Oct. 28, 1905.] 
in their full pride of strength — and with their boots ‘ on. 
Those who lived through the era of which these relics 
are reminiscent were often the men who had learned the 
value of reticence, the significance of silence. They left 
it to their followers and their posterity to be garrulous, 
and some of us can do it; but the few men now living 
who could -say something are too old and feeble. L ean 
detect the silver hairs about my own temples, and feel 
somewhat antique at this period. 
My grandfather sometimes related incidents of history 
of the frontier in its expansion from Ohio to California, 
but he was nearly always too busily engaged to say much 
of the. thousand events with which he had been identified. 
Aside from a few anecdotes connected with his meetings 
with Carson and Fremont, and a few notable Californians, 
he confined his narratives to prosaic accounts of the 
weary trips across the plains, the desert and the moun- 
tains, to side-hunts for buffalo, antelope, deer, bears and 
sometimes Indians ; and of later events in the mines. He 
had taken a part in some skirmishes with the Indians, but 
his accounts of these greatly modified the romantic pic- 
tures in the story books and of most frontier literature. 
What a pity it is that so few of us can confer with and 
listen to the words of our grandparents after we have 
reached an age of understanding or rationality. 
The grandfather of seventy or ei-ghty may speak of 
things of. interest to the man of fifty or sixty, but the 
average young man of twenty or even of thirty gleans 
so much from the present, or thinks he does, he has no 
storage capacity for antique materials. He faces the front 
and does not live in the past — not he. His attitude is a 
good one, but his pioneer ancestors had to watch and 
comprehend their surroundings, to keep an eye on the 
trails over which they had passed as well as upon the 
untried forward and flanking vistas. They did not con- 
sider every blaze upon every tree altogether trustworthy. 
They had learned by collisions in which they were per- 
sonally concerned that every hollow in the hills is not a 
profitable or judicious rendezvous. The young man of 
to-day is full of information that he has mistaken for 
wisdom and sometimes for discretion. That is one of 
the reasons why I am permitting myself to advance in 
years with some glee. 
My grandfather to the last would rather tell a humor- 
ous hunting story than dwell upon his serious experi- 
ences and important adventures. At seventy he could hit 
an inch bullseye with the rifle at fifty or seventy-five 
yards, or line bees to their knothole in the tallest tree ; 
he could w^alk fifty miles, and, if necessary, repeat it the 
next day ; he would walk where he might have ridden, or 
for the very work of it. Splitting rails, posts or shingles 
was to him recreation and diversion, while the use of a 
cross-cut timber saw was one of his vices. I could never 
understand his peculiar tastes in such matters; I am 
positive he did not inherit them from my side of the 
family. I have done some of those things, but I do not 
allow them to influence me any more than necessarj’’ — not 
if I can help it. I would rather never see a cross-cut saw 
than to come into close communion with one, for when 
1 do I speak without reserve or contemplation. Along- 
side of a cross-cut saw. a flail or a treadmill is one of the 
most fascinating methods of suicide. It makes no differ- 
ence which end of a cross-cut saw you become attached 
to, you at once feel sad, then utterly despondent. If the 
other fellow behind the log on the other end of it says ; 
“Say, if you’re going to ride, don’t drag your feet,” then 
you feel really depressed. Of course riding a cross-cut 
saw is not dissipation when indulged moderately, unless 
the other fellow is riding it, but then it is positively 
criminal, a direct attack with a deadly, weapon. I could 
never see anything fascinating within 100 feet of a cross- 
cut saw — no matter which end you measured frorn. They 
are made in Philadelphia and shippe^d away from there 
immediately. 
Men will do almost anything for money, even in Phila- 
delphia, but popular indignation and cross-cut saws go 
hand to handle — the brotherly-love people should know 
that. I did once see a saw — but I cannot afford to con- 
tinue with the subject. If mankind had not wasted so 
much time and vitality with rusty sheet-iron saws, hand- 
saws, w-cod-saws, see-saws, old saws, proverbs, religion 
and politics, he might now show some proof of his evolu- 
tion along Darwinian lines, he might produce an example 
with which to establish the first proposition, namely — 
that evolution is ascendant, progressive expansion. But 
the saw, the sawfish, the sawbuck and the sawyer are all 
indicative of quadrumanous declension — -that is a most 
singular and choice epithet — it is the best I can do with 
which to embody my conclusion in this matter. If that 
does not serve, and I am again impelled to take up this 
topic I shall look up the inventor of saws and see 
whether there is virtue in a whipsaw. 
