122 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Ara i6, 1902. 
— ® — 
Just Fishing. 
There were three of us, to say nothing of the boy, 
Three of a kind, all disciples of Blackstone. We de- 
termified to have a good old-fashioned day's fishing, if 
the wheels of justice ceased revolving. The Blind God- 
dess laid aside her blinders and took up her knitting for 
a day's solid enjoyment on that fair July morning after 
seeing so many of her wards safely disposed of. 
J We were in the mountains of southwestern Virginia, 
on the summit of the divide, in the quaint and interest- 
ing little village of Wytheville. A delightful summer 
resort combining the essentials to health and pleasure, 
good climate, good water and good society. 
Situated on the crest of the water shed, 2,500 feet above 
sea level, on a calm clear day (as the guide books say), 
from the top of the loftiest building in the town, you can 
gaze upon the yellow waters of the Mississippi, on the 
one side, and the billowing Allantic upon the other — 
provided your eyes are focused for the necessary dis- 
tance—they are both there. 
Way back in the mountains there were said to be 
trout streams filled with the dappled darlings (speckled 
beauties revised) ; and fifteen miles away was New River, 
reported to be teeming with bass, but these distant possi- 
bilities quickly lost their charm, and were relegated to 
the "some other times," wlien the boy assured us with- 
out reservation or qualification that: "The creek was 
full of bass, red-eye perch, chub and sunfish, beside 
slashin' big old hog suckers." 
We went .to the creek with some misgivings and a 
promise to the boy of a' swim in his clothes if the con- 
ditions as set forth did not materialize — but he made 
good, and the day was a success every way. 
The boy promised to provide the bait-worms, but as 
the ground was dry, he failed in his quest, so the start 
was delayed half an hour while all hands dug bait. 
The four-mile drive through the beautiful blue grass 
country in the early morning was a bit of unalloyed 
pleasure. The homes, meadows and stock were strik- 
ingly like what one sees in the bhte grass region of 
Kentucky, save that the land is more rolling. 
My two companions were natives and Virginian gen- 
tlemen. 
As dignity never goes beyond the city limits with a 
fishing party, ours was no exception, and so our town 
names had to be relegated for the time being. 
The most dignified member was christened Talk Easy, 
the other native Walk Easy and the writer Take it 
Easy; the latter being irony of a pronounced type. 
We all had things; Talk Easy a throat, Walk Easy 
and I stomachs, but all convalescent. Arrived at our 
destination, an old mill site with the dam partly broken 
away, we put the horse in a shady place and prepared to 
enjoy ourselves. 
it was but a few moments thereafter until we had an- 
other illustration of how unreasonable a boy is. 
"Get the net and bucket and come back with me up 
the road to the branch and let's try to catch soine min- 
nows," said L 
, As he laid down his pole and started to obey, traveling 
with, that broken back snak^ gait that a boy always af- 
fects when he has plans of his own that are interfered 
with, he was accosted by Talk Easy, who requested him 
to search among the rain coats, lunch baskets and other 
dufifle in the conveyance for his fish line. 
As the boy swelled up with injitred indignation, but 
before he. could voice it, the third member of the party 
called to him, and in a most polite tone of voice requested 
that he "look up the bait and carry all the cushions ovei- 
to the place selected to fish." 
Speechless for a moment, the unreasonable little 
heathen then howled: "How in ihunder-m I goin' to do 
half a dozen things at once? I ain't no triplets. Some- 
body else ought to do something, too." 
Then somebody promptly offered to do something, and 
as the somebody was the boy's avuncular relation, the 
small boy did a sprint across a bit of clover and hurdled 
over a high rail fence, and then retired to a thicket to 
meditate until time, the great healer, worked out a 
condition favorable to his return to our society. 
My minnow fishing was not a success, and I soon con- 
cluded to return and take chances with the others, using 
the plebian angle worm. They were hard at it, and Talk 
Easy had hooked, played and s.afely landed a fine fish 
of the genus chub that weighed all of 2>4 ounces and 
was nearly as long as the longest finger on his hand. 
After modestly acknowledging our hearty congratu- 
lations and recovering from the fatigue incident to such 
exertion, the gentleman calmly resumed his fishing. 
