263 
FOREST AND STREAM 
' IApril 2, 1904. 
Fields and Pastures New. 
My first trout was caught in a New Hampshire 
brook, over thirty years ago, and my first quail and 
duck were shot in Ohio several years before. Scarcely 
a year since has passed without my getting an outing, 
long or short, near or far, as circumstances permitted; 
and it has been my privilege and pleasure to catch trout 
in the Alleghenies, Adirondacks, around Lake Superior 
and in the Rockies, and to shoot white tail and black 
tail deer, elk and antelope, as well as smaller game, 
in these and other districts. I had, however, never 
shot or even seen moose or caribou, and longed for 
new game and new country, which I found as told 
hereafter. 
I. — TemagamS. 
In northern Ontario, about half way between 
Toronto and the southern end of Hudson's Bay, and 
about 200 miles east of Lake Superior, lies the "Tema- 
gami Forest Preserve," part of the great wilderness 
which extends indefinitely northward. Its only roads 
are Indian trails; its only houses Indian cabins and 
posts of the Hudson Bay Company, and these are very 
scarce; and the few Indians and whites who perma- 
nently make their home there practically depend on_ the 
only local staple, fur, the sable and mink skins obtained 
being especially dark, fine and valuable. Each Indian 
has his trapping range, often very extensive, and his 
rights are respected by others, and pass to his children 
by. inheritance. Trespass is very rare and is a grave 
crime, which custom permits to be prevented or 
punished by any means found necessary. 
Here the ancient backbone of the continent, the 
Laurentian Mountains, has been planed by glaciers 
and gnawed by weather and time, until it has be- 
come rolling or hilly country, ridged and ragged with 
rocks, dotted with countless lakes, and covered in large 
part by splendid forests of white and red pine, which, 
so far, have been spared the ax. Through the tangled 
swamps and boggy lakes splash and stalk the mag- 
nificent moose. The black bear and lucivee roam the 
forests, and the mink and martin are many. Ruffed 
grouse are numerous and ridiculously tame, and the 
scarcer and more solitary spruce grouse is often met 
with. Big black bass, pike and dore, the latter bemg 
the pike perch and locally known as pickerel, abound 
in the lower lakes and larger streams and, above the 
high falls, impassable to these, the speckled trout have 
taken refuge and thrive and increase abundantly. Tem- 
agami itself, most beautiful of lakes, with its multitude 
of channels and arms extending for hundreds of miles 
and studded with numerous islands, abounds in lake 
trout and whitefish, which grow to great, size. The 
serpent in this earthly paradise is the scourge of black 
flies, midges and mosquitoes, which appear about the first 
of June, make the summer months almost intolerable, and 
practicallv disappear by the middle of August. In the 
month of May the fishing is at its best and the flies 
have not arrived, and with September comes the shoot- 
ing season and the flies are gone, so the tender-skinned 
Yankee had better visit the country in May or Septem- 
ber, and avoid the months between. A few of the 
pests appear at the end of May and a few linger to 
the first days of September, so a provision of fly. dope 
and veils is expedient. 
This wilderness is reached from Lake Temiskaming 
either by the Montreal or Metabetchouan Rivers, the 
sole means of travel being canoes. The camp and 
personal outfit, tents, blankets, supplies for the journey 
and all luxuries must be taken from civilization, though 
flour, meal, sugar and such^ supplies can generally be 
obtained at the Hudson Bay Company's post at Bear 
Island. As everything must be carried over numerous 
portages, some of which are a mile or more in_ length 
and quite rough, the importance of going light is 
manifest and at the best travel must be pretty slow. 
A canoe and guide should be provided for each of 
the party, and an extra guide with canoe to carry sup- 
plies, cook and attend to camp, leaving the "sports," 
as those visiting the country for pleasure seem to be 
invariably called, and their personal guides, free to get 
away from camp in the morning or come in late at 
night, without the domestic economies being upset 
thereby. 
To avoid payment of duties, supplies of all kinds 
should be purchased in Canada, at Toronto or Mon- 
treal as may be convenient, and furnished in sacks con- 
venient for portaging. They can be checked as per- 
sonal baggage. Michie & Company, grocers of 
Toronto, make a specialty of supplying tourists and have 
given me complete satisfaction. Sleeping bags, tents and 
camp and personal outfit I have found could best be ^ 
obtained from New York dealers. Take the usual trout 
fly' equipment, a light steel rbd with spinners and 
spoons, and 200 feet of No. 20 annealed copper wire 
for deep trolltng. For moose I have., found the new .33 
qaliber Winchester "take down" quite sufficiently 
powerful and very handy, while the lightness of both 
gun and cartridges is a great advantage. A light .22 
caliber rifle or target pistol will be found useful for 
grouse or to give a finish to one of the big Temagami 
trouti W ir§ lucky wou|h tQ liQQk liiiB. 
