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FOREST AND STREAM. 

[AuG. 24, 1907. 

A Sea Angler Ashore.—Il. 
ONE day we left Blue Mountain Lake, took 
the canoes over several carries, and had sport 
of divers kinds. While we were at dinner two 
deputy sheriffs came along and asked if we had 
seen a man whom they described, and charged 
with so atrocious a crime that some of our party 
joined them and bagged the game the following 
day. A man hunt was more or less exciting, 
especially as the game threatened to shoot on 
sight. We came back down the lakes in good 
shape carrying the canoes over the carries, and 
about two in the afternoon reached Raquette 
with its placid waters, its splendid reaches of 
green hills and mountains, untouched by axe or 
fire. 
The wind was from 
SO weary the ten or 
the west, and as I was 
twelve mile row looked 
like a hardship. I bought a sheet from Jim’s 
Angler's Inn, rigged a small squaresail, and 
despite the protests of some, started, the wind 
sending the shell of a boat along in fine shape. 
When we were about in the center of the lake 
a big black cloud without warning tumbled over 
the edge of the mountains, presenting a most 
ominous yet splendid picture. I turned toward 
the shore, but before I could reach it the angered 
genii of the woods caught us. 
I attempted to tear down the sail, and then 
the wind fell upon us and literally blew us over, 
and I found myself on bottom in about five feet 
of water. I got my companion in the canoe 
again, hauled her ashore, and when in water 
waist deep, on the edge of the tall grass, I lifted 
the canoe and held it over our heads as a sort 
of umbrella, while the clouds seemed to empty 
themselves upon us until the lake fairly roared 
under the impact. 
Somewhere I had seen a picture of an Irish- 
man standing in the water up to his waist. in 
a rain storm holding an umbrella, and I thought 
of it, but held the canoe, as the fierceness of the 
rain was unpleasant. When it stopped we pre- 
pared to embark, but it was still blowing a gale 
and I could not make my way through the heavy 
tule, and matters began to look dubious when 
a launch came by and picked us up after we 
had been an hour or more in the icy water. | 
still see the many hands reaching out from that 
friendly craft, each holding a whiskey flask, just 
what the lady really needed, my own having 
sailed away. 
The suddenness with which squalls came up 
here is remarkable, and what is more beautiful 
than to look down from the summit of some 
of the ranges and see the squalls coursing along 
broken by sunbeams and_ illuminated spots, 
silver lakes here and_ there, interspersed with 
forests which seem to reach away and around 
the world. Nature could not have designed a 
more delightful series of lakes than this, from 
Blue Mountain around to upper Saranac. 
Following from one to another, working hard 
over the carries, camping out in delightful places 
with just enough hunting and fishing to keep the 
camp supplied, it all had an unexplainable charm. 
We arrived at Placid in the morning, fished 
with little success, and then went on to the St. 
Lawrence for a month with bass and a possi- 
ble muscallunge. There’s the rub. It has so 
happened that I have taken nearly all the large 
fishes but the king of the pike tribe; and in 
some incomprehensible way I am invariably 
asked, “Have you ever caught a muscallunge ?” 
Had the question been, “Have you taken a tar- 
pon, black grouper, giant ray, gray snapper, leap- 
ing tuna” or almost any impossible game, I 
could, in the language of the professional angler 
writer, have visibly swelled with pride and con- 
fessed to the soft impeachment; but the mus- 
callunge—there was the rub. I had fished for 
this fish for many years, others had taken them 
up to forty pounds the day before, or the day 
after, but the muscallunge always passed me by, 
much to my chagrin, but I never despaired. 
I am a firm believer in the saying that every- 
thing comes to him who waits, and I had been 
waiting for twenty years until this blessed day 
when I landed my first muscallunge. 
