FOREST AND STREAM 
[May id, 
up, twenty, thirty, forty and more feet in height, and the 
water would back up and spread out over the bottoms 
seeking new channels, carrying with it the jagged ice 
which tore up the ground and underbrush, and in places 
cut in two or carried away large trees. And then with a 
deafening roar the jam would break and let out the awful 
flood of water, ice, and debris, only to stop and pile up 
again a short distance further down the stream. It 
jammed just below our post, which was thirty feet above 
the river, and in five minutes the water was four feet deep 
in the buildings, and but that it soon broke the place 
must have been swept away. We had just time to run 
to the hills, and there we stood, shivering, expecting to 
see everything carried down the stream. In the warehouse 
nearly two thousand robes were wet and had to be re- 
tanned. Of a pile of sugar, nothing was left but the sacks, 
and many other goods were ruined. Cottontail rabbits and 
prairie dogs in the bottoms were well nigh exterminated; 
deer were killed by hundreds, and many buffalo were 
caught by the freshet. Even the beaver were drowned 
out, and in many cases crushed by the ice. 
Few people knew that here in the bad lands lying south 
of the Round Butte and between it and the Musselshell, a 
small herd of buffalo ranged until three years ago. They 
were the very last of the great northern herds, some thirty- 
five head, and the country they roamed so wild, so diffi- 
cult of access, that the men who knew they were there 
hoped that they would thrive and increase. These were 
the great cattle owners of the far-away Judith Basin, 
whose herds roamed the range for several hundred miles 
in every direction. Each spring they sent their cowboys 
into this rough country to drive out the cattle to their 
branding corrals, and when the buffalo were discovered 
the word was given that no employe was to kill or molest 
them under pain of something much worse than the loss 
of a job. When first found, there were only eighteen 
head of the buffalo, and part of them were bulls. But 
year by year the little herd increased, until there were 
thirty-five, counting calves. And then? Why those 
worthless, sneaking scavengers of the plains, the French 
half-breeds, in some way learned of their existence. Per- 
haps some cowboy in his cups made known the fact. The 
word spread. Down came the tattered lodges of the camp 
at Lewistown, away up in the Judith country, and a slow- 
moving column of creaking carts, drawn by skinny 
cayuses, started out for the slaughter. And it was com- 
plete. Riding the high ridges, scanning the broken coun- 
try from the tops of the tall buttes, the scouts finally 
found the little herd. There was to be no chasing, no old- 
time run, because by that method some few might escape. 
Signals were' waved back to the on-coming column, the 
hunters, Baptiste and Bogard, Bonaparte, Seviere, and 
all the rest came hurrying up on their scrawny ponies, 
cautiously made the surround, closed in, and slaughtered 
every one of the animals. Alas ! Alas ! Of little use are 
our game laws so long as these Canadian breeds are al- 
lowed to remain in the State. There is talk of rounding 
them up and driving them back across the international 
line. Let us all do what we can to forward that much-de- 
sired end. 
When the night settled down over the valley, several 
bands of wolves began their evening chorus, and the owls 
in the trees about joined in. Sah-ne-to does not like owls; 
they are not birds, according to her philosophy, but the 
reincarnation of deceased "medicine men," and prone to 
do serious mischief to us poor mortals. 
Appekunny. 
A Walk Down South.-XXVIII. 
At 4:45 o'clock on the morning Mr. Anderson's son 
came and routed us out by the light of a lantern. It was 
bright moonlight, but no faint ray of the dawn was yet 
to be seen. We sat around the blazing fire, the bright 
light shining on our faces, with curious shadows — the 
Indian, the mountaineer, the white-haired veteran of the 
lost cause — talking away the time till daylight. At last the 
sky quickened, and with that we took our duffle and bread 
boxes to start for the raft across a wet cornfield. We 
waded to our shins in the soft clay. 
On the raft, a great black rectangle, all was still. I 
put together the sticks of a fire and they two untied the 
cable and thrust the raft steadily into the current by long 
sweeps of the oars. The two walk logs on which the oars- 
men stood, were twelve feet long, a board snugly fitted 
between them to give something to hold the feet. With 
one foot against the hickory binder, the oarsman drew 
the handle of the oar to his breast at the throat, and with 
both hands on it walked to the other binding, where he 
turned clear of the end of the oar and walked back, hold- 
ing the handle low, on the log toward the first binding, 
where the stroke was begun again. The handle swept 
through three and a half of my steps, say ten feet. In 
less than five minutes of the work I began to have an 
understanding sympathy for the ga4Iey slave. 
