May 19, 1906.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
SEA ANID IRIVIEIR FISHING 


Leaves from an Angler’s Diary. 
BY BARAK MEADE, 
MAssaAcuusetts, March 25.—Out yesterday for 
a tramp along Scarr Brook. Trout are getting 
lively—but saw no flies. 
The weather was soft, breezy and bright— 
wet under foot, with a few water-logged clouds 
floating around overhead. The brook was on 
the flood, brimming to the verge of overflowing. 
The meadow grasses are tipped with green. 
Buds of the pussy willow are swollen to burst- 
ing and the catkins will be out in two or three 
days. 
Bluebirds flitting about in great numbers, 
blackbirds clattering, a robin chirruped from the 
top of a budding maple. 
Seven days yet before I can get after the 
trout! re 

April 2——Trouting yesterday! Out on Birch 
Brook. Flies on the water and trout on the 
rise. 
Creeled twelve fish of fair size, using cowdung, 
midge and a small willow. Had many strikes 
—splendid sport—beautiful weather. 
All the trees sprayed with green. Violets 
blooming timidly—ferns uncurling from beneath 
the rocks. 
Robins and yellowhammers scurried about the 
moist meadows and the dank forest floor for 
earth worms. Bluebirds and wood-sparrows 
piped joyously, and the liquid notes of a just- 
arrived cardinal floated down from the tip-top 
maple buds. 

April 20.—At peep o’ day I was up, and tramp- 
ing vigorously through misty hollows and along 
shaded hillsides; reached Boone’s Brook first 
of all the anglers. 
A black, cold, rock-lined stream is Boone’s 
Brook and runs through dense woods. Along 
the mossy edges of the stream cowslips gleamed 
in the deep shadows like lamps of the fairies. 
Pale violets and frail anemones mingled with 
the feathery ferns. Bloodroot and liverwort 
are blooming. 
No bird sang in the dark woods. Nuthatches 
flitted about silently. Occasionally a grouse 
would drum far down through the trees. All 
else save the brook was very still. 
Trout were a bit shy, but I creeled a beauty 
that would go near two pounds. Gamest trout 
I’ve caught in a long time. Took royal-coach- 
man dropper the first cast; rushed around the 
pool pretty lively; took nearly all my line; 
jumped twice; had trouble bringing him to the 
net; and just as I scooped him in the snood of 
the fly broke. In another instant he would have 
gotten away. 
_Landed four more—smallest eight inches. 
ee Cahill, royal-coachman, white-miller and 
eer. 

May 9.—For a day I have lived! 
Out in the woods and the fields, with the birds 
‘and the flowers and the trout! 
At dawn the red gods called so persuasively 
that I quit my books, took rod and creel, and a 
sandwich, and fled to the woods. A quick walk 
up Mt.’ Pomeroy along a tree-walled road 
brought me to Scarr Brook. 
The following of its winding course down the 
mountainside was delightful. Here—steep 
descents, with much roaring and foaming of the 
water; there—chanting riffles where the water 
was shattered on the pebbles and filled the air 
with a soft purling; yonder—the current bubbled 
into eddying pools, dappled with shine and 
shade; lower down—a swift flood gliding all- 
quietly between long-grassed banks. 
In the woods banks of ferns lined the moss- 
rimmed stream. Blue violets on tall, straight 
stems were star-scattered along the water rim. 
Dogwoods dropped snowy petals upon the 
waters; each breeze was laden with wild cherry 
blooms, and the forest was filled with the per- 
fume of the swamp pink. Where the ferns grew 
rank the lady slippers and the painted trilliums 
stood up strange and weirdly. 
Now and then a red tanager or an _ indigo 
bird flashed a line of color between the trees. 
Nuthatches were busy on the tree trunks— 
wrens were busily whispering about their loves. 
I caught a glimpse of a white-throated spar- 
row and heard, for an instant, the wild 
musician’s divine song. 
Much beauty out in the deep meadows, too— 
among the daisies and the buttercups! 
Bobolinks and larks sang and gyrated through 
the warm shine of the nooning sun—living notes 
of music that filled the air with a wonderful 
chorus. Robins busy looking for worms be- 
hind the plow. Swales of the meadow thick 
with blooms—buttercups, daisies, trout lilies. 
Day quickly spent—in the fragrant woods, 
through brilliant meadows, in scented alder 
thickets—taking sixteen gleaming trout, doughty 
chaps that gave me many tough little battles— 
until the sun dropped down behind the hills. 
The smallest eight inches—the largest ten and 

