IX. The card must always be presented when asking for 
 a book, and on renewing or returning a book. The proper 
 holder is in all eases responsible for books drawn with this 
 card. If lost, fifteen days (required to stop its use in other 
 hands) must elapse after notice being given of its loss 
 before it, can be replaced. 
 
 X A book may be renewed but once. Prompt notice 
 of change of residence must be given at the Library, and tin- 
 card must be surrendered when the holder ceases to be a 
 resident. 
 
 REVIEW-PRESS PRINT. 
 
THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 PRESENTED BY 
 
 PROF. CHARLES A. KOFOID AND 
 MRS. PRUDENCE W. KOFOID 
 
(_ 
 
MEN I HAVE 
 
 FISHED \V' TH 
 
 SKETCHES OF CHARACTER AND INCIDENT WITH ROD 
 
 AND GUN, FROM CHILDHOOD TO MANHOOD ; 
 
 FROM THE KILLING OF LITTLE FISHES 
 
 AND BIRDS TO A BUFFALO HUNT. 
 
 BY FRED MATHER 
 
 ("KEGO-E-KAY"). 
 
 Author of "Adirondack Fishes," "Trouting on the Bigosh," "A 
 
 Gander Pull in Arkansaw," "The Death of 
 
 Pongo" and Other Stories. 
 
 WITH PORTRAITS. 
 
 "For I had strength, youth, gaiety 
 
 A port, not like to this ye see, 
 
 But as smooth as all is rugged now ; 
 
 For time, and care, and war have ploughed 
 
 My very.soul from out my brow." 
 
 Mazeppa. 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 POKEST AND STREAM PUBLISHING CO. 
 
 1897. 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1897. 
 
 BY THE 
 
 FOREST AND STREAM PUBLISHING CO. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 REUBEN WOOD II 
 
 My First Fish. 
 
 BILLY BISHOP 20 
 
 Bobbing for Eels. 
 
 JOHN ATWOOD 30 
 
 First Night in Camp. 
 
 PORTER TYLER 41 
 
 My Early Teacher of Woodcraft. 
 
 GEORGE DAWSON 54 
 
 My First Trout. 
 
 MAJOR GEORGE S. DAWSON 64 
 
 GEORGE W. SIMPKINS 67 
 
 My First Deer. 
 
 COLONEL CHARLES H. RAYMOND 79 
 
 Turtles, Setters and Ducks. 
 
 THE BROCKWAY BOYS 89 
 
 Michigan in '49 My First Turkey. 
 
 CAPTAIN IRA WOOD 102 
 
 Striped Bass in Fresh Water Early Greenbush. 
 
 GENERAL MARTIN MILLER 114 
 
 Skating, Ice-Boating and Camp Cookery. 
 
 GARRETT VAN HOESEN 127 
 
 Spearing Eels and Trapping Rabbits. 
 
 STEPHEN MARTIN 141 
 
 Trap and Rifle Shooting The War Cloud. 
 
 GEORGE RAYNOR 156 
 
 Duck Shooting and a Tragedy. 
 
 M3734B3 
 
4 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHARLES GUYON 169 
 
 Gigging Fish in Wisconsin Shooting a Deer with 
 Wooden Plugs. 
 
 CORPORAL HENRY R. NEAVILLE 184 
 
 A 'Coon Hunt Fishing the "Sloos" of the Missis- 
 sippi. 
 
 ANTOINE GARDAPEE 200 
 
 Canto I. Trapping Fur Killing a Wolverine. 
 
 ANTOINE GARDAPEE 217 
 
 Canto II. Another Wolverine Snow Blind. 
 
 ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 234 
 
 Canto III. Christmas in the Forest. 
 
 SERGEANT FRANK NEAVILLE 251 
 
 Fish, 'Coons and Pawpaws. 
 
 TAY-BUN-ANE-JE-GAY 268 
 
 In Northern Minnesota Fishing Through Ice. 
 
 WE-NEN-GWAY 286 
 
 A Muskrat Feast The Trip Home on the Ice. 
 
 SERGEANT WILLIAM PATTERSON 303 
 
 A "Bad Man," a Load of Fish and a Dead Child. 
 
 WILLIAM WARREN 317 
 
 Shooting Fish in Kansas Bachelor's Hall The 
 Border War. 
 
 AMOS DECKER 336 
 
 Skittering for Pike Legerdemain My Only Buf- 
 falo Hunt. 
 
 A CHRISTMAS WITH "OLD PORT" 353 
 
 Return of the Wanderer and the Feast Port Tyler 
 Made in Honor of the "Jayhawker" Stories 
 Told by Port, Billy Bishop, Mat Miller and 
 Others Until Daylight Came Through the 
 Windows. 
 
PORTRAITS. 
 
 >FRED MATHER Frontispiece 
 
 From a photograph in 1897. 
 
 REUBEN WOOD 16 
 
 GEORGE DAWSON 56 
 
 MAJOR GEORGE S. DAWSON 64 
 
 COLONEL CHARLES H. RAYMOND 80 
 
 CAPTAIN IRA WOOD 112 
 
 GENERAL MARTIN MILLER 120 
 
 STEPHEN MARTIN 144 
 
 FRED MATHER 352 
 
 From photograph in 1864, as First Lieutenant Bat- 
 tery L, Seventh New York Heavy Artillery. 
 

 _v 
 
 A WORD WITH THE READER. 
 
 THESE sketches originally appeared in the Forest and 
 Stream. Read between the lines, and at times in them, 
 will be found the wanderings of a boy who had no further 
 object in view than to be in the woods and on the waters, 
 and who had no taste for anything like the harness of 
 civilization. 
 
 During the years of vagabondizing many things oc- 
 curred which at the time seemed to deserve little notice, 
 but subsequently grew into pleasant memories ; and I be- 
 gan to write them up, naturally expecting that my imme- 
 diate relatives and personal friends would read them with 
 some interest. I was surprised and gratified to find how 
 many strangers said pleasant things of them, and to know 
 that there was a demand for them in book form. 
 
 The present volume comprises the twenty-four chap- 
 ters which appeared between July n and Dec. 26, 1896. 
 Other sketches of "Men I Have Fished With" have been 
 printed since, and at this writing, in October, 1897, the 
 series is in progress. 
 
 I have aimed to make a sketch of the boy or man of 
 whom I wrote, so that the reader, gentle or otherwise, 
 would know him, as I thought I did, and I find myself tell- 
 ing how to bob for eels, camp out and sleep in barns, kill 
 deer with wooden plugs, taking my first trout on a worm, 
 hunting turtles with Colonel Raymond in boyhood and 
 reviewing his famous setters in after years, shooting tur- 
 keys, spearing eels through ice, and many other things too 
 numerous to mention, up to the time when I was glad to 
 get back home. 
 
8 A WORD WITH THE READER. 
 
 My lesson had been learned in that dearest of schools, 
 but it took more years than with apter scholars. Yet I 
 have never regretted the cost of the education. 
 
 The earlier incidents recorded took place in Green- 
 bush, N. Y., and on the Popskinny Creek. I have outlived 
 them both. The creek was merely an arm of the Hudson 
 reaching behind an island, and water no longer flows 
 through it. I tried to get at its correct name, but failed. 
 Mr. A. C. Stott, of Stottville, N. Y., writes that on a 1777 
 map it is spelled "Popscheny," and that older writers give 
 "Palp-Sikenekoitas," while O'Callaghan, in his "History 
 of the New Netherlands," speaks of the "Papsknee." Col- 
 onel David A. Teller, whose family has owned a farm on its 
 banks for over a century, gives me other spellings, and 
 I've seen it as "Popsquinea," therefore I have fallen into 
 the habit of spelling it as we boys pronounced it. It 
 makes no difference now, it does not exist. 
 
 Greenbush is dead in name only. It is now a city of 
 the Empire State, having been consolidated with East 
 Albany, Bath and other places, under the name of Rens- 
 selaer confound the vandals who had no regard for the 
 historic name honored in history by Fort Crailo, which is 
 the oldest building now standing in America, and by 
 Washington's headquarters on the McCulloch farm, on 
 the heights above the village. 
 
 So, one by one, the columns supporting the arches of 
 our memories are swept away by a younger generation, 
 which cares nothing for them. They are falling fast. 
 Men who are now reckless boys will live to realize this. 
 A year ago I made a pilgrimage to the old scenes, and I 
 regret it. 
 
 I was a stranger in a strange land. The tan-yard was 
 gone; the nut orchard was filled with cottages, and the 
 trees had gone where good trees go. No one likes to out- 
 
A WORD WITH THE READER. 9 
 
 live his cherished world or wants to know the holder of his 
 birthplace and the intruders in the haunts of his boyhood. - 
 I will go there no more; I prefer to have my memories 
 left undisturbed. The "City of Rensselaer" may grow 
 and prosper, but Greenbush has passed away. 
 
 I hope the reader may find as much pleasure in these 
 memories of boyhood as I did in writing them. 
 
 F. M. 
 
REUBEN WOOD. 
 
 MY FIRST FISH. 
 
 THIS noted sportsman, who for nearly half a century 
 made his home in Syracuse, N. Y., was well 
 known throughout the State, and it was my good 
 fortune to have him as an instructor in the art of angling 
 in earliest boyhood. We were born in the then small vil- 
 lage of Greenbush (opposite Albany), he in December, 
 1822, and I eleven years later. 
 
 Almost every man who has passed the half-century 
 milestone on life's journey loves to imitate Lot's wife and 
 look over his shoulder, and usually the retrospect is pleas- 
 ant because we do not remember clearly; we conjure up 
 the roses in the pathway, and the small thorns are indis- 
 tinct in the distance; a faint humming of the bees whose 
 honey we stole brings no remembrance of the penalty 
 paid for it ; the wound of the sting is cured by the honey 
 in memory, at least. Poor indeed is the man of fifty who 
 has no wealth of retrospect and who thinks the punish- 
 ment of Lot's wife was fitted to the crime ! It was cruelly 
 unjust, and in compensation at this late day she should be 
 sainted perhaps with the name and title of Saint Salina. 
 Here I pause to ask if there is really any such thing as 
 an occult cerebration which caused my pen to turn to 
 thoughts of Lot's wife while writing an apology for look- 
 ing back at the boyhood of a citizen of Syracuse, N. Y., 
 the great salt-producing city of the State? 
 
 There are men who never could have been boys en- 
 gaged in boyish sports and had a boy's thoughts. Every 
 one has known such men. Men who must have been at 
 
 least fifty years old when they were born if that event 
 
 11 
 
12 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 ever happened to them and have no sort of sympathy 
 for a boy nor his ways; crusty old curmudgeons who 
 never burned their fingers with a firecracker or played 
 hookey from school to go a-fishing. They may be very 
 endurable in a business way, but are of no possible use as 
 fishing companions. I speak by the card, for I've been 
 in the woods with them. 
 
 Reuben Wood was a boy, and was one to me as long 
 as he lived. We were boys together, he being a big boy 
 when I was but a little one; he was at our house a great 
 deal, and is among the earliest of memories. He was 
 "Reub" all through life to all his familiars, and they were 
 many. 
 
 It was a summer day, and I was some six or eight 
 summers old, when Reub came down the street with some 
 fish that he had caught in a stream then the northern 
 boundary of the village, but now in it and fishless. After 
 much solicitation he agreed to let me in the party next 
 day Bruin and me. Now, Bruin was a big Newfound- 
 land dog belonging to my father which Reub had taught 
 to pick me up whenever he said, "Bruin, go fetch Fred," 
 no matter what screams, kicks and protests his burden 
 made, and this was one of Reub's jokes which I failed to 
 appreciate. We started, Bruin and I, in high glee. Reub 
 cut some poles, rigged the lines, floats and hooks and put 
 on the worms, and he soon had a perch, a monster it 
 seemed then and does yet, while the sunfish that tried to 
 run away with my float and which Reub helped to land 
 probably weighed more than the grocer's scales could 
 tell; it must have been as big as 100 modern ones, and 
 Reub said "it was as big as a piece of chalk." Such was 
 my first experience in angling, as clear in memory as if 
 only a week ago. 
 
 A little pond turtle stuck his head up near the float, 
 
REUBEN WOOD. 13 
 
 looked at it and us, and paddled to the bottom in the fun- 
 niest way. Reub called it a "skillypot," but he had funny 
 names for everything. Then I caught a perch, actually 
 bigger than the sunfish, and a new world seemed to open; 
 but the spines of the fish cut my hand and the world was 
 not so bright. Five fish came to my lot in all, but Reub 
 had about twenty some perch, sunfish, two bullheads 
 and an eel. He said that I let the fish eat the worms off. 
 I saw a turtle climb on a log while Reub was up the bank 
 after more worms, and I went out on the log to get it, but 
 the turtle slid into the water, and so did I. A scream 
 brought Reub, who whistled for Bruin and ordered him 
 to "Fetch Fred," and he did. Oh, the dripping of clothes 
 and the splashing of shoes as we went home, and the fear- 
 ful tale of a turtle who wouldn't wait to be caught ! This 
 last seemed the greatest cause of grief and afforded Reub 
 and other boys a text for teasing, which they worked to 
 an annoying extent, and it was long before he would take 
 me fishing again, saying, "No, you'll go diving for tur- 
 tles." This occurred about 1840, and Reub referred to 
 it the last time I saw him, in 1883. 
 
 At this time Greenbush was a very quaint little village 
 on the upper Hudson, whose connection with the outside 
 world was by the Albany stage to Boston and by ferry to 
 Albany. No railroad entered it, and in fact the only one 
 at that time in the whole State of New York ran from 
 Albany to Schenectady, and hauled its cars to the top of 
 the hill by a stationary engine before hooking on the 
 light locomotive. The place was favorable for the devel- 
 opment of character, unhampered by the conventionalities 
 which come from contact with outside people, and Reu- 
 ben grew to manhood there and retained a quaint sim- 
 plicity all his life, a rugged, honest nature, whom it was 
 refreshing to know, and was a lovable man to meet. If, 
 
14 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 as a boy, he ever indulged hi forays on the fruit and melon 
 patches of the farmers, the fact is unknown to me. That 
 I did is certain, but the disparity of years forbade com- 
 radeship in such nocturnal pleasures. He was large, 
 strong and heavy of movement, with a deep chest voice, 
 even when a boy, that was remarkable. His brother Ira, 
 nearer my age, resembled him in this and other particu- 
 lars, and in both there was an air of honesty and truthful- 
 ness, not so frequent in boys, which was fully borne out in 
 their characters as men. 
 
 In after years I had a joke on Reub which was orig- 
 inally on me as a boy, but later knowledge reversed it. 
 With some other boys I had been fishing away up the hill 
 in the pond of the locally famous "red mill," and had seen 
 a pair of wood ducks alight upon a tree. We somehow 
 knew that they were wild ducks, but had no idea that the 
 term included more than one kind, for at that day we only 
 knew one sort of tame ducks. To see a duck alight on 
 a tree was strange, and I told Reub of it; and he spread 
 the incredible story, for he knew nothing of wood ducks, 
 and the laugh was on me. "Seen any ducks lightin' on 
 trees lately?" was a common and annoying salutation, and 
 years later the question was turned on Reub. I fished 
 with him many times as a boy, never after he left Green- 
 bush for Syracuse, in 1852; but we met occasionally after 
 1876, when thrown together at fairs and fly-casting tour- 
 naments, and he seemed to be the same boy that somehow 
 had gray hair. 
 
 The picture of him gives an excellent idea of his manly 
 face, but the cigar I do not recognize. This is not re- 
 markable, because he used from a dozen to twenty each 
 day, and there are people who might not recognize his 
 picture without a cigar of some kind. The badge upon 
 his corduroy coat is a certificate that he is a member of 
 
REUBEN WOOD. 15 
 
 the Onondaga Fishing Club, of Syracuse, which was al- 
 ways represented at the State Sportsmen's tournaments. 
 Take a good look at him! That kind, honest face would 
 be a passport anywhere. To me he was always the same 
 lovable boy to whom I looked up as guide, philosopher 
 and friend on my first fishing trip away back in the forties. 
 I think I am a better man for knowing Reub Wood when 
 he was a big boy and I a child. From him I learned that 
 the world was round "rounder than a marble," he said 
 and I saw that the sky was the upper half and that we 
 were inside the world; if he knew better he never ex- 
 plained the matter. 
 
 Reuben's humor was manifested in the use of strange 
 words, which he probably manufactured, as I never heard 
 them from any other person. A bad knot in a fish line 
 was a "wrinkle-hawk," an excellent thing was "just exe- 
 bogenus," a big fish was "an old codwalloper," and a 
 long-stemmed pipe was "a flugemocker." What a blank 
 page is a boy's memory that such things written on it 
 remain indelible for over half a century when more im- 
 portant ones have faded! The name of Reub Wood con- 
 jures up these trifling things, which, if heard ten years 
 ago, would have been forgotten. But he had such a 
 strong individuality that a person who only met him for 
 ten minutes would be impressed by it, and would know 
 him in after years ; what wonder that he should carve his 
 personality on the mind of a child? Impressions of other 
 men and boys in that small village are also quite distinct, 
 and, as is usual in such places, there is more profanity 
 and obscenity heard by a boy than in cities, for the tough 
 boy in small places excels in such things, and it seems 
 to me that he was worse then than now. But the worst 
 that I ever heard Reub say was "Gosh hang it," under the 
 provocation of having to cut a fish hook out of his thumb. 
 
16 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 His mind was as pure as his life, and that is more than 
 can be said of many who live straight enough, but have 
 to resist temptation frequently. A man is not so much to 
 be judged by his actions as by his thoughts, if you only 
 knew them, and Reub's thoughts were his spoken words. 
 
 In Greenbush he was employed in the bakery of Jonas 
 Whiting, where he learned the mysteries of bread and 
 cakes, and when he went to Syracuse he blossomed out 
 as a caterer for balls and parties, and then established a 
 business in fishing tackle, now carried on under the name 
 of "Reuben Wood's Sons." His old cash book is still 
 extant, and was not only what its name implied, but was 
 day book, journal and ledger all in one, with a margin for 
 a weather record which contained such items as "Gone 
 hunting," "Went after ducks," "Gone a-fishing," etc. 
 This is indefinite, and one wonders what the result may 
 have been until we strike the entry: "Wood returned from 
 Piseco with 250 Ibs. of trout." 
 
 In that early day, in the fifties, Onondaga Lake 
 abounded in pickerel and eels, and Reub and his compan- 
 ions often made a night of it, taking them with torch and 
 spear, as was the custom of the time, and the catch went 
 to their friends and the poor. When this mode of fishing 
 became unpopular and unlawful, in later years, Reuben 
 was one of the foremost in suppressing all kinds of fishing 
 that the law forbade; but at the time of which we speak 
 there was neither law on the subject nor public sentiment 
 against spearing. He followed the custom of the day, 
 merely drawing the line at fishing on Sunday. 
 
 A chum of Reub's was Mr. Charles Wells, of Wells, 
 Fargo & Co.'s Express, and they went shooting and fish- 
 ing when the spirit moved. Mr. Wells had not only all 
 the railroad transportation necessary, but could have 
 trains stopped anywhere in the woods if necessary, night 
 
REUBEN WOOD. 
 
REUBEN WOOD. 17 
 
 or day, by flag or fire signal. This brings a sigh, not of 
 envy, but merely a wish that such conditions existed to- 
 day and I was "in it," as the saying goes. 
 
 One day in the fall of 1857 a report came to Mr. Wells 
 that there were "rafts of ducks" on Cayuga Lake, one of 
 those numerous large lakes of Western New York lying 
 some thirty miles west of Syracuse, and a famous one for 
 ducks. He told Reub just in time for him to gather his 
 muzzle-loader and ammunition and get the next train 
 going to Cayuga, at the foot of the lake via the "old road" 
 of the New York Central R. R., a road then so slow that 
 it took the best part of a day to get there. Wells had his 
 camping outfit, and they camped for the night. As Reub 
 told me the story years afterward, daylight found him in 
 an old dugout, the only semblance of a boat at hand, while 
 Wells had a good place on the shore. The ducks were 
 flying down the lake and Wells had killed several, and 
 was signaling him to come and pick them up, when a 
 great flock of bluebills came up the stream and turned 
 directly over Reub's head. As he let both barrels go the 
 dugout somehow let him go into ice-cold water, but he 
 hung on to his gun and got ashore chilled to the bone, 
 and took the first train for Syracuse, where he traded his 
 gun and equipments for a Knight's Templar badge and 
 other things, and from that day foreswore the gun and 
 devoted his energies to wielding the rod. 
 
 About this time Mr. Wells learned to fish with the fly 
 and taught Reuben the art, to which he became devoted. 
 It was long after this that I met Reuben, the occasion 
 being the tournaments of the New York State Associa- 
 tion for the Protection of Fish and Game, where he was 
 a frequent competitor in the fly-casting tournaments, but 
 never would allow himself or his brother Ira to win first 
 prize because of a chivalric idea that another competitor 
 
18 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 to whom he always deferred should not be beaten. 
 Either of them could outcast the other man, whose hog- 
 gish nature never allowed him to acknowledge the 
 knightly courtesy if he had the capacity to appreciate 
 the sacrifice. Not until the State Association held its 
 tournament at Brighton Beach, Coney Island, in June, 
 1881, did Reuben Wood ever have a chance to cast un- 
 hampered by his sentiment. Here he had a new competi- 
 tor with a great local reputation, who had never cast in a 
 State tournament before. This was in the two-handed 
 salmon rod contest, and Reuben won the first prize, val- 
 ued at $50, with a cast of noft. His brother Ira came 
 second, with loift. Harry Prichard cast 91 ft., and F. P. 
 Dennison 94ft. All but Prichard were members of the 
 Onondaga Fishing Club, of Syracuse, and cast with the 
 same rod a split-bamboo, won by Reuben in the tourna- 
 ment at Buffalo in 1878; length, I7ft. I in. As there was 
 an allowance of 5ft. for every foot of rod in length, Mr. 
 Prichard was allowed 9ft. 10 in. because his greenheart 
 rod (made by himself) was ift. loin, shorter than the one 
 used by the others; hence his amended record of 91 ft. had 
 an allowance of 9ft. loin., making it looft. loin., giving 
 him third prize over Dennison. 
 
 In 1883 Prof. Spencer F. Baird appointed Reuben to 
 take charge of the angling department of the American 
 display at the International Fisheries Exposition in Lon- 
 don, an appointment of which he was justly proud, as he 
 wrote me in a farewell letter, and on June 1 1 he took part 
 in the English fly-casting tournament at the Welch Harp, 
 where he won first in salmon casting with an i8ft. split- 
 bamboo rod, scoring io8ft., Mr. Mallock casting io5ft. 
 with an i8ft. greenheart rod. In the single-handed trout 
 contest he won first with 82^ft. over four competitors. In 
 a contest with two-handed trout rods, a thing unknown 
 
REUBEN WOOD. 19 
 
 in America, Mr. Mallock won first with iO5ft., and Mr. 
 Wood took second prize with io2ft. gin. His many 
 trophies in the tournaments in Central Park, New York 
 City, are familiar to readers of Forest and Stream. 
 
 He died at his home in Syracuse on Feb. 16, 1884, m 
 his sixty-second year. Mr. R. B. Marston, editor of the 
 English Fishing Gazette, said of him: "I know many an 
 angler in this country will feel sad at hearing genial, jolly, 
 lovable 'Uncle Reub' has gone to his long rest. During 
 his stay in this country he never failed to make friends of 
 all who came in contact with him. I shall never forget 
 the enthusiasm and almost boy-like glee with which he 
 enjoyed a fishing trip with me to the Kennet, at Hunger- 
 ford. He would stand for hours on the old bridge watch- 
 ing the trout and marveling at their cuteness. The sys- 
 tem of dry fly-fishing pleased and astonished him greatly, 
 and he told me he meant to try it on some wary old Amer- 
 ican trout he was acquainted with. Then he would show 
 us some of his long casting with a split-cane rod. If we 
 in this country, who only knew him so short a time, feel 
 his loss so keenly, what must those home friends of his 
 feel his family and that wide circle of acquaintances who 
 were proud to call him friend?'* 
 
 His death was very sudden he fell dead while enter- 
 ing his dining room. In addition to his love of the rod 
 he was for many years an active member of the Syracuse 
 Citizens' Corps, and later of the Sumner Corps, two well- 
 known military organizations. He was also a member 
 of the Baptist Church, and his name was a synonym for 
 all that was honest and manly. The last time I met him 
 he referred to our first fishing experience by saying, 
 "Fred, are you catching many turtles now?" And the 
 answer was, "No, Reub, it keeps me busy watching wood 
 ducks light upon the trees." 
 
BILLY BISHOP. 
 
 BOBBING FOR EELS. 
 
 IF these hills should come together where would I be?" 
 asked Billy when he found himself alone in Quacken- 
 dary Hollow, where he had been sent to cut cord- 
 wood. This was his excuse for returning from a lone- 
 some spot which his superstitious mind peopled with all 
 kinds of creatures, which might even draw the hills to- 
 gether and crush him, as they had done on many occa- 
 sions, he said, in Holland, where his grandparents came 
 from. The scarcity of hills in that country may not have 
 been known to Billy, but that was a matter of no impor- 
 tance to him. 
 
