Oct. 15, 1910.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
615 
Hunting with Uncle Hi. 
A series of letters written to relatives by a sportsman 
sojourning at a camp on the Grasse River in the North 
Woods. 
VI.—PROGRESSIVE BEAR STEW. 
Before I came into the woods my appetite 
was the most inconsequential thing about me as 
you will recall, and that makes it appear very 
bad, for I was a skeleton physically, and the 
gray matter in my head had unquestionably 
turned to a sombre brown. Once a slab of bacon 
would give me the shivers and the sight of a 
piece of salt pork would cause a revolution with¬ 
in me. But there has come a change in my 
physical being and appetite. One morning I 
awoke to inhale with pleasure the aromatic flavor 
of frying bacon, and it tickled my rejuvenated 
palate. A little later it occurred to me that a 
chunk of salt pork, as a gastronomic tidbit, was 
superb. But it was not until I had absorbed 
generous portions of Uncle Hi's bear stew that 
I was assured of a new lease of life. 
This bear stew is the old man’s especial and 
ultimate triumph as a culinary invention. It is 
a progressive stew, appealing to sensitive nostrils 
and jaded appetites of yesterday, to-day, to¬ 
morrow and the day after. Neither time nor age 
neutralizes its pristine strength and loveliness. 
And the only reason why it did not go on and 
on forever was the fact that we ate it. 
Uncle Hi left us to our own devices that 
memorable day, taking his gun and pack basket 
with him. In the early afternoon he returned 
and told us that he had run on to a yearling 
bear on a beech flat and killed it. He had the 
meat and hide in his basket. 
“To-morrow,” said Uncle Hi, as he tacked 
the hide on the end of the cabin, “I’ll make ye 
a bear stew that’ll make ye rise up and roar for 
more.” When we awoke next morning we could 
hear Uncle Hi working outside the cabin door, 
while coffee and biscuit and venison were on the 
stove. We found Uncle Hi with a large board 
on his lap and this was covered with cubes of 
bear meat, and he was cutting more of it. In 
pans near at hand were potatoes, carrots and 
turnips, also cut into little squares. On another 
board was a mass of bruised sour dock (Rumex 
acetosella ) or sour grass, as Uncle Hi called it, 
and still another board contained wintergreen 
leaves and a few cranberries picked from the 
swamp across the river. Having prepared all 
these ingredients to his satisfaction he filled a 
huge iron kettle two-thirds full of water and 
placed it on the stove. Then into the water he 
dropped bear meat, sour grass, wintergreen, cran¬ 
berries, potatoes, turnips and carrots. It ap¬ 
peared that there was enough of the mess in 
the kettle to serve twenty people, and there was. 
“Now that our supper is cookin’,” said Uncle 
Hi, “we’ll eat breakfast.” 
“Supper!” we shouted, “Don't we get any of 
the stew for breakfast?” 
“Nothin’ but the scent,” said Uncle Hi. “This 
stew has to cook at least eight hours to be real 
good to the taste. Jest hold yerselves and pre¬ 
pare to go to bed happy for onct.” 
All day long Uncle Hi watched that simmer¬ 
ing stew with the greatest care, and we watched 
Uncle Hi. It did give off an appetizing odor, 
and we possessed ourselves in patience as best 
we could, until the evening shadows fell upon 
the woods. 
“Now,” said Uncle Hi, “let’s set the table. I’m 
sorry you boys haven’t exercised more to-day 
and put an edge on yer appetites. Bear stew 
is not frequent, even in the woods, and when a 
man goes again’ it he should be fit and fine. 
The table was soon arranged with a big bowl 
beside each tin plate. Uncle Hi took a skimmer 
in his right hand and lifted the lid from the 
kettle with his left. Up rushed a pungent, spicy, 
meaty odor that was grateful to our nostrils, 
but the liquid in the kettle was greasy and thick¬ 
ly dotted with the remnants of the leaves that 
had been placed in the kettle early in the morn¬ 
ing. The latter Uncle Hi skimmed off and 
threw in the wood box. Not another ingredient 
retained tangible form. The meat, carrots, pota¬ 
toes, turnips, cranberries and the major portions 
of the leaves had been completely dissolved by 
the slow-cooking process, and nothing remained 
but greasy soup. Its odor was far superior to 
its general appearance, but we knew we must 
partake of it or forever offend its inventor, so 
our bowls were filled. I noted that Charlie’s 
face bore an expression of grim determination 
as he swallowed his first spoonful. It did not 
taste bad, but I was not so sure that it made an 
irresistible appeal to my palate. It was too 
greasy. However, we both emptied our bowls 
and congratulated Uncle Hi on his ability as a 
brewer of bear stew. Then he explained : 
“A stew, to be real good, should be toned by 
a dash of good wine. That’s the way they do 
it in the settlements, I’m told. I had no wine, 
so I used the wintergreen leaves, sour grass and 
cranberries. The oil and acid in these are even 
better than wine, but ye must be careful not to 
put in too much wintergreen, ’cause that will 
give it a sickish taste. Now, I’ve made enough 
of this stew to last two or three days. I’ll just 
leave it in the kittle to cool. To-morrow morn¬ 
ing we’ll warm it up again an’ have some more. 
