Forest and Stream 
Six Months, $1.50. 
$3 a Year, 10 Cts. a Copy- 
NEW YORK, SATURDAY, AUGUST 9, 1913. 
VOL. LXXXI.—No. 6. 
127 Franklin St., New York. 
Two Weeks Under King Katahdin 
T HE weather and the woods had been dry, 
but during the night the rain came patter¬ 
ing down on our roof and lasted inter¬ 
mittently until the next noon. During the morn¬ 
ing, clouds swirled around the mountain and 
finally swallowed it from view for some hours. 
Wet weather seemed pleasantly familiar after 
our experiences of previous years in these woods 
where it rains so easily, and moreover it helped 
to make the fishing good. For while lakes and 
streams are well stocked with trout, there are 
times when no inducement will persuade them 
to bite at fly, minnow or worm. When fly-fish¬ 
ing failed, and there was urgent need of trout 
for food, it was our custom to resort to the 
rather undesirable method of trolling about the 
lake with a small spoon, and to this lure we 
owed several trout meals. This showery morn¬ 
ing I trolled and cast the fly from the canoe, 
with old Joe at the paddle, and as usual he en¬ 
tertained me with his stories and with his good- 
natured philosophy, which his skill in guiding 
and woodcraft have made him known far and 
wide. I could well believe him when he de¬ 
clared that he could travel for the rest of his 
life and not have time to visit all the good 
friends he had made among sportsmen from all 
over the United States. I caught six trout, and 
remember hearing a tale of a woodpecker who 
wasn’t satisfied with trees, but came hammering 
at the funnel of the chimney at Joe’s camp. He 
banged so loudly that everyone inside jumped. 
Joe ran out to see, and there was a big red¬ 
headed woodpecker hammering and stopping to 
listen—hammering and stopping to listen. He 
climbed the rusty iron pipe with feet and tail 
just as if it had been a spruce trunk. When I 
tried to corner Joe by asking how it was that 
the bird could stand the heat of the chimney, 
he quickly explained that there had been no fire 
in the stove because it was in the early morn¬ 
ing before anyone had arisen from their beds. 
What children we were off there in the 
woods, playing our games of tag with the trout, 
and having stories told to us! If we should 
take with us our own youngsters into the woods 
on our fishing trips, we should probably be sud¬ 
denly reminded of our own calendar ages. But 
then we were the boys—the children—playing 
with our camp outfits, our tackle (our dearest 
toys), and the world of adult cares and parent¬ 
hood was not ours for the time being. But if 
we should have chanced to begin teaching fish¬ 
ing and woodcraft to our own children, it would 
By WILLIAM S. THOMAS, M.D. 
Photograph by the Author. 
force on our minds the remembrance that we 
are really of the older generation. 
On that showery morning Ned and Tom 
walked to the mouth of the Sourdnahunk Stream 
down the blazed trail. There was little diffi¬ 
culty going, but on their return they had a lesson 
in finding their way along a route whose sign 
posts were often partly obliterated. They found 
again that nothing is much easier than to lose 
one’s way in the forest unless one keeps his 
senses preternaturally alert every minute of the 
time. 
After dinner, during which for variety Joe 
Dennis served us with boiled trout and a savory 
sauce, we were startled by strangers from down 
the lake. Our hearts sank. We did not want 
to see anybody, and no message would reach 
us away off there, unless it might be bad news 
from home. Joe, Jr., who went off in a canoe 
to investigate, returned with two weary and be¬ 
draggled sportsmen with their packs who an¬ 
nounced that they had spent two nights upon 
the mountain, and would like to rest over the 
night with us. We left them to fish the home 
lake and walked over to Lost Pond, a lake much 
like our own, a mile to the northwest, and one 
of our favorite old spots for casting from the 
canoe. But the day turned bright, and a strong 
northwest wind blew, and neither fly nor troll 
brought response from its capricious inhabitants. 
All hands grew sleepy and went ashore. The 
Indians built a smudge and slept by the shore, 
and we strolled back into the woods to lie down 
on the soft moss which there completely covers 
the uneven surface of the ground, and is thick 
enough to make a soft bed with no underbrush 
to annoy the visitor. There the eye saw noth¬ 
ing but the green mossy carpet, the straight 
trunks of the evergreens patterned with gray 
lichens, and overhead the sky peeping through 
the foliage. On the ground nearby one saw dead 
and rotting trunks and branches, cones, pine 
and spruce needles and occasional deer, rabbit 
or moose tracks. When the wind ceased sigh¬ 
ing through the treetops, the only sound to be 
distinguished was the humming of the omni¬ 
present mosquitoes and other insects. Although 
the fire made by the guides was 400 feet to lee¬ 
ward from us, yet the odor of smoke reached 
us from time to time, probably by reason of 
air eddies along the very uneven ground and 
among the tree trunks. 