 The hollow lay half a mile above the village of Green- 
 bush, and was then well timbered and uninhabited. 
 Twenty years later it had quite a settlement, and was often 
 called "Nigger Hollow." But Billy Bishop was fonder of 
 the society of man than of those weird inhabitants who 
 worked evil in the dark forests by day or in open fields by 
 night. On the hill above the railroad was a field which 
 formed part of the farm of Mr. Frederick Aiken, and a 
 dilapidated barn in it was prominent in the sky-line from 
 the river road above the first creek. This was the "spook- 
 house lot" and the "spook-house barn," the house which 
 gave the name having burned before my recollection. 
 Billy told me that spooks danced in the barn on certain 
 nights, and that in the shape of stumps of trees a dozen of 
 them had chased him down the hill one night; but before 
 daylight they changed into bats and flew back. This was 
 
 certified to by John Pulver and Jakey Van Hoesen, chums 
 
 20 
 
BILLY BISHOP. 21 
 
 of Billy and rivals in doing odd jobs about Isaac Fryer's 
 tavern when thirsty and time was plenty. The weight of 
 evidence was convincing. These things happened in 
 1841, the date being fixed by the death of President Har- 
 rison and the fact that Billy said: "Ef I'd 'a' knowed he 
 was a-goin' to die so soon I'd never 'a' woted fur him." 
 
 At this time Billy may have been forty years old, may 
 have been sixty ; it was all the same thing to me he was 
 old. All men over thirty were old, and ten to thirty years 
 more made no difference. 
 
 "Ef you got a lantern I want to borry it to-night to 
 get some worms outen yer garden," said Billy; and it was 
 a revelation to me to see him pick up a quart of big 
 "night walkers" in a short time. 
 
 "What are you going to do with the big worms, 
 Billy?" 
 
 "Bobbin' fer eels; don't yer want to go, to-morrer 
 night?" 
 
 "Yes, if mother will let me; come around till I ask 
 her." 
 
 "Well," said mother, "he may go with you, Mr. 
 Bishop, if you will take care that he doesn't fall overboard 
 and you don't keep him out too late at night." 
 
 "All right, ma'am; we can't stay late, because I'm only 
 goin' here in the crik beginnin' about sundown, and eels 
 don't bite at a bob much a'ter ten o'clock, nur, fur that 
 matter, much a'ter nine. I'll take keer of him all right, 
 an' mebbe I'll have some eels to skin fur yer bre'kfas', 
 ma'am." 
 
 The worms had been put in a keg with plenty of earth 
 and set in a cool place. I was home from school early in 
 the afternoon, for the mystery of bobbing for eels was to 
 be unfolded to me by a master of the art. Billy was on 
 hand an hour before sundown, and getting a few yards 
 
22 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 of stout linen thread and a knitting needle from my 
 mother, we started for the woodshed to arrange some- 
 thing, but just what it was to be was a mystery. First 
 Billy cut off about six feet of thread and fastened it to the 
 middle of the knitting needle by a knot and two half- 
 hitches, two young eyes watching every move. Next he 
 threaded a big worm straight through from one end to 
 the other, ran it the whole length of the thread and fas- 
 tened it so that it would not slip off. This was repeated 
 until the thread was full and was six feet of living worms; 
 then he wound the string around the ringers of his left 
 hand until the upper end was reached, when he cut off the 
 knitting needle, took the coil from his hand and laid it on 
 a piece of fish line, which he doubled over and tied hard 
 and fast, cutting through to the threads and leaving a 
 number of worm-covered loops at each side, and the 
 "bob" was made. The fact that it was a dirty job did not 
 disturb Billy nor me ; in fact, we boys made many of them 
 afterward, and neither dirt nor the possible suffering of 
 the worms were ever given a thought ; and at this ripe age 
 it seems to be no worse than the ordinary baiting of a 
 hook with "our mutual friend," as a late writer called that 
 humble beast which we have termed a "barnyard hackle" 
 and scientists have dignified with the title of Lumbricus 
 terrestris, to signify his ownership or occupancy of the 
 soil. It simply seemed a trifle worse because the labor of 
 impalement and the consequent dirt came all at once. 
 These things are a matter of taste and temperament, 
 nothing more. 
 
 With the boat at anchor in the little creek, just below 
 Hiram Drum's slaughter house, which was about as far up 
 as a boat could go at ordinary times, Billy told me how to 
 proceed. 
 
 "In swifter water we'd had to use sinkers to get the 
 
BILLY BISHOP. 
 
 23 
 
 bobs straight down," said he; "but we won't need 'em 
 here. You see, you want to let your bob down till it 
 touches the bottom and then raise it a couple of inches, 
 for eels they swim near the bottom and hit the bob just 
 right/' 
 
 "But you didn't put any hooks in my bob, Billy ; how 
 can I catch 'em when they bite?" 
 
 His back was to me and he was looking upward. He 
 smacked his lips, put something in his pocket, and said: 
 "I have to take a little sassferiller fer my lungs, the doctor 
 told me. Oh, no! we don't want no hooks; the eels just 
 gets their teeth tangled in the threads and comes up, if 
 you bring 'em easy, then when they are just up to the 
 surface of the water lift 'em quick and gentle inter the 
 boat and they drop off theirselves; but if you jerk 'em 
 they're gone, er ef you hit the side of the boat with 'em 
 they're gone. Drop yer bob over easy, so," and he low- 
 ered his bob in the water without a splash. Soon I felt a 
 jig, jig, very sharp, and said to Billy, "I've got a bite." 
 "Pull up !" said he ; "never let 'em more'n touch it," and he 
 landed an eel in the boat. I tried it, but Billy said I was 
 too quick, for the eel left. He took several before I 
 boated one, for what with jerking the line and slapping 
 them against the side of the boat they dropped back into 
 the water, if they even got fairly started on the way up. 
 
 It was easy after once getting the hang of the thing, 
 and it soon came natural to haul up slowly to the surface 
 and then swing them into the boat. Good fun this is in 
 shallow water, when no better fishing offers, and many a 
 night have I rowed from Albany down the Hudson to 
 Van Wie's Point some six miles below Albany, more or 
 less with a friend or two and spent a pleasant evening, 
 in later years, fishing behind the dyke and just above Van 
 IWie's light, and then rowed back to the city about mid- 
 
24 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 night with a bushel of eels, weighing from nothing up to 
 two pounds or more, for the larger eels are not so easily 
 captured in this way, their weight tearing them loose in 
 the air. 
 
 The night was clear and starlit; bats circled about 
 picking up insects here and there. Billy told me that 
 they could be caught if I threw up my cap and said, "Bat, 
 bat, come into my hat and I'll give you a pound of 
 cheese." There was no room in the boat to do this, but 
 I tried it afterward and didn't get any bats. A large bird 
 flew just over our heads with slow and noiseless flaps, and 
 Billy said something in Dutch. "What was that?" I 
 asked. "They're bad, them things that fly at night a- 
 making no noise, an' I doan' like 'em," and he took a little 
 medicine for his lungs. The moon, a few days past the 
 full, came up slowly just south of the spook-house barn, 
 and Billy said if a bat flew across its face I must say : 
 
 "Hookum skookum, 
 Rollicum kookum, 
 
 Holliche Bolliche, 
 Baniche spookum." 
 
 "Ef you don't," said he, "you'll go blind on the side 
 next the moon." No bat crossed the moon that night to 
 my knowledge, nor do I ever remember seeing one cross 
 it; but the charm has been remembered and held in re- 
 serve should such a thing happen, for no man cares to 
 lose an eye when it can be so easily avoided by simply 
 following the directions of a man so skilled in spook lore 
 as Billy Bishop. 
 
 This night we had fair success, and when Billy put me 
 ashore he saw me safely home, only a few doors below, 
 and said that he would send us up a lot of dressed eels for 
 breakfast; and he did. During the fishing Billy faithfully 
 
BILLY BISHOP. 25 
 
 followed the directions of Dr. Getty and took his medicine 
 frequently, as I could testify; but he did not seem to be 
 as disgusted with it as I was when the same doctor pre- 
 scribed his great tablespoonful doses for me. I men- 
 tioned this fact to mother, and she said that Mr. Bishop 
 was older and more accustomed to medicine, and knew 
 the importance of following the doctor's orders better 
 than I. No doubt mother was right, but I can't help 
 thinking that what Dr. Getty gave Billy must have tasted 
 better to him than what he gave me ; but I was young. 
 
 Several times afterward Billy Bishop took me with 
 him when he went eeling. Mr. John Ruyter, the tanner, 
 said it was because Billy was afraid to go alone, but it is 
 possible that a luncheon which mother left on the table 
 for us on our return may have had its influence. Father 
 said that Billy was not good company for a boy, and be- 
 sides that, "It would be better for Fred to stay at home 
 and read or study instead of being out bobbing for eels ; 
 his mind runs too much on such foolishness." But 
 mother argued that a boy must have some fun and could 
 not study all the time, and Billy Bishop was a kind- 
 hearted man who had never done anything wrong, and 
 the result was that we had eels for breakfast many times. 
 
 Billy occasionally played the fiddle for dances, not for 
 the balls and parties of the more fashionable sort, but just 
 dances, where the musician did not become wealthy all at 
 once. I was too young to know much of this, but once 
 he told me in a low voice, while putting on a fresh bob 
 when the water was warm and the old one was spoiled, 
 that he had played for a dance a few nights before, and 
 the big boys had been "pizen mean. They asked me out 
 for 'freshments an' I laid down my fiddle an' bow, an' 
 when I come back they'd sawed that bow 'cross a candle 
 an' it was that greasy that it sp'iled the strings, an' I was 
 
26 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 done fur the night. Who done it I do'no, but there was Bill 
 Fairchild, John Stranahan, Pole Sherwood an' a lot on 
 'em there, an' they made out like they was awful sorry." 
 
 Poor Bill Fairchild in after years died of burns re- 
 ceived while rescuing the books from the burning freight 
 house of the B. & A. R. R., for which he was a book- 
 keeper; the others have gone to rest with old Billy, and no 
 more will they grease his bow nor pour water in his fiddle 
 when he goes ot:t for " 'freshments ;" but I was told that 
 Billy learned Td take his fiddle and bow with him when 
 called from labor. The humor of these things did not 
 strike Billy in the least. This was evident when he asked 
 me: "Now, what fun was ther' in that? They hed to pay 
 me fur the evenin', and it stopped the dancin'. I tell ye 
 there was folks there that was mad, but, bless ye, they 
 couldn't find out who done it. No one done it. It done 
 itself! They tried to make me believe it was spooks, but 
 spooks don't come to dances where folks is; they catches 
 you all alone, in the dark." 
 
 Some years later, probably about 1845, when a large 
 country store was kept in the brick building on the corner 
 of Columbia street and Broadway, and in great letters 
 announced "I. Fly, Headquarters," there was a large shad 
 seine being knit in the hotel of Isaac Fryer, just above. 
 About a dozen men had an interest in it, and they knit 
 away every evening, Billy Bishop and Jakey Van Hoesen 
 being busy filling the needles with twine. I somehow 
 used to drop in there and knit a little early in the evening, 
 but the men stayed late. No one went down Broadway 
 except Billy, and Mr. Fly would have a man or two in 
 waiting to scare him. Sometimes a few stones rolled 
 after him would be enough to start him on a run ; at others 
 "spooks" would spring at him from the churchyard, and 
 although the victim may have been well fortified with 
 
BILLY BISHOP. 27 
 
 Fryer's "Hollands," his starting for home required the 
 courage of a Tarn o' Shanter, which he did not possess. 
 He would go up street with friends and around the back 
 way until his tormentors found it out, and in despair Billy 
 told the story of his persecutions, when he was furnished 
 with an escort and saw no more spooks. 
 
 Once he confided to me a great secret: "If the eels 
 don't bite good," said he, "just go to a stable and look 
 over the horses' legs. You'll find a scab on the inside of 
 every leg, and when this is big and comes off easy just 
 take it and put it in your bob and the eels '11 come a long 
 way to get at it; it is powerful strong, an' they can smell 
 it for miles." 
 
 "Why don't we use it in our bobs?" 
 
 "We don't need it; they bite well enough as it is; we 
 don't want all the eels in the river; what could we do with 
 so many?" 
 
 That was sufficient, and if the thing was ever tried I do 
 not know. Perhaps the idea originated in Billy's brain 
 or was told to him by some joker, yet it is possible that 
 the very powerful odor of that gland would either attract 
 or repel the fish in a decided manner. Let some eel bob- 
 ber try it and report to Forest and Stream. My time for 
 bobbing passed years ago, but if opportunity offers I will 
 try it tentatively in the interest of knowledge. 
 
 Once the shad seiners of the village had arranged to 
 make some hauls at the lower end of the island which lies 
 opposite Albany, and Billy had brought up his little boat 
 the night before and left it at the ferry where "Old Josey," 
 the ferryman, kept his skiff for late night service after the 
 steamboat had finished the day and the horse-boat had 
 carried the early night passengers. The fact became 
 known to "Pop" Huyler, the blacksmith; Charley Brad- 
 bury, the livery man, and Steve Miles, the carpenter. 
 
28 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 After some deliberation and discussion of the case they 
 decided that a short piece of board, fastened edgewise to 
 the under side of the keel and at an angle of about forty- 
 five degrees to its length, would be about the best thing 
 that could be done at the time. Bradbury finished the 
 board and Miles affixed it, and the boat was placed in the 
 water with the improved combination centreboard and 
 rudder. The big scow came up the river bearing the 
 great seine on a platform over its stern, and four stalwart 
 oarsmen made her stem the current past the ferry. A 
 crowd had assembled when Billy appeared with a pair of 
 oars on his shoulder, and casting loose the painter shoved 
 off his boat, put the oars in position and began to row. 
 The boat seemed bewitched, for it kept going round in a 
 circle, no matter how the oarsman tried to keep it straight, 
 and Billy, pale as a ghost, dropped his oars and was evi- 
 dently praying in Dutch. The boat drifted near the dock 
 below, when Pop Huyler kindly called to the old man to 
 throw him the rope; he did so, and Billy was safe, but 
 weak and faint. 
 
 "Must ha' been spooks in the boat last night, Billy," 
 said Pop. 
 
 "Yes/' he replied, "I 'spect so; might a know'd there'd 
 be bad luck, fur a hen crowed yestidy an' the fust man I 
 see this mornin' was cross-eyed." 
 
 "Sure," said Charley Bradbury, "that's enough to 
 bring bad luck ; but, Billy, come up to Brockway's tavern 
 and take something, and say that Dutch prayer once 
 more, and that'll fix 'em all right." 
 
 While Billy was repeating the exorcising words Miles 
 got help and pulled the boat on the dock and ripped off 
 the board, launched the boat, and then, after much per- 
 suasion, Billy tried it again; and behold! the spell of the 
 witches, spooks and other evil-doers was broken, and 
 
BILLY BISPIOP. 29 
 
 Billy, with great good humor, joined the party just in time 
 to help haul on the line as the seine boat reached the 
 shore, fully convinced that, while spooks might tempor- 
 arily annoy him, he could triumph over them in the end. 
 Old Vose, who played the clarionette in the band on top 
 of Fly's "headquarters," heard of it, and got Billy to re- 
 peat the verse which could so undo the work of witches ; 
 and as neither Billy nor he could write, Bill Fairchild vol- 
 unteered to act as amanuensis, and what he wrote no man 
 knows, for when Vose asked his landlady to read it for 
 him she became angry and burned the paper. No doubt 
 but her method was a good one, for no one ever heard 
 that Billy's boat was ever bewitched again. 
 
 Poor old Billy! He died after I left the place, and is 
 remembered by very few. Spooks can no longer chase 
 him at night, grease his fiddle-bow, nor obstruct his boat. 
 The hills have at last come together above him, but he is 
 safe. 
 
JOHN ATWOOD. 
 
 FIRST NIGHT IN CAMP. 
 
 LOOKED at from later years John was not a bad 
 boy, neither was he a good boy, but just one of 
 those ne'er-do-wells that could not be kept in 
 school nor out of the woods. He was long of leg and 
 could tell where most of the birds' nests were within a 
 circle of two miles, with the schoolhouse as a centre. His 
 acquirements at school dwarfed beside his knowledge of 
 the best "fishin' holes," and some parents I knew did not 
 look upon John as a desirable companion for a younger 
 boy. He was some three years my senior, and his knowl- 
 edge of the country roads, and of the birds, beasts and 
 fishes made him easily a leader of boys who had a taste 
 for such things. 
 
 It was long after Reuben Wood had shown me how 
 to fish that I sat on the railroad dock fishing with a pole 
 and float, for the Albany & Boston Railroad had invaded 
 the village, coming down between the present site of the 
 ' Episcopal Church and the district school to where the 
 lower bridge to Albany now spans the Hudson, and it 
 made a good fishing place for boys. John Atwood came 
 there that Saturday morning and sneered at my tackle. 
 
 "Yes," said he, "that's the way Reub Wood fishes, but 
 there ain't no fun in it, for you h'ist 'em out too quick 
 with a pole; throw that away and take off yer float, rig 
 yer sinker below the hooks, and when you get a fish haul 
 him in hand under hand and feel him wiggle all the way 
 in that's sport!" John's advice was followed and ap- 
 proved, the heavy sinker, with two or three hooks pendant 
 
JOHN ATWOOD. 31 
 
 above it, was swung around two or three times, and away 
 it went with a plunk, and a new style of fishing was ac- 
 quired, much to Reuben's disgust; but the majority of the 
 boys about Greenbush seemed to prefer this mode. The 
 fish that we took in the Hudson then were white and yel- 
 low perch, bullheads, shiners, eels, spawn-eaters (which 
 were small minnows), and an occasional sucker; but John 
 knew of the mud creek and the dead creek, a couple of 
 miles down the river, where the fish were larger and more 
 plentiful. The "dead creek" was a short inlet from the 
 river running only a few hundred yards into the island, 
 but the "mud creek," as we boys called it, was some five 
 miles long and formed the island; this was the bayou 
 which we knew later as the "Popskinny." 
 
 One Friday morning, while on the way to school, John 
 was met. Two boys were with him, and they were on 
 the way to the mud creek with all equipments. It was 
 in the spring of the year, and John said : 
 
 "Come along and have some good fishin'; I wouldn't 
 go to school when the fish are biting as they are now. 
 We are going to stay till Sunday night, and have three 
 days' fishin' and birds'-nestin'. Come along; you're a 
 fool if you don't." 
 
 "Where will you sleep?" 
 
 "In Rivenburg's barn, in the hay; it's good and warm, 
 and we got lots o' grub an' lines." 
 
 Here was temptation in very strong shape, but the 
 consequences loomed up. His mother was a widow, 
 
 mine was not. I could square it with mother, but . 
 
 After some debate the books were left at the schoolhouse, 
 a hasty note written to mother, saying that I would be 
 home Sunday night, and we went. 
 
 Such fun! John cooked fish over coals of fire, we 
 covered ourselves in the hay at night, and the crickets 
 
32 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 sang weird songs, the bats flapped about, the frogs sung 
 and the owls hooted. Surely this beat Robinson Crusoe 
 all hollow, for he was all alone for a while. This was life 
 of an ideal kind. Sunday night, when a reckoning might 
 be made, seemed too far off for consideration. The pres- 
 ent life was perfect ! 
 
 We made explorations across the bottom lands and up 
 the wooded hills, saw wild pigeons, and John wished for 
 a gun; chipmunks, squirrels, birds of kinds new to most 
 of us, but which John could name, and a rabbit! Here 
 was big game indeed, and when John oracularly said, 
 "School is a fool to this place," there was no dissenting 
 voice, and all regretted when the time came to depart. 
 We had more fish than we could carry, and only took the 
 freshest and best, and toiled wearily homeward, one in 
 the party at least dreading the arrival. What mother said 
 over the torn clothes and spoiled shoes we will not repeat, 
 but when father invited me to a conference in the wood- 
 shed she said: "Joseph, I have punished him severely, and 
 he has promised never to go off again without permission; 
 and he should not be punished twice for the same of- 
 fence." A look of disappointment crossed father's face; 
 he evidently missed something that he had mentally 
 promised himself and me, but, as I told John Atwood 
 next day: "Mother spanked hard with her slipper, but it 
 was nothing to what she saved me from ;" and John agreed 
 that it happened just right. "But," said he, "we are going 
 there next Friday for three days more of it; will you go?" 
 
 "No, I can't; I must go to school." 
 
 "Ask yer mother; she'll let you." 
 
 "Not now; father would object; wait a little later, and 
 I'll join you there on some Saturday." And I often did. 
 
 As near as memory serves, I was about eleven years 
 old when John proposed that I join him and another boy 
 
JOHN ATWOOD. 33 
 
 in the purchase of a gun, which could be bought for $1.50. 
 It was an old flintlock musket that had been altered to 
 percussion, and we bought it. A grand hunt was ar- 
 ranged, and off we went. By drawing lots it was decided 
 that I was the first to carry the gun until game was shot 
 at, and then it was to be passed to the next. No knight 
 who, after watching his armor alone all night, girded it 
 on for the first time to engage in tournament or battle, 
 was prouder than I at shouldering the musket after John 
 had loaded it; nor did Natty Bumpo ever scan the dis- 
 tance for sign of Mingo keener than my eyes penetrated 
 each bush and thicket for game. At last I saw it! We 
 were in a road between two rail fences, and the game was 
 in plain sight a few feet beyond a fence. Slowly I crept 
 up after John had cocked the gun until the fence offered 
 a rest, and the game appeared unconscious a tribute to 
 my cautious approach. Surely I was destined to be a 
 mighty hunter! Be still, my heart, your beating may 
 destroy my aim! The game was fully ten feet from the 
 muzzle and deliberation was necessary. A long sighting 
 of the gun, and the trigger was pulled. "Hurrah ! I killed 
 him! I killed him!" and jumping the fence I picked up 
 what had been a beautiful little summer yellowbird which 
 had been picking the seed from a thistle-top, wholly un- 
 conscious of danger, but now a stringy mass of flesh, bone 
 and feathers. Reviewing this feat in more mature life, it 
 looks this way: "If some kind-hearted man had then ap- 
 peared and taken that gun and broken it on the fence, 
 and then whaled me with the ramrod, he might have 
 taught me that the life of that little bird was as valuable 
 to him, and perhaps to the world, as my own, and it had 
 been killed to serve no useful purpose. Oh! ye unthink- 
 ing fathers who use guns for what we call legitimate 
 sport, do not give your boy a gun. A boy is a savage. 
 
34 MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 I was one an unthinking savage, who would take life 
 without other reason than the pleasure of taking it. Re- 
 member this : You can carry a gun all day without shoot- 
 ing anything except what you consider game; but a boy 
 is bloodthirsty, and his desire to kill is at once intensified 
 when the means are at hand. As a boy I did my share 
 of killing every living thing I saw, whether of use to me 
 or not, and most boys will do the same. Once I wrote: 
 "Don't give a boy a gun until he is ninety years old, and 
 then fit him out and tell him to shoot at every swallow, 
 bat or chipmunk that he may meet." Bless me, how I 
 have preached over that little yellowbird ! 
 
 John could bwild bird cages, and in the spring we 
 would wade through the wet grass of the meadows to trap 
 bobolinks, which we sold. He was most successful in 
 rearing robins, thrushes and other young birds taken 
 from the nest, while most boys lost theirs. Later we used 
 to shoot wild pigeons in the spring and fall flights, and 
 with our old musket would bring back from a dozen to a 
 hundred birds in a day, with an occasional snipe, squirrel 
 or rabbit. In winter we set spring poles and box traps 
 for rabbits, and within four years from our first fishing 
 scrape we knew the whole country within a radius of ten 
 miles from Greenbush on the east side of the river. My 
 father was a stern, strict business man, at that time part 
 owner in, and Albany agent of, the Eckford line of tow- 
 boats, having three steamboats and many barges plying 
 to New York, for then the canal boats came no further 
 east than Albany. Thirty years later, when John Atwood 
 was dead, father told me that he once put John in charge 
 of one of his barges ; but he would not attend to business, 
 and he had to discharge him and then give him a subordi- 
 nate place. "Confound him," said father, "he has no 
 sense of responsibility; he is sober and capable, but would 
 
JOHN AT WOOD. 35 
 
 just as soon be a deckhand as to be captain." He had 
 John's measure to the fraction of an inch. John worked 
 because he was forced to do it; if by diligently applying 
 himself for a year he could attain a competency, he would 
 have said, "I would rather go a-fishmV 
 
 I have said that John was a long-legged boy. He was 
 also a very quiet fellow never in any boyish fights or 
 troubles. These qualities commended him to Mr. Charles 
 Crouch, a harness-maker and superintendent of the Meth- 
 odist Sunday-school, and John was in demand for the 
 May anniversary to carry the centre pole of the banner, 
 while two shorter boys steadied the corners with cord and 
 tassel. "Jine the Sunday-school," said John to me; "I'll 
 get you to hold a corner of the banner, and we will get the 
 first whack at the refreshments when we stop in Albany." 
 I "jined," and at the first meeting there was a pathetic 
 appeal for funds for missionaries, and I chipped in the 
 only sixpence I had, and which John and I had figured to 
 spend in this way: six fish-hooks at Coshy Lansing's, 2 
 cents; ten knots of blue-fish line at Tom Simmond's, 2 
 cents; lead at Pop Huyler's blacksmith shop, 2 cents. 
 "And you went and threw that to the heathen," said John. 
 "Who are the heathen?" he asked. "What do you care 
 about the heathen that you give 'em your last cent? I 
 thought you had some sense ! Now we've got to make a 
 raise to get some fishin' tackle in the mornin' just because 
 you are a blamed fool ! I only go to Sunday-school just 
 before anniversary so as to get in on the refreshments; 
 they don't get no sixpence out of me. Why, them heathen 
 is all right; they're satisfied to be heathen, an' I'm willin'." 
 I had done wrong and felt abashed in the presence of a 
 superior mind, and to-day I regret the donation of that 
 coin, for John's closing argument is good. 
 
