462 
F O R E ST AND S T REAM 
August, 1918 
I sat there beside the track fighting mos- Those angle-worms we got out behind the 
quitos and cussing Jake into a pulp barn would make a trout’s mouth water 
we started single-file for the brook 
CROOKED BROOK’S MIDNIGHT OPENING 
“NEWT” NEWKIRK ASSISTS AT AN INFORMAL OPENING OF THE FISHING SEASON AND 
DISCOVERS THAT SUCKERS HAVE THEIR HABITAT IN PLACES OTHER THAN BROOKS 
By NEWTON NEWKIRK 
J AKE LOGAN hasn’t a lick of sense 
when it comes to fishin’. Now I like 
to fish as well as anybody, but I hope 
I’m not a nut about it like Jake is. I’d 
rather fish than eat when I’m hungry, but 
Jake is worse than that—if that Jake per¬ 
son was in the last stages of starvation and 
you were to give him his choice between a 
roast-beef dinner and chance to go fishin’, 
he’d say, “Come on—I’d rather starve to 
death fishin’.” 
When Jake left for his camp on Eagle 
Lake I went to the train with him. He 
gripped my paw just before he swung 
aboard and says, “Now lissen, Newt—if I 
send you a sure tip on something good in 
the fishin’ line will you come up for a few 
days?” I solemnly promised I would and 
we parted. About two weeks later a tired 
messenger boy shuffled into my office and 
laid a message on my desk. Opening it 
I read as follows: 
“Meet you at spruce siding Saturday 
evening crooked brook opens monday. 
“Jake.”' 
“Sign here,” says the messenger boy 
stickin’ his receipt book under my nose. I 
did so, but the kid still hung around. “Sit 
down and rest,” says I to him indicating a 
chair. “Nope, I gotta beat it,” says he. 
“Well, then, goodbye—call again,” says I. 
“That message is collect,” says the kid with 
a grin. “Oh, it is, is it 1 ” says I consider¬ 
ably amazed, then I dug up half a buck and 
paid the freight. 
As I reread the message my mind went 
back to the summer before when I had 
spent a few pleasant days fishing with Jake 
at his camp on Eagle Lake and I recalled 
Crooked Brook, one of its tributaries which 
was then closed to fishing. I remembered 
it as a beautiful trout stream and it oc¬ 
curred to me that if it was to be opened 
to fishing the chance to get a nice string 
of speckled beauts ought to be A-t. 
The prospect decided me to go and Sat¬ 
urday afternoon about 5 o’clock I swung 
off the single coach on the tail-end of a 
freight at Spruce Siding and rubbered 
around, but Jake wasn’t present. The train 
moved on until it disappeared from sight 
and finally the cough of the locomotive was 
lost to my ear. There was I solitary and 
alone in the wilderness with deep woods on 
both sides of the track. There was no 
station, not even a platform—and no Jake. 
When I had been to Eagle Lake before 
I hadn’t come in this way so I didn’t know 
which way to turn. To make matters 
worse the mosquitoes were thicker than 
fleas on a dog and I swatted ’em until my 
arms ached. Then in self defense I lit 
my pipe and sat down on my bag beside 
the track. Incidentally I called Jake every¬ 
thing I could think of. “Dura his unrelia¬ 
ble old pelt!” says I out loud. “Fine way 
to treat a friend this is!—promise to meet 
me and not show up !—Jake, you’re a liar 1 ” 
(G F I wasn’t so glad to see you, Newt,” 
says a voice behind me, “I’d knock 
your block off for callin’ me that.’’ 
I looked around and there stood Jake grin- 
nin’ all over his face. “Good thing you’re 
here,” says I. “Why?” says Jake. “Well,” 
says I, “if you’d staid away a little longer 
I’d had you so completely cussed that a 
mosquito wouldn’t light on you.” “I wish 
I’d hung back a spell,” says Jake scrapin’ 
a layer of the pests off his chin. 
It was only a three-mile jog over a fair 
trail to Jake’s camp and after a pork-and- 
bean banquet we sat out on a little front 
piazza (which was screened) smoking our 
pipes and making faces and stickin’ our 
tongues out at the “skeeters” on the out¬ 
side. “Now,” says I, “gimme the dope 
about the grand opening of Crooked 
Brook?” “It’s like this,” says Jake; 
“Crooked Brook used to be by long odds 
the best trout stream around here and 
that’s why it got practically fished out. 
Five years ago next Monday it was closed 
to fishin’ and I don’t know how many trout 
fingerlings were dumped into it by order of 
the fish commissioners. Since then it has 
been carefully guarded by the wardens and 
the result is that Crooked Brook is literally' 
alive with trout.” “That listens good,” 
says I. “You bet,” Jake goes on, “and 
next Monday there’s gonna be some fishin’ 
on that stream. Course there ain’t no 
monsters in there—unless they come up out 
of the lake—but I’ve done a lot of rub¬ 
berin’ up and down that brook and trout 
from one to two pounds are thicker’n 
hops.” “Good,” says I; “now we'll have 
to be on the job early Monday morning, 
Jake.” “We will,” says Jake with a mean¬ 
ing look. “We ought to be there by day¬ 
light,” says I. “Huh!” hulis Jake; “we’ll 
be back to camp by daylight!” “Whaddye 
mean back to camp by daylight?” says 1 
very incredulous; “Jacob, you must be 
dreamin’.” “Now pay attention, Newt,” 
says Jake patiently; “if you and I were to 
wait until daylight before we began to fish 
Crooked Brook, we’d strike seventeen 
dozen other fishermen and we wouldn’t get 
a smell. Why man dear, Ike Waltons from 
all over the county will be lined up five 
deep along Crooked Brook by daylight 
Monday morning. You and I will do our 
fishing before they arrive.” 
"Meaning which?” says I.. “Crooked 
Brook,” says Jake, “is open to fish¬ 
ing on Monday next, ain’t it?” “Yep, 
I’ll admit that,” says I. “Well,” Jake 
goes on, “Monday begins exactly at 
midnight when Sunday ends and right 
then’s when we’ll be on the job.” “Look 
here,” says I considerably mystified, “how 
in Sam Hill are we gonna catch trout in 
the dark?—are we gonna first catch ’em in 
a landing net and then put the hook in their 
mouth by the light of a lantern?” “Why 
man, says Jake, “in the dark a trout’s -got 
an eye like an owl. “This idea,” says I, 
of fishin for trout with a black-gnat fly 
at midnight don’t sound reasonable to me, 
Ill tell you those.” “Flies!” sneers Jake: 
“we’re not gonna use flies.” “What are 
we gonna use—salt-pork ?” I sneers back. 
“We’re gonna use,” says Jake, “the good, 
old-fashioned, irresistible, fat, juicy, succu¬ 
lent angle-worm. Now, Newt, you leave 
the bait to me and leave it to the trout to 1 
see in the dark.” 
W ELL, as I’ve said, I was sceptical 
and besides I didn’t very well like 
the idea of deteriorating to the 
primitive night-walker instead of using 
flies, but I made up my mind that Jake 
was giving this fishin’ party and resolved 
to do my bit with good grace. * 
Sunday was the longest day I have ever 
put it. We spent most of it wander¬ 
ing up and down Crooked Brook tak¬ 
ing observations and itching to drop a line 
in some of the pools where we saw the 
tantalizing flashes of bronze sides, or now 
and then a beautiful fish wearing red 
freckles come to the surface for a bug. Of 
course the trout were not as plentiful as 
Jake had said, but I hadn’t believed they 
would be. Jake had intimated they were so 
thick that every time they breathed in con- 
