Oct. 27, 1506.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
651 
doubt this was so, as no- large body of Indians 
could pass this point without being detected, as 
the Kennebec was the natural highway along 
which any raiding bands of French or Indians 
Would have to pass in order to reach the settle¬ 
ments further down the stream. The garrison 
was maintained here until 1763, in which year a 
treaty of peace was signed at Paris, and the fort 
was then abandoned. 
The corner stone of the fort was recently found 
in excavating for building in this vicinity, and 
was taken to the State House at Augusta. It 
bears the following inscription, “This Corner 
Stone Laid by Direction of Governor Shirley, 
1754 ”. 
It is a source of great satisfaction to know 
that this old block house is to be preserved. 
There are very few relics of the old days that 
now remain, and it is to be hoped that great 
efforts will be made to preserve those that are 
still in existence. They are both instructive and 
interesting, and I am bound to say that I was 
so much interested in this old block house that 
I. made several visits to it, and on the occasion 
of each visit, I discovered something interesting 
that I had not noticed before. 
Charles A. Allen. 
The Mountain Moonshiner. 
New York.— Editor Forest and Stream: Mr. 
Horace Kephart’s interesting series of articles on 
“The Mountain Moonshiner” are decidedly in¬ 
teresting and instructive. However, in the third 
article of the series, published in your issue of 
Oct. 20, it seemed to me that Mr. Kephart placed 
the mountaineer in a romantic glamour of which 
his life is entirely devoid, and gave him credit 
for heroic valor as a man and soldier, which is 
not substantiated by history. 
First of all, the mountaineer is a bush fighter. 
His favorite method is to ambush his enemy or 
his victim, and to take a pot shot at him from 
his safe point of vantage. Should he miss his 
victim, he scurries away to safety. He then 
waits for another opportunity, perhaps for years, 
though meanwhile he might be able to find his 
man in the open at short notice. 
Now as to the historical features. In his 
eulogy of the North Carolina troops, he states: 
“They carried the dav at Saratoga, the Cowpens 
and King's Mountain. From the beginning to 
the end of the war, they were Washington’,s 
favorite troops.” At the battle of the Cowpens, 
and the battle of Guilford Court House, the 
North Carolina troops fled. They were saved 
only by the valor of .Washington who came to 
their rescue with the dragoons. At Guilford 
Court House, the North Carolina troops were 
even more prudent. They fled when the British 
advanced. At Camden, the Virginia and North 
Carolina militia stampeded and ran so far, with 
General Gates acting as bell wether, that they 
never stopped running till not one man of them 
could see any other man, friend or foe, in sight. 
Meantime, the Maryland and Delaware regulars 
stood their ground, were broken by the fierce 
charges, and rallied repeatedly till they were 
overwhelmed by numbers. This evoked a letter 
from Washington to the President of Congress 
(Sept. 15) in which he gave some free express¬ 
ion concerning the worthlessness of militia whom 
he characterized as “inconceivably expensive, and 
too fluctuating and undisciplined.” “Fluctua¬ 
ting,” is a good word. Such would not indicate 
any high preference of them as favorite fighting 
men. 
At King’s Mountain, the mountaineers and 
frontiersmen fought nobly. But they didn’t stick 
to the campaign. After the battle, they went 
home. 
As for the Carolinians bejng the first to show 
the advantages of the open order formation, I 
am constrained to. believe that Mr. Kephart is 
jesting. The mountaineers rode as a mob, and 
fought without any discipline other than that 
obtained by Indian warfare. At King’s Moun¬ 
tain, they ran from the first fire of the British, 
each man seeking shelter of rock, tree, stump; 
anything that would shelter their precious bodies 
from harm. In a military sense, it was a mob. 
They taught no lesson, for they fought after the 
manner of the frontiersmen. They could not 
fight in any other manner, for they knew no 
other. If called upon to form in open order on 
the open plain, they could not respond. When 
placed at the front of battle, as at Hannah’s Cow¬ 
pens, they ran at sight of the enemy. They were 
bush fighters pure and simple, the pot shot being 
the favorite, and the only one, if a choice was 
possible. As an aggregation, they afforded an 
example of pot shots collectively. They came 
to give battle because the enemy was advancing 
toward their homes. The enemy being routed, 
they forthwith returned to their homes, leaving 
the rest of their state, and. all the states, to care 
for themselves. It was the troops of the other 
states that rescued North Carolina. The militia 
and mountaineers of North Carolina did seme 
extraordinary stunts in the way of leaving a clear 
field to the invaders. Fair Play. 
After a day’s sport in the woods or afloat, and 
while on our homeward way, the old rail fence 
beckons us until we cannot resist the temptation 
to tarry awhile on its top rail. Come, then, with 
me and sit on the lichen-covered top rail while we 
smoke the pipe of contentment, scrape the cockle- 
burrs off our clothing, and chat of the incidents 
Of the day or spin a final yarn before parting. 