 The "nut orchard" lay just out of the village and con- 
 
36 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 sisted of something like a hundred trees of shell-bark 
 hickory, straight of stem and tall. It belonged to Glen 
 Van Rensselaer, a man of middle age then, who watched it 
 as well as he could in the nut season ; but we boys always 
 had a sentinel out when foraging, and his shabby old silk 
 hat in the distance was a signal to gather the plunder and 
 leave, in order to avoid confiscation of the results of our 
 labor. There had not been frost enough to drop the nuts, 
 and several of us who were strong and active climbed the 
 trees and shook the limbs while smaller boys gathered 
 the nuts. A sentinel had just called, "Here comes Glen!" 
 when there was a scream and a thud, and a poor little 
 Irish boy, named Ryan, was lying on his back. We were 
 crying around him when Mr. Van Rensselaer arrived on 
 a run to catch us. The boy's head was bleeding and his 
 brain protruding, but he breathed. We gave him water, 
 and a passing hand-car on the railroad took him down to 
 John Morris' rope-walk, where his people lived. He died 
 next day. Most of the boys were shy of the nut orchard 
 that fall. The place is now filled with cottages, but the 
 name is retained. The "Indian orchard" is also gone, 
 and not an apple tree is left to hold the nest of a flying- 
 squirrel or a woodpecker. 
 
 West of the nut orchard some acres of pasture were 
 plentifully sprinkled with hawthorn bushes, which, by the 
 way, were called "thorn-apple bushes," and among these 
 were many of the big paper nests of the bald-faced hornet. 
 What fun it was, with John as the leader, to advance in 
 line, a cedar bush in the left elbow and as many stones as 
 the forearm would hold against the body and a big stone 
 in the right hand. "Fire!" cried John, and the stones 
 flew in rapid succession; and when all were gone the 
 enemy was upon us. Then how we retreated, swinging 
 the bushes about our heads, and how an occasional yell 
 
JOHN ATWOOD. 37 
 
 would announce the wounded! Fun? It was the very 
 height of fun, with its spice of danger, without which 
 some one has said there is no sport. Those who know 
 the bald-faced hornet know that he is as swift as a hum- 
 ming-bird and carries a poniard that for penetration and 
 venom discounts a bumblebee or any other stinger with 
 wings, and this reminds me : John Atwood and I had been 
 away beyond Bath after berries, when we passed a house 
 that stood only a few feet from the road. In front, just 
 inside the picket fence, stood a tall pear tree, well loaded. 
 'Them's nice pears," said John, disdaining all grammat- 
 ical rules; "le's have some." A study of the situation 
 showed that I could easily mount the tree, shake it, and 
 drop about ten feet in the road, and if the people in the 
 house were aroused John would be off with what pears he 
 could get outside the fence. I shook. Hard, burning 
 things struck my face, and I saw the nest of a colony of 
 bald-faced hornets within a foot of my head. Something 
 dropped it was I, and I dropped running. Oh, the agony 
 of eleven stings on head, face and neck, and the swollen 
 face of a boy whom his mother did not know an hour 
 later! Days in bed and a doctor seem a trifle now. The 
 pears were not good and John Atwood did not get a sting. 
 To-day, in 1896, it seems as if it was my mission to volun- 
 teer if there were hard knocks to be got, while some other 
 fellow got the pears. But this is a most common case, 
 and we see that same sort of a fellow every day ; and in the 
 economy of nature he is a necessity to the fellow who 
 gets the pears without the stings. 
 
 John taught me how to snare the brook suckers with a 
 noose of copper wire on the end of a pole. Brass wire 
 was too stiff, he said, and horsehair was not stiff enough. 
 We would get above the fish and drift the open loop so as 
 to inclose him, and when it was about his middle a smart 
 
38 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 jerk landed him on the bank. If the current took the 
 snare one side and the fish was not disturbed we would try 
 it over. 
 
 Once we walked down the track of the Boston Rail- 
 road to Kinderhook Lake to fish for pickerel through the 
 ice, after planning the campaign for weeks, and we carried 
 knapsacks filled with camping goods of more or less util- 
 ity. We got a fish, and took a rabbit and three grouse 
 from the snares of some poacher, and had a good time, all 
 of which was written up for Forest and Stream of January 
 3, 1889, as a "Christmas Reminiscence." The great won- 
 der to me then and now was where John learned all the 
 mysteries which he unfolded to me. He never told this, 
 and perhaps his air of mystery helped to magnify his 
 knowledge. He did not consort with Port Tyler, the 
 local Natty Bumpo, who lived by rod, gun and traps ; for 
 Port was a solitary man, and later, when I was taken as 
 an occasional companion by Port, he once said: "John 
 Atwood can't stick to one thing nor one place long 
 enough to do anything at hunting ; he runs all over, and, 
 durn him! he spoiled some good pa'tridge ground for me 
 once." This remark was a little foggy, but the impres- 
 sion was that John had interfered with some fences and 
 snares that Porter had set; but it was only an impression, 
 for no more was said. Perhaps the snares that we took 
 the grouse from were Port's! Port's remark fitted John 
 in other respects than hunting. A job in John Ruyter's 
 tannery, grinding bark, in Ring's "white mill," or in Her- 
 rick's distillery, feeding cattle, was not kept long. My 
 father's estimate of him was a just one, but of the boys 
 that I knew in youth few have a warmer spot in my mem- 
 ory than John Atwood. 
 
 Among the boys of Greenbush was one named Philip 
 Spencer, who came from Hudson, and at one time was a 
 
JOHN ATWOOD. 
 
 39 
 
 schoolmate of my oldest brother, Harleigh. His father 
 was the Secretary of War in President Tyler's Cabinet in 
 1841. Young Spencer had a copy of "The Pirates' Own 
 Book," and left it with one of the village boys with the 
 remark, "Keep this until you hear that I am a pirate;" and 
 through his father he was appointed midshipman in the 
 Navy in November, 1841. He planned a mutiny on the 
 U. S. brig Somers, was discovered, and with two others 
 was tried by summary court-martial and hanged at the 
 yardarm on December I, 1842. This book passed around 
 among the boys of the village for years, until John At- 
 wood loaned it to me. It had pictures of heroic pirates, 
 with belts well stuffed with pistols, boarding merchant- 
 men and putting the crew to the sword or making them 
 walk the plank, and it had in it Spencer's autograph and 
 newspaper slips of his execution. My mother found it in 
 my trunk, and after making me tell where I got it, took it 
 to Mrs. Atwood with the request that no more books of 
 that character be loaned to her son. John said: "It was a 
 fool book, anyway, and there was no fun in sinking ships 
 and killing people." And here again we can agree with 
 John. 
 
 An old darkey who had been a cook for my father in 
 his young days, when he was a sloop captain on the Hud- 
 son, had smallpox, and father fitted up a room for him in 
 the barn, and John Atwood volunteered to attend him, 
 and stayed by him until he was out of danger. As I have 
 said, John may not have been a good boy, but he was not 
 a bad one. Idle, shiftless and lazy? Yes, if you will, but 
 that is a combination to get much out of life, in a way. 
 John may have been "shiftless," but legs that followed 
 him on a day's tramp would deny the charge of laziness. 
 It would be fairer to say that he could only apply himself 
 to things which interested him. That is my latter-day 
 
40 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 summing up of his character. Men who think that the 
 accumulation of money by continuous industry is the 
 main thing in life have always decried those who did not 
 follow their precepts and examples, but there are other 
 standards of life than those of old Ben Franklin, who 
 thought that a boy or man should work like Gehenna and 
 never spend a cent. John Atwood followed the bent of 
 his inclination, and was happy when he did not have to 
 work at uncongenial labor; yet who could be more ener- 
 getic at removing a stone heap and digging out a rabbit? 
 
 As he approached manhood the necessity of labor that 
 was more remunerative gradually pressed upon him, and 
 the day came when John had to leave the birds and the 
 fish in their haunts and take a place as fireman on a rail- 
 road locomotive. The engine which startled the wood 
 duck from the lily pads had to be fed with great pieces of 
 wood, and the puffing monster drowned the song of the 
 bobolink and the whistle of the quail. John never could 
 have loved such a noisy, obnoxious thing. One winter 
 day about thirty years ago his engine stood at a side track 
 at Poughkeepsie ; the boiler burst, and the mangled body 
 of John Atwood was thrown far out upon the ice of the 
 river. As I read the account of it in a distant land the 
 thought came : Who will say to the boys, "A flock of geese 
 went north yesterday and the fish ought to bite good 
 now," or "The bluebirds are building in our pear tree an' 
 it's time to go in a-swimmin' "? Who, indeed? 
 
 The geese have gone north many times since, and the 
 bluebirds nested in their old home until the aged tree 
 broke and left only a stump, which I saw last year when 
 on a pilgrimage to the place ; but the poor, torn and shape- 
 less thing which the Coroner took from the ice no longer 
 notes the seasons by the coming and the nesting of the 
 birds. 
 
PORTER TYLER. 
 
 MY EARLY TEACHER OF WOODCRAFT. 
 
 AT first Old Port Tyler was a far-off and almost 
 mythical person. He appeared vaguely in the 
 stories of older boys who had really seen him, al- 
 ways in connection with fish and game. Garry Van 
 O'Linda had seen him cross the ferry to Albany with a 
 lot of rabbits and partridges, and Charley Melius saw him 
 with a great load of wild pigeons ; but to me he was a mys- 
 terious person who lived by fishing, shooting and trap- 
 ping. A man rowed a light boat around Dow's Point 
 and John Atwood said: "That's Old Port; he's been down 
 the dead crick after snipe," and here was the real live man 
 at last, but his mysterious and poetical life seemed as far 
 off as ever. A most ideal life to me, and he was at once 
 enthroned among my collection of idols, which then in- 
 cluded Davy Crockett, Daniel Boone, Baron Trenck, 
 Natty Bumpo and Charles XII. of Sweden. These men 
 I had not seen, but Port Tyler had passed Dow's Point 
 before my eyes, and his boat may have contained untold 
 numbers of snipe and countless fish. 
 
 Gradually it was learned that he was a bachelor and 
 lived alone near the red mill "Mechanic street" they call 
 it now; then it was "up by Fred Aiken's woods," and they 
 said that he had huts and caves all over the country and 
 lived in them when he pleased. These stories, and the 
 fact that a lunatic named Asher Cone had a hut back of 
 Harrowgate Spring and chased the boys with a club when 
 he saw them, added mystery and perhaps a bit of awe to 
 the personality of Old Port. In my own case this was 
 true, and at the age of twelve I never even hoped for per- 
 sonal acquaintance with a man whom I placed higher 
 
 41 
 
42 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 than the rulers of kingdoms for he was my ideal of the 
 highest form of manhood. I may as well say right here 
 that this was my ideal fifteen years later, and was lived up 
 to as closely as possible ; personal freedom from dictation 
 by others, a love of nature, and, above all, a sense of per- 
 fect independence, caused me to cast civilization aside, 
 and whisper it after six years return, not a prodigal, 
 but, like him, with a flag of truce in the rear, which the 
 small boy terms "a letter in the post-office." 
 
 The pigeons were flying well one October day, and I 
 had about twenty. They were in scattered flocks seeking 
 mast, and my neck was stiff from looking upward for 
 them. Often a dozen would start from a tree where none 
 was seen, and a wing shot was not possible, if I had been 
 capable of it. Resting on a log and watching the open 
 for a flight to come, and, like Irving' s skipper, who guided 
 his craft up the Hudson, "thinking of nothing in the past, 
 the present or the future," I suddenly became aware that 
 a man stood beside me. The leaves were damp from a 
 two days' rain, a high-hole was drumming away on an old 
 stub near by, and a couple of blue jays were scolding about 
 something perhaps about men and, being intent on 
 watching for pigeons to come my way, the whole com- 
 bination favored a silent approach that a falling shadow 
 was the first intimation of. The stranger said : 
 
 "There's a big flock feedin' on beechnuts over there in 
 Teller's woods, an' they may come this way; there's some- 
 body just south of 'em, 'cause the crows all left there a- 
 hollerin'." 
 
 He was a small man, rather thin, but wiry, clothing 
 not noticeable except a little faded, a keen gray eye and 
 a light double gun were the first impressions made by the 
 speaker. For young men it might be well to say that all 
 guns in those days were muzzle-loaders, and that the use 
 
PORTER TYLER. 43 
 
 of single-barrelled guns was so common that the excep- 
 tion was a matter of remark ; therefore the fact that he car- 
 ried a "double-barrelled gun" was duly noted. I told him 
 that I had been through Teller's woods an hour before, 
 but only found a few pigeons there and got but three of 
 them. 
 
 "The big flock was down to the crick for water, then," 
 said he, "and I saw 'em rise and go into the woods, about 
 three or four hundred of 'em in the flock ; and they haven't 
 left yet. You can stay here and get a few shots if they 
 come this way, as they will be likely to if that man over 
 south of 'em gets among 'em. I'll work off to the east'ard 
 and get beyond 'em if that man don't start 'em first," and 
 he moved off and was soon lost in the underbrush. He 
 was a man I had never seen before, and the incident was 
 only called to mind when, out after rabbits in the winter, 
 on Crehan's farm above the mill-pond, in jumping a little 
 stream I landed near a man who was skinning a mink. It 
 was the stranger of the pigeon hunt, and instinctively 
 came the knowledge that this was the mysterious woods- 
 man of whom so much had been heard. To my surprise 
 he knew who I was, and said: "Oh, yes, I've often seen 
 you down the crick and in the woods, and when I saw the 
 gun you carried I knew it belonged to your brother Har- 
 leigh, for he told me that you had it most ev'ry day when 
 you were out of school." 
 
 This was the first mink I had ever seen, and I watched 
 the skinning, which went very well until the tail was 
 reached, and this could not be skinned far because the 
 skin was so tight. We talked until he had finished, set 
 his steel trap and gathered his skins, and went on with the 
 hides of two minks and six muskrats a very good morn- 
 ing's work. Truly he was not now "mysterious;" he was 
 no longer a half mythical person, but a real, live man, and 
 
44 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 to me a most interesting one, whom I hoped to know 
 much better. 
 
 In the spring, perhaps of 1848 or '49, just after the ice 
 had left the river and the creeks, a party of us boys went 
 down the island creek, as we called it, Popskinny, or Pop- 
 squinea, as it appears on maps, to fish. It was merely an 
 arm of the river which crooked out and in again, making 
 an island some four or five miles long, beginning a couple 
 of miles below Greenbush. The water was cold yet, but 
 the hardy yellow perch were astir and the creek was full 
 of them. A railroad has filled the creek in where it crosses 
 and the water is shallow to-day, and but few fish go in it 
 now. There had been a few perch and bullheads taken 
 when Old Port came rowing a light scow down the creek. 
 Some one said that he had gill nets for herring set further 
 down, and this was a way of taking fish that I wanted to 
 see; so, when he stopped to ask, "What luck?" I got per- 
 mission to get in his boat and go with him. Two nets, 
 each about one hundred feet long and four feet deep, were 
 stretched across the creek, and had been there all night. 
 I helped raise them, and it was such fun! To-day it 
 would not be fun ; we take such different views of a thing 
 at different times of life. He took perhaps a bushel of 
 perch, half as many suckers and some 200 "herrin'," as 
 the alewife is called up the Hudson. "The perch an' suck- 
 ers ain't worth much," said he; "about ten cents a string 
 of a dozen or fifteen, accordin' to size; but the herrin' 
 fetches $2 per 100 as early as this; when they begin to 
 catch 'em in the river they drop to half that price, and by 
 May i they are so plenty and cheap that I don't bother 
 with 'em. At this time, you see, the people want to eat 
 'em fresh, and they're fine; but later they are spawning, 
 and are only fit for saltin' down." This was the financial 
 part of Port's herring fishing. I went in his boat with 
 
PORTER TYLER. 45 
 
 him to the nets many times, even as late as 1868, when he 
 was a man of fifty-eight and I of thirty-five, for he asked 
 me to his house and I became intimate with him from that 
 first trip to the nets. 
 
 "It's a cur'us thing," he said on one of these trips, "to 
 know how the herrin' get past these gill nets that reach 
 from shore to shore and from top to bottom ; but they do. 
 Last night I set my two about one hundred yards above 
 two of Cutty Carson's, and when I got through settin' 
 them there was Lon Crandell settin' his above mine ; but 
 I'll get about as many herrin' as they will, yet I can't see 
 how the fish get past the first net. They don't jump 'em, 
 for I have watched all night to see if they jump the cork- 
 line. As far as that is concerned, I'd just as soon have 
 rny nets in the middle as anywhere else." This is a puz- 
 zle a greater one even than how the shad get up the 
 Hudson past drifting gill nets and staked ones, to be 
 caught by the seiners of the upper river; but these do not 
 reach from bank to bank and from surface to bottom, as 
 the nets in the Popsquinea did. 
 
 He it was who first attracted my attention to the breed- 
 ing habits of fish. We were trolling minnows for pike 
 down this creek; the water had fallen and left strings of 
 perch eggs hanging to the bushes above the water. "Por- 
 ter," said I, for the days were getting long and permitted 
 the occasional use of his proper name, "there must be mil- 
 lions of perch eggs left to die that way every year; I 
 should suppose instinct would teach the fish not to spawn 
 high up during a freshet." 
 
 "Well, a yellow perch is a dull kind of a fish, and don't 
 know as much as a herrin'. When a flood comes and 
 covers all these bottom lands the herrin' go all over them, 
 but the minute the water begins to fall they scoot for the 
 creek and seem to find the ditches leading to it; and they 
 
46 MEN I "HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 don't spawn on the flats, but among drift stuff; their eggs 
 are separate, and stick fast to what they touch. These 
 strings of perch eggs are not fast to the limbs, but are 
 just hung over 'em with both ends down. I have put lots 
 of 'em back in the water. Maybe it's of no use, for there's 
 plenty of 'em and they ain't o' much account. It's cur'us, 
 though, to watch 'em spawn. I've seen 'em spawn in my 
 nets when I've been watching at night with a lantern. 
 When they are first laid they come out small, and there's 
 nothin' in 'em until the he one goes over 'em, and then 
 they swell up as big a mass as the fish that laid 'em." 
 
 When we came to his net he showed me perch nearly 
 ripe, and stripped a ripe male. I took perch eggs that 
 day in 1867 and hatched them in the State Geological 
 rooms on State street, Albany, by permission of Dr. Hall, 
 the curator, and through my intimacy with this observant 
 field naturalist I became a fishculturist and made it a life 
 work. 
 
 There was a gap of some nine years in my intercourse 
 with Porter, as I spent the years 1854-60 in the West and 
 parts of 1862-65 in the army; but the old man gave me a 
 warm welcome, "For," said he, "I liked you because you 
 took so much interest in all the live things, even if they 
 were no-account things." I never saw him after 1868. 
 He died at his home, which he owned, in 1882, aged 
 seventy-two years. Some of the Albany shooting men 
 thought him an old poacher because he sold much of his 
 game, and they said that he snared partridges (ruffed 
 grouse); and it may be that he did; I can't say; but to me 
 he was a kind friend and instructor of my boyhood in 
 things of interest, if not of usefulness. He was one of 
 those real outdoor observers, and the kind of naturalist 
 with whom the modes of feeding and habits of birds, 
 beasts and fishes take the first place, while of their struc- 
 
PORTER TYLER. 
 
 4-7 
 
 ture he knew little more than an outside view of fur, fin 
 and feather gave him ; yet his knowledge of many things 
 was far beyond what a scientific education could have 
 given him. Not that I wish to underrate such an educa- 
 tion, or to speak slightingly of it, for it is of very great 
 value ; but it is a fact that with most of our biologists struc- 
 ture and comparative anatomy are the beginning and end 
 of their knowledge of animal life, and a day spent with 
 Port Tyler would have opened up a new chapter to them. 
 Such a day might also have been of use to that class of 
 sportsmen who are mere butchers and measure the pleas- 
 ures of an outing by the amount of slaughter they have 
 done, and whose only knowledge of nature is where cer- 
 tain kinds of game could be found at certain seasons. 
 
 A man who, when out shooting, would stop, lean his 
 gun against a tree and spend half an hour watching a little 
 chipmunk dig his hole, has higher tastes than a mere 
 game butcher, and Port Tyler did that one day when I 
 ran across him in the Indian Orchard. "It's cur'us how 
 he does it," he remarked, "and because you don't find the 
 dirt piled up about the hole they say he begins to dig at 
 the bottom; your brother Harleigh told me that, but I 
 think he was joking." This last by way of apology, for 
 his sense of humor was not keen, and he did not always 
 realize the fact that some people would trifle with such 
 questions, and that his innocent and unsuspecting nature 
 invited just such remarks as the above. "That little cuss 
 is cute," he said; "he leaves a clean hole between two 
 roots, with no sign that he has been diggin'. But Har- 
 leigh is wrong; he begins at the top and carries the dirt 
 away in his cheeks, and drops it when he gets far enough 
 so that it won't attract attention. Maybe when he gets 
 down he can pack it one side into some hollow and save 
 labor. He ran off when you came, and there he is on 
 
48 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 that fence there by Cassin's house, jerkin' his tail because 
 he is mad at you for coming here to stop his work." He 
 knew that the little ground squirrel was a "chipmunk" 
 and stored its food under the protecting roots of trees, and 
 by observation had learned how it dug a hole without 
 leaving outside evidence of it, even though he knew noth- 
 ing of its anatomy. 
 
 Port's great fur harvest sometimes came in midwinter, 
 but always in early spring, by a "January thaw," and 
 surely in April. The ice never melts in the Hudson about 
 Albany, but is broken up by floods when the snow melts 
 in the upper country or in the Mohawk Valley, and often 
 goes out in great fields, nearly two feet thick, which crowd 
 on top of each other and break by the overhanging 
 weight. Grounding on shallows just above Castleton, 
 which bar in the river the Dutch knew as the "Over- 
 slaugh," the water is dammed and floods the lower parts 
 of Albany so that boats can often float up Broadway as 
 far as State street, and all the flats and bottom lands on 
 both sides of the river are several feet under water, often 
 for weeks or until the ice dam breaks. The muskrats of 
 that region have been so accustomed to this state of 
 things that they rarely build houses, as in other parts of 
 the country, although I have seen an occasional house 
 there; but houses being of no use in such events, the in- 
 stinct to build has been nearly lost. When the freshet 
 comes the musquash is drowned out of the holes in the 
 bank and seeks the piles of flotsam to hide among. Every 
 gun in Greenbush and on the hills below is brought out, 
 and everything in the shape of a boat that can be had is 
 put into commission for the slaughter, and the roar of 
 successive guns reminds a veteran of a skirmish line. 
 Many men are shooting for profit, Old Port among them, 
 but a larger number are out for fun and pile the rodents 
 
PORTER TYLER. 49 
 
 in their boat to give to some one who will want them. In 
 the early '5o's there would be found a number who were 
 shooting for fun and saving the animals for Porter. 
 Among these were Colonel David A. Teller, James Mil- 
 ler, Reuben and Ira Wood, Harleigh Mather, Godfrey 
 Rhodes, Bill Fairchild, myself and about a dozen others. 
 The result was that Port had to hire help to skin the ani- 
 mals while he would stretch the hides. 
 
 At this late day, with a memory hardly worth a hill of 
 beans, it is not safe to make an estimate of the slaughter 
 of muskrats during a freshet on the eastern shore of the 
 Hudson River, between Dow's Point, which is less than 
 two miles below Albany, and Castleton, which is nearly 
 ten miles from the city. I had to go to school, sure, for 
 my father knew well that only an iron hand could keep 
 me there, and he had it; but two days in the week I 
 claimed for rest and recreation. The latter I had, while 
 the former was not needed. It was poor shooting when 
 I did not pick up thirty muskrats in a day during a freshet, 
 and men have killed as high as 200 in a day. Perhaps 
 with about fifty gunners there was an average of thirty 
 musquash each, which would count up to over 10,000 in a 
 week! It seems too big a figure for eight miles on one 
 side of a river, but the flats or bottoms were from a half 
 to three-quarters of a mile wide, rich with alluvial deposit 
 from each overflow and rank with vegetation along the 
 river, the island creek and the ditches which drained the 
 bottoms into the creek ; also our sociable little mammal is 
 largely a vegetable feeder. With donations from his 
 friends, in addition to his own gun, Port Tyler one year 
 marketed over 2,000 muskrat skins, a few obtained by 
 winter trapping, but mainly shot during the freshets. Just 
 what these were worth at that time is forgotten; all were 
 not "prime" because of the shot holes, but they brought 
 
50 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 enough to keep this man of simple tastes until the fall sea- 
 son, even if the spring run of "herring" were not consid- 
 ered, and in addition to the winter's fur there was always 
 a few mink and other skins, for he was not above taking in 
 a prowling cat, as he said: "A common cat skin is not 
 worth much, but when I've killed her the skin might as 
 well be saved; and I kill 'em on principle, for they kill 
 nesting partridges, rabbits, and every young song bird 
 they can get hold of." 
 