Guides vary as human nature always does. Mine were 
excellent woodsmjen and excellent fellows, though 
sometimes rather slow, and did their very best to get me 
good sport. Others that I saw and heard of were in- 
efficient, and as usual in such cases sulky in proportion. 
The regular rates are two dollars per day and twenty- 
five cents per day for canoe. Tents and blankets can 
also be rented if arrangements are made in advance. 
The ice goes out of the lakes from April 20 to May i ; 
but vegetation hurries forward to get its work done 
during the short summer, and leaves can be almost 
seen to grow. Light snow and freezing nights may be 
expected early in October, and pretty heavy snow is 
probable by the end of that month. One is always 
likely to meet cool or even cold weather, and the 
clothing and outfit should be provided accordingly. I 
went in by way of Toronto and Mattawa, met my 
guides at Temiskaming, and went by steamer up the 
lake; but a railroad was then being built from North 
Bay to Lake Temiskaming, which may be now in 
operation, and will give a much better route, saving 
several days' paddling and portaging. 
My first trip here was in the fall of 1900, when I 
stayed only a few days and spied out the land. The 
following spring my wife and I started in at Hailey- 
bury, went up the Montreal and through Lady Evelyn 
and Sucker Gut Lakes, and up a river which meets the 
extreme end of the latter, ^ to which we gave the name 
"Lemabin." After passing three large falls we found 
wonderful trout fishing; in fact, the trout were so 
numerous that an hour's fishing per day would furnish 
all that could possibly be used, and fishing had to stop. 
Thence we went down through Temagami and out by 
the Metabetchouan, a canoe trip of over 200 miles in 
all, taking three weeks and full of delights. 
In the fall of that year I went back hoping to get a 
moose, but went in several wrong directions, struck 
bad weather, was taken ill, and was too weak to trail 
the only moose I saw, after shooting him through the 
neck. My guides followed and finished him. but his 
head was not worth mounting. This was outside the 
forest preserve in which shooting was not then permitted. 
The prohibition was removed the year after, and an- 
other trip provided me with a really fine specimen, 
having a maximum spread of 55^ inches, with very 
regular and beautiful antlers. This moose was evi- 
dently still young, and his horns seemed light for the 
great size of the animal. I measured him with great 
care and found his dimensions to be: Nose to tail, 
10 feet I inch; girth, 8 feet 3 inches; hind leg to ridge 
of back, 6 feet; height at shoulder (estimated) 6 feet 
9 inches. 
Visitors to this country will find it wise to comply 
strictly with the requirements of the local laws, which 
are in no way unreasonable. The authorities maintain 
a surprisingly efficient system of inspection, and the 
penalties inflicted on a detected offender are very 
severe. One can have plenty of sport legally, be safe 
from penalties, and, best of all, enjoy the approval of 
his own conscience. 
II. — Newfoundland. 
During the last trip to Temagami I met some New 
York gentlemen, who had been caribou hunting in 
Newfoundland the year before, and they were good 
enough to give me a full account of their experience, 
with names and addresses of their guides, routes and 
sources of supply, and, in fact, all the detailed informa- 
tion that one has usually to laboriously, tediously and 
expensively acquire for himself. I at once began 
correspondence, and succeeded as I thought in making 
all necessary arrangements, and our party of four left 
Cleveland on August 24. Four days' steady travel, by 
way of Boston, Plant line steamer to Hawkesbury, 
Cape Breton, rail to North Sydney, the steamer Bruce 
to Port au Basques, and the Newfoundland railway, 
would bring us to Grand Lake, where guides, boats 
and supplies were to be. The actual trip did not work 
out quite according to schedule, on account of some 
delay in the arrival of articles ordered shipped from 
New York, not quite time enough having been allowed. 
Newfoundland is roughly triangular, the sides being 
about 350 miles each, and much indented with bays and 
long narrow fiords, St. John's lies on the extreme south- 
eastern corner, and Port au Basques on the south- 
western. A total population of about 140,000, of which 
St. John's has 40,000 and about all the remainder live on 
or near the coast, make a laborious and precarious living 
by and on the product of the seal, cod, and herring 
fisheries, which are almost the only productive in- 
dustries. The climate is too boreal and the soil too 
barren to ad.mit of much agriculture, and there is little 
timber fit for anything but pulp and fire wood, but, in 
scenic beauty, and as a home for game and fish, few if 
any lands surpass or even equal it. The lower levels are 
like the Temagami country, though the rivers are finer, 
the hills higher and the whole landscape on a grander 
scale. The elevated plateaus, which make up a large 
part of the interior and are called "barrens," are un- 
like any country I have ever seen, and must resemble 
the Scotch moors, though with much more woodland. 
