200 FOREST AND STREAM Aug. 16, 1913. 
Rough Notes from the Woods 
By NESSMUK 
From issue of Aug. 12, 1880. 
S HE'S all my fancy painted her, she’s lovely, 
she is light. She waltzes on the waves by 
day, and rests with me at night. But I 
had nothing to do with her painting. The man 
who built her did that. And I.commence with 
the canoe, because that is about the first thing 
you need on entering the Northern wilderness. 
From the Forge House, foot of the Fulton Chain, 
on tint west, to Paul Smith’s Lower St. Regis 
Lake, on the east, is ninety-two miles. About five 
miles of this distance is covered by carries; the 
longest carry on this route is about one mile; 
the shortest, a few rods. If you hire a guide he 
will furnish a boat and carrj r it himself. His 
boat will weigh from sixty to one hundred 
pounds, and will carry two heavy men, with all 
the dunnage you need. He will “take care” of 
you, as they express it here, and will work faith¬ 
fully to forward your desires, whether you be 
artist, tourist, angler or hunter. His charges 
are $2.50 per day, and found. The tired, over¬ 
worked man of business, who gets away from 
the hot, dusty city for a few days or weeks, 
cannot do beter than come to this land of lake, 
river and mountain, and hire a guide. 
What the mule or mustang is to the plains¬ 
man, the boat or canoe is to guide, hunter or 
tourist, who proposes a sojourn in the Adiron- 
dacks. And this is why I propose to mention 
at some length this matter of canoeing and 
boating. Being a light weight and a good 
canoeman, having the summer before me, de¬ 
signing to haunt the nameless lakes and streams 
not down on the maps, and not caring to hire a 
guide, it stands to reason that my canoe should 
be of the lightest, and she is. Perhaps she is 
the lightest cedar-built canoe in the United 
States, or anywhere else. Her stems and keel 
are oak, her ribs red elm, her gunwale spruce, 
and six pairs of strips, three-sixteenths of an 
inch thick, with copper fastening from stem to 
stem, leave her weight, when sandpapered ready 
for the paint, fifteen pounds nine and a half 
ounces. The paint adds about two pounds. She 
is ten feet long, twenty-six inch beam, with 
eight inches rise at center, and, propelled by a 
light double paddle, with a one fool power in 
the middle, gets over the water like a scared 
loon. I propose to take her a rather extended 
trip before snow flies, if she does not drown 
me. I reckon her carrying capacity, in ordinary 
weather, at 150 pounds. If she proves reason¬ 
ably safe on the larger lakes of the wilderness, 
she is an achievement in the boat-building line. 
She was built by T. II. Rushton, of Canton, N. 
Y., and is by several pounds the lightest canoe 
ever made by him. I will only add that she is 
too light and frail. I would recommend ten and 
a half feet in length, with thirty-inch beam, and 
ribs two inches apart instead of three. Such a 
canoe would be stanch and safe for one, and 
need not weigh more than twenty-two pounds. 
She can easily be carried on the head, in an in¬ 
verted position, first placing a blanket or an old 
coat on the head by way of cushion. 
When I reached here, just one week ago, 
tired with a twelve-mile ride on the corner 
of a trunk, while I hugged that frail boat like a 
faithful lover, I only meant to stop until I could 
get my traps carried through to the Fulton 
Chain, which, in the case of the canoe, was not 
so easy. I was in no hurry—the hotel here is 
neat, well kept and prices very reasonable. 
While waiting for the man to turn up who 
wanted to carry the little craft on his head to 
the Forge House, it dawned on me that I was 
well enough where I was for a few days. 
Parties were constantly coming and going, and 
all stop at Moose River, which is the half-way 
house between Booneville and the lakes. 
For interviewing guides and taking notes 
of the region to the eastward, there could be no 
better point than this; and I needed practice 
with the canoe before taking her over the larger 
lakes. Moreover, I came here for a superior 
quality of water, air and angling, with a little 
hunting thrown in at the proper season. 
What if these things were at my hand, right 
here, and parties hurrying through post haste 
to the Brown Tract or the Raquette waters were 
running away from that they sought? Those 
coming out of the woods do not, as a rule, claim 
notable success with the trout. Many of them 
would eat salt pork oftener than broiled trout 
were it not for the guides, and one of the latter 
told me that “fronting” was poor on and around 
Big Moose, while he thought Little Moose and 
Panther lakes not worth a visit. “I could catch 
all the trout I wanted right around here,” he 
added. 
So I overhauled my fishing gear and went 
in for brook trout, and, as I supposed, found 
all I wanted; found that I could, by angling just 
enough for recreation, catch more speckled 
trout by far than I need, while there is very 
pretty fly-fishing at the spring holes in the river. 
Many gentlemen who go far into the wilderness, 
at much expense of guides, etc., would be well 
content with just such fishing as I am enjoying 
at Moose River. Then there are, within an 
easy walk of the hotel, several small lakes where 
deer “water” nightly, and may be “floated” for 
with a fair prospect of success. 
But this is not camping out—not a genuine 
woods life. We seek the forest for adventure, 
and a free, open air, hunter’s life, for a time 
at least. Well, it may be a little tame, but it is 
very pleasant and healthful, all the same. As 
for camping for the benefit of open air, bright 
fires and beds of browse, fresh picked from 
hemlock and balsam, we have that right here. 
Just under my eyes as I write, there is an island 
in the river some twelve rods long by six wide. 
It is well timbered with spruce, balsam, hem¬ 
lock, cedar, pine, birch and maple. It is one of 
the pleasant spots that nature makes and man 
neglects. The island lies high, with roaring, 
rushing rapids on the left, and a broad rock 
dam on the right, which at low water becomes 
a cool, clean promenade, 100 feet long by forty 
feet broad. Near the center of this rock is a 
natural depression, forming a basin into which 
the water slowly filters from the river. In this 
little dock I let the canoe rest at night; against 
the largest spruce on the island my light tent 
of oiled factory is erected, and there I rest 0’ 
nights—for a few days only, and then for 
broader waters and deeper woods; perhaps to 
go further and fare worse. 
Autobiographical Fragments. 
BY “NESSMUK.” 
(From issue of Aug’. 8, 1881.) 
* * * And I remain yours sincerely, Ness- 
muk, which means in the Narragansett tongue, 
or did mean, as long as there were any Narra- 
gansetts to give tongue. Wood-duck, or rather, 
Wood-drake. 
Also, it was the name of the athletic young 
brave, who was wont to steal me away from 
home before I was five years old, and carry me 
around Nepmug and Junkamaug lakes, day after 
day, until I imbibed much of his woodcraft, all 
his love for forest life, and alas, much of his 
good-natured shiftlessness. 
Even now my blood flows faster as I think 
of the rides I had on his well-formed shoulders, 
a little leg on either side of his neck, and a 
death grip on his strong, black mane. Or ride, 
“belly-bumps” on his back across old Junka¬ 
maug, hugging him tightly around the neck, like 
the selfish little egotist that I was. He tire? 
He drown? I would as soon have thought to 
tire a wolf or drown a whale. At first these 
excursions were not fairly concluded without a 
final settlement at home, said settlement consist¬ 
ing of a head-raking with a fine-toothed comb 
that left my scalp raw, and a subsequent inter¬ 
view, of a private nature, with “Par,” behind 
the barn, at which a yearling apple tree sprout 