 Port once said to me that a game dealer, hotel keeper, 
 or some other man, wanted him to shoot reedbirds in the 
 fall. "Now, what do you suppose he called reedbirds?" 
 he asked. "They're bobolinks in their fall gray coat 
 and that's goin' too far. I've shot blackbirds and snow- 
 birds for market, and while I was a-shootin' 'em I thought 
 it was small business compared to shootin' quail, pa'tridge 
 an' rabbits; but when it comes to shootin' bobolinks, 
 which makes the medders ring with song in the spring, 
 I'll be durned ef I'll do it! You've off en seen a he bobo- 
 link fly toward his mate an' then set his wings all a-trem- 
 ble as he told her that she was the best she bobolink he 
 ever see and the music! I've off en sot and listened to 
 him when I ought to be goin' on to my herrin' nets in the 
 spring. Of course the bobolink gets gray in the fall, an' 
 he looks just like a she one, but that's his natur', an' I ain't 
 a-goin' to shoot him for market. I'd rather hear him 
 sing, an', besides, he's too small to eat." 
 
 I have always held this opinion, that it is a sin to kill 
 this songster for the morsel of meat it has, and have con- 
 sistently refused to touch "reedbirds" when they have 
 been served at dinners. The bird is nearly extinct in the 
 meadows which it once enlivened, and during a life of 
 thirteen years on Long Island I have not seen a bobolink. 
 Guns, guns, guns ! I sometimes think it would be well if 
 
PORTER TYLER. 51 
 
 gunpowder had never been made. The true game birds 
 hold their own in many places fairly well only men of 
 intelligence can find them but in the older settled re- 
 gions the redheaded woodpecker has gone and the brown 
 thrasher and bobolink have almost disappeared. The 
 reason is a combination of gun and boy. 
 
 Game that Port didn't sell he cooked for small parties 
 at his house. He was a good cook, and when it was 
 known that he had a few ruffed grouse on hand a supper 
 party would be organized at once, and he would furnish 
 everything but the liquors. He was a very temperate 
 man and seldom used either wines or stronger stuff, and 
 said that he did not care to sell it even if he had license to 
 do so; but the jolly old cocks who were fond of his game 
 suppers did not allow themselves to suffer on this account. 
 I attended only one of these affairs, as I was rather young 
 for that sort of thing; but I had been out after grouse and 
 had three, which I gave to Porter, whom I met near home. 
 The cause of this generosity was because I did not dare to 
 take them home, having surreptitiously borrowed a fine 
 double gun from my father which I was forbidden to take 
 or handle; but, as he never used it, he often loaned it to 
 me without his knowledge. Under these conditions Por- 
 ter got the birds and I was invited to the feast. General 
 Martin Miller, of the State militia, presided; in times when 
 Greenbush was at peace with all foreign countries he kept 
 a grocery store and was commonly known as Mat. Miller; 
 Tobias Teller, Bill Fairchild, Godfrey Rhodes, Port and 
 I fourteen of us in all, six men and eight grouse. After 
 the last bone had been polished Bill Fairchild was 
 thoughtful, and as he was sucking away on the backbone 
 of a grouse, trying to extract the very last of the bitter that 
 is so dear to the lover of all kinds of grouse, he asked: 
 
 "Porter, did you ever eat a muskrat?" 
 
52 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 "Yes, I've eat 'em many times, an' they're right good, 
 too, if you know how to dress an' cook 'em, an' I'll tell 
 you what else is good, but you may not believe it; that's 
 young quawks ; the old ones are fishy, but the young ones 
 are not, though they are fed on fish, an' I'll get you up 
 a " 
 
 "But about the muskrat, Porter; I've eaten him, and I 
 don't want any more." 
 
 "Wa'n't it good?" 
 
 "I'll tell you," said Bill; "you know old Dandaraw, the 
 C'anuck Frenchman who keeps the little drunkery just 
 north of the B. & A. passenger houses? Of course you 
 do. Well, after the spring freshet I dropped into Dan- 
 daraw's, and we were talking about shooting muskrats. 
 Dandaraw said: 'You shoot-a da mus'rat, hey, Bill?' 'Oh, 
 yes,' said I; 'sometimes, just for fun, and I give 'em to 
 Port Tyler, and he skins 'em for market.' 
 
 " 'You doan eat-a da mus'rat, hey, Bill?' 
 
 " 'No, I don't eat 'em; they smell a little too musky for 
 me.' 
 
 " 'Oh, Bill, you mus' eat a-heem; you doan' know how 
 good-a he ees.' 
 
 "I asked him how he cooked 'em, just for curiosity, 
 for I had no idea that the things were eatable, and I only 
 wanted to hear him chirp. He said : 
 
 " 'First you skeen da mus'rat an' clean him fine; den 
 you bile him a leetle; den you fry him an' you eat him, 
 an' (smack) o-o-o!' 
 
 "Well," said Bill, "I skeen-a da mus'rat an' I clean 
 him fine; den I bile him a leetle; den I fry him an' I eat 
 him. I could do the whole trick except the (smack) an' 
 the o-o-o. I could eat a muskrat on a pinch, but for 
 choice would prefer one of these partridges that Port 
 serves up so good." 
 
PORTER TYLER. 53 
 
 Port thought that he could serve up some nice fat 
 young muskrats so they would fill Dandaraw's descrip- 
 tion, and even Bill Fairchild would smack his lips loudly 
 and say "O-o-o," and it was agreed to try it a few weeks 
 later; but I missed the feast. 
 
 Tyler was the only man I ever knew who could suc- 
 cessfully hunt woodcock without a dog. He seemed to 
 know just where to look for them and how to find them, 
 and said that he did not want to be bothered with a dog. 
 An English gunner and dog fancier lived in that lower 
 end of Albany called Bethlehem perhaps the same dis- 
 trict now known as Kenwood. They called him Ken 
 King, his front name being Kenneth, and I bought a bitch 
 puppy from him, the mother being a pointer of famous 
 stock and the father the then celebrated setter Dash, the 
 crack setter of the time, owned by Mr. James Bleecker. 
 By the way, this Nell of mine never showed the slightest 
 trace of setter blood, and she went to Michigan afterward, 
 and was the mother of many good pointers with never a 
 sign of setter blood. 
 
 This was in 1853, and my people having moved to 
 Albany there was no place for Nell, and Port agreed to 
 take care of her. I wanted him to work her on snipe and 
 woodcock, but he said: "A dog is all right for men who 
 can't find birds without one, but they are little use to me; 
 I like to find 'em myself, and on the old grounds that I've 
 hunted for years I know the best feedin' spots in every 
 marsh or cornfield, and if the birds are there they'll not be 
 far from these spots." This is a strange statement, but 
 the fact that this man lived up to it and shot both snipe 
 and woodcock for market without a dog can be attested 
 by men now living in Albany and Greenbush. Surely a 
 most strange and interesting character was Old Port 
 Tyler. 
 
GEORGE DAWSON. 
 
 MY FIRST TROUT. 
 
 ABOUT 1850 my people moved across the river into 
 Albany, and I was a student in the "Classical In- 
 stitute" of Professor Charles H. Anthony, on 
 Eagle street. Among the scholars was George S. Daw- 
 son, eldest son of George Dawson, who at that time was 
 assistant editor of the Albany Evening Journal. Young 
 George told his father that I knew of a good trout stream 
 down near Kinderhook lake, and it led to an interview. 
 Mr. Dawson wanted to go, and we would take an early 
 train for Kinderhook station, on the B. & A. R. R., and if 
 the distance was too far to the brook he would hire a 
 horse to take the three near the stream, for George S. 
 would go. This seemed a reckless bit of extravagance 
 to a boy whose whole expenditures for fishing had been 
 a few pennies for hooks and lines and of leg muscle to get 
 to the fishing places. 
 
 The only thing that serves to fix the time of year is the 
 memory that pond lilies were in bloom; the cat-tails were 
 just pushing up their curious blooms, and had not burst 
 to scatter their seeds, and the black-cap raspberries were 
 ripe. It must have been early in July, for the swallows 
 were skimming the meadows and had not begun to con- 
 gregate on the telegraph wires. These things are re- 
 called by Mr. Dawson's wish to take home the pond lilies, 
 our picking berries near the railroad station, and young 
 Dawson's doubt of my statement that swallows could 
 gather on wires charged with electricity. What a thing 
 
 54 
 
GEORGE DAW SON, 55 
 
 is man's memory, and by how slight a cord is it tied to the 
 past! The exact year is forgotten, but it was before 1854, 
 probably three years before. Mr. Dawson carried a short, 
 hand-made rod of some kind of wood, with ring guides, 
 the first thing of the kind I had seen, and that gave me 
 an impression that he must be a very superior angler, es- 
 pecially as he said that his father had brought expensive 
 rods for trout fishing from Scotland, but they had been 
 lost. This was a revelation! "Expensive rods" he 
 called them "rods" and the idea of paying money for 
 such things when we could cut an alder pole and thought 
 it expensive to buy fish hooks and lines; but, like the 
 Irishman's owl which he had bought for a parrot, I said 
 nothing, "but kept up a devil of a thinking." If money 
 had been more plentiful in boyish pockets it is doubtful 
 if its expenditure would have been in the direction of "fish 
 poles," which could be cut anywhere and thrown away 
 after use. This was a bit of dilettanteism in angling that 
 hardly seemed consistent with our primitive ideas of using 
 only those things which nature furnished, always except- 
 ing hooks and lines. His hooks were also a revelation. 
 We used only Limericks of large size, and boys usually 
 prefer big hooks because they look so strong, and they 
 fear that a big fish may break a small hook. Mr. Daw- 
 son's hooks were small and the wire was slim, but they 
 were long in the shank, something like the hook now 
 known as the "New York trout," if not the same, and the 
 most wonderful thing about them was that they were 
 neatly put on gut snells another new thing. He rigged 
 my line with one of the smallest hooks and discarded the 
 sinker, which before seemed to be an indispensable part 
 of a fishing outfit, and he showed us how to fish down 
 stream and how we must keep a good distance apart. We 
 fished with worms, and the slim, long-shanked hooks 
 
56 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 were perfect, because they did not break a small worm 
 and allowed the use of a generous bait on the long wire. 
 How I treasured a dozen of these hooks which he gave 
 me, and how som* boys looked at them with envy and 
 others sneered at them, saying, "A big fish would bite 'em 
 in two," are things well remembered. 
 
 The stream was small; in places one could jump across 
 it; then it would widen out, sometimes in deep holes and 
 at others in shallow riffles, through meadows most of the 
 way and often fringed with alders, which troubled the 
 angler to use his rod. In the latter case trout would be 
 hauled in as on a hand line. There was no landing net in 
 the party. At this time the existence of such an imple- 
 ment was unknown to us boys; we hauled in a fish, un- 
 hooked it, and either strung it on a twig and carried the 
 string or let the fish hang in the water to keep alive. 
 This day the latter mode was not practicable. The trout 
 in this stream did not run very large, perhaps from four 
 to six ounces ; but the new kind of hooks, the absence of 
 a sinker and the consequent ability of the fish to fight, 
 made it the grandest event in all my fishing, and one ever 
 to be remembered. The day was perfect: a light breeze, 
 the sun not too bright, and the fish taking the bait freely. 
 Crawling through the brush or skipping the places where 
 it was too thick to get a short rod and line in the water, 
 we worked slowly down stream. I had let my hook drift 
 under a log in a hole on the other side of the stream, when 
 a trout struck it hard. We had not arrived at that point 
 in fine angling when reels were used, and the strike 
 caught me with my tip lowered, and there was a struggle 
 which soon ended in the line being fast to some immova- 
 ble thing, and a strong pull parted it, and for the first time 
 the biggest got away. This has happened to others. 
 
 Surely it is hard to tell, at this late day, whether grief 
 
GEO. DAWSON. 
 
GEORGE DAW SON. 57 
 
 over the loss of a big fish overtopped the grief of losing 
 one of those marvelous hooks; but that grief in solid 
 chunks was abundant in a little clump of swamp willows 
 is certain. The gut snell was frayed and had parted in 
 the middle, as if chafed over something rough ; and after 
 bending on a new hook I came upon young George near 
 a little foot-bridge, on which most of his clothing lay in a 
 wet state. 
 
 " What's the matter, George?" 
 
 "Fell in. How many you got?" 
 
 "Nine, nice ones; but I just lost an old whopper and 
 one of those hooks your father gave me. How many 
 have you got, and how did you fall in?" 
 
 "I only caught three; the fish get scared as soon as 
 they see you and scoot away. I was after one that started 
 down stream, and stepped on a slippery stone and just 
 plunked in, that's all." 
 
 After pointing out to him that trout must not be 
 chased in order to make them take the hook, he was re- 
 minded of what his father had told him about not letting 
 the fish see him, but in his anxiety to get a worm under a 
 trout's nose all rules had been forgotten. The morning's 
 work had brought on a first-class appetite on my school- 
 mate as well as on me, and Mr. Dawson had the material 
 to alleviate and cure that gnawing sensation if he could 
 be found. Leaving all my traps and fish at the foot- 
 bridge, I started down stream to find Mr. Dawson. Soon 
 he hove in sight, coming up stream, and he had a string 
 of about twenty fine trout. "It's getting near midday and 
 the fish are not biting well, so we might as well rest and 
 eat a bite," said he, "and then by the time we are through 
 and walk back to the station the freight train will be along 
 and we will go back in the caboose, as the agent said, for 
 if we wait here for more fishing we will not get home to- 
 
58 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 night, as the fish will not be on the feed again before an 
 hour or two of sundown." 
 
 George Dawson, while a trenchant political writer, 
 was also fond of depicting life in the woods and on the 
 streams. With pleasure I renewed my acquaintance with 
 him in later years, when peace reigned in the land, and by 
 invitation accompanied him to the Adirondacks when 
 both were familiar with the use of the fly in luring the 
 trout. He was born in Falkirk, Scotland, in 1813, and 
 came with his parents to America five years later. He 
 had no early schooling, but learned the printers' trade be- 
 fore he was thirteen, and educated himself. Then he 
 went to Rochester and worked for Thurlow Weed, editor 
 of an anti-Masonic paper, and in 1836 Dawson became 
 editor of the Rochester Democrat. Weed was afterward 
 editor of the Albany Evening Journal, and in 1846 Dawson 
 joined him as assistant editor. Weed retired in the stir- 
 ring days of 1862, and Mr. Dawson took his place as edi- 
 tor and proprietor of the Journal, then as now one of the 
 leading papers of the State of New York; and it soon be- 
 came known that the pen of the new man was a most 
 vigorous one. His love of nature was a most prominent 
 trait, and fishing was his favorite means of enjoying this 
 love. Once, while on the way to the Adirondacks with 
 him, I remarked: "The woods to me is a place to loaf." 
 If I had read Whitman then I would have added, "and 
 invite my soul," but only added, "A couple of hours' fish- 
 ing morning and evening is all I want; if the fish bite good 
 it is well; if not, the trying for them suffices." 
 
 "My boy," he replied, "that is just exactly my own 
 notion, and I have a dislike for the companionship of the 
 
GEORGE DAWSON. 59 
 
 bustling, busy angler, who fishes as long as he can see to 
 do it, morn, noon and dewy eve, in the hope of getting 
 the last trout in the water. Such a man makes a labor of 
 fishing; I go to the woods for rest and other attractions 
 purer, higher and more ennobling than the mere act of 
 taking fish." 
 
 He put these same words down in a notebook, and 
 while in camp wrote an account of the trip to the Journal 
 and used them in its columns in June, 1873, now before 
 me. 
 
 Once, in writing of "how really garrulous are the 
 silent men of meditative mood," and relating how, when 
 in the woods, their faces would be illuminated by the pass- 
 ing thoughts while they were really communing with dis- 
 tant friends, and their silence was only seeming, and mus- 
 ing in an abstracted way was a rare and pleasant gift, he 
 said: "It is not so with the chronically absent-minded, 
 who may be heavy-browed, but are vinegar-visaged and 
 constitutionally morbid, and would no sooner think of 
 angling than of robbing the exchequer of the realm. An 
 editor's life is neither the best nor the worst in which to 
 cultivate this rare gift. There are those in the profession 
 who can so concentrate their thoughts that the pertin- 
 acious pleadings of a score of office-seekers cannot tangle 
 the thread of their meditations. And sometimes even the 
 least abstracted among us have to throw off sentences 
 amid such persistent din that bedlam itself would blush at 
 the clatter. What little of the art came to me by nature 
 and compulsory practice has been strengthened by the 
 opportunities for silent meditation afforded by the habit 
 of angling." Thus spoke the weary political editor, and 
 we read between the lines his disgust with the horde of 
 office-seekers, who, under the ante-civil-service laws, ren- 
 dered miserable the life of every man who had "infloo- 
 
60 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 ence" in the smallest degree ; but the deduction which he 
 draws that the practice of angling conduces to deliberate 
 thought is one that should commend its practise to par- 
 ents as the best of all sports for their sons. The murder- 
 ing instincts of a boy are often satisfied with the death of 
 a low form of animal life which cannot suffer as much 
 pain as mammals or birds, under any circumstances, be- 
 cause their nervous organizations are lower. Shake- 
 speare was greatly in error when he wrote, in effect, that : 
 "The poor beetle that we tread upon in corporal suffer- 
 ance finds a pang as great as when giant dies." Suffer- 
 ing is entirely a matter of nerves. A worm which can be 
 cut in two and go on living, and perhaps grow into two 
 worms, cannot suffer much. Pull a lobster's claw from 
 its body and a new one grows ; pull a limb from a mouse 
 and the animal dies. 
 
 Under date of July 3, 1878, Mr. Dawson wrote me: 
 "No pastime is so attractive to me as angling, and when 
 not at it I greatly like to talk and write about it, ethically, 
 not scientifically, for I have never been able to master an 
 'ology' of any kind," and then he goes on to ask about the 
 details of grayling fishing. Some time before this I called 
 on him and enlarged on the pleasures of a trip to the Au 
 Sable River, Michigan, with Mr. Daniel H. Fitzhugh, of 
 Bay City, and of the capture of the gentle grayling. He 
 listened a while and then asked : 
 
 "How large do grayling grow?" 
 
 "Those we took were fish that would weigh from 
 three-quarters to one and a half pounds, but some have 
 been taken that would weigh as much as two pounds." 
 
 "My boy" he seemed to be fond of addressing me in 
 this way, perhaps because of the fact of the great disparity 
 of years when we first fished together back of Kinderhook 
 Landing, or because his son, George S., was my school- 
 
GEORGE DAWSON. 61 
 
 mate "you talk enthusiastically about this new fish, 
 which never exceeds two pounds in weight; did you ever 
 take a salmon?" 
 
 "No, but " 
 
 "Well, I have, and the grayling may be a good little 
 fish for those who have never hooked bigger game ; but it 
 seems rather small to one who has taken a salmon." 
 
 This was a setback from an enthusiastic angler, and, 
 after pulling myself together, I ventured to suggest 
 that his angling literature, as far as I had read it, rather 
 placed the weight and number of fish in the background, 
 and that, as the originator of the saying that "it is not all 
 of fishing to fish," I had thought that the newly discovered 
 grayling might interest him. He saw the point at once, 
 became interested in the fish and went to Michigan to 
 take them, an account of which can be found in his "An- 
 gling Talks," published by Forest and Stream in 1883 a 
 most interesting little work, full of flavor of the woods and 
 waters. 
 
 Mr. Dawson died February 17, 1883, after a few days' 
 illness, aged seventy years. His life had been such an 
 active one, and as a political leader he was so prominent, 
 that his death produced a profound sensation. The Al- 
 bany Argus, politically opposed to Mr. Dawson, said of 
 him: "To journalism this man bore no undistinguished 
 relation. He was a ready, wise, dangerous writer. He 
 was a Greek to be feared when he came bearing presents. 
 * * * He was very able in stating a case for a party; 
 he was even abler in stating a case against a party. He 
 was ablest in giving a man either a fatal defence or a fatal 
 attack. His genius ran to combat; battle was his ele- 
 ment. Routine tired him. Peace gave him a sense of 
 ennui" 
 
 About five months before his death he retired from his 
 
62 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 editorial labors, although his well-knit frame and com- 
 pact form showed no more sign of weariness than did his 
 mind. The Argus said: ''Pneumonia wrestled the life 
 out of this Scot, they say. Doubtless it did; 'twas pneu- 
 monia of which he died. But how came his constitution 
 to take it? Through cold? Why, he had summered for 
 years in water knee-high, or waist-high, putting up jobs 
 on fish. Why, he had repeatedly slept on the floor of lum- 
 ber cabins o' winter nights, his feet to a fire and his head 
 under an open window, in the Michigan woods. He had 
 the conquering will that defied wet and blasts. Did his 
 prolonged labors undermine his constitution? Emphat- 
 ically no! He was ever strongest in harness. When he 
 went to press every day he went to bed every night to 
 sleep the easy-breathing, refreshing sleep of a boy. 
 Knocking off work unsettled this man's strength. Labor 
 was a tonic to him. He would have lived through sheer 
 love of labor had he remained a scalp-taker every day, 
 armed with his keen pen and keener thought. None can 
 be blamed. He quitted work because he said he wanted 
 to quit it. He thought that lessening the tension would 
 enable him to play in the youth of old age. And he loved 
 to play. But work was his best play. Then he played 
 with thunder." 
 
 Only once did Mr. Dawson hold public office. He 
 was postmaster of Albany from 1861 to 1867, at a time 
 when his pen was most actively engaged in the patriotic 
 work of upholding the integrity of the Union. But he 
 did not stop at writing editorials and equipping his eldest 
 son for the army. He publicly announced that he would 
 pay to the families of any six printers who would volun- 
 teer $4 per week during the time they remained in the 
 United States service, and he did it. One of the six, 
 Charles Van Allen, of Bethlehem, Albany county, went 
 
GEORGE DAW SON. 63 
 
 out with my regiment in August, 1862, and died in An- 
 dersonville prison September 18, 1864. His wife received 
 the pay for nearly a year after he died, or for the full term 
 of his enlistment, some $624, all to one family. 
 
 George Dawson was a member of the Baptist Church, 
 a Sunday-school teacher and lay preacher. A noble man 
 and a most charming one to be in camp with. Entirely 
 without ostentation, his acts of charity were known to 
 but few, and if within his power his pencil would be drawn 
 through most of these lines, written by one who is proud 
 to have known him and to have called him friend. 
 
 
MAJOR GEORGE S. DAWSON. 
 
 CAPTAIN GEORGE S. DAWSON, Second New 
 York Heavy Artillery, my schoolmate and fish- 
 ing companion on the one trip which has been 
 related, was stationed in the defences of Washington, near 
 Alexandria, in 1863, and came to visit me when my regi- 
 ment, the Seventh New York Heavy Artillery, occupied 
 the forts from Tennallytown, on the Harper's Ferry road, 
 to Fort De Russy, near the Seventh street road, and we 
 had a grand review of the schoolboy days and of the only 
 fishing trip that we ever had together. Said he: "That 
 day will ever be remembered, for in my case it filled the 
 proverbial measure of fisherman's luck; and that lunch! 
 Did you ever strike anything so fine?" His regiment, in 
 June, 1864, was in the Second Brigade, First Division, 
 Second Corps, Army of the Potomac ; while mine was in 
 the Fourth Brigade of the same division and corps. 
 While we lay in the trenches at Cold Harbor I sent him a 
 note asking if he was catching many trout now, and he 
 answered, in effect, that his regiment caught something 
 else in the charge on June 3, and to the best of his knowl- 
 edge the Seventh Artillery had some of the same brim- 
 stone. The official records show that the Second lost 215 
 officers and men killed, wounded and missing in that ter- 
 rible assault on the impregnable works at Cold Harbor, 
 mainly in the charge on the morning of June 3, 1864. 
 My message had the desired effect; it showed that my 
 schoolmate had lived through the storm and was still on 
 duty. Twelve days later our brigades were halted near 
 each other, preparatory to forming for the battle which 
 
 64 
 
MAJOR GEO. S. DAWSON. 
 
MAJOR GEORGE S. DAW SON. 65 
 
 took place next day, and he sought me out. In the few 
 minutes' chat he ran over several incidents of school days, 
 and referred to good old Professor Anthony and our 
 trouting. That day's fishing was firmly fixed in his mind. 
 I never fished with him again, and do not know that he 
 ever went fishing after that time. In later years, while 
 fishing with his father, we often talked of the Major, and 
 he was a favorite subject with the elder George, but no 
 reference to his fishing, except on that one occasion, was 
 ever made. 
 
 A bugle call broke our conference, and with a hurried 
 grip of the hand Captain Dawson said: "I think we will 
 intrench here and besiege Petersburg, and then we can 
 visit often. Good-by." 
 
 There was a siege of Petersburg after the assault on 
 the enemy's works on June 16, but Captain Dawson took 
 no part in it. A rifle-shot just above the left knee, which 
 he thought only a flesh wound and which the surgeon 
 termed "a thirty-days' scratch" meaning a furlough for 
 that length of time took him off the field; and twenty- 
 four hours later, while on his way to the Second Corps 
 hospital at City Point, he was strong enough to hold in 
 his lap the head of a poor fellow whose leg had been am- 
 putated. Whether the wound was more serious than was 
 at first supposed, or because of the jolting in the ambu- 
 lance, his leg was amputated shortly after reaching the 
 hospital, and he was sent by steamer to Washington, 
 where he remained four months before he was allowed to 
 be taken home. Shortly after reaching Washington his 
 commission as major was received. "That's good," 
 said he; "when my leg gets a little better I'll be mustered 
 in as major, and then I can join my regiment as a mounted 
 officer; for a fellow with one leg is of no use in the line, 
 and I want to see this war fought to the end." Poor fel- 
 
66 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 low ! he died on December 6, nearly four months after re- 
 ceiving his wound, aged twenty-six and a half years. 
 