Then we’ll have more for dinner and supper. 
It'll git better as it grows older.” 
And that was the program we followed. I 
really grew to like it before it was entirely gone 
—I had to. I am beginning to believe that my 
appetite and stomach would not revolt even 
against a meal of raw dog. Charlie, however, 
cannot be induced to say more, except in Uncle 
Hi’s presence, than that “the stew wasn’t half 
bad.” 
VII.—THE STORY OF TIIE HERMIT. 
The rough life of the camp, the long walks 
in the forest, the breathing of the pure air, the 
paddling of the canoe on the winding river, are 
beginning to have a beneficial effect on my shat¬ 
tered nerves. I notice an increase of good, hard 
flesh and already I have been forced to let out 
my belt. 
Early one morning Uncle Hi, who had watched 
my improvement with solicitous care, called to 
me: “Are you fit this morning, boy?” 
“Fit for a long tramp,” I replied. 
“Then, by jing, we’ll go a-huntin’.” 
Breakfast over, we started. I knew it was 
to be an all day tramp, for Uncle Hi stowed 
skillet, teapot and grub in his pack basket. We 
crossed the river on a log, mounted the rise on 
the far side and strode off to the north. The 
woods were beautiful in their autumn colors. 
There had been a slight shower, followed by 
frost. The hardwood leaves color best under 
such conditions, and this clear morning they 
were of every hue. While some had fallen they 
were sufficiently moist to admit of noiseless 
movements. But the fickle breeze changed from 
east to southeast, to south and back again. It 
was one of those days that are good for the 
hunter’s lungs, but trying to his temper. Deer 
signs were plenty, but only signs. Occasionally 
we would catch the flash of a whitetail, but not 
once did we see the body of a deer. We had 
traveled many miles when our appetites struck 
twelve. We were then on the northwest corner 
of Uncle Hi’s hunting ground, and at our feet 
Silver Brook stole away into the gloom of the 
alders and tamaracks to the east. 
“There ain’t much use in hunting to-day,” said 
Uncle Hi. “The wind is again’ us all the time. 
I guess we’ll drop down here and eat a snack." 
While the old man was brewing his tea I 
wandered along the creek bank. I had gone but 
a short distance when, in a little hollow between 
two ridges, I came upon a dilapidated log hut. 
Its roof was caved in, the board door had fallen 
apart and the marks of porcupines were appar¬ 
ent on the window frame and inside the hovel. 
It was a lonesome, forbidding place. I heard 
Uncle Hi whistle and returned to the fire. I 
told him of the cabin and asked what he knew 
of it. He smiled as he replied: “That’s where 
Hermit Hinckley lived. He went away about 
ten year ago and never come back. He only 
lived there about four years. Strange man, he 
wuz.” 
“Tell me the story,” I said. 
“There ain’t much to tell. I had been out of 
the woods over summer gettin’ ready for my 
huntin’ and trappin’ trip in the winter. I come 
into the woods about the middle of August and 
two of my boys were with me to help tote the 
grub and other things. They stayed with me a 
couple of weeks and then I took ’em out to the 
road to Colton an’ sent ’em home. The day 
after they left I was over here along the brook 
prospectin’ for trappin’ places, when I run inter 
this cabin. It was spick and span new, but there 
was no one to home. I looked inside and saw 
that it had no floor, but the earth was beaten 
hard and it looked tidy. A bunk was in one 
corner, covered with blankets, and a shelf held 
’bout a dozen books. There was a board table, 
two chairs made of boxes, a lookin’ glass and a 
sheet iron stove. That was all. I wondered 
who my new neighbor wuz, an’ I waited to find 
out. I sat on a box in front of the cabin for 
an hour and finally I saw a man cornin’ through 
the woods. I saw that he wuz carefully follow¬ 
ing a new blazed trail that led off toward Burnt 
Bridge Pond. When he got close I stood up an' 
said, ‘Howdy,’ an’ he said, ‘Glad to meet you, 
sir,’ but he looked flustered. 
“We soon got on visitin’ terms an’ he told 
me that his name was Hinckley, from Boston, 
an’ that he’d come here to live, bein' tired of the 
world. He was a fine looking old fellow, but 
he had a sad look that kind o’ hit me hard an’ 
I didn’t ask him no more questions. He wuz 
afraid of bein’ lost, he said, an’ he had blazed a 
trail to the pond, and then took in about a mile 
square. In this space be said he was goin’ to 
hunt and depended on the blazed trees to keep 
him safe. I soon saw he wan't used to the 
woods an’ I told him I lived about two mile 
from him on the river, an’ I would see him 
offen. Followin’ my trap lines I offen dropped 
in on him, an’ told him as much about the woods 
as I could. I gave him venison an’ sometimes I 