I made my headquarters on Westminster 
Island at an attractive inn at the head of a little 
bay almost in the geographical center of the 
river. Over to the south was Alexandria Bay, 
and to the north, from almost any point of view, 
one could see Gananoque and the Canadas. It 
was a delightful spot. The little bay and others 
were always smooth, and near at hand were 
divers allurements and delights which appealed 
to the soul of the ardent angler. There was de- 
lightful scenery, islands of all kinds and shapes, 
from rocky cliffs to soft moss grown mounds, 
among which you could drift, sail or paddle 
With a constant change as a solace. There were 
banks of white daisies at the very door, regions 
where the cowslip dwelt. The forest of beach, 
pine and other trees came down to the very 
water’s edge in places, so that one could slip 
from his canoe or skiff and enter these sylvan 
glades. The air, sifted down from the west 
somewhere, seemed to have been purified and 
perfumed by passing through so many trees, and 
I fancied it had a special quality as it was like 
velvet on the cheek and had a perfume of its 
own, stolen from banks of wild rose and reaches 
of pine. In ten minutes from the inn I could 
row into a little bay almost choked with water 
lilies, and many a day I have seen fair ladies 
coming out through the narrow passages, the 
skiffs smothered with these trailing flowers. 
It is a fancy for artists under the spell of 
Venice to paint or depict gondolas sweeping 
along with splendid stuffs, brocades of purple or 
crimson velvets streaming in the water, but no 
Venetian scene was more beautiful than these 
masses of pure white lilies and their leaves 
trailing behind. Then there were black bass of 
the small and big mouth variety, yellow perch, 
wall-eyed pike, pickerel and lastly muscallunge. 
At this time my oarsman was one Bill Massey, 
who stills holds forth at Alexandria Bay, and 
who knew every secret of the big river, from 
the farm house where the thickest cream was 
‘o be had for punch, to the abode of the biggest 
bass. Bill had no “off days.” I never failed to 
make a catch with him on our long twenty mile 
row around Grenadier Island. 
Bill never claimed to be a modern Elijah, but 
he was a marvelous prophet, as many a time he 
would display this canny, yet wholesome, gift by 
aying, ‘‘There’s a bass waiting on that rock just 
head,” and the sayings of the Medes and Per- 
slans were not more true or positive than this, 
as the moment he passed it, resting on the in- 
‘de oar, and my fly or minnow approached the 
rock, up into the air would go the bass, and the 
resilient rod would make a play to delight the 
shade of the immortal Walton himself. 
Down around Grenadier was our favorite row, 
starting at six or so and taking it leisurely, 
uterally drifting down this—to me at least—river 
of delights. How clear the morning, how sweet 
the air sifted through ten thousand fragrant 
sieves of green. I have wandered all over the 
continent, but these isles of peace have never 
lost their charm to me, typifying as they do, 
~bsolute rest, comfort and delights of a varied 
character. 
We had just pushed off one morning when 
the sky was blue, the water as clear as crystal, 
and Bill was pulling slowly along the high rocky 
shore of Westminster, whose shadows were so 
distinct in the water that one could hardly be- 
lieve that the world was not inverted, when I 
saw the fins of some fishes above water at the 
base of a tall rocky cliff. As Bill stopped row- 
ing, the skiff drifted nearer and nearer, and as 
I rose to my feet silently I saw a school of 
black bass so large, so gigantic, that I turned 
my eyes away and looked again, fearing that I 
had seen a vision. But there they were, five, 
everyone a monster, following - one another 
around in a circle in some game of the tribe of 
bass. 