Determined that there should be a show of scientific 
fishing, I rigged up a fly outfit and proceeded to indus- 
triously whip the water that looked favorable, hoping to 
take a bass. 
The conversation that immediately ensued between my 
companions was not calculated to encourage me. "What 
is he doing?" said the fisherman who had scored. 
"Practicing to drive a dog tram on the Klondyke," was 
the reply. 
"Does he think it possible that fish eat feathers?" 
"No; his idea is to scare them to death with a near 
view of the fearful and wonderful insects." 
I cut short this brilliant show of pleasantry by drop- 
ping a large stone in the water's edge between them, 
splashing some muddy water on each. 
My further efYorts to educate creek fish up to a feather 
diet proceeded without criticism or comment. 
When thoroughly discouraged, I put away my fly ^out- 
fit* and got down to business with a worm. Talk Easy, 
who seemed to be the real fisherman of the crowd, had 
caught another fine chub, almost as large as the first, 
and several red-eye perch that were clearly visible to the 
naked eye, and was in a fair way to become very un- 
popular with the less successful members of the party. 
He and Walk Easy had fished on down the stream to- 
gether, and when I followed them and came near enough 
to hear their conversation, I saw again that oft recur- 
ring, but ever deplorable sight, "man's inhumanity to 
man," in confidence betrayed. Talk Easy would find a 
likely hole, cast in and take a fish or two; then, if no 
further success rewarded his efforts, he would call to 
Walk Easy to come there where he had found a good 
place, and with the arrogance born of success and a be- 
lief in his superior skill, direct hira as to the proper bait 
to use and spot to cast in, and then leaving his grateful, 
but deluded friend to fish exhausted waters, hurry on to 
the next good hole. 
It was a case calling aloud for foreign intervention, 
but added to the fact that I had no gun, was the further 
fact that it behooved me to get ahead of the trouble in 
question and find some unfished water so as to save my 
own reputation. 
Returning about noon to where the unequal partners 
were operating, I found the head of the firm laden with 
conceit and fish, while the junior was struggling with 
physical exhaustion and the problem of why it was that 
he had found the only worms in the can that the fish 
would not eat.' . ' 
We now proceeded to enjoy one of the most pleasant 
events of even the most eventful outing, the lunch hour. 
The boy was called, and canae in with two fish, and vol- 
uminous explanations of how it was that his string was 
not full, and after making proper apologies for the short- 
comings of early morn, was restored to limited fellow- 
ship on probation. The lunch basket assayed well and 
proved entirely satisfactory, until Walk Easy produced 
from its profoundest depths a small brown bottle about 
half full of fluid and other things, which he said had 
been placed there by order of the supreme dictation of 
his household, with express instructions that he proceed 
to take a little as antidote for lunch in excess. 
Merely out of curiosity, we agreed to join him in par- 
taking of the contents of the bottle, as it _ had some 
queer objects that we had never seen used as ingredients 
in any beverage. 
Cork cocktail we found it to be, and give the formula, 
as it will probably become more popular than the famous 
drink of the commonwealth — mint julep. 
Fill up a bottle with corks and stuff the interstices 
with spirits fermenti. Let stand until all the flavor 
of the cork is extracted. Two teaspoonfuls of this — 
which was our share after Walk Easy had worried down 
his prescribed dose — made us think we were two bits of 
thistledown; and our poor friend, with a full dose to con- 
tend with, had to sit holding a large stone in his lap for 
some time. 
■ It is a great discovery, this cork cocktail, but the man 
who fully exploits it had best provide himself with the 
footwear of a deep sea diver if he wants to retain his grip 
on terra firma. 
We resumed operations after dinner and the luck 
held. The man who knew the game continued to catch 
fish, while his partner industriously fished exhausted wa- 
ters. 
The boy joined them for a season, but when Talk 
Easy, under the impression that he had a large fish, tore 
a minnow out of the water with such force as to jerk its 
head half off, his frankly expressed opinions and hilari- 
ous shouts of laughter ■ revived his unpopularity of the 
mornitig, and he concluded to join me for a while. 
There is always something original about a boy's fishing 
outfit, and our boy was no exception. 
His pole was so long that he either had to fish across 
to the opposite side of the stream all the time, or else 
sit well back from the water's edge. 