But I built. the fire that morning, and soon had hot 
coffee boiling, and in a broad eddy or still water, a short 
distance below Anderson's eddy, we sat down to eat, while 
the raft thrust ahead, always with that little swirl round 
each end of the bow, and the tumble of disturbed sedi- 
ment in the water close to the logs. 
It was coming sunrise, a saffron glow, followed rapidly 
by a streaking of red, then a silver white, after which the 
sun lost its glow in the leaden murk that covered the rest 
of the sky. It was delightful to eat there with these 
strange Americans while the day came on. A frontier 
meal of pork, corn pone and bread, while a forest and 
cornfields went by, just enough chill to make the fire seem 
generous. Red horse gnats came flying aboard. They 
were like northern sap bugs, only larger, a curious insect 
that gathers in great clouds and swarms on the branches 
of trees in summer nights, so thick that they are like 
the clumps of drift clinging to the twigs. 
While I played the French harp — "Step Light, Ladies," 
"The Irishman's Shanty," etc. — they manned the sweeps, 
dancing to the music — a long-limbed, perpendicular back- 
bone dance at the stern, a crouching hop, clawing dance 
at the bow, where the Indian was, a sort of gyrating, 
Adirondack breakdown by the fire where I was. 
Leaning against the door of a log cabin several hun- 
dred yards down .stream, was a man, his head bowed, his 
knees bent, his shoulders stooped. He heard us. His 
head straightened up, then his knees, then his back, till 
hi was all erect, with his head twisted to catch the 
sounds, and eyes shaded to see the sights coming down 
the river. A baby came to the door, then a grown girl, 
then some more babies and some more girls, by and by a 
boy or two, and then at last a big bulk of a youth plowed 
through the obstructed door and stood out before them 
all ; there they were while the sawbuck tenor aft roared : 
''Old Satan chased me 
Round the stump, 
I thought he'd catch me 
Every jump. 
Little David play on yer harp!" 
Dancing against the sweep while two big gray patches 
flared on his otherwise black suit of clothes. The audi- 
ence grew enthusiastic; so did the show. 
When we were round the bend Ball at the stern wiped 
the sweat off his forehead and out of his hat with his 
elbow. 
"Say, Abe," he yelled forward, "I told you we was 
going to have a good time this trip." 
"Yep ; I just knowed it," Abe replied with a grin. Then 
Abe sang a fragment of the corn dance in Indian and 
danced. 
Here and there were banks of the stream that had be- 
gun to cave off. "Carp digging and rooting in the mud 
done it," said Indian- Abe. He said that the carp are so 
plenty that they wear into the mud and have caused a 
good deal of damage in this way. 
The scenery was beautiful. The Seven Furnaces, for 
instance, were seven great columns of rock jutting from 
a cliff, like monster bay windows, decorated with the 
natural curtains of moss and twig lacery. There were 
banks of trees, too, and a general look of nature even in 
the cornfields, which had been washed over by the stream 
in the last tide. 
On the hills in the elms were many Baltimore orioles 
calling. The Indian said they cried "White sucker, white 
sucker, white sucker," and called them summer birds. 
In the cliffs of rocks there were caves in which raftsmen 
sometimes take refuge from the weather at night. 
Strange and thrilling these caves are to look at. The 
dense black entrances, with the mystery of the unknown 
hanging over them, and the idea, not so very dim, that 
in these places the frontiersmen and Indians played the 
original game of hide and seek, have a look that is 
thrilling. 
"I make you a little joke," Abe said to me at one place. 
"When I was hunting one time I find some bad Indians 
in a cave — there ! I pick those stones up there and throw 
them in the entrance — so ! Hah !" 
The rocks were as large as a hall bedroom and did 
seem to cover the entrance of a cave — so I was face to 
face with an old tradition. Just above Tampico, a river- 
side village, was Buffalo Ford, named so in the days 
when the buffalo trails were to be seen in that country, "so 
wide that three wagons could be driven abreast in one 
of them." We saw some ducks and buzzards, where the 
spirits of the wasted herds may have remarked the change 
in firearms from their day to this. 
