Nov. 24, 1906.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
809 
them. Especially is this true of the oyster. 
Into every keg of oysters packed in Maryland 
go three quarts of preservaline, which for all 
time takes the true flavor from the bivalve. 
“I don’t like oysters that have that stuff in,” 
said Capt. “Dad.” “If I have oysters, I want 
them fresh, and fried like these, or boiled in 
their own liquor.” 
Opinions will differ as to oysters and the 
best ways of cooking them, but any one who 
enjoys even the doped oysters, ought to go 
down to the bay. He will have the real article 
for once in his life—as often as he wishes—but 
when he returns to the kegs for his shellfish, it 
will be a long time before he can enjoy them 
because of his taste having been cultivated. 
Rusk, in our little wanderings together, dis¬ 
covered that we were congenial. Our individual 
eccentricities did not interfere with each other, 
so he invited me to go with him on his con¬ 
verted canoe to “sell gasolene engines.” That 
was Rusk’s idea of having a good time. I don’t 
know that he really was a serious agent out foi 
the mere profit of selling engines; I am inclined 
to think that he regarded himself as a sort of 
missionary, preaching the doctrine of power 
boats against the argument of sailing vessels. 
Rusk’s canoe, named the Virgie Lee, was 
beached on the opposite side of the Choptank 
at Sullivan’s farm, and when the engine, no 
larger than a logging camp coffee-pot came, we 
took it over to the canoe and proceeded to put 
it in place. The old bed had to be ripped out, 
the shaft hole stopped down, a new bed built 
of plank, and everything adjusted, so as to get 
the propeller shaft true with the crank shaft. 
The work on the shaft had to be done between 
tides, for the boat was up by the bow on the 
sand, and only at low tide was the stern post 
free. Lying on his back on a plank, wriggling, 
hammering, measuring and fussing, while the 
little wavelets lapped back and forth, sending 
long and longer streamers toward the plank till 
the worker was watching two ways at once, and 
calculating whether he had time for two spikes 
or for one only. But the job was finally done, 
just in time. 
Then the engine was trued up a bit, fixed 
over, turned and fitted. A five-gallon oil can 
was put on a platform in the stern behind the 
engine, and a system of universal joints, Ls and 
street Ls rigged up to conduct the gasolene from 
the can to the engine. Finally little platforms 
for dynamo and storage battery were knocked 
into shape from pieces of soap boxes and 
chunks of wave-worn drift. Wires were brought 
out, felt of, smelt of, tested and looked at. There 
was some doubt as to which represented the 
north pole and which the south pole, and we 
longed for a piece of damp litmus paper, so that 
we could stick the wires on it and know, from 
the mark, that we’d found the south pole. We 
knew that one or other end stuck into a cup 
of ivater would have bubbles on it, but which 
it was impossible to remember. 
However, the engine wa$ wired up, the spark 
plug sparked, the induction coil concentrated 
the “juice” and the business had the look of a 
go to it. Greasy, with aching backs and tri¬ 
umphant smiles, we gazed upon the silent green 
machine—it looked trifling and lost in the big 
stern space of the boat, and compared to the 
size of the craft looked incapable of moving it. 
After a day of serious engine installing, the 
proof of the pudding was at hand. Would the 
engine run? She would, and did. She started 
up. speeded, kicked the water astern, made a 
big noise and then, all of a sudden stopped 
with a loud sound and a profane burst of blue 
smoke. Rusk wriggled the wires, chucked the 
engine under the chin, so to speak, tightened 
bolts, loosed wires, tapped pipes and turned up 
the switch, turned the crank and saw the en¬ 
gine speed up to about 300, and then go bang 
and stop. 
Night coming on, we retired to Mr. Sullivan’s. 
I was jubilant, but I didn’t let on. The way to 
learn what’s what with a gasolene motor is to 
have something go wrong with it, and then 
help put it into shape. Rusk had had a dozen 
or so launches and gasolene engines. Trouble 
was not new to him, as proof of which his 67 
years rested kindly upon his countenance. In 
the morning when we returned to the engine, 
we tried it again, with the same result. 
“She back-fires!” Rusk announced and pro¬ 
ceeded to tighten packing, squeezing bolts, and 
got it so tight we couldn’t crank it. I got down 
and peeked to see where the puff came from, but 
the explosive puff of blue smoke always came 
with such astonishing suddenness that I couldn’t 
be sure whether it was out of the packing, 
pump or base. At last, we dismounted the en¬ 
gine again. We unhitched the pump, un¬ 
screwed the wires, unjointed the pipes and got 
everything apart. As we lifted the cylinder 
from the base. Rusk exclaimed: 
“Well, ain’t I -.” Then he stopped. There 
was a hole in the bottom of the crank shaft 
chamber, and back in the tool box was a drain 
cock which appeared to have been thrown in 
for good measure by the makers. But it was 
an essential part of the engine. The base had 
to be lifted and the bed bored to take the drain 
GEO. SHIRAS, 3D. 
cock. By the time we had the engine up and 
doing again, night was coming on—all our work 
was done in and between showers on gray, 
chilly days, but at last the engine worked. 
