462 
FOREST AND STREAM 
April 13, 1912 
rice stalks, but never once could even a por¬ 
tion of its bulk be discerned. 
Pedro whispered an anathema, and I replied, 
“So say I.” For hours of torture of skin we 
waited, long after our invisible quarry had 
eaten its fill and departed, and then we arose 
sadder, wiser and hungrier men. Another fruit¬ 
less Philippine night! 
As we wended our wearisome way up through 
the sandy gullies, Pedro remarked, “Maestro, 
we will go again and take some beaters and 
I am sure we will have better fortune.” Hard 
though our previous experiences had been, my 
need for fresh meat led me to grasp at the new 
hope with avidity. The expected hour was 
awaited with impatience. 
Weeks later Pedro came to my ant-ridden 
room. He cheered me by saying, “Maestro, I 
have arranged for a grand hunt this time. 
Tinguianes from Abang, up the river, will be 
our beaters and we will wait at some con¬ 
venient spot for them to drive the deer past. 
Nothing will be easier than to shoot them 
then.” I was elated. 
On the appointed day we forded the Abra, 
passed through the leafless trees where the 
giant bats roosted and saw the ruins of the 
huts outside Abang, where the headhunters 
had recently obtained some victims. In Abang 
the Tinguianes received us hospitably. Around 
the village we found the triplicate bamboo 
fence erected to keep out the headhunters. 
All was speedily made ready and the beaters 
gathered with their dogs and deer nets. A long 
valley extended down to the Abra from the 
higher mountains beyond. It was grass clothed 
with an occasional body of trees in which we 
knew deer could be found. 
At the top of a long wooded rise three miles 
beyond Abang we found a rough, rock-encum¬ 
bered field. There in a little elevated copse of 
trees I sat, old-fashioned Filipino rifle in hand. 
Then the beauties of the scene drew aside my 
attention. For two hundred yards before me 
the field rose until its upper lip curled over 
the sky line. To the left and right the tropical 
forest met the field. 
Then the halloos of the beaters filled the 
valley at my left, but nothing appeared. My 
thoughts wandered to America, but were in¬ 
stantly brought back to the islands by a crash 
in the undergrowth, and out of the woods 
jumped a doe and fawn and began to cross the 
field in a succession of leaps. I sat and admired 
them. 
Wake up! I wasn’t there for that. I must 
have the meat. Aiming as carefully as I could, 
I had the fate to see the dust raised by my 
bullet several yards in the rear of the fleeing 
pair, yet my feelings were not injured by that 
miss. 
Another wait, another listening to the dis¬ 
tant beaters’ shouts. Gazing at a piece of 
woods forty yards away, my abstraction was 
hurled from me by beholding a great buck 
standing in full view and calmly gazing around. 
My gun was not even reloaded, but I did not 
realize it, for I was too intent on the scene. 
There was a buck in his native habitat, a rare 
scene. Was not he majestic? Buck fever or 
buck admiration possessed me. Then the buck 
broke the spell by beginning to leap in my 
direction. Hastily I pushed in a Filipino- 
loaded cartridge made for use in the insurrec¬ 
tion. The buck came right to the foot of my 
little hillock and passed broadside on. When I 
felt sure of him I pulled the trigger. The 
primer exploded, the cartridge did not. With 
bated breath I actually moved the muzzle to 
follow the deer, hoping the powder would yet 
I T is a long glance backward from the thermos 
bottle of to-day with its manifold possibilities 
of heat and cold, to the water bottle of the 
pre-Columbian period. Not many relics so 
fragile as a bit of pottery come down to us 
from the fifteenth century. 
As I write there sits before me on the table 
an ancient water bottle bearing the date Nov. 
A NEGRITO SHARER OF THE JUNGLE WITH THE DEER. 
13, 1447, with the maker’s name. The inscrip¬ 
tion is in the old English style of penmanship 
and is still legible through the cracked and 
battered glazing. It is an odd old piece of 
ceramic, unlike anything I have ever before 
seen. 
It would be interesting, were we able to trace 
the history down through the centuries since 
it left the kiln. Alas! that history is lost. One 
may only reproduce it in imagination. One 
may picture an English laborer, with the bottle 
on his arm, wending his way across the moor 
while yet the day is unborn; see him as' he 
places it beneath a hawthorn and covers it with 
furze; watch him, when the sun beats hot, pause 
in his labor, wipe the sweat from his brow and 
seek the refreshing draught its fat sides hold. 
Mayhap it belonged to some lord of the 
manoi* whose henchman carried it, filled with 
ruby wine, when his master rode afield with 
hawk on wrist. There are many things that 
might l>e dreamed of the old relic. One might 
ignite and give me my meat. The deer went 
around a shoulder of the hill to safety and— 
the rifle 'discharged into the earth at my feet 
as I lowered it. 
Hot, weary, downhearted. T went back to 
Bucay hungry and yet to be so. 
picture it hidden away among the household 
goods of some emigrating family in our early 
Colonial settlement. Might even suppose it to 
have touched shoulders with spindle-legged 
chairs and tall Dutch clocks in the Mavflower, 
a plebian mixed with aristocracy. 
Why not? Enough junk was brought across 
in that historical catboat to furnish patents of 
gentility to hundreds of families in this coun¬ 
try. Why not some obscure hind, with no 
thought of founding a family on the strength of 
a dilapidated chair or an asthmatic settee, at 
the last moment of making ready, pack this old 
bottle away among the bedding with the re¬ 
mark to his goodwife, “Beshrew me, Rachel, 
we will fetch the old water bottle along. Per- 
adventure I shall need it when I labor afield.” 
However it happened, it has come down to 
us from generation to generation, growing yel¬ 
low and cracked as the years rolled away, 
gathering the moss of tradition until its history 
has been concealed. The old bottle is eleven 
inches in height, nine inches in diameter and 
two inches thick. It is composed of some sort 
of hard red clay, glazed brown with light yel¬ 
low splashes. It is not quite true, being smaller 
on one side, nor is it exactly round. 
The history so far as I have been able to 
trace it is but slight. It came into the pos¬ 
session of T. J. Campbell nearly forty years 
ago, being presented to him by a man named 
Thompson, who said it had been in his family 
time out of mind. He died a very old man and 
had known of the bottle for over eighty years. 
Time to Go A-Fishin’. 
Get out your rod and tackle 
And prepare the luring flies. 
For it’s time to go a-fishin’ 
In the anglers’ paradise; 
Drop some oil upon the bearings 
Of your last year’s patent reel, 
And be sure there’s nothin’ missin’ 
When you pack the wicker creel. . 
Test the lines for weakened places, 
So the fish can’t get away. 
For you know how that would vex you 
And the things which you would say; 
Try the pole before you pack it 
And be sure it’s good and strong. 
Tor the season soon will open 
And you’ll want to join the throng. 
See what time the trains are leaving 
For your fav’rite anglin’ haunts, 
Have your boots well oiled and ready 
Ere you start your summer’s jaunts; 
Pack some luncheon, in the basket 
Where you know it can’t fall out. 
For remember you’ll be hungry 
After whippin’ hours for trout. 
—Portland Oregonian. 
Out of the Past 
By CHARLES S. MOODY 