There was about a seven-foot tide in the river — tow 
heads were overflowed and trees along the bank sur- 
rounded by water. A few rolls in the water — waves 
caused by a shoal — gave the raft an undulating motion, so 
snake-like that I shuddered. 
At intervals during the day a misty rain fell, but with 
a hot fire its evil effects were averted. Sometimes in 
eddies both the raftsmen came to the fire to warm. Then 
Abe would draw the red stockings which served as his 
mittens from his hands and thrust his brawny, wrinkled 
fists into the blaze and turn them over, just as he had 
been doing at raft fires for forty years. 
"I love to drop over to yon bank," he would say; "it 
saves fighting down below." Then they would go to 
the sweeps and and make the oars creak on the dry, wear- 
ing pegs. 
A little before dusk we made another landing. Under 
my boat the less valuable stuff was piled out of the rain, 
and then we went bed-hunting in a rainstorm. The river 
landings were known to them. They had been to this 
one many times, but they climbed the hill instead of go- 
ing round it, and for nearly an hour, it seemed to me, we 
wandered along wood paths to a road, and round to a 
house, which we found by a light; thence on again, back 
down across a dark, wide, muddy cornfield through the 
dark, till, at last, on a knoll, we came to a house for 
which we were hunting. We dried and warmed before 
the fire, and then all went to bed'in the room where 
there were four beds and a couple of cots. It was a com- 
fortable sleep. In the morning it was colder and still 
wet. We started for the river, and once more roamed 
over an extra mile before we got to the raft, but once 
there we started away at once, and as usual I built a fire 
and soon had hot coffee. I took the pail off the fire with 
my bare hand, and the bail burned across three fingers in 
a way that was painful for hours. We had wheat bread, 
cold chicken, apple butter pie, pear jelly and cookies for 
breakfast, beside corn bread and pork. 
When it was broad daylight I started out after firewood 
in the raft's canoe. It was a sixteen-foot long, eight-inch 
side affair, modeled after the old style dugout, a long 
slope up at each end, and only 20 inches or 22 inches 
wide. I ran very easy. I paddled ahead of the raft a 
hundred rods and found a pile of drift, from which I 
began to fill my canoe— fence rails, boards, dead limbs 
and other dry stuff. The raft came slipping by sooner 
than I expected, and might have got out of sight had not 
the men yelled at me. » 
I paddled after the raft soon and with my load at the 
fire pit, I started out for a little ride. I ran along the 
bank to a brook, up which I tied the canoe and looked 
for arrowheads, finding a few in spite of the deposit of 
sediment. After a while I started leisurely after the 
raft. I got to a long still water, and it was nowhere in 
sight, whereupon I started in pursuit. The raft was 
nearly an hour ahead of me by my paddling, but after a 
while I saw the distant blue smoke far away over the 
smooth yellow surface, and then "raised" the raft and 
soon was once more on board. We passed Strawberry 
Plains, where Longstreet stopped a Federal cavalry raid, 
before long. 
We were nearing the Tennessee River by this time. 
The raftsmen grew expectant ; they talked less and looked 
at the bank with sweeping glances, and down the Holston 
with a searching gaze. 
A wide bottom, a few trees and houses growing plenti- 
ful gave signs of something important happening in the 
geography thereabouts. A top of some stone derricks on 
the other side of a ridge — a big marble quarry — was on 
the French Broad River. Then Abe, looking across the 
lower end of the ridge, said : 
"Yes, sir, we've got French Broad eddied. We're a 
foot higher at feast." There was a touch of pride in the 
tone. 
The next moment the raft went gliding out of the mouth 
of the Holston— I glanced back at that river, glanced up 
the French Broad, and then, with a flutter of the heart, 
turned and looked down the Tennessee toward which I 
had been traveling since Oct. 4. 1901. It was now 2:10 
P. M. o'clock on Jan. 30, 1902. For nearly four months 1 
had been coming — the thought made me so weak that I 
sat down. Raymond S. Spears. 
— ♦ — 
In a Cup of Mud.* 
BY EDWARD A. SAMUELS. 
On reaching the house we found that Mrs. Murray's 
son, Ralph, who had . obtained a short vacation at the 
academy, at which he was studying, had arrived during 
cur absence, and was standing at the door to welcome us. 