When the Anglers’ Club of New York first 
began to practice fly- and bait-casting in Central 
Park—on Saturday afternoon—members were 
held up by nursemaids, old gentlemen and small 
boys and asked to explain. Every small boy put 
the old familiar question, “Say, Mister, get any 
fish?” But the treasurer of the club, Mr. Poey, 
fanned interest among the onlookers to fever 
heat when he, with other members’ assistance, 
put out his line of colored balls. This line was 
run out from the casting platform and made 
fast on shore. Fifty feet from the platform a 
5-inch air-tight celluloid ball, highly colored, was 
made fast to the line, and every ten feet up to 
170 there was another one of equal size, but 
each one of a different color. Standing on the 
casting platform, the 50-foot ball, the first one, 
is blue; the 6o-foot ball, yellow; 70. dark red; 
80, pink; go, white; 100, carmine; no, blue again; 
120, yellow; 130, dark red; 140, pink; 150, white; 
160, carmine; 170, pink. Mr. Poey offered to 
attach twelve smaller balls between the others, 
to mark every five feet, but the io-foot marks 
proved sufficiently accurate until the casters be¬ 
came accustomed to the significance of each 
color without counting forward or backward to 
determine the distance. 
This plan., once the values of the colors are 
memorized, is of assistance to the fly- and bait- 
casters, but the long line of bright floats caught 
the eye of every park visitor at once. The 
nursemaids exclaimed, “Oh, my, how pretty! 
I wonder what they are for,” etc. And an old 
German, after asking everybody in. sight, button¬ 
holed a member and queried “Mine vriend, vat 
iss dose balls for alretty—eleck-dricity, hein? 
No?” 
K 
Sportsmen get into curious predicaments at 
times. One of them whom I know went shoot¬ 
ing in the state in which he lives, but the rail¬ 
way over which he traveled passes through an¬ 
other state. On his return home, accompanied 
by a companion, in changing cars he was way¬ 
laid by a warden in this other state, taken aside 
and asked' what the wheat sack he was carrying 
contained. There was about five minutes’ time 
to take his train, and trying a bluff, he told the 
warden it was none of the latter’s business, but 
he soon realized that this would not work and 
that the possession of a gun and this bulging 
sack must be explained before train time. Still, 
he is fond of a joke and led the warden along 
until the latter felt certain he was justified in 
taking the man before a magistrate for arraign¬ 
ment. then put 'his sack down and disclosed 
several dozen eggs, four fine dressed chickens 
and other choice farm produce he had purchased 
to take home at the last moment. 
R 
If there is a sportsman who is contemplating 
a shooting journey southward the coming 
winter, but is unfamiliar with Florida, and would 
like to have as a companion a gentleman ac¬ 
quainted with the woods and waters, I think 
both parties can be pleased. The man referred 
to has fished and shot in Florida every winter 
for twenty years, for his own amusement, but 
informs me he cannot afford to go again this 
year alone, but is willing to go with another 
sportsman if his expenses are paid,, in return 
for which he agrees to take an excellent bird 
dog over which, he says, it is a pleasure to 
shoot: make camp, cook and act as guide. He 
is familiar with splendid places within twenty 
miles of Jacksonville, and says that on the 
first day last season at this place this party got 
three deer, a bear and a lot of ducks and quail. 
The exnenses of the trip would be very light 
while in camp, and he guarantees good sport. 
He lives in the North and is prepared to furnish 
references. Any communication on this sub¬ 
ject sent to me in care of Forest and Stream 
will be forwarded to him. 
R 
An angler sends me this clipping from a 
Missouri paper: “Bass may not like corned 
pork, but they cannot stand for fierce-looking 
submarine torpedo-shaped minnows.” 
This in reference to the growing practice of 
using immense artificial minnows equipped with 
three to five sets of large treble hooks, then 
attaching a slab of fat pork as a trailer. No 
wonder the bass pitch into contrivances of the 
sort, for they may regard them somewhat as 
citizens of a peaceable Western village formerly 
regarded a much beweaponed cOwpuncher 
under the influence of chained lightning and 
making ready to “shoot up" the town. I have 
an idea that I can bring more bass to the net 
when using a single hook on wooden minnow 
or spoon than with one or more trebles. At 
any rate, I use the single hook. 
A few opinions on this subject, based on ex¬ 
perience, might be interesting. 
*» 
Not long ago I was encamped with a fellow 
angler near a salt-water inlet once famous for 
its big striped bass, but now noted principally 
for crabs and eels. The nights were cool and 
we enjoyed sitting beside a small friendship fire 
for an hour before turning in. My companion 
is . fond of eels, while I am not. My pleasure 
in catching an eel ends when he commences 
to wind up my line, an operation I prefer to 
conduct myself. As our fire was not far from 
the water, and the tide was flooding at night, 
my friend found he could cast far out in the 
inlet, then sit by the fire while awaiting a bite, 
an occupation as restful and expectant as any 
angler could ask for. One night I sat beside 
the fire while my companion landed six eels 