His line was long ?ind strong and carried two hooks 
of generous size., • • ■ 
But the artistic finishing touch of the outfit was the 
float. This consisted of a cork disk about as large as a 
batter cake of generous thickness, and of such buoyancy 
that no ordinary fish could have pulled it , under the 
water. 
The effect produced by the casting of the boy's line 
was to be compared only with the explosion of a sub- 
terranean mine. 
We got on fairly well together — the boy and — ^but 
his method of fishing was too strenuous for results. 
Every few moments he would pull in and cast out, the 
first half of the process sounding like puUing a stump, 
and the return being a s-wish-s-sh, ker-plunk, su-wash! 
The climax being the settling of the float. 
At my earnest insistance, he finally removed the float, 
and shortly thereafter fished for several minutes with his 
hook hanging from a bush on the opposite bank, where 
it had lodged when cast, without his noticing that fact. 
His disgust was great, and no amount of argument could 
convince him to the contrary of a great opportunity lost 
in the few moments that he had fished up a tree. 
This was much more amusing than the next incident, 
as any one but a boy would know, but he thought the 
contrary. I had caught a minnow and was fishing a 
long stretch of water for a bass. A fine strike showed, 
and when I pulled I was fast to something J^ig and 
strong. The boy observed it, and greatly excited, aban- 
doned his own business to rush over to offer me advice 
and assistance. 
"Pull him in! Snake him out! Don't let him get 
away," he shouted; "What you reckon it is?" 
"A bass," I coolly replied, "and a good one. Stand 
back and I will show you how to properly land a large 
fish." 
Having no clear water to play it in, I was steadily 
reeling and pulling in my catch, which was fighting in a 
jerky, stubborn way rather unusual in a game fish, but I 
believed it to be such, and a good heavy one, too. 
Setting well back, pulling hard and reeling fast, with 
the boy jumping and shouting with excitement, I brought 
my catcii to the surface, and with a lunge and splash, it 
came into full view, proving to be a long, slender, green 
switch that my line had become fast to in the center, so 
that in .pulling it through the water it offered the jerky 
resistance described. 
I was both disappointed and chagrined, and for one 
brief instant thought that even my companion was going 
to be considerate and sympathetic, as he seemed to share 
my disappointment, but this was a violent presumption — 
he was only a boy. 
After one look at my prize, the boy proceeded to roll 
over and over on the ground with whoops and yells, 
occasionally choking and smothering with his efforts to 
be sarcastic: "Oh I what a bass." "Ain't he a big one, 
though," and other remarks of like nature, until I was' 
minded to wonder how a boy could be such a brute, nat- 
urally. 
I do not believe in punishing other people's children — ■ 
having sma.ll troubles of my own — ^but after the insuffer-i 
able row kicked up by that young hopeful had continued 
to a point beyond human endurance, we separated. | 
He never knew that the vicious slashes made at him 
with that stick, as he sought safety in flight, were only 
intended to frighten him; nor the further fact that they^ 
might have done so to the extent of shortening his 
earthly career without causing regret. The cool of thei 
evening found us all back at the starting point at the: 
dam, and a canvass of the returns showed Talk Easy 
high hook, with his deluded and confiding companion, 
yet like the small boy who said: "When I catch the one 
I am after, and two more, I will have three." 
But the law of compensation now intervened, and the 
weary, unsuccessful fislf^rman came to his reward. With; 
all of us fishing as near him as we could crowd, hel 
caught the four largest fish of the day, and was once; 
more happy. 
The ride home was uneventful with one exception. 
In fording the creek we drove in the deepest water and! 
.succeeded in entirely submerging the floor of the buck- 
board, where sat the boy. 
We .have heard Nilsson, Patti and Campanini— none 
of whom discoursed music as sweet as the sound of the 
yells of rage and anguish that proceeded from the throat' 
of the boy as he slashed around in the cold water of 
that spring-fed stream. ,1 
The glory of a mountain sunset was full in our faces^ 
as we drove home. A grand sea of molten gold dotted! 
with crimson islands. ! 
The miracle that we call the sun going down, that 
was old Avhen these lofty mountains were the levels 
of the great deep, that is as old as the first day of the 
creation and yet is ever new. 
But this is not fishing, and the inevitable must be met.' 
