April 22, 1911.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
609 
beautiful skin and is, I suppose, the most sav¬ 
age animal in the sierras. They will attack peo¬ 
ple, and although the popular belief is that 
mountain lions will not, there are said to be 
exceptions to the rule. 
On the trail I saw a wooden cross and on ask¬ 
ing a Mexican what it was, he told me that 
some months ago two Mexicans and a lad of 
about ten years were driving a burro train, and 
in the morning the two older men sent out the 
youngster to fetch in the burros. They waited 
and waited, but the boy did not return and after 
a time they started to search for him. They 
found his body all torn up and partly eaten and 
realized in a moment that it was the work of 
a puma. 1 hey hurried off for dogs and avenged 
his death by killing the lion, which was a very 
old one. Perhaps it is true of mountain lions 
as it is of African lions. When a lion cannot 
kill game through old age and infirmity, it is 
likely to become what one may term in a very 
minor sense a man-eater. It will take children, 
rob the farm hog pen and such things. Such 
cases are rare, but still exceptions prove the rule. 
I here is no doubt about the truth of this story 
about the Mexican lad. The wooden cross marks 
the spot where he was killed and everybody 
knows it. It occurred only about a year ago. 
The other morning I saw a beautiful grizz'y, 
but he was away before I could get in a shot 
and I had left my one hound at camp. If the 
dog had been with me I do not for one minute 
suppose that he would have run the bear alone. 
Minor hunts we can indulge in at any time. 
There are many ’coons, but the skunks which are 
abundant are a great nuisance. I am trapping 
a good few and have been successful in getting 
some foxes. There are not a few wolves, al¬ 
though personally I have not seen any as vet. 
I have just been talking to a Mexican who 
says that many bears do not hole up in the winter 
in the Sierra Madre. They merely come lower 
down on the mountains. So much the better 
for me, as we shall have bear hunting all the 
winter, and in three weeks, when my partner 
gets back, there will be something doing. For 
wild pigs we must go about ten or fifteen miles, 
just over the divide into Sonora. They are quite 
good sport, but death on dogs, unless the latter 
are very careful. On the Sonora side there is 
a species of monkey which has very fine fur. 
So far as I know it is the only one of the 
monkey family in the northern part of this 
country. 
The birds one can describe only as magnificent, 
of many sorts and of beautiful plumage; in my 
opinion even rivaling those of Africa and Abys¬ 
sinia. The woodpeckers and anteaters—or I 
imagine they are anteaters—especially interest 
me. They have a very long-pointed tongue and 
the other day I killed one and found on its 
tongue several dead ants. We also have in this 
part of the country the ivory-billed woodpecker, 
a large black and white bird with a white bill, 
and as far as I can learn exceedingly rare. This 
country I refer to—say twenty miles west of 
here—is practically unknown. Miles upon miles 
of mountains which practically no white man 
has traveled through, and the difficulties of 
transport are such that it will be many years 
before it is gone into. When I say the moun¬ 
tains are impassable in many places, I mean it. 
It is sheer up and down. My partner tells me 
of an animal that I have never heard of, al¬ 
though he swears that an American told him 
direct that he had seen one in the Sierra Madre 
Mountains. It was described as a black moun¬ 
tain lion with white or light stripes like an In¬ 
dian tiger. Whether there is any truth to this 
or not I cannot say. He tells me a Mexican 
killed the only one he has heard of being killed, 
but I cannot trace up the story. I only hope it 
may fall to my luck, not only to see one, but to 
secure him. 
So far as one can see, sport will last here for 
many years. On the Chihuahua side of the 
divide the land in the sierras belongs to private 
parties, who jealously guard their rights. I have 
permission to wander over some 200 miles of 
country so I need not complain. On the Sonora 
side the land belongs more to the country, and 
shooting is free, but on account of the distance 
and the roughness of the country, it is little 
hunted. This place would make an ideal game 
preserve for some rich individual or club. It is 
some 80,000 acres in extent, with the fine river 
I have mentioned running right through the 
property. About 1,000 acres are fit for maize; 
in fact, a Mormon grows corn here every year 
and the timber on the property should pay the 
purchase price. Of course, now it is too far 
from the market. There are adjacent properties 
aggregating 200,000 acres over which the shoot¬ 
ing rights could be secured for a mere song, 
T HE Deacon was a fisherman to the rod born, 
though up to now that rod had been wielded 
for the most part over the turbulent and 
salty waters of the Jersey coast. He was a tall, dis¬ 
tinguished looking man, with gray side-whiskers, 
luminous blue eyes, and a mouth that constantly 
wrinkled into a smile as he told some comical 
incident of days gone by. His comrade was a 
short man, a doctor, but of that school which 
deals with philosophies rather than with philters. 
