9 88 
FOREST AND STREAM 
[Dec. 22, 1906. 
A Memory of the Old Days. 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
I have been much interested in the article re¬ 
cently published in your paper, “In Newfoundland.” 
This writer carries me away back to my boyhood 
days, when it was my delight to shoulder a gun 
or sling a creel and rod and tramp into the silent 
woods, or to the rippling stream. New Bruns¬ 
wick—not Newfoundland—was my hunting and 
fishing resort. When ten or twelve years of age 
(that was in the early forties), I well remember 
the thrill of delight when my brothey Harry, a 
true sportsman, would say, “Come, Bob, get the 
bag or the creel ready; to-morrow we go for 
pigeons, partridges, plover or snipe,” as the sea¬ 
son might be. Those were the years when game 
and fish in their season were easily reached from 
the little town of F. on the river St. John. In 
1840 one had to travel three to five miles only 
to get into the dense forest or to the shady trout 
stream. 
Many a time we—Harry and I—have started at 
five in the morning and returned by ten with a 
dozen brace of pigeons or partridges in the bag. 
Those were the days Fenimore Cooper tells us 
about when the flocks of pigeons would darken 
the fields of buckwheat in their flight, as if a 
thunder cloud was passing by. Ah! Those free 
and easy days, when the woods and lakes were 
not pre-empted by man or law, and the true sports¬ 
man’s conscience was sacred and sensitive to 
nature’s order of life—those days have long since 
passed away; and a large portion of the game 
has gone with them. 
At that period the town of F. was the capital 
of the Province of New Brunswick. It was. a 
military headquarters, and from 500 to 1,000 English 
soldiers, officers and their families were stationed 
there. The staff of these regiments were to a 
man fond of fly-fishing and hunting. My posi¬ 
tion from the age of fourteen to twenty-two was 
in the principal stationery and book store; and in 
the store was sold tackle of all kinds for the 
lovers of sport. Naturally, then, I got acquainted 
with the officers of the garrison. Now that I 
am nearly in the eighties, white-haired, but for¬ 
tunately not feeble, it is often I peep into the 
past; and in memory I hear the voice of Colonel 
A., or Captain B. saying on the quiet, “Bob, get 
leave of absence and guide 11s to the Nashwaak, 
the Oromocto or the Miramichi, where we can 
catch some nice trout, or may be a ten or fifteen 
pound salmon.” It was business for the “Boss” 
to cultivate this sentiment, and I usually received 
the permit with a degree of pleasure that needs 
no description. 
A trip for one day is typical of the others— 
only two persons can go, the Captain and Bob. 
At the river shore lies our bark canoe of native 
Indian make, light as a feather and as easily 
upset as a saucer. Bob steadying the craft, warns 
his companion, “Now, Captain, lay your tackle 
and grub carefully on the center floor. So—that’s 
it. Then step in very quietly and get your feet 
under the rail near the bow and sit perfectly still 
on the rail.” Bob takes the paddle and away 
she goes like a bird across the quarter mile river 
to the mouth of the Nashwaak up which Bob 
is to paddle three miles to Drake’s Mill. Ar¬ 
riving safely at the other side of the river, the 
Captain says: “I say, Bob, don’t you know, I 
thought that big long log that was coming down 
stream would bust our craft into smithereens; 
but you steered her clear and here we are. Let 
us rest a wee.” 
In a few minutes we again start for the 
mill, and arrive without accident. “Look sharp 
now, Captain. It is just as neat a trick to. get 
out of as to get into a bark canoe, without getting 
into the water.” As for Bob he did not care a 
cent, as he was perfectly familiar with being 
dumped into the water, and climbing from the 
water to the canoe; but he had to see the Captain 
safely through the trip. 
By the side of the mill dam there was a sluice¬ 
way, at the foot of which was as fine a trout 
pool as I have ever seen in the Beaverkill or 
elsewhere; and at all seasonable periods fine 
large trout were eager for the hackle or gray 
wing. Bob moved the canoe quietly a short dis¬ 
tance below the pool. “Sit perfectly still, Cap¬ 
tain, while I run the stern to shore; get out and 
bring the bow around, and hold her steady while 
you step on the little sand beach you see there. 
Move easy now.” And the Captain got safely on 
terra firma. “I would like a sandwich and a soda, 
Bob, after that trip. It was well done.” And 
now to cast a fly. Yes, now for the fun. “You 
see those three logs at the foot of the sluice? 
Go very quietly behind those logs, stand where 
the sand is, a little above them, and cast into 
that small curdling spot. See—just there.” The 
fly fell lightly on the spot. Quick as thought a 
strike—a miss. 
“I say, Bob, he came so soon I did not see 
him.” 
“Well, cast again in the same spot *and be 
ready for the strike.” 
The Captain cast with good precision the sec¬ 
ond time, hooked and landed a fish about one 
pound in weight. The day was fine; a little 
hazy, the old mill ground out its solitary tread, 
and the stream of water glided smoothly, yet 
swiftly down the sluice. The Captain and Bob 
have twenty fine beauties in the creel, and at 3 
o’clock we entered our saucer canoe and in due 
time reached home tired and hungry. The next 
day the Captain calls at the store, relates the 
story to the Boss, closing with, “I say, Mr. M., 
that Bob of yours is a brick.” 
