Nov. 8 , 1913. 
FOREST AND STREAM 
595 
Rough Notes from the Lakes 
By ROBERT PAGE LINCOLN 
M INNESOTA is famous for her outdoor 
beauty, and above all other things her 
lakes, the number of same within her 
borders being listed as ten thousand. It is hard 
to go anywhere without finding a lake set in 
between woods and pastures, and each and every 
one of them seem to have their undiminishing 
supply of the finny fellows. Of course it is true 
that all of these lakes have not the full quota 
of abundance, but taken as a whole there is pre¬ 
sented some of the best opportunities found in 
any of the States. This is a cold fact; not a 
railroad advertisement. I have journeyed around 
some to exploited lands, and I know that the 
most of what you hear of exceptional fishing 
in so-called favored climes must be taken with 
a pinch of salt. I have come to rely fully and 
unreservedly upon Minnesota. I am perfectly 
familiar with her. I know what she is capable 
of offering to the Waltonian disciples. And in 
the name of abundance there is hardly anything 
to equal our northern Minnesota lakes. They 
have a sealed reputation. Thousands come here 
every year from all parts of the United States 
to indulge in the pastime of pastimes, and they 
are always welcomed with success more than you 
can say for the majority of the fishing waters 
exploited in print and by word of mouth. The 
northern lakes are teeming with fish of all varie¬ 
ties, common and otherwise. In their wild state 
they will take bait readily, and without the least 
suspicion—a quality noted in the pursuit of 
fishes near to civilization. 
Sparkling and transparent are some of these 
lakes, and their depth is something to marvel 
at. I am not writing this to tease you to Min¬ 
nesota the coming season, but I know when the 
old ice breaks out next spring, where Robert 
Page Lincoln will establish camp and head¬ 
quarters, I know that I am not going to pay 
exorbitant railroad fares to get fishing and out¬ 
door beauty to my liking either. A camp by one 
of these northern lakes will suit me, and despite 
the fact that the mosquitoes hover over man¬ 
kind in such regions in unstinted plenty, still for 
all that the wealth of joy one will gain out of 
life makes up for any inconveniences and dis¬ 
comforts felt. 
There was a time I sort of scoffed at Min¬ 
nesota, my home State, but upon my return I 
have counted my beads, and I find that I have 
been a pure, idiotic fool. I am not going to 
exploit Minnesota; I am just going to write 
about her with sincerity and purpose, telling just 
what I find and how I find it. There is so much 
here to marvel at, and it may be had wherever 
you go. It amounts to a whole lot, turn where 
you will, locate where you will, and within an 
hour’s ride get good fishing and even hunting. 
I am not going to dwell upon the hunting feat¬ 
ure of it here, but will give it my attention 
later. Owing to the sickness of my mother I 
was called back from Denver, where I had begun 
elaborate preparations for a trip through the 
South. I found detriments on all sides, and 
pessimistic words by many men were poured 
into my ears. They told me to abandon it. And 
shall we say it (as luck would have it I was 
called back), and here I now am, with still a 
number of brilliant fishing days awaiting me in 
the dear old festooned and spectacular' month 
of October, the finest space of all the year. I 
had hardly returned than old fishing friends laid 
plans for trips to nearby lakes. On the 28th of 
September we spent one glorious day near to 
home, and we had fine luck. It brought back 
those hallowed old memories that will always 
crop up. Two o’clock in the early morning we 
routed out of bed, put up our lunch, had a bite 
to eat, then harnessed the horse, and were away 
for the waters and the fish. But a ten-mile ride 
and the lake was reached, just when the skies 
in the east were coloring up in a pale, rosy glory. 
Out at the Minnesota bottoms the gunners 
were located in their blinds, and a perfect can¬ 
nonade proceeded, and band after band of ducks 
were seen flying through the air. The lake it¬ 
self, old Bush Lake, o{ boyhood remembrance, 
was still the same, unchanged, the woods com¬ 
ing down to the shores on all sides in rounded 
and perfect beauty. The frosts of a pair of 
nights before had dyed the leaves in yellow and 
orange beauty, giving a hint of the treasured 
days soon to be presented. You take a day like 
this for instance, and you treasure it a thousand 
times more than a common, sultry, uninteresting 
summer day, when the fish are idle for that mat¬ 
ter, and chances are often against you. Now 
the days are cool, the sunshine brighter than 
bright. Pure gold would be the fit name for it, 
and pure gold alone. It puts vim into the body, 
and every moment is crowded with charm. If 
no fish will greet your patient efforts, there will 
at least be the enhancing beauty and saintliness 
of a perfect day to remember, when all things 
are counted up. We put out from shore with 
two Hendrix spoons out on duty for pickerel of 
course. Across those glassy waters the boat 
glided, propelled by my partner, he of many past 
fishing trips into the heart of Arcady. We knew 
the old places, and thither we went carefully 
and noiselessly skirting the weeds, now at their 
full growth. You take one of these bays, for 
instance, and they will be surrounded by a defi¬ 
nite sense of expectation. Any moment may be 
prolific of a catch, and there may be a big one 
at that. Always in the morning hours for the 
pickerel. Then they are feeding, and with a 
glittering and scintillating spoon out on duty the 
chances are great, to say the least. 
