Forest and Stream 
$3 a Year, 10 Cts. a Copy, 
Six Months, $1.50. 
NEW YORK, SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 1913. 
VOL. LXXX.—No. 6. 
127 Franklin St., New York. 
Adirondack Camp-Fire 
By WILLIAM SIMPSON 
I T was several years ago—I had not been very 
well for some time, not to a degree of ill¬ 
ness that incapacitated me from attending 
to my usual duties—I consulted a doctor of 
medicine, who said I had “rails on my lungs.” 
He looked wise and sad, like one who lost a 
whole lot, or an old friend that forgot to leave 
him a legacy. Anyway, he shook his head, wrote 
out a prescription, and handed it to me with 
some oral instructions. I moved about as usual 
at the foot of Lower Saranac Lake?” It is 
burned down now, but it used to be a favorite 
rendezvous; not the fashionable hotel, you under¬ 
stand, but woods hotel of the old sort, where a 
man could use his knife for the purpose of trans¬ 
porting nourishment to his mouth without at¬ 
tracting undue attention. 
It was early in the season when I arrived 
there. The lumbering was over for that year, 
and many of the men who had worked on the 
a favor, or throw a troublesome customer out 
of the barroom door. Here the pine, balsam, 
spruce, cedar, birch and many other varieties of 
vegetation breathe out their perfumed air and 
health-giving qualities, more especially at night, 
and if those unfortunate individuals who are 
troubled with that parent of many ills, “dys¬ 
pepsia” and its near relation, consumption, and 
some of their less troublesome kin, were to come 
here during the summer months and be lulled 
ON THE STILL W.\TER. 
for some time, the physician’s serious looks had 
given me some misgivings, but between doubt 
and hope as to my actual condition, I struggled 
along fairly well for awhile. 
Did you ever notice when you have been in 
poor health, the number of gratuitous cures that 
are suggested to you by your friends and the 
various remedies that are thrown in? Well, that 
was my experience, too. I finally consulted the 
most celebrated doctor of medicine, E. G. J., 
whose great knowledge and wonderful ability 
were universally acknowledged. His advice was 
as honest as it was brief. He said; “You are 
in bad shape, and if you do not give up your 
activities for awhile, there probably will be a 
store where yours is now, but you will not likely 
be the proprietor.” So I inferred I was likely 
to be the central figure at a funeral. I put my 
affairs in order and went to seek health and 
recreation among the Adirondack Mountains. 
“Do you remember the sportsman’s retreat 
luijiber job were now “guides” and were stop¬ 
ping here, waiting for pre-arranged appointments 
or looking for prospective “sports.” As I 
alighted from the stage coach, the first place I 
made use of was the ante-room off the office, 
where guests often entered to wash up and re¬ 
move the soil of travel. The water was all 
right, all Adirondack water is, but when it came 
to the comb and brush, perhaps I ought to draw 
the veil of charity over that comb. Its teeth 
in some respects resembled the front rank of a 
defeated army. The brush was not so bad; it 
looked younger and may have been less fre¬ 
quently used, but it had a serio-comic smell, and 
it was a red-letter day when that roller had a 
new towel put on it. But this is not a hard- 
luck story. The place had many redeeming quali¬ 
ties ; the rooms were clean and tidy, the beds 
good and their linen perfect; the dining room 
was large and cheerful, the fare excellent, and 
the jolly landlord always willing to do a friend 
ON THE RAITDS. 
to sleep by the murmuring waters and breathe 
this air, laden and mingled with the perfume 
of the water lily and all the wild flowers that 
come to life in the woods between the entry of 
the snowdrop and the e.xit of the golden rod, 
their troubles would be removed a lot. 
With improved health, nature sends in¬ 
creased zest and relish and a better appreciation 
and fuller enjoyment of outdoor life. So in 
due season I received my share. 
There was in the party “Laura Louise,” a 
relation of mine by marriage, who entered into 
the full enjoyment of everything as it came 
along, especially the trout fishing, and at close 
range could cast a fly as well as the best. Often 
in the gloaming we would go out on the lake 
to the mouth of one of the small brooks and 
there she would try her skill with the fly, which 
on one occasion was rewarded in landing two 
nice half-pound trout with one cast of her flies. 
Our next moving day brought us to “Bart- 