"How many feeshes, Daddie?" is the question in sweet 
chorus that meets us at the gate. 
Then to the house we go with deep longing for the 
welcoming caress that each has looked forward to all, 
through the long ride home; and the hearty words of 
praise that sound so sweet from loved ones to the weary,! 
yet successful fisherman, only to be met with that 
query— replete with subtle wit, and old, oh! how old— 
not dating back, perhaps, to the first sunset, but ante- 
dating many, many sunsets: "Why, how nice.' What did 
you say they cost you?" Lewis Hopkins. 
On a South American River. 
The revolutionary movement now going on in the 
United States of Colombia began in November, 1899. 
In February of that year, with a companion, Col. Dun- 
stan, I visited Colombia and spent more than two 
months in „ the interior, returning in May. It is ten 
days' voyage from New York to Savanilla. Just after ! 
startmg, we were caught by the great blizzard of thati 
year, as we ran southward along the coast, and had to lie 
to for. many hours; after that we had fine weather for 
the rest of the trip. We stopped at Fortune Island for 
perhaps half an hour, to take on some cargo handlers, 
who would be dropped off again on the return voyage, i 
and then made for Kingston, Jamaica, where we lav 
twenty-four hours. After jounding the east end of 
Jamaica, the jun along the southern coast to Kingston is 
famous for its magnificent mountain views. 
From Kingston we ran a straight course for Savanilla, . 
which, being right across the Caribbean Sea, was out of 
tlie track of ordinary travel, and we saw no sail on the ' 
way, but as the weather was fine, contented ourselves: 
with the sight of flying fish and dolphins and grand sun-i 
sets. The Magdalena River is to Colombia what the 
Mississippi is to this country, a great commercial high-' 
way. Unfortunately, its mouth is too shallow for steam- 1 
ers or any large craft to enter, so that, while the custom I 
house is at Barranquilla, not far above the mouth, ves-' 
sels discharge and take on cargo at Savanilla on the 
coast, eighteen miles west of the town and connected ' 
with it by railroad. Savanilla is merely a railroad station 
and a collection of a dozen or so thatch-roofed houses, 1 
but there is a fine steel pier 4,000 feet long at the outer 
end of which vessels tie up and discharge their cargo into 
cars, which are then sealed and run to the custom house 
at Barranquilla. Travelers get their baggage after it is 
inspected at the latter place. We reached Barranquilla' 
at 11:15 A. M., when of course everyone had gone to 
breakfast and its following siesta, so we had to wait a ' 
couple of hours for the officials to return, which time we 
utilized by driving to the English hotel ahead of our ' 
fellow travelers and engaging the only vacant room, a ' 
corner one looking out on the plaza and flanked by a 
church. It being against the law to take rifles into the i 
countrjr, I \\ibs doubtful as to what would be done with ! 
my little .44-40 Winchester, but after I had been intro- 1 
duced by a friend, Don Luis Pochet' — an American cit- I 
izen, by the way, who served in our Navy in the Spanish 
war— and had shown how a one-armed man handled the 
gun, and had, in pantomime, disposed of a half dozen 1 
imaginary assailants, leaving them dead upon the cus- 1 
tom house floor, a proceeding which brought a chorus ; 
of "Bueno!" from the crowd of officials and spectators, 1 
I had no trouble, and carried my gun off in peace. Late 
in the afternoon we found that a boat for our river was , 
to leave next morning at 7 o'clock, and decided at once 1 
to go by it, as another might not leave for weeks. This ' 
left little time in which to see the town, but Dunstan 
had been there often and knew where to go, so I saw 
enough then and on my return to give me an idea of it. 
It is a town of say 20,000 people, built on sandy soil, 
sloping gently to the Magdalena, on the west bank of 
which it lies. As a rule, the streets are narrow and 
the buildings low, one or two stories high, but with high , 
ceilings and all brick, stuccoed and whatnot, either brill- 
iant white or pale yellow. There are the usual courts, ' 
balconies and barred windows. A well planted, well-kept . 
plaza is faced on opposite sides by a church and club 
house, business houses occupying the rest of the space. 
There are electric lights, street cars drawn by mules 
and an ice plant. There is a garrison with the cuartel ] 
near enough to the hotel for the guests to hear the ca3\% 