About 5 o’clock our caravan arrived at Summit Spring 
(Jones’), and the little group of log houses. We were 
covered with dust, floundering in it ; why, we w'ere full 
of it. Enochs shouted to me in an effort to ask some- 
thing, and he looked like a roman candle shooting saffron 
colored powder, and smoke and red mud. When Dick 
jumped off the wagon it was like a cartload of ashes 
being dumped in a yard, wTile he remained smoking like 
the chimney to a brick kiln. Our team, originally a black 
and a gray, were now accurately matched in color — 
smoked buckskin — wdiile Jack and the dogs were moving 
examples in reality — real estate. Possibly there is a point 
there, somewdiere, but I fail to detect it, so let it pass. 
We w^ere the most harmonious combination of color ex- 
tant, but we viewed ourselves at a disadvantage, as our 
eyes had embankments or bulwarks surrounding them, 
over which we peered to get such glimpses as we could. 
After we had shaken ourselves, coughed, sneezed and 
otherwise, replaced some of the road as best we could, 
we took off our hats and shook the remainder of it over 
the rockiest places near us. 
The first thing to attract our notice w'as a log. about 
fifty feet in length, that had been hollowed out with the 
ax and was set upon trestles for a water trough'. To it 
other smaller troughs, .likewise hewn from smaller trees, 
conyeyed,' water'' from' th.e. spring, and the big log was 
brimming over. It w^as coated with moss of emerald 
green, while the flashing silvery water wetted the moss 
from one cud of the great log to the_ other. The setting 
sun, that managed to sift a few of his last rays through 
tile forest, made it look like some fallen pillar from some 
mighty temple — a jeweled fragment of stupendous mag- 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
tiificence. When we drove up to it our horses plunged 
their noses and faces into the water up to their eyes, and 
then they very promptly took them out again, champing 
their bits, snorting, and shaking their heads; and they 
. restrained a good portion of their eagerness. 
The trouble was that the water of the spring is nearly 
iee cold at all times, standing constantly at a temperature 
of two to three degrees above freezing. Horses can only 
take it a little at a time, warming that little in the pro- 
cess before they can trust it implicitly and let it into 
their inner sanctum, or whatever it is they do let it into. 
Men are at the same disadvantage and we, as eager as 
the horses, were forced to adopt the same process, and 
even then it made our teeth ache in all their weak places 
and faiily benumbed our lips and mouth as we dipped 
into it. 
As soon as Jack got out of the wagon he made for that 
log full of liquid frigidity. We watched, to note the as- 
tonishment and contraction that he would display when 
he got at it, but we were it, not Jack. He got upon the 
trough astride of the water, lapped a little and the next 
instant he was in it, entirely submerging himself, diving 
and plunging from one end of it to the other, and back 
and forth, sending up flashing showers and streamers of 
the fluid silver.. It seemed to be the best thing he had 
ever -found, and he wouldn’t even shiver a little for our 
benefit. After he got out of it with a glance of compas- 
sion in our direction, he got back in again, and had some 
more. 
The spot was like a deep cleft in the mighty forest. 
Upon every hand stood towering pines and firs that shut 
off ail distant perspective, all horizon, and left only a 
little strip of sky straight up overhead. A man could get 
about as comprehensive a view from the bottom of a 
well, if he was interested in the heavens exclusively, but 
a forest like that is not without interest to a close ob- 
server. The largest and tallest tree near by was a dead 
sugar pine, a tree that had doubtless died of old age. It 
had been dead for twenty years but still towered to the 
sky, holding up great white arms broken and bereft of 
bark. It was a giant of its tribe, between eight and ten 
feet in diameter, and yet solid at its base, though the 
bark, five or six inches in thickness, hung from it in strips 
and patches. Much of the body of the tree was bare and 
smooth, and bleached by weather and sun until it was 
white. The forks of branching boughs were at intervals 
filled with wreckage from the top, fragments of bark, 
twigs, the abandoned nests of squirrels and birds, and 
trash. 
When Jack had enough of the water he clambered out, 
ran up the road, and chased about by himself, the dogs 
being too exhausted to take part in his gambols. The 
more he ran about, the more filled with excitement and 
delight he seemed, until he apparently went crazy. He 
selected the gnarled and giant pine, and up its dangerous 
trunk he went, with all the momentum he coud generate. 
For the first forty or fifty feet the tree was almost bare 
of bark and branches, and he went up that far like a 
jumping jack upon its stick. Then he reached crumbling 
branches and loose bark that gave way at his touch; frag- 
ments of branches fell crashing to the ground, while 
great slabs of bark gave way and came swishing and 
thundering to the earth, sending upward clouds of dust. 