Also he had a love almost amounting to a pas¬ 
sion for the crystal waters and wind-swept wilds. 
To him the best point of view from which to 
study life was along the slender tip of a taper¬ 
ing rod. 
All daj 7 and all night the train had sped away 
from the big city; all morning again it ran be¬ 
tween spruce and poplar forests, till at high 
noon we stopped at Megantic Lake. The songs 
of the voyageurs, the musical French of the 
Canadas, the smell of the wilds were all telling 
us that the happy hunting grounds were near. 
Across lakes and over portages we sped by boat 
and foot, until at last, when the sun was hang¬ 
ing low, we stepped ashore at our camp on Spider 
Lake. 
So eager were we to be out on those b’ue 
waters that we scarcely waited to greet our 
guides, Indian Albert, and Leopold, the French- 
Canadian. We must be out on the lake to watch 
the sun sink below the mountain and to listen 
to the angelus of the woods. Lying with eyes 
half closed we glided over the lake. From the 
depths of the marsh came the “tonk-a-tonk” of 
a bittern, for all the world like the sound of 
and it could be made one of the finest preserves 
on the American continent besides carrying 1,000 
or more head of cattle, which should pay run¬ 
ning expenses. It is well worth the attention 
of some individual or club. 
Mexico and the Sierra Madre have their at¬ 
tractions; the mountains are full of mineral and 
only yesterday I ran across some ore that looks 
well and have sent samples to El Paso for assay. 
“Quien sabe,” as the Mexican says, and if this 
does not pan out there are lots of others. 
To the searcher for prehistoric facts there are 
the caves of the cave dwellers, and one finds 
many of their ancient implements around the 
caves. It surely is a country of many and 
diverse interests. 
I closed this yesterday, but after doing so 
went out for a look around and ran right on to 
a fine silver tip, which was in fine condition and 
as fat as a pig. He did not know I was in the 
country and gave me an easy shot at about sixty 
yards, of which I took due advantage. He was 
grubbing right out in the open. It is always the 
unexpected that turns up, as I certainly never 
dreamed of finding a bear where he was. 
I shall hope before long to be able to tell you 
how my partner fared with the tigers and 
whether he had any luck. 
an axe on a half-submerged log; “'spile driver” 
Leopold called him, and the name fitted well. A 
pair of wild ducks went whistling by to lose 
themselves in the silent glory of the goiden west, 
where over distant lakes and forest the light 
hung in purple haze. 
Looping on a hook ess fly we cast softly where 
the afterglow was reflected under the shadow of 
the spruces. Immediately the feather was taken 
and a trout lifted clear of the water by the in¬ 
voluntary strike of the angler. Up he sailed in 
a graceful curve, his golden sides shining the 
while, till he disappeared with a splash that sent 
the wavelets rippling everywhere. Near and far 
the mirror-like surface of the lake was broken 
with a score of dimpled smiles where the trout 
rolled up to suck in the tiny midges invisible to 
our eyes. The fish were there, schools of them, 
and eagerly we looked forward to what the mor¬ 
row should bring. 
That night we gathered in the log cffibin be¬ 
fore a great stone fire-place. Our party was in¬ 
creased by four more. There was Talcott, a 
man not of parts, but of wholes, some fourteen 
stone of muscle and bone which required two 
good men to balance when he took his p'ace in 
the long canoe. A business man he, from the 
city of skyscrapers, a canny man and a gentle¬ 
man withal, a keen lover of sport and a veteran 
of many trails. Round, robust, with a guttural 
roar for voice—Cave Man we dubbed him 
straightaway. With him was his wife, a wooer 
of the silent pines, a dreamer amid the thickets 
where the white waters sing their eternal song— 
Gray Rabbit we named her as we noted her 
The Novice on the Northern Trails 
By THOMAS TRAVIS 