 The post-mortem showed that the bone was injured 
 above the amputation, and in army parlance he is still 
 "awaiting muster." As a schoolboy he was very bright 
 and studious, and although several years my junior he 
 helped me out in my studies and "exams." many times. 
 After leaving school he entered the service of Weed, Par- 
 sons & Co., publishers, and was a member of the Tenth 
 Regiment, New York Militia, before the war. Early in 
 the war he offered his services as a private, but was re- 
 jected because of a defect in one eye from an accident in 
 childhood ; but he was bound to go in some capacity, and 
 after the Second Artillery left Albany there was a vacant 
 first lieutenantcy, and he got the appointment and joined 
 the command at Staten Island, before it left the State, and 
 was afterward made captain. No less a poet than Alfred 
 B. Street wrote quite a long poem on "George Seward 
 Dawson, Major Second New York Artillery, died from 
 wounds received before Petersburg, June 16, 1864." Af- 
 ter his death the Governor of the State forwarded to the 
 bereaved father a brevet commission for his son (in mem- 
 oriam) of lieutenant-colonel, "for gallant and meritorious 
 conduct before Petersburg, Va." His regimental com- 
 rades bore witness to his soldierly qualities in a set of reso- 
 lutions sent to his father, and Post No. 63, Department of 
 New York, Grand Army of the Republic, of Albany, is 
 named "George S. Dawson," after the young soldier 
 whose life of promised usefulness was, like so many others, 
 brought to a sudden end, but cannot be considered 
 wasted. 
 
GEORGE W. SIMPKINS. 
 
 MY FIRST DEER. 
 
 IF I was ever a good boy my mother never told me of it. 
 Hundreds of times, when I would come home from a 
 nutting expedition with trousers torn by shag-bark 
 hickory, she has said, while viewing the breaches in the 
 breeches, "I declare, Fred, I think you are the worst boy 
 in the world." As this was often repeated when my 
 shoes were ruined by being in mud and water all day, I 
 accepted it as a correct estimate of my rating. But, I ask 
 you, how is a boy to get the first whack at the shellbarks 
 before they drop unless he climbs the trees? How can he 
 wade a stream without wetting his shoes, unless he takes 
 them off? The fact was apparent to me that my mother 
 knew little about a boy's needs, and therefore was not 
 competent to criticise a boy's actions. You've got to shin 
 up a tree to get the nuts if the frost has not opened the 
 shucks and the tree is too tall to use sticks and stones on 
 with good effect. That's a plain statement of fact, and it 
 can't be disputed; but somehow mothers fail to see these 
 things in the proper light. 
 
 "When vacation time comes," said my mother, "if you 
 are a good boy and go to school regularly, don't ruin your 
 shoes in the swamps nor tear your clothes in the nut trees, 
 you may go and visit with Mr. Simpkins, where you will 
 have all the fishing and shooting that you want. He 
 writes that he would like you to spend your vacation with 
 him, and perhaps you may see a deer, for they are plenti- 
 ful near his place. It all depends, however, on th? way 
 you behave between now and then." 
 
 "Who is Mr. Simpkins, mother, and where does he 
 live?" 
 
 67 
 
68 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 "He is a farmer who lives up in Warren county, on the 
 border of the great woods. His farm is on the Schroon 
 River, where there are plenty of fish, and the woods are 
 full of game of all kinds. He married a distant relative 
 of mine whom you never met, but who spent some months 
 with us before you can remember." 
 
 Here was a prospect of fun! Fishing and shooting, 
 with the chance of seeing a real live deer! There was a 
 stuffed buck in the State Geological Hall in Albany, but 
 it appeared to be ridiculously small to my notion, for I 
 had read that "A monstrous buck came crashing through 
 the underbrush," while the little animal, a trifle moth- 
 eaten, that stood, stuffed and looking unhappy, was not 
 as big as our brindle cow. 
 
 This was in the spring of 1849 recalled by one of 
 mother's letters now before me and I would be sixteen 
 years old when August came. From a public library 
 Cooper's "Deerslayer" was borrowed, and John Atwood 
 and I studied it carefully. It was excitingly interesting, 
 and we held our breath when the cap was lifted from the 
 old pirate, Hutter, in his ark, and he was found to be 
 scalped when they thought he was only drunk, and the 
 whole story of Indian fighting, capture and escape from 
 torture so took possession of us that the book was finished 
 before it occurred to John to say: "It's a mighty good 
 story, but I'll be durned if it tells much about killin' deer. 
 I thought it was a-goin' to tell a feller how to find 'em, an" 
 how to shoot 'em, an' it's all about killin' Injens. I don't 
 want to kill any Injens they never hurt me none but I 
 would like to get a crack at a deer. You got to have a 
 good rifle an' take 'em jes back of the fore shoulder, right 
 in the heart, or they'll run off an' die. You couldn't kill 
 a deer! You'd git scared if you saw one. I don't believe 
 Ole Port Tyler could kill a deer, 'less the deer stood still, 
 
GEORGE W. SIMPKINS. 69 
 
 for they jump a hundred feet at a lick, an' lightnin' 'd have 
 a hard time to ketch 'em/' 
 
 The days were filled with talk of the coming expedi- 
 tion into a land where the deer had not only lived, but had 
 been seen feeding among the cows; and the nights were 
 filled with visions of deer whose horns were as high and 
 branching as an oak, and the squirrels were leaping from 
 tine to tine, disturbing the partridges which were nesting 
 in the antlers. Even dreams have ends to them, whether 
 of sport, fame or wealth. The long-looked-for day came, 
 and the start was made. At this day all is blank until 
 Glens Falls was reached, and whether we started from 
 Albany by rail, canal or stage is uncertain. The ecstatic 
 pleasure of at last really going to this promised land of 
 fish and game obliterated all such purely mechanical ideas 
 as the ways to get there. But Glens Falls was a place to 
 be looked out for with open eyes. Here was the cave in 
 which Hawk-Eye and Uncas stood off the Mingoes! 
 Here was the precipice from which Uncas killed the 
 Mingo who fell from an overhanging tree, and Uncas was 
 chided by the scout for hitting him some "two inches be- 
 low" the painted belt line, as memory recalls the story. 
 
 Mother went up with me. She was entirely ignorant 
 of the history of that terrible night in the cavern when 
 the screams of the tortured horses directed the rescuers 
 to the cave, and actually seemed indifferent about visiting 
 places which to me were not only historic, but sacred. 
 
 Here I must pause and look back. At that time the 
 difference between history and fiction was not a strictly 
 defined line. My ideas of such things were crude. To- 
 day, forty-seven years later, when one should be able to 
 discriminate between fact and fancy in what passes for 
 history, that line seems as misty as ever. Prescott's "Con- 
 quest of Mexico" is grand, but we do not find the evidence 
 
70 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 of an advanced civilization before the conquest of that 
 country. The great temples have not a stone left. There 
 is not a trace of an aboriginal, intelligent people, while at 
 Glens Falls the cave of Uncas is there, in part. The great 
 cliff, where the Mingo was shot by Uncas, is being torn 
 down, and a few years ago I was there with a Fish Com- 
 missioner who had no poetry in his soul, and who actually 
 suggested cutting away a portion of the celebrated cave of 
 Uncas to make a fishway ! 
 
 I have strayed from my text, but let us hope that the 
 people of Glens Falls or of the State of New York will 
 preserve this cave, as all other historic places are pre- 
 served ; for if the cave is not a part of real history, it should 
 be made so by law. 
 
 It was evening when Mr. Simpkins met us at the hotel 
 in Warrensburgh with his team. He was a stalwart 
 farmer, whose appearance, from team to person, denoted 
 thrift, and his cordial reception soon made us friends. A 
 drive of three or four miles northward brought us to his 
 farm, a welcome from Mrs. Simpkins and supper. The 
 house was at the foot of a mountain, up which ran a road, 
 and most of the farm was in a deep bend of the Schroon 
 River, where the soil was very rich and from which a crop 
 of grain had been taken. It was too late in the day to fish 
 or shoot, but my fishing tackle was laid out and inspected 
 and we talked of field sports until bedtime, when a tired 
 boy turned and caught enormous fish which unhooked 
 themselves and either walked back into the water on the.tr 
 tails or vanished into air. A squirrel which I had killed 
 turned into a live bear and was charging me when Mrs. 
 Simpkins called me to breakfast, and the real world came 
 suddenly back. If the shade of Shakespeare could have 
 
GEORGE W. SIMPKINS. 71 
 
 spent the night with me he would have amended his say- 
 ing: "Dreams are the children of an idle brain." Mine 
 was busy. 
 
 Bait had been provided and the river was reached. Mr. 
 Simpkins had often fished before, but it was evident that 
 my schooling under Reuben Wood and John Atwood 
 rendered me competent to show him how to rig his lines, 
 select his poles, and how to properly impale a worm. He 
 chose a low point of land where there was a high bank and 
 a deep hole on the opposite side, in the bend, and we 
 fished. At that early day there were no black bass in 
 either Schroon Lake or the river, and we took a fine lot 
 of perch and a few other fishes. He was an observant 
 man and showed me where kingfishers had nested in a 
 hole in the bank, under a stump, and we dug out the nest 
 and a lot of fish bones, and the nesting habits of this bird 
 were learned. 
 
 Gray squirrels were plenty; they could be seen and 
 heard in all directions from the house, and as this kind of 
 game was rare about Greenbush, where the little chicka- 
 ree, or red squirrel, was abundant, there was every morn- 
 ing either fishing or squirrel shooting, and in the evening 
 a shot or two at the great northern hare, a new animal to 
 me, which they said was white in winter. Mother went 
 home after a week, saying that she had eaten fish and 
 game enough to last for some time, and I went up the 
 mountain the day before she left and brought her five 
 ruffed grouse (we called them "pa'tridges") to take home 
 to the family. I made the usual promise which a mother 
 always expects, to be a good boy ; no hard matter, with no 
 schoolmaster near and all the time to do as I pleased. 
 
 One day we were fishing in the river, taking an occa- 
 sional fish and watching the little rafts of boards float by, 
 when one with a man on it came in sight. He was steer- 
 
72 MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 ing it with a pole and starting any others that had lodged 
 along the banks; when he saw us he pushed up ashore, 
 and, after the usual greeting, said: "Simpkins, we are 
 going to have a deer hunt day after to-morrow; will you 
 go?" 
 
 "Yes; where are you going to make the drive?" 
 
 "Over on the West River, where we went last year. 
 Our boys haven't had a bite of venison this summer, and 
 they think it about time for it; we'll look for you, sure," 
 and he poled his raft into the stream and was soon lost to 
 sight. 
 
 The "West River" was a local term for the Hudson, 
 the Schroon being the "East River." I had heard that 
 Simpkins was a mighty hunter, especially good at still- 
 hunting. He said that the season was too early for the 
 latter sport, because the trees and underbrush were in full 
 leaf. He brought out his favorite gun, oiled the locks 
 and cleaned the barrels. It was a double gun, one barrel 
 a rifle and the other a smooth-bore, quite heavy and hand- 
 somely finished. I had been using a single-barreled shot- 
 gun on the grouse and squirrels, and had not seen this 
 one. Old Gunner, his hound, had an eye on the gun, and 
 it might have been hard to say whose excitement was 
 greatest, his or mine. There was this difference between 
 us: Gunner was asking and expecting to go, and I would 
 not ask and did not expect to be invited to join in a hunt 
 with men who might not like the intrusion ; but you have 
 no idea how much I would have liked an invitation ! 
 
 "Ever shoot a rifle?" Simpkins asked. 
 
 "No; but I've seen a man shoot at a mark lots of times, 
 and have often sighted it on his targets, and I know how 
 to load one." All this to show that I thought I could be 
 trusted with a rifle if he'd only ask me to go. Oh, if he 
 only would! "I know you put the bullet on your flat 
 
GEORGE W. S1MPKINS. 73 
 
 hand and pour on powder enough to cover it, and that's 
 the proper load. Then you put the powder in the rifle 
 and lay a greased patch over the muzzle, put the bullet on 
 the patch and force it down, way down, until it is home 
 and the ramrod bounds on it. The rod won't bounce if 
 the bullet isn't home." This was to give him further 
 proof that I knew enough about a rifle to use one. Would 
 he ever take the hint? 
 
 "I've killed eleven deer with this gun," said he, "and 
 I haven't had it two years. Killed all but one with the 
 rifle barrel. That one was close by, not over thirty yards 
 off, and I missed it clean with the rifle; the bullet may 
 have touched a twig and gone off somewhere else, for the 
 deer stood broadside to and didn't see me. He jumped 
 at the shot, but I fetched him with buckshot in the other 
 barrel. Ever see a deer?" 
 
 "Not a live one; only stuffed ones, in the museum; but 
 I would like to see a real live deer in the woods, jumping 
 as they do in pictures." There! that was a distinct bid 
 for an invitation. If it didn't come after that he was a 
 stupid, or did not want me. He put the gun aside, rilled 
 his powder horn, spent much time with other things, and 
 then slowly said: 
 
 "How would you like to go along?" 
 "Oh, Mr. Simpkins! you don't mean it! I would be in 
 the way, I fear." 
 
 "No, you can go if you like; I'll go up the hill to Kel- 
 lam's and borrow a rifle for you; he has three, and you can 
 practise with it this afternoon, and we'll get an early start 
 in the morning." 
 
 My rifle shooting that afternoon did not break all rec- 
 ords, unless for bad off-hand shooting; but who could do 
 good shooting when all a-tremble from head to foot? The 
 fact that many monstrous bucks were killed in bed that 
 
74 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 night proves that I had some sleep. Otherwise I doubt 
 if an eye was closed. 
 
 Two boys joined the party before we had gone far. 
 They were Henry Tripp and my later army comrade, 
 Colonel M. N. Dickinson, both living in Warrensburgh 
 to-day. Ben Kellam and another man made up the party 
 of six, and there were about as many hounds. 
 
 A man took all the dogs and put them out singly as he 
 found a deer track, while the rest went on to take stands 
 on the runways. I was placed in a road looking over a 
 field to a piece of woods some two hundred yards off, and 
 told to watch a point where a deer might come out, but 
 not to shoot until it had jumped the rail fence, when it 
 might stop to look up and down the road if not frightened, 
 and so a good shot could be had. It seemed many hours 
 it may have been half of one when a hound that had 
 been baying for some time in the distance was evidently 
 getting nearer ; still he was afar off. A farm wagon came 
 rattling up the road with three men in it. When opposite 
 me, as I turned to look at them, one arose and yelled : "See 
 that deer !" I looked back and saw something like a small 
 calf turn and re-enter the woods. So that little thing was 
 a deer! Where was the hound? In the pictures the 
 hounds were pressing the deer hard, some of them tearing 
 at his flanks. More time passed ; such long hours I never 
 did see; the sun was not yet at meridian, and the hound 
 kept slowly approaching oh, so slow! and finally old 
 Gunner came out of that bit of wood, giving tongue at in- 
 tervals, and after slowly getting to the place where I first 
 saw the deer he turned and followed its track, making a V 
 out into the field. I had at last seen a real live deer! 
 That was a thing to tell John Atwood and Port Tyler, and 
 to brag about. 
 
 Young Tripp, who had been stationed next to me, 
 
GEORGE W. SIMPKINS. 75 
 
 came running down to learn if the deer had crossed. The 
 driver soon appeared and said that it was an old runway 
 that was seldom used, and none of the party wanted it. 
 "Yet," said he, "the first deer of the season took it, and 
 you'd have got a shot only for that wagon." 
 
 Perhaps it was well that it turned out so, for, as he 
 spoke, a rifle shot was heard off to the left, where the deer 
 went, and we learned afterward that Dickinson stopped 
 my deer a mile above, and it was a fair-sized doe, in good 
 condition. 
 
 So far there was a lack of excitement in hounding 
 deer. The long, solitary waits, not long in reality, but 
 intolerably so to a boy whose gun was ready, and, as he 
 fixed himself on the runway, mentally said: "Now bring 
 on your deer!" 
 
 The patience of the fisherman somehow was mislaid. 
 The case was different. Of course you must wait in the 
 quiet of a mill-pond for a fish to come to sample your bait, 
 but here was a noisy, bell-mouthed hound proclaiming 
 his every move, bringing to you a new game of great size, 
 which tested your marksmanship to its utmost. He would 
 not swallow your hook and be pulled in by main strength, 
 oh, no! Here I give up the comparison. We all know 
 just how it is. I've tried to tell how I think it is, but give 
 it up. Can't do it. 
 
 Ben Kellam took me over to the river, and put me on 
 a runway there, and left. He said that the other hounds 
 were off, some out of hearing, but they might bring a deer 
 this way. I was on a high bank on an outside bend of 
 the river, and could see down to the next bend, about one 
 hundred yards, and there was a shallow riffle that a deer 
 could walk from opposite my station to the point below, 
 on my side. I ate my lunch. Squirrels jumped about 
 and a partridge alighted on a nearby limb. Temptation 
 
76 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 is one of the hardest things to resist, and I have not always 
 been equal to the task; but this day I simply took good 
 aim at them and thought. It had been impressed upon 
 me that I must not shoot except at a deer that a shot 
 from me would testify that a deer had come my way and 
 would confuse others. Hounds were tonguing in sev- 
 eral directions. I had about lost interest in this stupid 
 work when, "flecked with leafy light and shadow," a buck 
 walked down the opposite slope into the river! It must 
 be a dream! There were no hounds after him that could 
 be seen, and it seemed as if I was choking. He drank, 
 looked around and drank again. I must shoot him ! That 
 fact came slowly to me, but I was all a-tremble. He 
 walked diagonally across the river. I aimed and fired. 
 He floundered in the water. Surely he was hit, but might 
 escape! Never thinking to load and shoot again, I left 
 the rifle, and with bare hands started for the buck to take 
 him by the horns and drown him. I slipped on the slimy 
 stones and fell twice, but the buck was slipping and falling 
 also. I was within twenty feet of him when a rifle shot 
 dropped him. It was Simpkins, who had hurried forward 
 at the sound of my shot, and just in time to save the day. 
 Unless a scratch on top of his neck was made by my bul- 
 let, I missed him. The slippery stones threw the buck 
 when he tried to run, and to my statement that I intended 
 to take him by the horns and drown him Simpkins said: 
 "You durned fool, he'd 'a' ripped all the clothes offen you 
 with his forefeet, and might 'a' taken your bowels out at 
 the same time. Don't you ever go to foolin' with a deer 
 that has g*ot fight left in him, or you won't have any left 
 in you." The shots brought Dickinson and Tripp, and 
 the buck was soon skinned and cut up for transportation. 
 Although the horns were in the velvet and said to be of 
 no use, I insisted on saving them as a trophy of my "first 
 
GEORGE W. SIMPKINS. 
 
 77 
 
 deer," for, like Falstaff over the dead body of Hotspur, I 
 intended to "swear I killed him myself." So the trophy 
 was preserved and taken to Albany, and for many years I 
 did more lying about killing that buck than a dealer in 
 garden seeds does in his spring catalogue. 
 
 Simpkins said: "A little lie like that never hurts any- 
 body. Most all young hunters lie a little about their 
 game." At first it hurt me to lie about it especially to 
 Old Port Tyler, who wanted all the details but the story 
 soon assumed the veracity of history. In later life I killed 
 many deer, but they somehow never assumed the impor- 
 tance of the only one I ever lied about. I wrote John At- 
 wood about it, quoting from "As You Like It:" "Which 
 is he that killed the deer?" and winding up by telling him 
 that he didn't know a thing about the jump of the deer, 
 for they couldn't make over fifteen feet at a jump. 
 
 A quarter of the doe which Dickinson killed was given 
 me to carry. I was put on the road home, while the rest 
 went another way. Stopping at Kellam's about sun- 
 down, his wife gave me supper; and, leaving the rifle, I 
 took a shotgun and shouldered the venison for home, 
 down the mountain. An unearthly scream came from a 
 distance, and my pace quickened. Again the horrible 
 scream was given closer by, and with an open pocket knife 
 and a cocked gun I jumped down the hill, leaving tracks 
 that surprised men who saw them next day. Getting 
 over a rail fence near the house the knife pricked my wrist, 
 and it seemed as if the animal had me. I was faint with 
 fright, and it was some time before Mrs. Simpkins could 
 learn the cause. Her husband came about midnight and 
 heard her story as he was about to get in bed. He 
 dressed, called Gunner, took his rifle and started up the 
 hill. Kellam and he put the dog out, but old Gunner 
 soon came back, cried, got between his master's legs and 
 
78 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 could not be made to stir. A puppy went on and put up 
 something, but they could not follow it. 
 
 A panther had been about the locality, and shortly 
 after I left Mr. Simpkins killed a large one. A Mr. Bead- 
 enell said it was a blue jay that screamed and scared me, 
 but when I told this to my friend he said: "Bluejays don't 
 scream after dark," and that settled the jay question. 
 
 At this time Simpkins was perhaps thirty-five years 
 old. He had not lived near Warrensburgh long, and 
 moved West a few years later, and I lost track of him. 
 Memory recalls him as an intelligent farmer, a good 
 hunter, an indifferent fisherman, and a good friend who 
 helped me lie about that deer, for which let us hope that 
 both he and I have been forgiven, and that the recording 
 angel, as in the case of "Uncle Toby," after recording the 
 sin dropped a tear upon the page and blotted it out for- 
 ever. 
 
COLONEL CHARLES H. RAYMOND. 
 
 TURTLES, SETTERS AND DUCKS. 
 
 THE only fishing companion of earliest boyhood 
 with whom I have kept in touch throughout life, 
 and who is living to-day, is the subject of this 
 sketch. He was born in Albany, N. Y., in January, 1834, 
 and is near my own age. He frequently visited me across 
 the river, and we hunted turtles in the creeks from the red 
 mill to Quackendary Hollow pond turtles, snapping tur- 
 tles and box turtles and the point was to collect as many 
 as possible and try to train them to race. We fished a 
 little once in a while, but to Raymond it was too slow and 
 lacked the excitement of grabbing turtles; and this was 
 characteristic of his life throughout. As a fisherman pure 
 and simple he would never have achieved fame. He 
 lacked that quality of patience which is not strained, but 
 droppeth like the gentle worm overboard when it is the 
 last in the bait box. I cared little to fish with him because 
 of this lack of patience. He was of the class who say, 
 "Yes, I like to fish if they bite fast." But he was a born 
 hunter, wing, rifle shot and "bird-dog" man, and took to 
 setters as ducks go to a mill-pond. 
 
 We would watch old John Chase lift his fyke nets in 
 the creek, and he would give us the turtles that he caught. 
 We would stroll down the Greenbush bank, past old Fort 
 Crailo, where I went to school, and watch the sturgeon 
 jump in the river. Then a big one would jump every few 
 minutes ; now there are few, if any, in the Hudson. We 
 went back of the nut orchard and drank the strong sul- 
 phur water from Harrowgate Spring, which we often talk 
 of to-day. It is singular that we never went shooting to- 
 
 79 
 
80 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 gether, perhaps because his ideas of sportsmanship were 
 higher than mine, and he could go to more distant and 
 better places than I; but, whatever the reason, we often 
 talked of shooting, but never shot in company; yet I kept 
 track of him and of his shooting trips in various parts of 
 the country. 
 
 While still a small boy too small to carry the smallest 
 arms he followed afield such sportsmen as the late Dr. 
 Judson and his pupil, Alexander Bullock, of West Sand- 
 lake, Rensselaer county, N. Y., in admiration of their 
 skillful handling of the Doctor's slashing English setters, 
 of which I heard much at that time. The masterful way 
 in which those adepts in the art of wing shooting grassed 
 the plump brown woodcock, which they flushed in front 
 of their dogs in the rich coverts that lined the banks of 
 the Wynantskill, taught him lessons in that "deliberate 
 promptitude," so dear to Frank Forrester, that have never 
 been forgotten. As he grew older he was permitted to 
 accompany these sportsmen and shoot with them, and I 
 heard a great deal of these trips after I became his school- 
 mate at Professor Anthony's, with the late Major George 
 S. Dawson, the subject of a sketch in this series. 
 
 The first field dog that young Raymond owned was a 
 setter bred by Doctor Judson, called Prince, a very good 
 dog for a boy, because he knew the ways of birds, and, as 
 I remember, had a way as well as a will of his own. His 
 next and a rare good one it grew to be was a pointer 
 from my Nell, who was described in the article on Port 
 Tyler as a pointer whose father was a setter. She was 
 stolen from me and recovered by my father after I left 
 Albany, and he bred her to a liver-colored pointer owned 
 by Mr. Sawyer, of Albany, and gave the choice of the 
 litter to his nephew, young Raymond, who named him 
 Don and trained him to a perfection that was rare in those 
 
COLONEL CHAS. H. RAYMOND. 
 