As we watched in dismay all else was forgotten, as we 
expected each instant to see Jack come down with the next 
slab of bark, like a man from a treacherous scaffold upon 
some steeple, but he postponed the culmination. Up, up 
he clambered, clutching at what seemed to us to be sure 
destruction; slab after slab, and branch after branch 
came swishing from aloft to the ground, but Jack still 
ascended. 
“He’s done for,” exclaimed Enochs, “now he’s coming ! 
No, he’s got another hold; here he — no, he’s staving it 
off a minute — now then watch ! That was a close call!” 
Again and, again the very patch of bark, or the treach- 
erous branch to which he had clung, slid away and down- 
ward with a cra.sh, but the bear was always just an instant 
ahead of fate as he reached yet another precarious hold 
overhead. 'Why he persisted in ascending was a puzzle. 
Several times he reached temporary safety on larger 
snags that held under his weight, but he would leave 
them to hasten his destruction. There was no other ex- 
planation for it— -he must be insane. ■ 
At last he had reached the last snag upon the dizzy, 
disintegrating: tree .top, that was large enough to offer 
him a perch, and there 'he sat, fully 250 feet from the 
ground. He looked in size and outline like an owl, 
scarcely larger. Our cries and excited voices and move- 
ments had called out Mr. Jones, and after comprehend- 
ing the situation he said : 
“He’s in about the worst place he could get. I do not 
see how he got there or how he can get down. I never 
saw a bear up as high as that. If he starts down the 
loose bark will give way with him. You may save his 
skin, mebbe, but I’m not sure of that, nuther.” 
Here were four of us, but if there had been a thousand 
I could have suggested no means of rescue for poor Jack. 
I could conceive of no device known to man that would 
be of service. It was almost dark, and in a few moments 
therafter he was invisible. Bark and fragments fell at 
intervals, but we neither saw nor heard anything more. 
We turned away feeling singularly helpless and useless.. 
A few rods distant below the road there was a saucer- 
shaped depression, of several acres in extent, containing 
large trees that had carpeted the ground with leaves and 
needles from pines, making a favorite camping place. 
Here we parked our wagon, unharnessed the horses and 
made our camp.- .'VVe were almost exhausted, famished, 
ravenously hungry. Dick soon had a fire burning, our 
box of provisions out of the wagon, and he was preparing 
some slices of bacon that- made us wild with anticipation. 
“If Jack smells this bacon cooking,” said Dick, “he’ll 
1 ry to come down, and it’ll be all day with him. It’s too 
bad, ain’t it ? I’d most as soon fall from that tree my- 
self.” And he meant it. 
“He’s -a gone bear.,” said Enochs, “but if you fellows 
are in na hurry we— we can wait awhile; we can eat some 
bread and crackers. Give the cuss a chance. If he 
smells the bacon broiling he’ll lose what little sense he 
has left.” 
That was about the siheerest expression of sympathy or 
tenderness"! ever; heard from Enochs. As if feeling that 
he had betrayed real fondness for Jack he hastily added a 
proposal to ‘‘shoot him out of the tree” if I would stand 
881 
under and catch him, so as to “save the meat,” but it was 
a transparent ruse, he was as anxious and gloomy as I 
was. At every sound of bark falling from the tree one 
or the other of us went to see if- Jack had let go; and at 
one time I found Enochs groping about its trunk, feeling 
of all dark objects. He pretended that he was hunting 
wood, but we had plenty of wood much nearer the fire. 
By 8 or 9 o’clock we could withstand our hunger no 
longer, and cooked the bacon and boiled our coffee, wait- 
ing meanwhile and listening for the sounds of the last 
operation in which Jack Would be actively engaged. We 
thought the odor of the bacon would bring him, and so 
end our anxiety; but we finished supper without hearing' 
anything drop of sufficient weight to console us, or re- 
lieve our suspense. 
After numerous trips to the tree, we fixed our fire for 
the night, having meantime to get into our coats, as we 
were shivering with cold-^a great change from our con-' 
dition three or four hours earlier. We lay down upon 
our blankets and watched the lights and shadows from' 
our fire dance upon the giants of the forest surrounding 
us, listening to the voices of the night that only accentu- 
ated the silence, the fire flickered lower, lower and we 
were asleep. ’ 
I do not know what time it. was, but it was somewhere 
about midnight when something awoke me by clutching 
my hair from behind. I reached up and back and grasped, 
in the darkness, the hairy paw of a bear. It closed upon 
my hand with the firm rigidity of muscular development 
that I well knew. I was not startled, not even scared, 
and, as Jack poked his cold nose into my cheek I made 
no resistance, but I did get up quickly to give him his 
supper, which he devoured with wonderful promptitude 
and dexterity, even for him. Dick and Enochs got up, 
too, no slight effort under the circumstances, and we had 
our customary romp and laugh over Jack’s antics with 
the two dogs and ourselves. 
