clear past all the reefs, to the point of the dam. at which 
place we found ourselves completely below the falls, with 
deep, smooth, swift water ahead of us, broken only by the 
heavy, foaming tongue of water out of the point of the 
dam, and the occasional black head of a rock, projecting 
above the surface. 
"I'll tell you what. Colonel," said Lacy, as we drifted 
companionly in a bunch down the deep, swiftly moving 
reach below the falls, the farm buildings of the Keyser 
place close at hand on the right bank, with the lane lead- 
ing down from the buildings to the river, just below which 
was our camping place. Three or four farm horses were 
coming down the lane at a brisk trot, their heavy 
harness jingling and clanking in rhythm with their rough, 
jolting trot, while behind them jolted and jingled another 
harnessed horse with a young man perched on his back. 
They splashed noisily into the water, into which they 
thrust their noses deeply, while the boy looked out on 
our passing fleet with interest, followed by recognition — 
he knew us — "I'll tell you what, Colonel, you'll get the 
most amizing spill one of these fine days if you don't 
quit rushing these shoots so recklessly." 
"That's all right," replied the Colonel. "I notice that 
I get through about as well as the rest of you do. with 
your monkeying around. I got through the falls better 
than the Commodore did, for all his backing and filling." 
"That's true," I admitted; "for I cetrainly made a par- 
ticularly clumsy run of it; but my mishaps were due en- 
tirely to carelessness, and not to my 'backing and filling,' 
as you call it," I continued, as I paddled gently up along- 
side a big wooden punt moored at our camp ground, into 
which I stepped, and then shoved my canoe aside to make 
room for the others to disembark. 
It was S '.30, and never were canoeists more glad to 
reach camp than were we, and we were quite tired out 
and in condition to thoroughly appreciate and enjoy the: 
good, stiff lemon preparation which I put up for the boys 
as soon as the camp duflle was well ashore and the canoes; 
carried up the .steep, sandy bank and placed in position! 
for the night, and we went about our camp duties in a. 
ILstless, lazy manner in keeping with our jaded condition,, 
and it was fully dark before we sat down to a good and': 
abundant supper, to which we did ample justice. 
After our pipes and cigars we turned in early, and' 
didn't put in much time reading either, and by 9 o'clock 
no signs of life were visible about the camp save the 
faint gleam of the lantern, suspended from one of the 
poles of the dining fly, while no sound broke the stillness 
of the night but the drowsy hum of the forest around 
us and the deep, subdued, musical drone of the falls a 
quarter of a mile above, borne in rising and falling 
cadences on the gentle night breeze which rustled 
caressingly through the leaves above us. 
[to be continued.] 
A, C A, Membefship. mm 
Atlantic Division — Mr. Joseph B. Taylor, 26 Cortlandt 
street, New York, Brooklyn C. C. 
■ — # — ■ 
Yachting Fixttjfes, 
Secretaries and members of race committees will confer a favor 
by sending notice of errors or omissions in the following list and 
also of changes which may be made in the future. 
AtlGUST. 
17. Manhasset Bay, club series races for points; open to knock- 
abouts (21 and 18ft.), cabin and open catboats, bay boats,, 
Manhasset raceabouts and sailing dories. Port Washingr 
ington, Long Island Sound. 
17. Shelter Island, club. 
17. Moriches, open. 
17. Wollaston, Quincy Bay, Boston Harbor. 
17. Corinthian, fifth club championship, Marblehead, Mass. Bay. 
17. South Boston, club handicap, City Point, Boston Harbor. 
17. New York, New Yxjrk Bay. 
17. Cohasset, knockabout, championship and handicap races, Co- 
hasset, Mass. 
17. Quincy, handicap, Quincy, Mass. 
17, Kennebec, club, Kennebec, Mass. 
17. Kennebec, club, Kennebec, Me. 
17. Winthrqp, special handicap, Winthrop, Mass. 
IT Indian Harbor, annual, Greenwich, Long Island Sound. 
17. Seawanhaka Corinthian, seventh race for Center Island cup. 
Oyster Bay, Long Island Sound. 
17. Hull-Massachusetts, club, Hull, Mass. 
17. Savin Hill, club Boston Harbor. 
17. Canarsie, Corinthian regatta, Tamaica Bay. 
17. Columbia, Chicago, Lake Michigan. 
24 Shinnecock Bay, association regatta, Shinnecock Bay. 
24. Corinthian, sixth club championship, Marblehead, Mass. Ba>. 
24. South Boston, ladies' day. City Point, Boston Harbor. 
24. Winthrop, class handicap, Winthrop, Mass. 
24. Cohasset, knockabout, championship and handicap races, Co- 
hasset, Mass. 