COLONEL CHARLES H. RAYMOND. 81 
 
 days, took him to Michigan and shot over him, to the sur- 
 prise of the shooters there, who had never seen a field dog 
 work on feathered game and had no experience of wing 
 shooting. These things to hear I, like Desdemona, would 
 seriously incline in after years, and the fame of my Nell 
 and her progeny seemed partly mine. Young Raymond 
 gave Don to his friend, Harry Palmer, in 1856, and shot 
 over him again two years later. After Mr. Palmer's death 
 Don was sold at auction for $50, a very high price for a 
 bird dog in Michigan at that time. I had given Nell such 
 training as she had. My boyish knowledge of dog train- 
 ing must have been crude, although I did not suspect it 
 at the time, for I had read Youatt, Frank Forrester and 
 other authors, and had seen some bird dogs work, and 
 thought, boylike, that I knew it all; but Nell was not 
 broken to suit the fastidious taste of Master Raymond. 
 He next bred her to the famous Pumpelly pointer, and 
 then to a club-tailed pointer owned by a man named Ma- 
 guire, and one of the litter was a beautifully coated liver- 
 colored setter, the first one in four litters that showed the 
 blood of her sire, James Bleecker's well-known setter. 
 This puppy, Fifine, Mr. Raymond gave to Monsieur 
 Pierre Delpit, his fencing master, in 1859. 
 
 It was in Jackson county, Michigan, where Mr. Ray- 
 mond and Don surprised the natives, and the woodcock 
 and game of all kinds abounded there. Mr. R. learned 
 to track the deer amid the oak openings, through the 
 mossy swamps around Vineyard Lake and alongthe wind- 
 ings of Raisin River. Here the early lessons of old "Un- 
 cle Henry" Harris, the famous hunter of Lake George, 
 who taught the boy to "shute rifil," found their academy 
 of graduation, and thereafter, so long as eyes held their 
 own, Charles could look with confidence along the sights 
 of a rifle at moving game. We had drifted far apart until 
 
82 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 my return in 1860 from a six years' tramp, and we no 
 more lured the sunfish from the creeks, nor held disputes 
 over the species, age or other things appertaining to tur- 
 tles and tortoises. We left the frogs to be stoned by 
 younger boys, and contented ourselves with reminis- 
 cences of our mighty deeds, the only difference of opin- 
 ion, then and to-day, being the question which of us it 
 was that attempted to jump a stream and changed his 
 mind when half way across and stuck in the mud. I still 
 believe it was Charles. 
 
 In the meantime he had undertaken long journeyings 
 abroad, and save a chamois hunt in Switzerland, with its 
 climbing, sliding, crevasse leaping and glacier scram- 
 bling, there was no shooting for two years. After wan- 
 dering through Germany and Italy, living on foot for 
 months along the valleys and on the mountains of Switz- 
 erland, he went back to France and made his home in the 
 Latin Quarter of Paris, along about in Trilby's time ; and 
 if he failed to meet Little Billee, I know by what he has 
 told me that he must have been on friendly terms with 
 Zoo Zou and the Laird, for he knew all the pretty songs 
 mentioned or hinted at in Mr. Du Maurier's truthful re- 
 cital of life "in the Quarter," and from conversation with 
 him within the year I gained the impression that he even 
 knows the fourth and expurgated verse of "Au Clair de la 
 Lune" Be that as it may, he returned to his native land 
 with the ripened experience of a man of the world, and a 
 mind well stored not only with the literature of various 
 countries, but enriched by that contact with the people of 
 those lands which only travel afoot can give. 
 
 After his return the Insurance Department of the 
 State of New York was being organized by the Hon. 
 William Barnes, superintendent. Mr. Raymond was ap- 
 pointed to a clerkship in that office, from which he rose to 
 
COLONEL CHARLES H. RAYMOND. 83 
 
 succeed the Hon. James W. Husted as deputy superin- 
 tendent of the department. While thus engaged he be- 
 came a member of the Albany Zouave Cadets, a fine body 
 of citizen soldiers, which was afterward merged into the 
 Tenth Regiment New York State National Guard, as 
 Company A. Then came the war, when men left the 
 farm, the store and the workshop to hasten to preserve the 
 Union. The Tenth Regiment volunteered, was recruited 
 to the full standard and mustered into the U. S. service as 
 the 1 77th N. Y. Volunteers, and on its rolls was "Charles 
 H. Raymond, first lieutenant, Company A." The regi- 
 ment was assigned to the Department of the Gulf, under 
 General N. P. Banks. Just before the siege of Port Hud- 
 son he was appointed aide-de-camp on the staff of General 
 F. S. Nickerson, and later was made Assistant Adjutant- 
 General on the brigade staff. 
 
 All through that weary siege, lying in the trenches in 
 a swampy country which filled the hospitals with mias- 
 matic patients, Colonel Raymond was at his post of duty, 
 even when, as his comrade, Colonel David A. Teller, told 
 me, he had been positively ordered to the hospital ; and in 
 the first assault on the works, May 27, 1863, was again at 
 his post, although hardly able to stand. Looking over 
 one of his war-time letters this sentence is found: "This 
 campaigning with field men and field guns, but without 
 field dogs, Inter arma silent canes, which, being inter- 
 preted, means that when men go afield to shoot each other 
 pointers are. no longer to the point, and setters get a set- 
 back. These are not the dogs of war." 
 
 While in the field Colonel Raymond could not entirely 
 sink the sportsman in the soldier, for in writing to me of 
 the second assault on Port Hudson he said: "You cannot 
 think how sad and strange sounded the whistling of the 
 quail in the fields over which our brigade charged on that 
 
84 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 fateful June 14, and how that weird whistle seemed to ex- 
 ult over men who, with empty guns, were rushing forward 
 to glory and the grave." A little more than a year ago he 
 again visited that battlefield; again heard the whistling of 
 the merry Bob Whites, descendants of those birds of 1863, 
 and received from the proprietor of the plantation the 
 son of the owner at the time of the battle a cordial invi- 
 tation to come down when the season opened and shoot 
 in peace over the field where his men had shot in war some 
 thirty years before. Verily the whirligig of time brings 
 wondrous changes, as well as revenges ! 
 
 With the return of peace the Colonel went back to his 
 former position in the Insurance Department of the State, 
 and to the dogs. He bred a good and serviceable line of 
 setters from the native strains of Mr. Truax, of Albany, 
 N. Y., and of General William J. Sewell, of Cape May, 
 Colonel E. M. Quimby, of Morristown, and Mr. Theo- 
 dore Morford, of Newton, all in the sporting State of New 
 Jersey. With these dogs he established the kennels of 
 Fox Farm, near Morristown, N. J. 
 
 In the early '705 Mr. Raymond entered into partner- 
 ship with Mr. John A. Little, the general agent of the 
 Mutual Life Insurance Company for New York City. 
 Later on, when Mr. Little retired from business, Mr. R. 
 assumed sole charge of the Mutual Life's metropolitan 
 agency, which includes Long Island and Staten Island, a 
 position which he retains to-day. In 1890 he was elected 
 to the presidency of the National Association of Life Un- 
 derwriters, and few men are w r ider known or have more 
 warm personal friends than the genial and cultured gen- 
 tleman who is the subject of this sketch, of whom a writer 
 once said: "The fine and distinctive personality of Mr. 
 Raymond is what makes him what he is. We might 
 sweep away all business details, and all that men know 
 
COLONEL CHARLES H. RAYMOND. So 
 
 and value in him would remain ineradicably stamped 
 upon the memory and embalmed in the affections of those 
 who call him friend. A joyous temperament, luminous 
 intellect, almost inerrant sagacity, forceful initiative, wo- 
 manly tenderness, brilliancy, wit, courage and generosity 
 were blended in the alembic from which his nature was 
 evolved. Learned in the literature of books and in the 
 lore of field sports and the natural kingdom; a poet, a 
 sportsman, a soldier and a mathematician ; suggestive, in- 
 centive, steadfast and true, such is the man as he is known 
 to the editor of this journal and to those who know him 
 better." As the editor of the Insurance Times has de- 
 scribed Colonel Raymond so much better than I could, 
 and in fewer words, I am content to quote him and not to 
 attempt to improve on his concise and truthful descrip- 
 tion. 
 
 In 1874 Mr. Edward Laverack, of Shropshire, Eng- 
 land, offered for sale two of his most famous setters, Pride 
 of the Border and Fairy. These were sought for by sev- 
 eral sportsmen both here and abroad, and after some cor- 
 respondence their breeder decided to sell them to Colonel 
 Raymond, who at once arranged for their importation 
 and transportation to Fox Farm. This was the first pair 
 of that renowned and highly-bred strain of setters sent 
 from Mr. Laverack's kennels to America, and their pres- 
 ence in this country excited much attention among sports- 
 men and in the sportsmen's press, both here and abroad, 
 in England and on the Continent. Fairy was a great 
 beauty and a natural fielder, staunch on the point and at 
 backing, with great pace, fine nose and grand staying 
 qualities. Pride of the Border at first seemed puzzled at 
 both the scent and the habits of our quail and ruffed 
 grouse, but after a short experience on both he showed 
 extraordinary intelligence and brain power in working 
 
86 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 on his birds, and was a most admirable and satisfactory 
 field dog, working on game as closely and knowingly as 
 a man could do if he had a dog's form and faculties. 
 Neither of these Laverack setters retrieved game, but they 
 made a rattling brace on a snipe meadow, backing on 
 sight at any distance, absolutely staunch on point and 
 dropping in good old-fashioned style to wing or shot. 
 They still live in loving memory of many human hearts, 
 and their strain, crossed with the Morford stock, is still 
 carefully bred; its inherited physical and mental qualities 
 and capabilities, the resultants of generations of selection, 
 training and association, making these canines as thor- 
 ough workers in the field as they are affectionate and in- 
 telligent friends and companions at home. They are so 
 human that it is often said of them, "They think them- 
 selves folks," and the best in the house, be it window-seat, 
 lounge or hearth-rug, is never too good, in their own way 
 of taking it, for these two comprehensive and compre- 
 hending members of the family. Nevertheless, unlike 
 Squire Kayse's famous pointer Lee, of Sussex county, N. 
 J., these setters can't catch fish with hook and line, and if 
 they have occupied much space in this narrative it is be- 
 cause they deserve it. No sketch of Colonel Raymond 
 would be complete without an extended notice of this im- 
 portation of some of the best blooded setters of England, 
 and of their having been bred to some of the native stock, 
 for which American lovers of high-class setters will ever 
 be under obligations to Colonel Charles H. Raymond. 
 
 During the period that the Fox Farm Kennels were in 
 existence it was my fortune to be a guest of the proprietor 
 and to talk bird dog as well as turtles with him, while pick- 
 ing the wing of a partridge at his table. I have long since 
 forgiven him for saying that Nell was imperfectly broken 
 and would not "back a point." Of course she would not 
 
COLONEL CHARLES H. RAYMOND. 87 
 
 back, because she never hunted with another dog until he 
 had her. How could she? That is not just what trou- 
 bled me. There was an insinuation that at eighteen years 
 old I could not train a bird dog to perfection. That thing 
 tasted sour forty years ago, but to-day it looks as if my 
 cousin Charles may have been right. 
 
 It is many years since I have cared to shoot anything 
 except ducks, which come to hand dead. I have grown 
 tender-hearted, and say, with lago, "Though in the trade 
 of war I have slain men," yet I have cried over a doe 
 whose fore-shoulders I had broken, and refused to shoot 
 more when my retriever brought a live quail to be killed 
 by hand. Therefore fishing came to be the more enjoya- 
 ble sport, because there was no regret when the lower 
 form of life was taken, no keen suffering, because of a 
 lower nervous system; but there is always a latent interest 
 in any kind of sport in which a man has once engaged. 
 To prove this it is only necessary to point to the fact that 
 Colonel Raymond still has a faint liking for fishing. Not 
 for the kind which we had in boyhood, for it is possible 
 that a pond full of painted and spotted tortoises, or a pool 
 full of frogs with an assortment of stones at hand, would 
 hardly be attractive to him to-day. He is blase on turtles, 
 frogs and sunfish, and needs more exciting game and a 
 broader field. He fishes occasionally, incidentally, as it 
 were, when nothing better offers in the way of sport.. 
 Every June he visits, as a guest, Camp Albany on the 
 Restigouche River, and there he occasionally casts for, 
 and even occasionally lands, a fine salmon; but I fancy he 
 does this in a perfunctory way, because there is nothing 
 else to be done. How I would like to stand on the bank 
 and criticise his fly-casting, and thereby get revenge for 
 his remarks on the training of Nell! 
 
 The owners of Camp Albany are Messrs. Dudley Ol- 
 
88 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 cutt and Abram Lansing, of Albany, N. Y., two skilled 
 and accomplished salmon anglers, learned in all the in- 
 tricate lore of that grand art; but it can hardly be possible 
 that Colonel Raymond, lacking, as he is, in that virtue of 
 patience which alone bears good results to the angler, can 
 profit by their precepts and example; yet he occasionally 
 sends a fine salmon to a friend, and as Colonel Olcutt and 
 Mr. Lansing both say that he actually catches them, I am 
 certain that he does ; and the fact that there are no bullet 
 holes in them proves that his Jock-Scott, silver-doctor, or 
 other combination of hair, fur, feathers and steel can be 
 cast by my friend with occasional effect. 
 
 Later, in November, and on the ducking shore, it is 
 different. Then the gallant Colonel is himself again, and 
 no doubt returns the compliment to his friends of Camp 
 Albany and sets them a pace which may worry them to 
 follow. Shooting from a blind, over decoys that truly 
 Presidential sport, the great delight of the sportsman of 
 or past middle age, when the long tramp over hill and 
 through marsh after pointer or setter seems now to re- 
 quire more exertion than it did in youth has a fascina- 
 tion for Mr. Raymond, and a better appointed shooting- 
 box than his at San Domingo, on the Gunpowder River, 
 I fancy would be hard to find; and few, indeed, are the 
 places where better sport has been found. But duck 
 shooting, like all other earthly joys, must have its day and 
 fade away. Each year the ducks are fewer and their 
 flights further between, so that ere many more years in 
 their turn shall have flown the canvasbacks and redheads 
 will have gone to join the once countless flocks of passen- 
 ger pigeons and the innumerable caravans of the bisons, 
 "and the places that knew them," throughout our broad 
 land, from Alaska to Florida, "shall know them no more 
 forever." 
 
THE BROCKWAY BOYS. 
 
 MICHIGAN IN '49 MY FIRST TURKEY. 
 
 THERE seemed to be no end to them. The woods 
 were literally full of them of Brockway boys, I 
 mean. Boys, and girls also, from babies to men 
 and women, they were everywhere I went. This ceased 
 to be surprising after my uncle, Erastus Brockway, had 
 driven mother and me from Monroe to his home at East 
 Ogden, in Lenawee county, Mich., and after crossing the 
 county line pointed out each house for miles as being 
 owned by one of "his numerous kinsmen, until it seemed 
 to my boyish fancy that all Michigan must be peopled by 
 Brockways. 
 
 The fact is that mother's two brothers, older than she, 
 had emigrated to Michigan in the early thirties, while it 
 was yet a territory; each had a large family, and at this 
 time they had grandsons older than I, for their many sons 
 had followed the parental example in the matter of replen- 
 ishing the earth. 
 
 Mother was an invalid, and the journey from Albany 
 to Buffalo was made by canal, and from the latter place to 
 Monroe by steamer. The packets which carried 'passen- 
 gers on the canal had been about killed off by the railroad, 
 and we had good quarters in a large freight boat, the cap- 
 tain giving up his cabin to us and a woman with two boys. 
 It was an ideal trip. In 1875 I had frequent occasion to 
 go from Lynchburg to Lexington, Va., up the James 
 River and Kenawha Canal, and it is my mature opinion 
 
90 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 that traveling by canal is the very poetry of traveling; it is 
 the ideal mode of getting about. This statement is often 
 met with ridicule "it is too slow." My friend, listen: 
 You who say this know little of the pleasure of travel for 
 itself. You wish to annihilate space in a business-like 
 way; you want to go from New York to Chicago, and 
 consult the time-tables for the train which will land you 
 there an hour sooner than another, and you take a 
 "sleeper" that abomination rendered necessary by mer- 
 ciless business! and you go that way even on your wed- 
 ding trip ! Go to ! The mad American train-catching spirit 
 has possessed you, and, like my friend, Col. Raymond, of 
 my last sketch, you "can fish if they bite fast." The pleas- 
 ures of that week on the Erie Canal often arise as I whirl 
 over the route in late years. Little Falls ! There we boys 
 jumped ashore and stole apples and caught the boat at the 
 locks. Weedsport! Here we got off on the "heel-path" 
 side and ran into the outlying edge of Montezuma Swamp 
 and had to swim the canal, when I was the only good 
 swimmer, and, after carrying all the clothes across and 
 safely landing the smallest boy, was forced to lick the 
 older one in the water to keep him from drowning me. 
 His story to his mother conflicted with mine; his black- 
 ened eyes and swollen nose seemed to prove his claim to 
 have been beaten without provocation, but mothers will 
 be mothers, you know, and there was a drop in the social 
 mercury. 
 
 Pardon me; the canal took me off into the swamp, 
 miles away from the Brock-way. I will try to get back 
 to the Brockway boys, as I knew my cousins and sons of 
 cousins away back in Michigan in the long ago. 
 
 Jim was a big boy nearly a man. He could not only 
 smoke a cigar, but could also empty a clay pipe without 
 any visible protest from his stomach. He was big and 
 
THE BROCKWAY BOYS. 91 
 
 strong, and could beat us all at jumping, and was one of 
 the younger sons of the oldest of the brothers, Eusebius, 
 or Uncle Sebe, as he was called a man who, at sixty-nine 
 years of age, was entered 'for a foot-race the first day I 
 saw him. Martin and Oliver were smaller boys, sons of 
 Erastus, who, by the way, was many years younger than 
 his brother, physically much weaker, but intellectually 
 stronger. Jim could throw me by sheer weight and 
 strength; Clark or the others of his age could not, for 
 wrestling and boxing had been my study as well as play. 
 This put me on a good square footing with my backwoods 
 cousins, who had little respect for my soft hands and city 
 ways. They had small facilities for schooling, but great 
 opportunities for clearing land for the plough, chopping 
 trees that had been deadened by the girdle, piling great 
 logs for burning that a few years later would have been 
 worth more than the land originally cost. Harvesting 
 the hard-earned crops had given them a rude strength 
 that made it seem incomprehensible how a city boy, who 
 couldn't pitch a fork full of hay into the mow, could lay 
 them on their backs. From a subject for ridicule this 
 city boy came to be respected, especially when they found 
 that he could turn a back somersault from the floor and 
 alight on his feet. They had seen pictures of such things, 
 but to find an ordinary boy outside a circus turn a flip- 
 flap was a thing that made him a hero. My city manners 
 and fine fishing tackle were all forgotten, and the Brock- 
 way boys from far and near were invited to come and see 
 their cousin, who in a few hours had overcome all preju- 
 dice and was voted to be a really decent fellow. 
 
 Said Jim: "Let's go a-fishin'; what yer say? We'll take 
 a team and wagon and go over to the River Raisin and 
 have a good time yes?" And we went, about six of us. 
 There was William, twenty-eight years old, a hunter of 
 
92 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 deer and turkeys, who owned a rifle that became mine 
 some years later; Jim, Martin, Oliver, Mathew and 
 others whose names are forgotten, but all brothers, cou- 
 sins or uncles to each other, and a jolly party they were. 
 Harvest was over, and threshing, corn-husking and such 
 work had not begun; just the time for a fishing trip. An 
 early start and a drive of ten miles behind a good team 
 brought us to the house of another relative for, as before 
 said, the woods were full of Brockways. The team was 
 cared for, and a walk of half an hour brought us to the 
 river. They cut poles and rigged up their lines with float 
 and sinker and with worms for bait. They had said that 
 the river contained pickerel, and I tied on some very small 
 hooks and with a little switch caught several minnows 
 while they were taking a few catfish, sunfish and others. 
 Grins went around, and Martin asked: "Is that the kind 
 o' fishin' you do down in York State?" 
 
 "Yes, sometimes." 
 
 "It 'pears like small kind o' fishin'," said Jim; "don't 
 ye ever ketch bigger fish 'n that when you go a-fishin' 
 'bout Albany?" 
 
 "Yes, sometimes." 
 
 "Mighty small eatin', them things," said another; 
 "guess you've got to get yer specs on to see 'em when 
 they're cooked. I wouldn't take 'em home if you'd gi' 
 me a cartload. Here, take my pole an' fish for fish that's 
 worth having." 
 
 By this time there were half a dozen live minnows in 
 the little water-hole scooped in the bank, and, reaching 
 for my pole, I bent on about twenty feet of line a fair-sized 
 hook with a gimp snell another new thing to the boys 
 and hooking a minnow through the lips I cast and skit- 
 tered it, a trick learned from Old Port Tyler on the Pop- 
 skinny in the spring before. All except William, the old- 
 
THE BROCKWAY BOYS. 93 
 
 est "boy," haw-hawed out loud; he simply watched the 
 curious performance. Cast after cast was made, when a 
 garfish took the lure and was landed a strange fish to 
 me, but no stranger to the others, who with one accord 
 voted him "no good." They had all stopped to watch 
 this way of fishing, which now was proved capable of tak- 
 ing a gar at least, but when a pickerel of about eighteen 
 inches long came in it was my moment of triumph. If 
 this (to them) crazy mode of fishing had not been a suc- 
 cess that morning ridicule would have been my portion. 
 I had known that from the remarks at the beginning, so, 
 turning around, I said : "Yes, Jim, we often catch bigger 
 fish than that when we go a-fishin' about Albany;" and 
 William, who had said nothing, borrowed a hook on gimp 
 and arranged to skitter, while Martin and Jim went catch- 
 ing minnows for the same purpose. When you beat a 
 man or boy at a game he thinks peculiarly his own, he 
 suddenly develops a respect for your abilities perhaps 
 beyond their real deserts. 
 
 William and others took some good fish by skittering, 
 and altogether we had a fine lot, something like two hun- 
 dred pounds of fish, many strange kinds to me, including 
 pickerel (pike, we call them now), suckers, a strange 
 green sunfish, a strange catfish, as well as the familiar 
 bullhead and the common yellow perch. There was also 
 a "dogfish," strange in that day, and, stranger still, this 
 last-named fish and the gars were said to be uneatable. I 
 had supposed that all fresh-water fishes were eatable, even 
 the suckers in winter, only, like the beer story, "some's 
 better 'n others." We were all learning. When the 
 whole catch was collected it was divided into as many 
 parts as there were houses to be passed on the road home, 
 some fifteen or twenty, and strings arranged to be left at 
 each, with a special one containing choice kinds for a 
 
94 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 widow, and we rattled home in short time under a full 
 moon. 
 
 Going among people whose whole life, training and 
 mode of thought is different from my own has not been 
 an uncommon thing, but this first experience was new, 
 and at times annoying. I felt as a dime museum freak 
 must feel, if he does feel. Interest in such things as 
 changing autumn foliage, the form of a passing flock of 
 wild geese or the strange appearance of clouds, seemed 
 to my backwoods cousins to be silly; these things had 
 never occurred to them as worthy of thought because 
 they were every-day affairs, and to-day I know that a boy 
 who has to turn out at five o'clock in the morning, milk 
 the cows, feed the horses and pigs, and get ready to hoe 
 corn after breakfast has no eye for the beauty of a sunrise 
 any more than he has for a glorious sunset after a hard 
 day's ploughing, when the horses have to be cared for, 
 and all those things which a farmer calls "chores" not 
 work, by any means have to be done before he eats his 
 supper and crawls to bed, only to be awakened before 
 nature tells him that he has slept enough. Yes, to-day 
 it is plain why the city boy was a "freak." He had no 
 "chores" to do at home. He could breakfast at eight, go 
 to school at nine, and after four o'clock he had leisure to 
 observe the change of foliage, the flight of wild geese and 
 the colors of the sky at sunset. On Saturdays he could 
 shoot and fish, and there was a six weeks' vacation when 
 the only things he had to obey were his instincts. 
 
 Lenawee county was marshy in many places. It was 
 the source of water flowing east into Lake Erie, west into 
 Lake Michigan, and south into Ohio. The country was 
 heavily timbered, and the phlebotomizing mosquito was 
 abroad in the land. We boys slept in the barn to avoid 
 them. Boys came from nearby houses for the frolic in 
 
THE BROCKWAY BOYS. 95 
 
 the hay, old and young boys, sometimes a dozen or more. 
 Uncle Erastus did not object to their sleeping there, but 
 did forbid card playing; whether he objected to cards at all 
 times or only to the lights necessary to their use among 
 his hay we did not know. One day, after a little talk lead- 
 ing that way as we sat in the house, he said: "I suppose 
 the boys have a game of cards once in a while in the 
 barn?" this in an inquiring sort of way. 
 
 "They couldn't play cards in the dark/' I answered; 
 "they'd have to have lights for that. There ! What was- 
 that big bird that passed the window?" and I ran out to 
 see. 
 
 The next day mother said: "Fred, did you find out 
 what kind of a bird it was passed the window when your 
 uncle asked you about playing cards in the barn?" 
 
 "No, ma'am; it was gone " 
 
 "Yes, it was probably gone before you saw it; but I'm 
 glad that you did not tell on the boys nor lie to your 
 uncle. Do they play cards there nights?" 
 
 "Yes'm, but William said not to tell uncle, and Jim 
 threatened to lick me if I did, and I hope he won't ask me 
 any more. I'll lie to him if he does." 
 
 "No, you mustn't lie to any one, and I am glad you told 
 the truth to me. I knew they played cards and had can- 
 dles there, for I saw the light through a crack that their 
 blankets did not cover, as I walked out last evening." 
 
 Oliver had heard this and said afterward: "Golly! but 
 you got out of that scrape nicely; if you had told your 
 mother the boys didn't play cards in the barn she'd 'a' had 
 you, sure." 
 