When we again turned in, this time for the night and 
some hours after, Dick and Jack slept side by side, both 
their heads upon one pillow. Both of them snored with 
considerable abandon. But it was all right. 
Ransacker. 
[to be continued.] 
The Rattlesnake^s Bite. 
A San Francisco dispatch of Oct. 16 reports that Rob- 
ert R. Roberts, one of the election commissioners of San 
Francisco, while on his wedding trip to Little Geyser, 
Napa county, was bitten by a rattlesnake while out hunt- 
ing Sunday afternoon. Mr. Roberts shot a large rattle- 
snake with a shotgun, blowing the snake into three pieces. 
He took up a stick and with it picked up the head of the 
snake. The head moved suddenly and struck him in the 
hand with its poisonous fangs. Mr. Roberts’ hand im- 
mediately swelled up to a large size. Remedies were ap- 
plied to counteract the effect of the poison, and the in- 
jured man was brought to Salistoga Monday, but in spite 
of medical assistance Mr. Roberts died this morning. 
Los Angeles, Cal, Oct. ii. — The tragic death of Rob- 
ert Roberts, of San Francisco, who was bitten by a rat- 
tlesnake last Sunday, brings to me a vivid recollection of 
the misadventure I had with a big rattler in Riverside 
county in 1903, an account of which was printed in the 
Christmas number of Forest and Stream that year. 
My hunting companion, Mr. Collier, of Corona, shot 
the snake in two. Only a shred of skin joined the pieces. 
The section to which the head was attached was only a 
few inches in length, yet enough muscles remained for 
the snake to strike at us viciously. Unable to reach his 
enemies the rattler turned and struck its own body three 
times. 
The California quail season opens next week, and sev- 
eral acquaintances have taken my advice and are provid- 
ing themselves with small hypodermic cases and a supply 
of permanganate of potassium and strychnia tablets. The 
tablets may be taken internally, but there is a possibility 
of one’s throat swelling so that it might be impossible to 
swallow a short time after being bitten by a rattlesnake. 
There are not a great number of venomous snakes in 
this vicinity, but I shall never go afield again without tak- 
ing these precautions. Frank E. Wolfe. 
Birds and Bird Enemies* 
Raleigh, N. C., Oct. ii . — Editor Forest and Stream: 
I read with interest the articles on enemies of bird life, 
now running in Forest and Stream, and would like to 
add the inclosed clipping as evidence of guilt on part of 
the squirrel: 
“This seems strange, but it is true; he did not hatch 
him, but snatched him. This is how it happened.. Some 
small boys were passing through the lovely lawn of Mr. 
William Grimes’ residence on Halifax street, yesterday 
morning, and heard the wail of William, Jr.’s — known by 
his playmates as ‘Bill Grimes’ — pet chicken, and on in- 
vestigating found that one of the many squirrels that 
feast on the nuts on the trees in the grove had changed 
his diet and had concluded to try chicken. His squirrel- 
ship pounced upon William’s pet and hied away to his 
nest in the tree, the chicken vainly protesting in the mean- 
time. ‘Bill’ is catching sandfiddlcrs down at Wrights- 
ville Beach and has not yet heard of his loss.” 
It would be very unfortunate for squirrels in general 
to get the chicken habit, for they would certainly have 
trouble with Mr. ’Coon. I would advise them to keep 
hands off the chicken. A few pair of squirrels were 
placed in the capitol sciuare four or five years ago have 
increased until they overrun the city, and would spread 
over the suburbs but for a few people who see nothing 
in any bird or animal but so much meat. Some shoot 
every squirrel that comes in their yard. Our last Legis- 
lature changed the oi)en season for squirrels to equal the 
quail season, as many quail were killed before the season 
opened for them by jiretended squirrel hunters, and even 
yet I often hear the rapid shots of quail shooting, fol- 
lowed by much shouting here! here! here! the shooters 
trying to give the impression they are rabbit shooting 
with hounds. 
I first learned that a squirrel required flesh as food in 
this way. M.y brother hgd a pet mockingbird, and one 