As I stood regaling my eyes with their splen- 
did proportions, Bill showed his innate gallantry 
to the sex and cleverly retired me from the 
field. It was the custom on the fishing ground 
to take turns. The inside or shore fishing was 
Supposed to be the best; in other words, the 
shore rod would in a day’s fishing take three 
times as many bass as the rod on the outside, 
fence there was a fair alternation. When we 
started I was on the shore side, and the first 
cast at these titans of the tribe fell to me by 
all right and precedent, but while the anticipa- 

tion was sinking into my soul, Bill so maneuvered 
the skiff that the partner of my piscatorial joys 
and sorrows—a_ skilled angler—made her cast, 
and before I recovered from the shock she had 
hooked the king of the school and the mad- 
dened fish went whizzing into the air, a splen- 
did spectacle even on another’s line. I have 
never seen a better play, or more skillful man- 
agement. As the fish made a brilliant sally out 
into the stream, then stopped by the resilient rod, 
it came bounding back, leaping, whirling itself 
over, doubling, playing all the tricks a bass is 
capable of, and putting up a fight which com- 
manded the admiration of even the stolid boat- 
man. 
So powerful was this bass that it pulled the 
skiff around in a strong steady strain and then 
it appeared to go mad, dashing this way and 
that, shaking its head in the water and out, but 
all in vain, as it came slowly in and was netted 
by Bill. We took off our hats to the lady, and 
well we might, as the bass tipped the scales at 
five pounds and a half, and doubtless my com- 
panion, who received all our homage for her 
cleverness, agreed with Dr. Henshall that “pound 
for pound, inch for inch,” etc. 
This was only the beginning. I naturally sup- 
posed that the next bass would fall to my rod, 
but I was never more mistaken. Bill so skill- 
fully pulled up to-the school again, as they were 
still there, that again I was on the outside, and 
again the lady’s split bamboo sent the lure in 
among them. Into the air went the second bass 
as soon as hooked, and out and away from the 
rocky cliff sprang the game, twisting, throwing 
its mouth wide open and shaking at the hook 
as a dog would a rat, hoping to dislodge it, to 
fall and rush away, taking yards of line, seek- 
ing some point of vantage, some rock upon which 

to cut the thread, some weeds into which to 
plunge. Then suddenly the lady took control. 
For a moment the bending rod threatened to 
collapse as she held the fish which bore steadily 
awiy, then gave an inch and came steadily on, 
all the while circling the boat, occasionally leap- 
ing and breaking away to come in and in until 
Bill in an ecstacy of delight began to finger his 
net, then inserted it, or pushed it down at the 
psychological moment, lifted the beautiful creat- 
ure into the skiff, a five-pounder by-all the gods! 
as this is a veracious and -honorable yarn. I 
2m not telling of my own victories, but of an- 
other's. 
Again Bill placed the lady near the school 
which, strange to relate, was still swimming near 
the cliff as though some weird attraction kept 
them there, end again she took One, a four and 
a half-pounder, and again the skiff drifted or 
was towed out into the sky, aided by Bill, that 
the school might not be broken. or alarmed. And 
so in this manner the lady took, I believe, every 
bass in the school, and when the last one in 
evidence was weighed (none less than three and 
a half pounds) and in the box, we were still 
hardly a gunshot from the pier. 
Surely this was an auspicious opening. In 
less than an hour we had picked up what I be- 
lieve was the record catch. in those charming 
waters for many a day. 
We had agreed to meet a certain professor 
from Yale at lunch on a certain isle, Fiddler’s 
Elbow, perhaps, and as we rowed into the little 
bay and found him waiting, it was hard to reply 
nonchalantly and disguise the burning flames of 
triumph. He had a goodly catch on the grass, 
shapely bass, while the aroma of fried perch 
that rose in the air was incense indeed. Tt was 
Bill who replied to his jolly aphorism, “What 
luck?” with a dubious shake of his head, and 
then like the prestidigitator, spread out our (I 
Say our advisedly, as I was in the same boat 
with the lucky angler) catch and silenced oppo- 
sition. 
How we talked it over, described the catch, 
the furious runs of the game, their high leaps! 
Surely there were never such bass seen or heard 
of before.» Then we drew around the ‘table on 
the grass and Bill and his brother and the boat- 
men of several other boats waited on the table 
and served fried yellow perch and bass, rashers 
of bacon, toast and cream. Ah! if the envious 
shade of Lucullus was not lurking in that sylvan 
glade that day I am mistaken. 