They are a series of rocky ridges and knolls, often sev- 
eral hu;idrf4 f«et high aii4 sgme, niile§ apart^ diyidf(i 
by valleys containing numberless streams, lakes and 
marshes, and dotted here and there with patches ot 
densely growing spruces and balsams. Much of the 
higher land Is covere'd with a growth of dwarf spruce 
and juniper, rarely exceeding three feet in height, and 
matted and tangled beyond description. It is too thick 
to walk through and not quite thick enough to walk 
on, and would be practically impassable for civilized 
man, were it not for the caribou paths, which radiate 
m every direction and are beaten down by centuries 
of use. 
,, The caribou moss, "sphagnum," I think, forms a 
" soft mass of a foot or more in depth, and holds water 
like a sponge. Everything below the ridges is soak- 
ing wet, and one's feet are in the water most of the 
time; a good stock of waterproof foot gear is therefore 
necessary for comfort. Boots are too noisy for stalk- 
ing, and moccasins are difficult to keep at all dry, so 
a lumberman's overshoe, or rubber moccasin with 
leather tops, would seem to be indicated and I shall 
try them this fall. 
The Newfoundland railway, a well constructed nar- 
row gauge line, runs from Port au Basques to St. 
John's, curving northward to about the center of the 
'island and making a line of 540 miles in total length. 
An express train, with parlor and dining car, is run 
m each direction three times a week, with a mixed 
tram on alternate days. In summer the express starts 
on time and is rarely very late; while the mixed train 
IS likely to turn up anywhere from two to twenty-four 
hours after schedule time. In winter, which begins 
about October 15 and lasts until May, I understand 
that It is not unusual for trains to be run three months 
apart and to be four months late in arriving, but this 
is beyond my personal experience. 
The harbor of Port au Basques is a small basin, 
entered _ through a cleft or cafion and surrounded by 
rocky ridges, sparsely mottled with scrubby vegetation 
and irregularly placed whitewashed cabins. One is at 
first reminded of pictures of Iceland and Greenland, 
but the railroad soon passes into a more attractive 
country, crosses or skirts several magnificent salmon 
rivers, and after a run of about 100 miles, comes down 
to the splendid salt water fiord called "Bay of Islands," 
fifty miles long by a mile or two wide, and bordered 
by stately hills which are nearly worthy of the name of 
mountains. Into the head of this bay flows the Hum- 
ber River, a glorious salmon stream of large size, flow- 
ing between lofty hills, precipitous cliffs, and all that 
is picturesque in landscape. Ascending this river it 
first widens out into Deer Lake, and then contracts 
again into the upper Humber, into which flows the 
Junction River, the outlet of Grand Lake and another 
superb salmon stream. The two log cabins which form 
Grand Lake Station are just west of the latter river, 
and there is a fine salmon pool immediately below the 
bridge. Grand Lake, about seventy miles long and one 
to three miles wide, stretches off to the southwest, 
bordered by rapid slopes rising to the great upper 
barrens, 1,500 feet above, promontories of which make 
picturesque headlands, and down which flow a series 
of dashing streams. 
The journey down Grand Lake is made in dories: 
and parties can leave the lake and climb to the barrens 
at any one of many points, being practically sure of 
good shooting anywhere. We went down the lake 
some thirty or forty miles, and made the climb and 
journey over the barrens to our main camp very easily 
in one day. That is, it was easy for us, but how our 
guides climbed that fierce hill and tramped across the 
scrub under their huge packs, was a wonder to me. 
They were thoroughly skilled woodsmen, keen sports- 
men, willing, prompt and highly efficient; in fact, the 
best guides I have ever had, and were well satisfied to 
receive a dollar and a half a day each, which also paid 
the hire of two dories. 
Caribou hunting here is real deer stalking, the game 
being often found, and its size and value determined 
with a powerful field glass at a mile or two away, and 
then approached with due regard for the wind and 
cover. The large stags are always quite light in color, 
showing a great deal of white, which increases as the 
season grows later, while the does, yearlings, calves, 
and young stags are much darker, often showing a good 
deal of black. A distant white spot is always worthy of 
careful examination and, if it proves to be a deer, his 
value as a trophy can be often pretty well determined 
by his color, long before his antlers can be seen. Many 
of the does bear horns, though these are always small; 
but I noticed that no does which had calves with. them 
bore antlers, and think it possible that they are worn 
only by does that are barren that year, and hence can 
apply to the growth of horns the strength that nursing 
a calf would otherwise consume. The coat is very 
thick even in summer, and, with the heavy body, makes 
the hornless does and calves look much like Jersey 
cattle in figure, though the coloration is black, gray and 
white instead of fawn. A large stag will weigh nearly 
cr quite 500 pounds, and is therefore about twice the size 
of our red deer, and half that of our elk. They seemed 
to me notably unsuspecting and easy of approach, far 
more so than any oth^r of the Cervidce, so that with 