 "Well, Oliver, I was in a corner, but I never tell 
 mother a thing that is not so, nor father either, and I try 
 to be truthful all the time, but it's hard work sometimes. 
 There was no other way to dodge your father than to see 
 
96 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 a big bird and run out, but before that I fear that what I 
 said was almost a fib, but I wouldn't tell on the boys." 
 
 "That's all right. Martin wants to know when you 
 want to go after the blind snipe we started the other day. 
 What was it you called 'em?" 
 
 "Woodcock ; say to-morrow." 
 
 "O. K.; there's a spaniel over at Uncle Sebe's that 
 William trees pa'tridges with ; don't know how he'll do on 
 these birds ; nobody shoots 'em here. I never saw more'n 
 three or four in my life, and never thought they were 
 plenty." 
 
 The spaniel was not a promising dog for the work, but 
 we started. In the talk about woodcock shooting some- 
 thing was said about shooting them on the wing, and 
 Martin almost shouted : "What ! You don't mean to say 
 you shoot 'em a-flyin'?" And here again was a surprise; 
 but the success of skittering for pickerel was in mind, and 
 there was no ridicule, but an amount of curiosity to see 
 the thing done. Such a thing had never been heard of, 
 and on a small scale it resembled the experience of 
 Colonel Raymond in an adjoining county a year or two 
 later. I had William's light double gun, and Clark car- 
 ried a single one, while Oliver was to look after the dog. 
 When we reached the bog where we had kicked up a bird 
 before when crossing it, Oliver started with the dog to 
 try and quarter the ground somehow, as I had explained 
 to him; but it was queer work, for Dick had no idea of 
 woodcock, and being used to ranging out of sight for 
 ruffed grouse, and barking to call his master when he 
 found one, we had hard work to keep him in sight. Mar- 
 tin kicked up a bird, and I fired and missed it; but as it 
 dropped behind some bushes he insisted that it dropped 
 dead. He had a long cord in his pocket, and proposed 
 to tie Dick and keep him with us, and as Oliver was bring- 
 

 THE BROCKWAY BOYS. 97 
 
 ing the dog he flushed one that came our way and I killed 
 it. The boys thought this wonderful and the bird the 
 strangest they had ever seen. 
 
 "What's his eyes doin' in the back of his head?" asked 
 Oliver. 
 
 "That's so's to see who's a-comin' after him when he's 
 feedin'," explained Clark; "and he can see good, too, and 
 don't scare up till he thinks you're going to step on him. 
 Say, I'll tell what let's do. Let's all three and the dog 
 walk abreast an' kick 'em up. What d'ye say?" 
 
 This seemed to be a good proposition, for the dog was 
 of no use, and we tried it with better result than I ex- 
 pected, for we succeeded in putting up eleven birds that 
 morning, of which I killed five, Oliver retrieving them 
 almost as soon as they were down, with the help of Dick, 
 for the dog soon learned what we were after and was a 
 fair retriever. The boys told of that morning's work with 
 great pride, never failing to add: "An' he killed 'em all 
 a-flyin'." 
 
 On the way home one of the boys shot a big blue 
 heron which was standing in meditation by a marshy 
 brook, and wing-tipped it. Oliver proposed to capture it 
 alive and we surrounded the bird, which had no idea of 
 allowing us to catch it. Standing with head drawn for 
 a stroke and with defiance in its eye, now ablaze with 
 fight, and facing the one who came nearest, it was a most 
 heroic figure, worthy of study by an artist. The spaniel 
 essayed a hand in the fight, and then tried four spry legs 
 on the homestretch after the heron stuck his spear-like 
 bill in the dog's back. 
 
 "You make a dive for him," said Oliver to us, "and 
 while he is facing you, I'll get him by the legs and neck." 
 He tried it, and the bird wheeled like a flash and struck 
 the boy a blow on the back of the hand that rendered it 
 
98 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 useless for months. Martin then tried to stun him by a 
 blow on the head with a stick, but the heron met him 
 with a jump and a stroke at his face that luckily missed, 
 or he might have been killed or lost an eye. We learned 
 something of the fighting qualities of a blue heron that 
 was new to us all. I had not been as rash as the others, 
 for Port Tyler had told me how one had made a dent in 
 the stock of his gun ; and after seeing what Oliver and the 
 dog got I had great respect for a wounded heron, which, 
 by the way, the boys called a "crane" as they took him to 
 the house dead. 
 
 We made several trips to the river and each time had 
 fine sport. Martin once had a big turtle on his hook, 
 which fortunately was strong, and the turtle was landed. 
 But it was a singular beast. In the last story it is related 
 how the collecting of turtles was a fad of early boyhood, 
 and I thought I knew them all, yet here was one with a 
 soft, flat shell which felt like wet sole leather, a snout like 
 a pig's, and a temper as savage as that of a snapping tur- 
 tle. Verily Michigan had singular fishes and turtles, but 
 no unfamiliar bird had been seen so far; but that was to 
 come, and in a way to be remembered. 
 
 "Ever shoot a wild turkey?" asked Jim. 
 
 "No, never saw one; we don't have 'em about Al- 
 bany." 
 
 "I'll get you a shot at one if you'll come over to my 
 house," said he, "and you won't have to go far for it. I 
 know where it feeds every day." 
 
 If I had known the whole story, or how it was going to 
 turn out, perhaps the turkey might have lived longer ; but 
 Jim had an idea of getting some fun out of either me, the 
 turkey or some other thing. It happened that a neighbor 
 of his had a flock of white turkeys which ranged the 
 woods, and a stray young wild turkey fed with the tame 
 
THE BROCKWAY BOYS. 99 
 
 birds, meeting them in the morning and leaving them in 
 the evening, when they went home. A boy about Jim's 
 age, whose people owned the flock of white turkeys, knew 
 of this wild one, and had marked it for his meat later 
 on. Jim went with me and posted me behind a fallen 
 log, and I killed the turkey and started for the road to 
 find Jim, when a big boy appeared and claimed the bird. 
 Now the killing of that turkey had not a bit of sportsman- 
 ship in it and was nothing to be proud of, but it was a wild 
 turkey and mine. I refused to give up my game. 
 
 "This is not one of your turkeys; yours are white." 
 
 "I say it's mine, and I'm going to have it. That 
 sneakin' Jim Brockway sot you up to kill my turkey; he 
 dassn't kill it himself, but I'll have it." 
 
 "You won't get it. Jim Brockway is down in the road 
 yonder, an' if you call him a sneak he'll lick you." 
 
 "Jim Brockway can't lick one side o' me, nur you an' 
 him together. Gi' me that turkey," and he pushed me. 
 I set the gun back against a log and tossed the turkey 
 behind it. He was bigger and stronger than I, but les- 
 sons from Shel. Hitchcock, Albany's teacher of sparring, 
 gave me confidence, if he could be kept from a "catch-as- 
 catch-can" hold. He struck an awkward swinging blow 
 and got a stinger on the ear. He was astonished, but 
 made a rush, which was avoided, and took one on the 
 nose, which, as Professor Sheldon Hitchcock would have 
 said, "brought the claret." So far I was unharmed ex- 
 cept for my right hand, which has never been equal to the 
 biceps which drove it, and I had only learned to use the 
 left as a guard. He gathered himself and struck straight 
 this time, but I dodged and upper-cut him on the jaw, and, 
 in the language of the Professor, "he grassed." By this 
 time Jim appeared. He had seen it all, but affected sur- 
 prise. 
 
100 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 "Hello!" said he, "what's this all about?" 
 
 The fellow picked himself up and said: "You know 
 what it's all about, Jim Brockway, and I'll get square on 
 you for it some day, you mind." 
 
 "Why don't you get square with this boy?" said Jim, 
 in a tantalizing manner. "You seem to have had some 
 trouble with him. I don't know what it's about." 
 
 "I'll tell you, Jim," said I; "I killed a turkey and he 
 claims it; there it is, a wild one, and everybody knows 
 that all the tame turkeys about here are white, so't they 
 can tell 'em from wild ones. Come on, Jim; he don't 
 want that turkey now, 'cause he said he was goin' to take 
 it, but he didn't." 
 
 On returning to the house of Uncle Erastus with the 
 turkey, which was doubly mine now, first by right of hav- 
 ing reduced it to possession and again by the gauge of 
 battle, mother at once saw the condition of my hand, now 
 painfully swollen, and, mother-like, wanted to know what 
 had happened. I answered: "Mother, if I should try to 
 tell you just how I injured my hand in shooting a wild 
 turkey the story might get twisted, and I was excited so 
 much that I might be mistaken. Jim will be over to- 
 night. He was there and knows all about it; let him tell 
 it." This must have made her curiosity almost boil over, 
 for there was a mystery, but she was one of those stoical 
 people whose faces never give an indication of either curi- 
 osity, pleasure or pain, so she said: "Very well," and 
 waited. After hearing Jim's version of the turkey hunt 
 she never referred to it afterward. She may have de- 
 tailed the whole affair to father, but when I said, one day 
 after getting home : "Father, I killed a wild turkey out in 
 Michigan," he only asked: "How much did it weigh?" 
 
 My cousin, Mrs. Gilleland, of Adrian, Mich., wrote 
 me a year ago: "William H. is now living at Somerset 
 
THE BROCKWAY BOYS. 
 
 101 
 
 Center; Jim died in '67. Of my brothers, Clark died 
 when twenty-four years old; Oliver died in Anderson- 
 ville prison; Mathew lost a leg at Vicksburg; Alonzo was 
 in the army, but came out comparatively well; Martin B. 
 was in Andersonville twenty-one months, and is now liv- 
 ing at Petersburg, Mich." 
 
 I do not know what became of the fellow who claimed 
 the turkey. I knew his name at the time, but I remember 
 that he didn't get the bird. 
 
CAPTAIN IRA WOOD. 
 
 STRIPED BASS IN FRESH WATER EARLY GREENBUSH. 
 
 I KNEW him better in after years, for he was only a 
 child when he left Greenbush, and while his older 
 brother, Reuben, oversaw the capture of my first fish, 
 as before recorded, it was some years later before I had 
 the pleasure of fishing with Ira. Along in the early '5o's, 
 perhaps in 1852 or '53, he came from his home in Syra- 
 cuse to Albany and called on me. He was then a young 
 man of medium height, closely knit, muscular, and the 
 owner of a deep chest voice, which was pleasant and melo- 
 dious. He had been an actor, and had an engagement in 
 the theatre at Albany to play old men's or other parts, and 
 next week I was to go with him to the theatre to his 
 dressing-room. Like many other young fellows, I had 
 thought the stage a most desirable place to strut a brief 
 hour, although my choice did not lay in his direction. 
 Stars did not travel with their own companies then, but 
 depended for support on the stock companies, and as they 
 usually had two or three different plays each week the 
 members of the company had to study hard, and there 
 was always an after-piece. But this was a rare treat for 
 me. I knew Charley Kane, the low comedian, who also 
 tortured the bass drum in Johnny Cooke's brass band, 
 and Shel. Hitchcock, my sparring tutor, who raised the 
 curtain ; but this did not give me the privilege of the stage 
 door. Ira did. 
 
 The week opened with Mr. Eddy as the star. Ira 
 
 102 
 
CAPTAIN IRA WOOD. 103 
 
 played Brabantio to his Othello, but who the lago was is 
 forgotten. For a boy of eighteen or nineteen Ira's make- 
 up as the "reverend signior" was excellent, and he filled 
 the dignified part well, as many said. Eddy was an actor 
 of the robust school of Forrest and not unlike him in man- 
 ner, and would bear nothing that would even slightly 
 mar one of his scenes. Ira also played with Mr. Eddy in 
 "Richard III." that week, and afterward with Couldock and 
 other stars of those days. I do not remember seeing him 
 in comedy except once, and that was as Sir Anthony Ab- 
 solute, in "The Rivals," with Mrs. John Drew as Mrs. 
 Malaprop, with her "derangement of epitaphs," but for- 
 get who played Bob Acres and Sir Lucius OTrigger. 
 
 One day Ira wanted to go fishing, said he had only 
 some four hours after the morning rehearsal, and did not 
 want to put in all his time in going and coming to the 
 fishing grounds and back. Evidently the Popskinny was 
 too far on the east side of the river, and the Normanskill 
 equally so on the Albany side. Fishing off the dock for 
 such strays as might pass had ceased to be attractive as 
 manhood approached, and after a moment of hesitation I 
 said: "Have you ever fished for striped bass in the river 
 here?" 
 
 "No," said he, "the only fishing I have ever done is on 
 the inland streams and on Onondaga Lake. I don't 
 know what a striped bass is like. If they are near here 
 and there is a chance to get one or two let's try it. How 
 big are they?" 
 
 "Down in salt water they grow big. Up here they 
 run up to half a pound. Meet me at the State Street 
 Bridge at any hour you name and I will be ready with 
 everything that we need." Naturally all these conversa- 
 tions in the long ago are reproduced in substance in the 
 words that memory suggests as she recalls the facts; no 
 
104 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 stenographer was present. When Ira came he found a 
 boat hired from old John Cassidy, who had a fleet to let, 
 and it was provided with long ropes and anchors at each 
 end one of those wide, flat-bottomed scows, built like 
 the Dutchman's wife, who said: "She vas so besser built 
 for sittin' down as for runnin' " and we rowed out of the 
 basin under the Hamilton Street Bridge, for there was a 
 bridge to the pier in those days, and out into the river 
 opposite the foot of Dallius Street, which bears another 
 name now. We dropped anchor just on the eastern edge 
 of the channel ; I knew the ranges well in those days, be- 
 fore bridges over the river were built, and their piers had 
 changed the currents and filled in the creek behind the 
 island opposite the city, where we boys fished and swam. 
 
 After dropping one anchor, we brought the boat 
 across the current and dropped the other. There is a tide 
 at Albany except when the great freshets come down. The 
 water in those days at ordinary stages varied from one to 
 two feet at high and low tides, but even on flood tides 
 there was always a current down stream, weak or strong, 
 as the tide might be flood or ebb. Therefore we could 
 fish from the lower side of the boat, no matter how the tide 
 was. I opened a two-quart tin pail. "What's that stuff?" 
 asked Ira. 
 
 "That's sturgeon spawn, for bait." He made no re- 
 ply, but watched the production of some linen thread, and 
 a lot of white mosquito netting, which was cut into four- 
 inch squares. Then I rigged him a hand line with sinker, 
 about two feet above which was a hook on a one-foot 
 snell. Above the hook was tied one foot of linen thread, 
 and, putting a quantity of sturgeon eggs in a square of 
 netting, it was fastened about the hook by the thread and 
 cast far out down stream. I had learned this mode of 
 fishing from my brother Harleigh, who, with Uncle John 
 
CAPTAIN IRA WOOD. 105 
 
 Wilson, the ship carpenter, and John Ruyter, the tanner, 
 were the only ones who practised it about Albany. It 
 was an art. The fly-fisher may curl his lip if he pleases, 
 but I am a fly-fisher to-day, and will say that to take small 
 striped bass by this mode is more difficult than to take a 
 trout on an artificial fly, after the novice has learned the 
 trick of casting. 
 
 In order to explain this mode of fishing I will tell it as 
 I probably did to Ira, premising that the mode is obsolete 
 because the sturgeon in the Hudson are nearly obsolete; 
 or, if not, their eggs, instead of being thrown away, as in 
 the "good old days," are now made into caviare, which 
 men otherwise truthful have said was a delicacy, and the 
 Albany angler no longer fishes in this way. Perhaps the 
 young striped bass, which only ascended the river to feed 
 on the spawn of the shad and the sturgeon, may also be 
 obsolete in these waters. 
 
 "Now, Ira," said I, in obedience to instructions under 
 Harleigh, "hold your line taut. When you feel the light- 
 est touch give a twitch as though you didn't want a fish 
 to have a taste of your bait. A bass will quickly follow 
 the hook and you will feel it again. Keep this up, hand 
 under hand, until you either feel them wiggle on the hook 
 or they abandon it. In either case haul in, for the bait is 
 gone or the fish is hooked. Don't allow a bit of nibbling 
 or the bait is lost. Snatch it from them as if you did not 
 want them to have it, until in despair they make a rush 
 and take hook and all. Allow no sampling and sifting of 
 the eggs through the netting." 
 
 After a while he got the hang of it, losing much bait in 
 the meantime, and we took quite a number of small 
 striped bass in the only mode of taking this fish near Al- 
 bany, where they were rarely found outside the channel 
 of the river, that I knew. Fish of half a pound were con- 
 
106 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 sidered big ones, but Captain John Hitchcock, a retired 
 river man, who fished from the steamboat landing almost 
 daily, once caught one of two pounds weight. While we 
 were fishing we saw young shad, perhaps two or three 
 inches long, rising near the boat, apparently after such 
 loose sturgeon eggs as might escape through the netting 
 or were dropped from the boat. With destructive man 
 in addition to all these eaters of sturgeon eggs it is no 
 wonder that "Albany beef" is no longer found in the mar- 
 kets of that city. The great fish held its own for un- 
 counted centuries against all these enemies, the greatest 
 of which was the eel, but man upset the balance that 
 nature had kept and the sturgeon has nearly followed the 
 buffalo, the wild pigeon and other beasts and birds which 
 man has pursued for market, and has not been saved from 
 extinction by artificial propagation, as he has saved the 
 shad and some other fishes. We did not philosophize on 
 these things then. We were boys and life was before us. 
 The future of the sturgeon troubled us as little as the 
 precession of the equinoxes or the differential calculus. 
 Boylike, our mental vision was bounded by the year, and 
 a year was a long time then. It was so long from one 
 Christmas to another. A man of thirty had lived a great 
 while, we thought, and the disrespectful boys of Green- 
 bush prefixed "old" to the name of every man over fifty. 
 This reminiscence is brought up by Ira's questions. 
 
 "Does old Hogeboom let the boys go in swimmin' off 
 the dock now?" 
 
 The man referred to was a justice of the peace, an office 
 which he held for years, but from my earliest recollection 
 I never heard him called anything but "old" Hogeboom. 
 Once my mother expressed surprise that I had returned 
 from a swimming trip in the island creek so soon. 
 "Yes'm," said I, "we on'y just got nicely in when ole 
 
CAPTAIN IRA WOOD. 107 
 
 Morris came down and drove us out." She said: "Don't 
 let me ever hear you call Mr. Morris 'old Morris;' you 
 should have said: 'Mr. John Morris drove us out.' " 
 Therefore I said to Ira: 
 
 "No, Squire Hogeboom," with emphasis on the 
 Squire, "doesn't allow us to go in off the village dock, but 
 there's good swimmin' off the rafts over there by the 
 island." 
 
 He thought a moment and said: "There's one thing 
 sure, I've got to quit the theatre or begin a course of 
 study that I never thought of. I must learn dancing, 
 fencing, music and a whole mess of things if I continue 
 in it. I thought that a little knowledge of elocution was 
 all that was needed, and I got a little of that and went 
 ahead. It is all up-hill work, and I think it is best to 
 quit. Reub says that old Genet gives fencing lessons yet, 
 if he's living; is he alive?" 
 
 With mother's lesson in mind I answered : "Yes, Gen- 
 eral Genet is alive," again with emphasis on the title for 
 Ira's benefit, "and he is the same skillful swordsman that 
 he always was, and as he is still going around selling 
 building lots in Greenbush, with no buyers, the chances 
 are that he will be glad to give you lessons." If Ira was 
 beside me now he would be reminded of his irreverence 
 and told, what he may have learned in after years, that 
 his fencing master was a son of the illustrious "Citizen" 
 Genet who figured in our Revolutionary times. In after 
 years Ira had the reputation of being a good swordsman, 
 and while he was learning I picked up a point or two 
 which was of service in garrison when the neck of a cham- 
 pagne bottle was to be severed at a clean stroke, "but I 
 anticipate" you may be told of this when ex-President 
 Arthur is under the searchlight. 
 
 After all his lessons in fencing, and his studies in other 
 
108 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 directions, Ira shook the dust of the stage from his feet, 
 left Thespis, Melpomene and other more or less reputable 
 goddesses behind him and sought other fields. We did 
 not meet again for many years. Boys do not care for 
 each other as men do, if they take the trouble to care for 
 any one except their royal selves, and we went our ways, 
 but somehow we were thrown together again ; perhaps by 
 some occult fatalism of which we then, and I now, know 
 nothing, for on a review of life to-day no man is recalled 
 whose early ideas so fully accorded with my own. He 
 never thought of accumulating wealth. A powerful 
 physique enabled him to disregard all thoughts of health 
 and a romantic disposition led him to seek adventure. 
 Without consultation we both went away in the same 
 year, he to the army and I to try a different but equally 
 adventurous life. 
 
 Ira Wood enlisted February 18, 1854, in the Engineer 
 Corps, U. S. A., at Boston, Mass., for five years. He was 
 under instruction at West Point for a while and was then 
 employed on Fort Sumter, at Charleston ; Fort Taylor, at 
 Key West, and was discharged Feb. 18, 1859, at Fort Cas- 
 cade, Washington Territory, by reason of expiration of 
 his term of service as an artificer of Company A, First 
 Lieutenant James C. Duane commanding. He had made 
 application for examination for promotion to a lieuten- 
 antcy, but no examination was held between the time of 
 application and his discharge. 
 
 At the call for volunteers after Fort Sumter was fired 
 upon, and the regiments of State militia were found in- 
 sufficient, Ira Wood raised the first company for the first 
 regiment of volunteers that was organized in the State 
 of New York ; but by some delay at Albany other organi- 
 zations were numbered ahead of it, and the regiment left 
 the State as the Twelfth New York Volunteer Infantry, 
 
CAPTAIN IRA WOOD. 109 
 
 with Ira as first lieutenant of Company A. He was 
 mustered into the United States service on May 13, 1861. 
 During that year he participated in the battles at Black- 
 burn's Ford, Bull Run and Upton's Hill, all in Virginia. 
 He was promoted to captain, and mustered as such, to 
 date October 29, 1861. He was engaged in the following 
 battles while a captain: Near Big Bethel, siege of York- 
 town, Hanover Court House, Seven Days' battle, Games' 
 Mills, Malvern Hill, Malvern Cliff, second Bull Run, An- 
 tietam and near Shepardstown. He was honorably dis- 
 charged on tender of his resignation by special order, 
 War Department, October 14, 1862. He resigned to be- 
 come a field officer in a new regiment, but owing to the 
 clamor of politicians for places for their favorites he did 
 not get the appointment. While with the Twelfth a 
 friend writes me : "The regiment was for a good part of 
 the time commanded by Captain Wood, the senior cap- 
 tain, and he was the only company commander who was 
 present at every engagement up to the time he resigned. 
 At Antietam he made a record with his color guard, when 
 ordered to retreat, by backing off the field as much as pos- 
 sible, declaring that he preferred to take the bullets in 
 front." 
 
 On leaving the army he was for a few years in the em- 
 ploy of the American Express Company, and while living 
 in Buffalo became a captain in the Seventy-fourth New 
 York State National Guard. He then went back to Syra- 
 cuse and for four and a half years was chief of the fire 
 department of that city, resigning the position in October, 
 1 88 1, to travel for an Eastern manufactory of fire hose. 
 Upon his resignation as chief the Board of Fire Com- 
 missioners tried to induce him to remain, and passed reso- 
 lutions of regret. Steamer No. I and the Hook and Lad- 
 der Company presented him with an elegant desk clock, 
 
110 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 with an inscription commending his mode of handling 
 fires. The leading citizens and merchants of Syracuse 
 presented him with a costly watch in recognition of his 
 efficient service. 
 
 In 1867 Ira married Miss Brinckerhoff, of Albany, 
 who, with one son, Frederic K. Wood, survives him. He 
 was born in Greenbush, N. Y., May 18, 1834, and died 
 at Albany, N. Y., April 6, 1886, after an illness of only 
 three days, caused by some bladder trouble. He was an 
 enthusiastic Mason and Grand Army man. He attained 
 the thirty-second degree of the Scottish Rite in Masonry, 
 and was Adjutant of George S. Dawson Post, G. A. R., of 
 Albany. He was buried with services of the G. A. R. 
 and with those of the Knights Templar, these organiza- 
 tions attending in uniform. It was also my privilege to 
 witness the last sad rites over the friend of a lifetime, one 
 of the bravest, truest and gentlest men that ever trod the 
 earth. 
 
 Ira went to Albany in 1883 as head of a branch of the 
 house of Pierce, Butler & Pierce, of Syracuse. Long be- 
 fore this his fame as a fly-caster and winner of prizes at 
 tournaments of the State Association for Protection of 
 Game, held at Rochester, Buffalo and Syracuse, had 
 drifted eastward, but not until the tournament of the 
 State Association was held at Coney Island in June, 1881, 
 when I superintended the fly-casting contests, did we 
 clasp hands since we parted in Albany, some twenty-seven 
 years before. 
 
 "Why, you old duffer! You have been in a flour mill! 
 Your hair is all white! Take off your hat and I'll dust 
 you off!" 
 
 "Yes, that'll all come off, but your head is mildewed, 
 and you'll have to bleach it in the sun to kill the mould." 
 
 His record in that tournament was 101 feet with a 
 
CAPTAIN IRA WOOD. 
 