We had just turned into the first bay when 
I felt a jerk that almost unseated me, and the 
next moment I was active with the line. There 
are those who will go into brilliant and high 
falutin language over the ecstasies of trout and 
•yellowtail fishing, the former found in treasured 
lands, the latter off Catalina and the Gulf of 
Mexico. Very well, but also will the pickerel 
give you a run for the money there is in it, if 
any. The poor, inconspicuous pickerel. But say, 
get one of those husky fellows firm on a hook; 
get a nice limber rod and a good reel to back 
you up, and there is every bit of sport connected 
with the performance of bringing the pugnacious 
one into the boat. In short order we landed 
him, and in the second bay, among the weeds, 
we caught a mate to it. They were six and 
eight pounds, respectively. Then abandoning the 
trolling feature for the time being we went in 
for still-fishing and brought out a nice lot of 
the little fellows, the choicest dainty in the fish 
world as a table fare. To the eating qualities 
of the sunfish I fasten my faith and will meet 
all comers who will combat the assertion. How¬ 
ever, remembering what someone has said about 
the mistake Frank Forester made in his writ¬ 
ings in his all too frequent mention as to the 
beauties of eating, I will refrain from delving 
into this delicate subject (understanding that 
perchance a tinge of immortality may rest upon 
my own efforts), and thanking you for the 
flowers, I will say that had I the remarkable 
art of a Forester, and could do the eating part 
of it a generous turn, I would spend nine chap¬ 
ters telling you about eating sunfish, fried with 
crumbs adhering to them, and brown or golden 
at that, but since there is a tinge of immortality 
clinging languorously around this screed, I will 
not share with you my convictions. Patience, 
immortal patience, the still-fisher is the personi¬ 
fication of it. To fish, to dream and occasionally 
catch a fish to disturb the monotony of things, 
this is the aim and purpose of the still-fisher. 
You sink that line, and on the end of it you 
have a perfect hook, with a good neck bend to 
it, and a juicy worm wriggling for dear life. A 
nibble—ah! it was a nibble, and it was heavy 
and ominous. It was a fish. Immediately you 
call to mind a red-brown fellow, and you are 
pulling him in, and he comes up sideways, the 
slender rod bending, the reel buzzing, and back 
and forth he goes it. How else fish for sunfish 
than with a rod and reel. It is the poetry of it. It 
keys you up to the excitement of it. Relatively 
the same sensations are felt when taking the 
speckled beauties. After all there is a philoso¬ 
phy in fishing. If but for the reverie and lassi¬ 
tude of it, it would be conspicuous, and one to 
give attention to by the elite, a term that goes, 
not to the rich, but to the common everyday 
people born of simplicity and contentment. 
Toward the evening hour we withdrew from 
our fishing scenes of the earlier part of the day 
and moved down the lake to the lilypads. The 
winds had now stilled down. An immortal still¬ 
ness and solemnity rested upon the face of the 
waters, so glassy, mirror-like, reflecting so per¬ 
fectly the trees that lined the shores that we 
poised out there for some time to view it. In 
among the lilypads we noticed the bass rising for 
insects. It was enough. The change of small 
hooks to coaxers was made, and standing up in 
the boat I prepared to cast. Past knowledge of 
the rowing feature was liberally shown by my 
partner’s present skill. From right to left and 
ahead of us I cast, the bait falling, sometimes 
true, at other times away from the mark. One 
of these times I placed a red-winged coaxer 
just where I wanted it. A moment before this 
a bass had risen, and the circles had not receded 
when the bait fell, and it fell right on top of 
a round pad. I pulled it off, and undoubtedly 
it created an imitation of a frog plumping into 
the brim. However this may be, the next 
moment a fine old fellow rose and snapped it 
up. It was quite unexpected, for I had been 
treated to failure many times before, but now 
I had him, and a delicious fight was on. Talk 
about stirring the latent blood corpuscles! I 
(Continued on page 604.) 