a half. Professor and Beaverkill took most of 
them. 
May 14.—Off early this morning for the 
Squawkill. 
Spring has gotten into tune and almost leaped 
into summer. The south wind and the sun have 
made our little world lying within the pale blue 
distance blossom. gloriously. 
Hillsides clothed in green—meadows deep in 
long grasses, strewn with daisies and gilt 
dandelions. The leaf growth of the woods is 
full-fledged against the summer’s heat. Violets 
everywhere. Bluets carpet the forest floor. 
Flags growing lush. 
Catbirds mewing in the thickets. Heard the 
faint call of a cuckoo and, by stealthy crawling 
through a plum thicket, got a glimpse of the 
shadowy bird. As I netted my last trout a 
hermit thrush far up the brook let fall its ex- 
quisite notes. 
The Squawkill is a trouter’s paradise. Wild 
and remote—a hermit stream. Wide enough 
for casting flies without catching in the white- 
thorn bushes and alders. Deep pools are fre- 
quent where lurk many lusty trout. The waters 
eddy, rush and glance in silvery sheen over a 
labyrinth of sparkling gravel. Forest odors, 
whispering waters, bird notes, murmuring 
foliage! Beauty everywhere! 
Following the Squawkill, the angler walks 
hand in hand with nature, his mind robbed of 
narrow views, his thoughts and spirit expanding 
under the influence of all this nature glory. He 
worships at the shrine of the great all-mother 
and thanks God he is alive—and trouting. 
Could have filled my.creel, but was too busy 
looking, listening and dreaming. 
Eight fine, glittering, crimson-spotted trout. 
Smallest seven inches—largest ten. This one 
was a beauty and gave mea battle royal. Royal- 
coachman, Cahill and brown-hackle. 

New Mexico, April (one year later).—Spring 
in New England—time of trouting, flowers and 
birds! I have been dreaming about it all day. 
A year ago I was wandering through singing 
‘rifles and by dark pools, taking radiant trout 
from the sparkling waters, wading in deep, lush 
fields and bathing in the shine of the sun and 
the perfume of the flowers, breathing the fra- 
grance of meadows, the odor of pines and hem- 
locks, listening to the flowing, flowing of little 
brooks. Great 
things there! 
Heaven, how sweet are all 
“Only an idle little stream, 
Whose amber waters softly gleam, 
Where I may wade, through woodland shade 
And cast the fly, and loaf. and dream. 
“Only a trout or two, to dart 
From foaming pools, and try my art; 
No more I. wishing—old-fashioned fishing, 
And just a day on nature’s heart.” 
About Guides. 
Hanpy and obliging guides are as necessary to 
one’s comfort in the “woods as skilled and good- 
natured servants are to the peace and harmony 
of the domestic circle at home. Many a sum- 
mer’s outing has been marred for the want of 
them. But my experience has taught me that the 
quality of a guide, like the quality of a domestic, 
depends very much upon the quality of those who 
employ them. Oftener than we are willing to 
admit it is “like master like man,” and like mis- 
tress like maiden. Neither care to be “nagged,”’ 
and both are apt to reciprocate in kind. 
There is, perhaps, a larger percentage of mild- 
mannered men in our fraternity than in any 
other; but all are not as good-natured and con- 
siderate as they should be, and for this reason 
are not always as well served as they might be 
and as they would be were they less exacting and 
better tempered. It is the habit of some men al- 
ways to bully their subordinates. This sometimes 
pays. no doubt, but it oftener fails to secure 
cheerful service, especially in the woods, where 
we haven’t even “Hobson’s Choice” to fall back 
upon, 
There are few things more helpless than the 
average angler on unknown waters. He is as de- 
pendent upen his guide as the “occasional fer- 
eign correspondent” is upon his guide-book. Un- 
Jess he has learned from long experience just 
where to look for what he seeks, he will not even 
know where to cast without his guide’s sugges- 
tion; and if, unhappily, his guide is “tiffed” by 
his manner, or rendered mulish by his unde- 
served rebuffs, he will be very likely to be kept 
ignorant of the best preserves and most prolific 
waters, Few things bring a better return any- 
where than good nature, but nowhere is the habit 
more remunerative than in the woods, where your 
pleasure can be very easily made or marred by 
your pleased or displeased servitor. There is 
just as much human nature to the square inch 
in a woods-guide as in any other son of Adam 
or daughter of Eve, and that angler will make 
the most of his outing who, in all proper ways, 
makes the most of his guide. 

I oNCE spent a week in May on the Raquette. 
near where were camped two gentlemen who had 
never before been on the river at that season. My 
tent was pitched at Setting Pole Rapids and 
theirs on the high’ ground near Lothrop’s Chop- 
ping. The fishing was superb on the rapids, and 
I enjoyed it to mv heart’s content from the fact 
that all I could kill were gratefully received as a 
supplement to the scantily provided larder of a 
logging camp in my immediate vicinity. Notwith- 
standing the proverbial voracity of a “bush- 
whacker’s” appetite. the fish were so abundant 
that the supply was never short of the demand 
and never in excess: for I soon discovered that 
however many fish I might kill none would be 
wasted. The result was the busiest and most 
enjoyable week I ever had had. up to that time, 
on angling waters. But while IT was thus having 
an absolute surfeit of sport. my neighbors were 
doing little else than cursing the stupidity of their 
guides and anathematizing the barrenness of the 
waters. When I heard of their ill luck, I sent 