“She runs, she runs, she always runs!” Rusk 
cried exultantly. A mechanic charges from $15 
to $25 for installing a motor. The price seemed 
reasonable when our engine was in. 
Now we were ready to launch, and on a high 
tide five or six men lent a hand and shoved the 
boat afloat as easy as a peeled log. More trials 
and more troubles ensued, of course. It was a 
trick to feed just so big a drop of gasolene to 
the engine, and it was a disappointment when 
the dynamo failed to work, but the storage bat¬ 
tery worked, and we cruised a few rods down 
the beach, started to turn back, and the engine 
stopped again. We fussed and fixed some more 
—got out the anchor so we wouldn’t drift clear 
away, and when the engine did start up with 
suddenness and loud burstings, I’d jump and 
haul in the anchor and wait to see what would 
happen next. 
We ran up the river side to Collins’ house, 
and staid there all night. On the way we stopped 
and had a talk with Major Dickerson, who owns 
one of the prettiest of the Choptank River 
farms. With a bachelor chum and a dozen or 
so darkey hired men, he lives and enjoys the 
comforting life of a Maryland plantation farmer. 
On occasion he can out-dialect a Louisiana 
plantation hand—indeed, there are many ways 
in which the Maryland farm life surpasses most 
lives. For the mountain man, however, the 
muggy, humid atmosphere winter and summer 
must always be a drawback. 
On the following day we crossed the Chop- 
tank River, and this trip will always be remem¬ 
bered by me as an occasion of novel pleasures. 
I had never before been afloat on salt water 
in a small boat when the waves were a bit 
rollicky. Now a cold wind out of the west, 
bearing misty rain, stirred up rollers that made 
us plunge. Who can describe the sheer joy of 
swinging in the waves? I could appreciate the 
fervor of those who first called the lisping and 
bubbling of waves along the side of a boat 
“music.” Quite the most beautiful tone I ever 
heard is the tinkling of ice-clad grass leaves 
thrown into motion by a ripple in a brook, and 
next to this fairy sound comes the bubbling of 
salt waves along the sides of a boat. 
At Cambridge we fitted out for a cruise. The 
big gasolene tank under the bow deck was filled 
with oil, and the little cabin was almost filled 
with bedding, things to eat and other necessities, 
including my duffle, and Rusk’s. Rusk rigged 
cleats and two crossbars, so that at night we 
could fill in the space between the cabin lockers 
with two boards. By spreading mattresses out 
on these and on the lockers we had beds. 
Ninety cent quilts and dollar mattresses served 
the purpose very well. By day quilts, mattresses, 
overcoats, etc., were rolled up and shoved against 
the bow end of the cabin. This left us about 
five feet of space on the lockers and floor. 
For cooking arrangements, we had a tiny 
90-cent oil-stove, a frying-pan, coffee-pot and 
some pails. As the saying is, “They would do.” 
and they did as long as we had need of them. 
Having equipped ourselves, we headed away 
up the Big Choptank to Secretary. It had now 
come clear and warm. The wind was against 
us and pounded the bow of the boat insistently. 
I took my first trick at the 14-inch galvanized 
iron wheel and learned the feel of the waves 
pounding down against the rudder. Now and 
then, for no apparent reason the engine would 
come to a halt. I’d heave over the anchor and 
then we’d examine the engine, shake it here 
and there, and at last get it going again. 
Cranking it had a dire effect upon our hands. 
At one time I had seven blisters, due to the iron 
crank handle. This handle Rusk smoothed off 
with a file and emery cloth, and wrapped with rags, 
in vain endeavor to save the cuticle of our 
palms. 
The hurt hands were the one drawback to the 8- 
mile run to Secretary. The river varied from three 
to five or six miles wide. Here and there long 
reefs jutted out from the banks, lending hues 
to the deep shades of the channel. Reading the 
water was thrust upon one instantly by these 
sands. To the unpracticed eye the waves were 
all alike, but when one stands at the wheel with 
Rusk fussing over the engine, mooning over 
the scenery ceases to be a joy. 
“Now, where you going?” Rusk would ask 
suddenly, bringing me from a reverie of pure 
joy to a realizing sense that I was headed a mile 
or so off the course. 
There were caving gravel banks on either 
side the river, and the trees about the houses 
gave them a beautiful, snug and home-like ap¬ 
pearance. There was promise of sport in a 
dozen duck blinds off various points. The 
blinds were made of long, narrow boards, nailed 
into a rectangle, like a woodrick for a wagon. 
Down both sides, and across the bow were bored 
holes every ten inches or so into which was 
stuck cedar brush. The hunters anchor these 
blinds bow and stern, put out the decoys, and 
then get into the blinds with their skiffs and wait 
for the ducks to come. 
Flocks of ducks left the water ahead of us, and 
circled back a mile or so away, for they were 
much hunted. On the edge of the land, looming 
dead against the sky beyond, were two or three 
trees with vast osprey nests in them. In the 
intervals when the chuckling of the motor 
ceased, we could hear birds chirruping from the 
bushes, and once or twice, the strange cry of 
the sou’southerlies, called hounds by some. 
We ran up Secretary Creek, and made fast 