Many outings of a similar character were en¬ 
joyed with various officers of the garrison, some 
for a day, others for four and ten days to the 
more distant streams where salmon, grilse and 
trout were abundant in those bygone days. Oh, 
happy years of my youth, would that I could live 
them over again and with a good digestion, a 
sturdy physique, romp over “Ye banks and braes 
of bonny doon,” and enjoy the dear delights of 
the forest, the hill and dale! and again lie on fresh 
spruce or pine-made bed beside the swift current 
flowing against the round top boulders, singing 
a lullaby that brings the restful sleep. With a 
heart full of wonder and awe one can look up¬ 
ward at the “spangled firmament on high” and 
wonder who or what the great being can be who 
guides the rising and setting of the sun, the 
moon, the stars, and directs the destinies of man. 
R. R. 
A Big Florida Bass. 
Maitland, Fla., Dec. 3.- — Editor Forest and 
Stream: A day or two ago, while trolling in 
Park Lake in front of the hotel, my nephew and 
I caught a black bass 30 inches long, 8^2 inches 
wide and iglS inches girth. It weighed exactly 
12 pounds, the largest by 2 pounds that I have 
ever taken. B. G. Yates. 
Late Pike Fishing. 
What is claimed to be the largest wall-eyed 
pike taken in the vicinity was captured by 
Charles Welsh, of York, Pa., in the Susquehanna 
River at Goldsborough, on Dec. 3. Its weight 
was 11^2 pounds. Up to Dec. 13 the Pennsyl¬ 
vania Fish Commission was in receipt of reports 
of good catches of these fish in the Susque¬ 
hanna and Juniata rivers. 
The Forest and Stream may be obtained from 
any nmasdealcr on order. Ask your dealer . to 
supply you regularly. 
A Salve for the Conscience. 
For a long time I have secretly held the opinion 
that the average man who makes frequent hunt¬ 
ing or fishing trips would find it somewhat diffi¬ 
cult to justify the considerable expenditure of 
time and money that these trips cost. I am well 
aware that Rowland E. Robinson’s hero, Sam 
Lovel, “found his luck in the woods;” that Ness- 
muk believed that “the seed of the true woods¬ 
man would never be found lacking bread.” and 
that many other famous contributors to Forest 
and Stream have shown, to their own satisfac¬ 
tion at least, how much better off is the man who 
occasionally goes hunting and fishing than the 
man who is “chained to business.” And yet, not¬ 
withstanding all of these to the contrary, when I 
sit down at the end of the year and coldly cal¬ 
culate the number of days I have spent in the 
woods and along the streams, seeking my own 
pleasure and amusement to the neglect of my 
family, my work, and my own self-culture, I feel 
that it is necessary to find something for the 
other side of the account in order to make the 
transaction appear at all like a fair one. 
Of course this, does not apply to all classes of 
men. The man who through ample means and 
abundant leisure is complete master of his own 
time will do well to spend much of it among the 
mountains and by the waters. Would that all of 
us who love the out-of-doors were in his shoes! 
And the man who is not well or strong will fre¬ 
quently find that both his health and work im¬ 
prove under the open-air treatment that he may 
be encouraged to take through his love for rod 
and gun. There is a tradition in my own family, 
however, that in my younger days when at all 
unwell I took to duck hunting as a cure and that 
the cure at times was near being the death of me. 
Like all tradition this one probably has a grain 
of truth in it. And then too there is the man 
who writes so delightfully on out-of-door sub¬ 
jects that his books help all of us through the 
long dragging months of winter when we hug 
the chimney corner and wish for spring. He 
surely should be encouraged to drop everything 
else and go exploring and camping, and hunting 
and fishing, and bird hunting and botanizing, that 
he may keep the rest of us sane with his cheerful 
and wholesome talk about God’s good handiwork. 
I have one case filled with the writings of these 
men and it is to this case that I turn when the 
body is ailing or the spirit weak. 
But the man who has no such good and suffi¬ 
cient reason for his trips is the one I have had 
in mind all along. How is he to satisfy his 
family, his friends, and himself that he has a 
right to take a number of days off in the fishing 
season and again in the hunting season to visit 
the creeks and hills? I am not sure that I have 
ever succeeded in silencing family and friends in 
my own case, but I have a certain salve for the 
conscience that for me has some healing virtue 
and has made it easier to justify to myself my 
own conduct. I simply take an interest in the 
children I meet at their solitary homes among 
the mountains and by trifling kindnesses to them 
compel myself to believe that my trips have 
yielded pleasure to some one besides myself. 
It may be true that the barefoot country boy 
with torn hat and turned-up pantaloons is hap¬ 
pier than a king under certain favorable circum¬ 
stances. but my experience with backwoods chil¬ 
dren makes me think that many of them lead 
lonely lives barren of nearly all of the pleasures 
and interests that appear to be the birthright 
of boys and girls in towns and cities. Outside of 
the family they have no companions and seldom 
see new faces; of books and games there is an 
utter lack; there is little variety in the food; 
on stormy days and in the depths of winter they 
are confined to a house of three or four rooms; 
clothing is often scanty and poor, and for the 