24. Hull-Massachusetts, club, Hull, Mass. 
26. Cape Cod, Provincetown, Mass. 
27. Wellfleet, Wellfleet, Mass. 
29. Plymouth, Plymouth, Mass. 
30. Kingstown, Kingstown, Mass. 
31. Duxbury, Duxbury, Mass. ^ 
31. Beverly, Corinthian, Monument Beach. 
31 Westhampton C. C, open. Y . 
31. East Gloucester, club, Gloucester, Mass. 
31 Marine and Field, Gravesend Bay. 
31. Shelter Island, Club. 
31. Cohasset, knockabout, championship and handicap races, Co- 
hcissct IMsss. 
31. Hull-Ma'ssachusetts, club, Hull, Mass. 
31. Hartford, annual, Saybrook, Long Island Sound. 
31. Huntington, special, Huntington, Long Island Sound. 
31. Manhasset Bay, club series races for points; open to knock- 
abouts (21 and 18ft.), cabin and open catboats, bay b;.jts, 
Manhasset raceabouts and sailing dories. Port Washing- 
ton, Long Island Sound. 
31. Larchmont, special. Larchmont, Long Island Sound. 
SEPTEMBER. 
2. Cohasset, knockabout, championship and handicap races, Co- 
hasset, Mass. 
2. Handicap, quincy, Mass. 
2. Indian Harbor, special, Greenwich, Conn. 
2. Annisquam, open, Ipswich Bay, Mass. 
2. Beverly, open. Monument Beach. 
2. Duxbury, ladies' day, Duxbury, Mass. 
2. 3. Corinthian, cruise. Marblehead, Massachusetts Bay. 
2. Lynn, Nahant, Massachusetts Bay. 
2. Gravesend Y. K. A., al! classes, Gravesend Bay. 
2. Norwalk, special. South Norwalk, Long Island Sound. 
2 Sachem's Head, annual, Saybrook, Long Island Sound. 
2. Larchmont, fall regatta, Larchmont, Long Island Sound. 
2. Atlantic, special, Sea Gate, New York Bay. - 
2. Pavonia, special, Bayonne, New York Bay. 
2. Canarsie, ladies' day, Canarsie, Jamaica Bay. 
2. Seawanhaka Corinthian, Oyster Bay, Long Island Sound. 
2. Burgess, Marblehead, Massachusetts Bay. 
3 Chicago. Chicago, Lake Michigiin. 
3 Shinnecock Bay, open, Shinnecock Bay. 
5, 6. Seawanhaka Corinthian, open special, Oyster Bay, L. I. 
Sound. 
7. Cohasset, knockabout, championship and handicap races, Co- 
hasset, Mass. 
7. Kennebec, club, Kennebec, Me. 
7. Beverly, open, Mattapoisett. 
7. Seawanhaka Corinthian, fall regatta, Oyster Bay, L. I. Sound. 
7. Atlantic, Sea Gate, New York Bay. 
7. Lynn, Y. R. A., rendezvous. 
12. New York, autumn sweepstakes. New York Bay. 
14. Hull-Massachusetts, club, Hull, Mass. 
14. Brooklyn, fall regatta, Gravesend Bay, New York Bay. 
14. Larchmont, Larchmont, Long Island Sound. 
14. Indian Harbor, fall regatta, Greenwich, Conn. 
14. Manhasset Bay, club series races for points; open to knock- 
abouts (21 and 18ft.), cabin and open catboats, bay boats, 
Manhasset raceabouts and sailing dories. Port Washing- 
ton, Long Island Sound. 
14. Atlantic, fall regatta. Sea Gate, New York Bay. 
21. Kennebec, club, Kennebec, Me. 
21. America Cup race, Sandy Hook. 
21. New York C. C, fall regatta, Gravesend Bay. 
21. Manhasset Bay, fall regatta. Port Washington, L. I. Sound. 
21. Canarsie, commodore's cup races, Canarsie, Jamaica Bay. 
28. Manhasset Bay, fifth series race for Jacob cup, Port Washing- 
ton, Long Island Sound. 
At the annual election of the Sea Cliff Y. C, 
held at the club house at Sea Cliff on Thursday, Aug. 8, 
the following officers for the ensuing year were elected: 
Com., Theo. W. Sheridan, sloop Madcap; Vice-Corn., 
Charles E. Silkworth, sloop Impudent ; Treas., C. S. Dun- 
ning; Sec'y, C. Sackert Chellborg; Trustees for three 
years, Samual Stenson and Dwight W. Pardee. The 
Treasurer's report showed the finances of the club to be in 
the best condition since its organization. 