_We returned his greetings warmly, for he had proved 
himself to be not only an intelligent guide, but also a 
most estimable young man — one who was destined to 
make his mark in the world. 
"This is a pleasant surprise, indeed," said the Doctor as 
he grasped his hand. 
"Yes," replied the young man, "and it is almost as 
much a surprise to me as it is to you, for I had no 
thought of coming until yesterday, when I received 
Phoebe's letter announcing that you were here, and then 
I made up my mind to drop my studies at Annapolis for 
a short time and come home." 
Ralph was struggling for an education, and to obtain 
it was obliged to work very hard and make many sacri- 
fices. In the winter he taught school o'r worked with 
the lumbermen, and in the summer and autumn he worked 
on the farm, and when opportunity offered he added to 
his modest income by "guiding" and assisting surveyors 
to "run out lines" through the long stretches of forest 
which lay around the settlement. 
"We are very glad that' you have come," said I, as we 
passed into the house, "for you can relieve John for a 
few days, if you wish, and that will permit him to do a 
little farm work that seems to be pressing just now." 
"I shall be very glad to," answered Ralph, "and I hope 
we may continue to have as good success as you have had 
since your arrival." 
On entering the house we emptied, the contents of the 
birch cup that we had collected into a bowl and set it 
aside for further examination. 
"You returned, just in time," said Mrs. Murray. "I 
have cooked some of your birds for dinner and the large 
trout, and it would have been a pity to have them spoiled 
by waiting." 
"Yes," replied the Doctor, "we have returned in good 
season, and with good appetites, too; your glorious Sep- 
tember air would make a dyspeptic hungry." 
The dinner was admirably cooked, and it was discussed 
with a keen relish. 
The afternoon passed quietly, and when supper had 
been partaken of; we assembled, as usual, in the cozy little 
sitting room. 
"Well," said the Doctor, when the lamps were lighted 
and the curtains were drawn, "I suppose you would like 
to examine through the microscope some of the creatures 
in my bowl of mud. I will get it in a few minutes and we 
will begin our investigations." 
"Yes," I replied, "and I know we shall find something 
that will prove very interesting." 
At this juncture a knock was heard at the door, which 
was followed by the entrance of Uncle Bob and his 
wife. 
After the greetings and introductions had been made 
the visitors laid aside their wraps and joined our little 
group for a social chat. "I heerd ye firing down in the 
swamp after ye left me," said the farmer, "and I expect 
ye got one or two woodcock." 
"Yes," replied the Doctor, "we had very good success ; 
there were not many birds, but the coming frosty nights 
will send along some from the north." 
"Our woodcock shooting used to bring several Amer- 
ican sportsmen to this settlement every season," said 
Mrs. Coalton, "but in late years they have not been here. 
I suppose the birds are growing more scarce." 
"Possibly," replied the Doctor, "but perhaps your 
stringent, and I must say unfair, game laws keep them 
away." 
"No doubt," said Mr. Coalton, "we keep out of the 
Province many thousands ©f dollars that would come 
here ev'ry year, just to please a few Halifax gentry and 
officers who had the laws made for their own benefit. Ye 
see the game society wants to keep Americans away, and 
mighty cute they are in getting the laws made to do it. 
Now, I believe if one foreigner is to have no show here 
unless he pays for it, another shouldn't; but the English 
officers have fixed things so that they have all the shootin" 
and huntin' they want just as if they belong here and pay 
taxes. Ye see, accordin' to the law no person whose 
domicile is not within Nova Scotia shall hunt -any of our 
game birds or animals without first obtaining a license, 
which is $30 for moose and caribou, $ro for birds and 
$5 or $10 for fishing for trout, etc., accordin' to the time 
it is wanted. Now the English officers are not domiciled 
here, and they don't pay any taxes, but see how sharp they 
fix things, for the law provides that if those officers are 
members of the game society they don't have to pay any 
license fee whatever, and if they ain't members, all they 
have to pay is $5, and while Americans have to pay duties 
on their guns and fishing rods.f the officers don't have 
to pay any. Now, I say 'tain't right to give the English 
*This is Chapter XI. of "An Outing in Acadia." 
fDuties are refunded if the guns, etc., are returned to the U. S. 
