catching more beaver than they were, so I had but little faith m 
Hugh’s bait. 
One Saturday I rode over to Grady station and ran across old 
Hugh in Tom Moore’s saloon. He was feeling pretty hilarious and 
soon began talking noisily about trapping and turning to me said, 
“I see you are going to make a trapper and I have a good notion to 
larn you how to make beaver bait.” 
I told Hugh not to spoil a good notion. I had often treated old 
Hugh and thought this a good time to throw one or two more under 
his belt, so I treated him to a drink or two and then persuaded him 
to go home. We mounted our mules and started, as we traveled the 
same road. As we rode along Hugh reeled first to one side and then 
to the other and, as I had hoped, began to tell me how to make beaver 
bait. I listened intently to every word Hugh said, and not only did I 
listen but I impressed every word upon my mind. It was a long receipt. 
As soon as T arrived home, having the castor sacks and oil stone 
of beaver, I had previously caught, I proportioned it as Hugh had 
directed and the following day I used Hugh’s bait. To my suprise 
the next morning as I was running my trap line, I had caught four 
beaver and during the same week I caught ten more, making a total 
catch of fourteen beaver in one week. This may seem unreasonable 
to you readers, but it was a fact. 
The next Saturday I met old Hugh Dennis at Grady station. He 
said, “Well, kid, how be ye gettin’ along catchin’ beavers?” I told 
him fine, that I had caught fourteen that week. He looked at me, 
surprise in his face, and said, “Who larned you how to make bait?” 
When I told him he did he looked even more surprised and said, 
“When did I tell you how?” I told him when and he asked me to 
repeat it as he had given it to me. I told him his receipt and when 
I had finished he said, “Well, that is a very good bait, but 1 will 
tell you one that is better.” Hugh was pretty sober at the time and 
proceeded to give me what he said was a better bait. 
As soon as I reached home I started to compound Hugh’s “sober 
bait” as I called it. I used it exclusively in baiting all my traps only 
to find the next morning that I had no beaver and the second morning 
I found I had no beaver. I began to smell a rat. I was trapping for 
beaver in a large cypress brake which the beaver had dammed. This 
brake had an outlet that ran into another brake. As I was crossing 
this outlet, which was almost dry, I ran into a regular beaver road, 
all their tracks going down this draw. I followed the beaver to where 
the draw entered into another lake. Here I saw lots of fresh cut trees 
and knew the beaver had left the upper lake. Do you know what old 
Hugh Dennis had done? He had given me a formula that instead of 
attracting beaver drove them away, made them leave their home and 
go somewhere else, so I immediately dropped Hugh’s “sober bait” 
and thereafter used only his “drunken bait,” which was fine. 
I caught exactly forty beaver, thirty-four coon, nine otter, sixty- 
three mink, thirty-two deer and several wild hogs and turkeys all 
told that season. I sold my furs at Little Rock, Arkansas, and when 
I had settled all bills I had about $65.00 a month clear, for five months’ 
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