 Ill 
 
 two-handed salmon rod, a full account of which appears 
 in the sketch of his brother Reuben. In the class for 
 single-handed rods Reub and Ira entered. Ira had not 
 got out all the line he could handle, and Frank Endicott 
 said that, as his brother Reuben cast before Ira and took 
 first with 75 feet, he withdrew for fear of beating his 
 brother. This was probably the fact, because I had at- 
 tended a State tournament after this where the contest- 
 ants were Seth Green, Reuben and Ira Wood. Seth had 
 a wonderful reputation as a fly-caster, and they used 
 to report his casts without strict measurements, because 
 his only contestants up the State were Reub and Ira, and 
 Reub would not beat Seth under any circumstances; nor 
 would he allow Ira to beat Seth. Once I stood on the 
 casting platform. Seth had cast, and Reub had re- 
 strained himself and was restraining Ira. 
 
 "Don't you do it, Ira," said Reub; "hold it, don't beat 
 the old man, it will break his heart. There now! That's 
 far enough." 
 
 "Go in, Ira," said I; "go in and win," for I never loved 
 Seth as Reub did; "don't let Reub hold you back; this is 
 a fair open contest, and you should win if you can." 
 
 He didn't win; could, but wouldn't. He listened to 
 his brother, and if the little fly-casting tournaments of the 
 State Association had been kept up the same old farce of 
 "don't you do it, Ira," would have continued. After the 
 Coney Island tournament was over "The National Rod 
 and Reel Association" was organized, with Francis Endi- 
 cott as president, and yearly tournaments were held on 
 Harlem Mere, Central Park, New York City. Here both 
 Reuben and Ira were freed from Reuben's worship of 
 Green, who never cared to meet Hawes, Leonard, 
 Prichard and the other great fly-casters, and the scores 
 of the Wood brothers are familiar to readers of Forest and 
 
112 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 Stream. After these meetings, when Ira and I got to talk- 
 ing over old times and swapping army experiences, some- 
 thing always happened to interrupt, and the loss cannot 
 be repaired. 
 
 At the tournaments in Central Park it was a common 
 remark how Ira was always on the casting platform un- 
 tangling the lines, tying on flies and helping the men who 
 were in the contest against him; a course so opposite to 
 that of the "mug hunters," which the lax rules of the As- 
 sociation encouraged to enter the lists, that it could not 
 have passed unnoticed. Unconsciously the subject of 
 this sketch was exposing himself and his great, kind heart 
 to the public, and, worst of all, to one who in later years 
 chose to write him up and show him by lime-light on the 
 great curtain of Forest and Stream. 
 
 In 1885, after I had begun the stocking of the Hudson 
 River with salmon, Ira organized the Eastern New York 
 Fish and Game Protective Association, which still exists. 
 Under date of November 18, 1885, he wrote me: "I have 
 set on foot a plan for forming a club or society, to be com- 
 posed of the best men in this city (Albany), to care for the 
 salmon which you have planted in the Hudson, and also 
 to protect all other fish and game in this region." 
 
 In this imperfect sketch I have been greatly assisted 
 by Mr. William Allen Butler, of Syracuse, N. Y., in gath- 
 ering facts concerning Ira's life in that city. He tells me 
 that "Captain Wood came of good old New England 
 stock, being a descendant of Dr. Samuel Wood, who 
 came from England in 1684, and was one of the first set- 
 tlers of Danbury, Conn., in 1696. His mother was a 
 Breed, and her father, with three brothers and their father, 
 fought in the battle of Bunker Hill on their own farm; 
 their ancestor, Allan Breed, having emigrated from Eng- 
 land in 1630 with Governor Winthrop and the Puritans." 
 
IRA WOOD. 
 
CAPTAIN IRA WOOD. 113 
 
 As a boy, Mr. Butler was one of Ira's pupils in fly-casting, 
 and speaks with great enthusiasm of his teacher when he 
 relates their trips to the Adirondacks. 
 
 About a week before his death Captain Wood opened 
 a store in Albany, at 1 5 Green Street, for the sale of fish- 
 ing tackle and general sporting goods, with every pros- 
 pect of success. Cut down by the reaper before he was 
 fully ripe, those whose good fortune it was to know him 
 intimately can say with Marc Antony : 
 
 "His life was gentle; and the elements 
 So mix'd in him that Nature might stand up 
 And say to all the world, This was a man!' " 
 
GENERAL MARTIN MILLER. 
 
 SKATING, ICE-BOATING AND CAMP COOKERY. 
 
 WITH clothing torn and bloody, his face bruised 
 and cut, one eye blackened and swollen shut, 
 Mat Miller came down the main street in 
 Greenbush one day. Beside him walked a giant negro, 
 like Eugene Aram, "with gyves upon his wrists," and in 
 a condition like Mat's as to face and clothing. This sight 
 so impressed me that it always came up whenever I heard 
 of or saw Mr. Miller. We little boys had never seen such 
 a sight, and when we learned that the colored desperado 
 had been a terror to the country for miles around, and was 
 a burglar, and that Constable Miller, having learned that 
 he was sleeping in the old spook-house barn, had attacked 
 him alone and captured him after a long and fierce fight, 
 he was our hero. We learned in later years that this 
 genial, fine-looking athlete was the champion wrestler of 
 Rensselaer County, and at "collar and elbow" or "square 
 hold" could lay the local wrestlers on their backs. But 
 this capture of the powerful burglar overtopped his other 
 feats. 
 
 Some time after this event Herr Driesbach, the great 
 animal trainer, wintered his menagerie in Greenbush, in 
 the stables of Bill Gaines, the local racing man, on Broad- 
 way, just below Columbia Street, back of Fly's brick 
 store, which still stands there. In those days the circus 
 and the menagerie were two distinct things. The circus 
 had no animals, while the menagerie had a ring in which 
 dogs and monkeys rode on ponies and appealed to that 
 portion of the public which objected to men and women 
 
 114 
 
GENERAL MARTIN MILLER. 115 
 
 in tights. In early days, when my father's barges brought 
 emigrants up the river to Albany, Jake Driesbach was an 
 emigrant runner for a line of canal boats which took them 
 to Buffalo. He then went to Germany, and returned as 
 "Herr Driesbach, the world-renowned lion tamer." Boys 
 were not wanted in the stables, but as father's business 
 froze up when the river did, and Driesbach came to our 
 house in the long evenings to play chess with father, I 
 had the run of the show, to the envy of the other boys, 
 who could not get in unless I chose to take them. To be 
 on intimate terms with so great a man for a lion tamer 
 is the biggest kind of a man to a small boy was indeed 
 a pleasure unknown to men who were never boys. By 
 that I mean those old fellows who were born "young 
 men" and never had any fun. 
 
 The privilege of seeing these animals at all times was 
 something, but to witness the rehearsals that were neces- 
 sary to keep both men and animals in readiness for the 
 opening performance in the spring was a thing that a 
 real live, full-blooded boy would naturally class as but 
 little below paradise, if he didn't consider it a dozen miles 
 above. As the village constable, Mat Miller walked in 
 the menagerie when he pleased. In fact any reputable 
 citizen could; the line was drawn at boys, who might get 
 hurt or into mischief. There was no steam-heating ap- 
 paratus in those days, and the two elephants, the giraffe 
 (the first one ever in America), the monkeys and other 
 inhabitants of warm countries were in the end where the 
 great stoves were. One day a chained elephant became 
 scared at something; Driesbach said the animal saw a 
 mouse and feared it would go up its trunk. The cage 
 containing the royal Bengal tiger was overturned, and 
 pandemonium, or the Cooper Union after an Anarchist 
 meeting, was a Quaker assembly compared to it. The 
 
116 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 elephants trumpeted, lions roared, hyenas howled, mon- 
 keys screamed and what the cockatoo said is lost. "Mat" 
 was there, and so was Driesbach and the writer. The 
 constable jumped, grabbed the cage by the top and forced 
 it back to its place at the expense of a coat and a torn 
 shoulder from the tiger's claws. Driesbach was astounded 
 at the quickness and strength of this unassuming man, 
 and offered him a lucrative position to travel with him, 
 which was declined. Me? Oh, yes! After it was all 
 over "Dandy" Nesbitt, the jockey, Tom Scribner and I 
 were found safe under the wagon where the trick bear had 
 his residence. 
 
 Up to about 1845 there was lots of fun every year at 
 "general training." This was an assembling of the uni- 
 formed and the ununiformed militia for several days or a 
 week's drill in camp, as required by law. The ununi- 
 formed militia consisted of every man between certain 
 ages, not specially exempted, who could, I think, escape 
 by paying a certain sum. It was a grand spree for some 
 and the guard-house was always well filled with drunks. 
 When in garrison in later years this gang was known as 
 Company Q, 
 
 Martin Miller was a general of militia, but of what 
 rank I never knew ; in fact, rank was unknown to us boys 
 beyond the fact that there were officers and privates. It 
 was my fortune to see two "general trainin's/' one on the 
 farm of John Morris, above the village, and the other at 
 Clinton Heights. Then I think the law was changed and 
 they were abolished, perhaps before 1845, f r I was tnen 
 old enough to remember more than two such rackets. It 
 was a great event. Drums, flags, the squads of farmers' 
 boys who couldn't keep step to the drum, the neat uni- 
 forms of some of the companies, the usual crowd of bump- 
 kins, yokels, three-card-monte men, thimble-riggers, 
 
GENERAL MARTIN MILLER. 
 
 117 
 
 sweat boards, chuck-luck and other gamblers, peanuts, 
 gingerbread and, above all, General Martin Miller re- 
 splendent in chapeau bras, epaulet, sword and sash, 
 mounted on a white horse, trying to bring order out of 
 chaos. If all these things did not make soldiers for the 
 State out of the rawest kind of material it certainly made 
 a very large day for the small boy. 
 
 If any one trait was more prominent than another in 
 the mental make-up of General Miller it was his love of 
 boys and his desire to see them have fun. Having no 
 children of his own at that time, he was fond of those of 
 his neighbors. Things were getting along in shape and 
 the gamblers were reaping a harvest, when the General 
 invited a crowd of boys to follow him if they wanted to 
 see some fun. Every sweat board and chuck-luck table 
 had piles of coin of all sizes and values piled up to show 
 their ability to pay bets, and as the General came along- 
 side of one he would wheel his horse suddenly, clap the 
 spurs to him, and that gambler's coin was scattered far 
 and wide, a harvest for those who could reap. Somehow 
 the gamblers did not appear to like this, judging from 
 their remarks. 
 
 Years after this the General became a grocer, and in 
 that very democratic community subsided into plain, 
 every-day Mat Miller, so called by every man, woman and 
 child in the village. 
 
 We were in his store one day talking of going down to 
 the Popskinny for a couple of days' fishing and to camp 
 in Rivenburg's barn in the hay. 
 
 "What do you boys do down there at night?" he asked. 
 "Perhaps you raid Teller's potato patch and roast his po- 
 tatoes with his fence rails. I think I'll go along to keep 
 you straight." 
 
 "Come along," said Billy Shaw, "we'll let you gather 
 
118 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 drift-wood, and then you'll know whether we use fence 
 rails or not." 
 
 "Yes," chipped in John Atwood, "and you can hook 
 the potatoes, too, if you want 'em. We never trouble the 
 farmers and they don't trouble us. We take our grub 
 along and just cook a few fish." 
 
 Billy Atwood, a boy who seldom said anything, re- 
 marked: "Mat might go and milk some of Rivenburg's 
 cows if he wants to eat his fish in milk," a reference to a 
 man who was said to have tried this dish on recommenda- 
 tion of one Harleigh Mather, whose humor lay in such 
 things. This man was known as "Suckers and Milk" un- 
 til life became a burden to him and he moved away. This 
 same irreverent joker in after years replied to a clergy- 
 man who wished to know how to cook frogs: "Oh, we 
 stew them just as we do bats." I do not approve of this 
 sort of thing except when I do it myself. 
 
 Rivenburg's barn was only used to store hay in until 
 it could be pressed into bales and sent off, therefore it was 
 empty most of the year, but there was always enough 
 loose hay left to sleep in. It was one of the finest barns 
 you ever saw, for ventilation. The doors were off the 
 hinges and were propped up by poles. We did not dis- 
 turb them, but walked in from whichever side was con- 
 venient. The double doors were, if I remember, a trifle 
 larger than the other holes. 
 
 John Atwood had brought the worms for bait in some 
 old mustard boxes, and we assured Mat that they were 
 not brought in the coffee-pot because that had been kept 
 hidden in the barn as part of our permanent outfit, along 
 with the frying-pan and tin cups. Hot coffee, fried 
 sausages and other things saw us comfortably fed by sun- 
 down. Great clouds came up and the wind shook the 
 barn and we hurried to the tightest corner as the storm 
 
GENERAL MARTIN MILLER. 
 
 119 
 
 suddenly broke over us. The thunder made the barn 
 shake and it could not have rained harder. Flash after 
 flash came so fast, and the thunder followed so quickly 
 that one could hardly note the interval. Heaven's artil- 
 lery opened right over us, and every fellow was doing his 
 own thinking and keeping it to himself. Billy Shaw was 
 the exception. He ventured to remark : "Maybe you fel- 
 lows like this, but I wish I was home!" That broke the 
 spell, and he was nearly smothered in the hay which they 
 piled on him. During this smothering of Shaw I saw, or 
 believe I saw, a flash of lightning shoot up from the 
 ground. It was so close to the barn that it seemed as if a 
 man had shot a gun in the air. Two boards were off that 
 side and there was no man there. If such a thing ever 
 occurs, I saw an instance of it; if it does not I was de- 
 ceived. No hole in the ground was visible in the morn- 
 ing, but half a century has not dimmed the picture. 
 
 Such a rain never lasts long, and soon the stars were 
 shining, and we rebuilt the little fire, and with dry ma- 
 terial from the barn for seats were enjoying life, when 
 the sound of oars was heard, and soon the lapping of the 
 water under the bottom of a little scow told that a boat 
 was near. 
 
 "Halt! Who comes there?" was the challenge of the 
 General. 
 
 Bill Atwood, John's younger brother, who had already 
 shown symptoms of nautical bacteria which eventually 
 dragged him to a sailor's life, hailed the coming craft 
 with : "Aboard the scow ! Pull on yer starb'd oar or you'll 
 foul our coffee-pot!" 
 
 A few more strokes and the boat was beached and out 
 stepped the old trapper, Port Tyler. "Where's that cof- 
 fee-pot?" said he. "I'm wet an' cold, and some hot coffee 
 is just what I want. No, thanks, nothing to eat; I've got 
 
120 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 lots. Why, Mat Miller! What you doin' here campin' 
 out with these boys? I see ye all go by when I was hid 
 in the lilypads around the bend yonder watchin' for wood 
 ducks, an' I knowed the hull lot on'y Mat, an' I'd a 
 knowed him ef I'd a-suspected he'd come a-campin' with 
 you boys. What're ye up to, Mat? Burglars or thieves 
 been on the island, or are ye on'y lookin' up the boys 
 that's just come of age and just goin' to vote for the first 
 time this fall?" 
 
 "Sit down here," said the General ; "get outside of this 
 warm coffee. I'm not looking for you, but there's a 
 widow up there at John Morris' rope-walk that is, and 
 she'll get you, too, if you don't look out." 
 
 This was a clean knock-out, for if ever there was a 
 man who was shy of a woman it was that confirmed old 
 bachelor, Port Tyler. 
 
 The stars twinkled. Venus, just about to disrobe 
 and retire for the night, winked at Polaris, the night 
 clerk, and hid herself behind Bethlehem woods. A 
 night heron said "quawk" in a derisive tone, and even 
 the little barn owl seemed unduly hilarious as it alighted 
 on the gable of the barn with a field-mouse. Then there 
 was a vast wave of silence that rose like the battle waves 
 of Ossian and overflowed the lands on either side of the 
 historic Popskinny. Miller's shot struck home, and the 
 bashful trapper took it in silence. Not a leaf stirred. 
 Billy Shaw finally ventured to ask, "What kind o' game 
 are you after, Port?" 
 
 "Oh, just lookin' for yellow-legs and shore birds. 
 I've got three young quawks* in the boat, and nobody 
 
 *This is the way we called this night heron, Nycticorax. The com- 
 mon name is sometimes spelled "squawk," while some naturalists call it 
 "the qua bird." If you take my spelling and add "quock" to it, and 
 then divide the sum total by two, you will get very near to the bird's own 
 pronunciation of its name ; and who should know better than he? 
 
GENERAL MARTIN MILLER. 
 
GENERAL MARTIN MILLER. 
 
 121 
 
 about here eats 'em but me; so I can't sell J em, an' if 
 you'll eat 'em I'll cook 'em." 
 
 By unanimous consent it was voted "a go/' or words 
 to that effect. Billy Shaw, who had no fear of thunder 
 now that it was not in his immediate front, said that we 
 were down for fun and might as well have it. "If you 
 are not hungry now," said he, "you will be by the time 
 old Port gets these song birds dressed and cooked." 
 
 John Atwood and I took Port's boat and put out his 
 set lines for eels, in order to have fish for breakfast. 
 These lines were of quarter-inch cord, reaching from 
 bank to bank. At every two feet was a one-foot snood 
 tied with a "bow-timber hitch," dropping only one foot 
 below. This enabled the fisher to snatch a snood loose 
 and drop it in the boat, eel or no eel; but the beauty of 
 Tyler's rig was the eyed hooks with a knot above and 
 one below, which prevented an eel from unlaying the 
 snood and breaking it strand by strand, merely turning 
 the hook as if on a swivel. There is no patent on it. 
 
 The quawks were roasted when we returned after 
 putting out the eel lines in several places, and the fact 
 that we had eaten one supper did not prevent us from 
 eating of the strange birds, and they were not a bit fishy, 
 as one would suppose, but were tender and good. Port 
 had set up a wind break and heat reflector by the fire 
 and hung the birds on strings, so that they kept twisting 
 round. When we came to crawl into the hay for the 
 night Billy Shaw seemed a bit nervous and inquired if 
 there might be rats about, and that started stories of 
 enormous rats that lived along the creek and in the 
 barns, all for his benefit. The little owl would whinny 
 not unlike a horse, and Billy was evidently uneasy until 
 Miller ran a stick in a wiggling way into the hay and said 
 something about snakes. Then Billy vowed that he would 
 
122 MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 go home. The General owned up and persuaded him to 
 lie down, and the next we knew the night had gone. 
 
 We had eels enough for breakfast on the first line, 
 and then Port took up the others and left us. We 
 fished until near noon, when the fish took a rest, and we 
 gathered at the barn, each with several strings of perch, 
 bullheads and rock bass. John Atwood had a strange 
 fish, one that none of the party had ever seen before. 
 We learned that it was a black bass, a Western fish that 
 had come into the Hudson by way of the Erie Canal, so 
 Harleigh said, and he was the village authority on fish 
 and fishing. Just why the bass have not become more 
 plenty in the upper river is a problem. Down about 
 Newburgh, where the water is often somewhat brackish, 
 they seem to be more plentiful. A little more fishing in 
 the afternoon, and we went home after sundown. The 
 General declared it was a pleasant trip, but I never knew 
 him to fish before or after this once. 
 
 Back of Ruyter & Van Valkenburg's tannery there 
 was a great heap of spent tanbark to tumble in, and 
 Jimmy Brown and I practised somersaults there; the 
 other boys merely jumped. This interested the General, 
 and he would help us in a whirl with his strong arm, 
 which landed us on our feet. This was a special help in 
 the back flop. Poor Jimmy Brown! We used to play 
 the banjo for each other's jigs on the sanded floor until 
 he was burned up on the steamer Reindeer in the sum- 
 mer of 1850. General Miller also taught us to wrestle 
 in the "collar-and-elbow" and "square hold" styles, and 
 always impressed his correction of a fault upon us by 
 taking hold himself and making the faulty one put his 
 foot or his weight in the wrong position and then quickly 
 laid him on his back. There were many fair wrestlers 
 then among the boys of Greenbush. 
 
GENERAL MARTIN MILLER. 123 
 
 One winter, when the ice was exceptionally good, he 
 proposed a skating party to Hudson, some twenty-eight 
 miles down the river. We had an ice boat that some of 
 the boys built, and this was to go along to pick up strag- 
 glers and to return on. Cub Wilson sailed the boat. A 
 Greenbush boy of those days had little reverence and less 
 respect in his composition, and nicknames were com- 
 mon. Wilson was then about twenty-five years old, fat 
 and unwieldy, and had been called Cub from boyhood 
 and didn't mind it. He may have had a given name, 
 and no doubt his mother called him by it. The party 
 consisted of John Atwood, John and Hiram Stranahan, 
 Jerry Van Beuren, James Miles, Isaac Polhemus, John 
 Phillips, General Miller and myself, the youngest in the 
 party. We started in the morning about eight. A light 
 south wind was in our faces, and coats and overcoats 
 were soon piled on the ice boat. In places the ice was 
 too rough to skate, and once we took off the skates and 
 walked about half a mile. Phillips and the Stranahans 
 were the best skaters, and took the lead and kept it, 
 reaching Hudson some time ahead of us. Atwood, Van 
 Beuren and I brought up the rear. We did the stretch 
 in four and a half hours some claimed less time pretty 
 well tired and with numb feet. We all wore high boots. 
 The skates, with great turned-over prows ending in brass 
 acorns, were guttered in the bottoms, and strapped so 
 tightly over the foot that the blood could not circulate. 
 We did not think skating possible under any other con- 
 ditions. When the strap would not take up another 
 hole we drove wooden wedges between the strap and the 
 boot to make it tighter. A few years ago I tried on the 
 old style of skate and could get around a little, but could 
 do nothing with those of the present model. 
 
 At Hudson General Miller took us to a hotel and we 
 
124 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 had a good dinner. We had a strong wind from the 
 west on the homestretch and the ice boat did not have to 
 tack once, and we were not long on the way. Skipper 
 Wilson remarked: "You boys beat me when I had to 
 tack against a head wind, but you couldn't do it now." 
 On telling the story the General said: "The boys are all 
 good skaters, but you should see 'em eat ! They cleaned 
 up everything in that hotel, and if they ever go to Hud- 
 son again that landlord will close his house when he sees 
 'em coming." 
 
 "Hans Breitman's gife a barty 
 
 Where ish dat barty now? 
 Where ish de lofely golden cloud 
 
 Dat float on de moundain's prow? 
 Where ish de himmel strahlende stern 
 
 De shtar of de shpirit's light? 
 All goned afay mit de lager beer 
 
 Afay in de ewigkeit!" 
 
 This philosophical verse of Leland's comes up when 
 that day is recalled, for all except the writer have passed 
 into the ewigkeit of the Plattdeutsche, or evigkeit of the 
 German. Five died peacefully. John Atwood was 
 killed by a boiler explosion, Van Beuren was drowned 
 in California, and Phillips was killed by interlocking his 
 "turn-over" skate with that of another boy, and his skull 
 was broken on the ice. Surely I may ask: Where is 
 that party now? And ewigkeit, or eternity, as you 
 choose, is the only answer. 
 
 I learn from one of boyhood's companions who has 
 not yet crossed the Styx that General Martin Miller was 
 born on May 12, 1816; was Doorkeeper of the State 
 Senate in 1845-46; was member of Assembly in 1858, 
 and died in the summer of 1882. The General married 
 
GENERAL MARTIN MILLER. 125 
 
 and died in the summer of 1882. The General married a 
 sister of my friend, Garrett M. Van Olinda, who is now 
 in business at 18 Harrison street, New York, and one 
 son survives him. 
 
 For a few days during the time of the Mexican war 
 the sleepy little village of Greenbush was disturbed over 
 a very small word and argument ran high. Abram 
 Van Olinda, brother to the General's wife, had raised a 
 company of volunteers for the war, and the citizens of 
 Greenbush purchased a sword to be presented to the 
 Captain; but it must have an inscription of some kind to 
 tell who presented it and also who it was presented to. 
 A few had agreed that the blade should be inscribed: 
 "Presented by the citizens of Greenbush to Captain 
 Abram Van Olinda, and never to be sheathed but with 
 honor." This was the sentiment of Volkert P. Douw, 
 Squire Hogeboom and John L. Van Valkenburgh. 
 Isaac Fryer moved to strike out the word "but" and in- 
 sert "except," and Thomas Miles and others backed him. 
 The inscription hung fire, and the women of the village 
 took it up and hot arguments were held as to which of 
 the two words was the best to use in the inscription. A 
 meeting of all who had subscribed for the sword was 
 called at Fryer's tavern, and after much argument from 
 each side "Mat" Miller was asked to give his view of 
 how the inscription should read. He rose and said: 
 : ' 'Never to be sheathed but with honor' is good; we all 
 know what it means. We also know what it means if 
 we say, 'Never to be sheathed except with honor/ and it's 
 only a choice of words, and 'but' is Dutch." That settled 
 it. The Douws, Van Valkenburghs and Hogebooms 
 were defeated by this thrust. Captain Van Olinda was 
 killed while leading his men at the charge on the heights 
 of Chapultepec, on September 13, 1847. The result of 
 
126 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 which was sent home, and is still in the possession of his 
 family. 
 
 Mat Miller I love to think of him as "Mat" was a 
 warm friend to boys. Perhaps he liked some boys bet- 
 ter than others, but he was always my friend, and he was 
 the manly sort of man that I could look up to with con- 
 fidence. He was a man when I was a boy. When I 
 was fourteen he was thirty-one, but he was always one of 
 us on such frolics as have been related, and never seemed 
 to know of that gulf which separates the fun-loving boy 
 from the money-grubbing man which some men de- 
 velop into. 
 
 General "Mat" Miller! You covered yourself all 
 over with glory when you attacked a desperate burglar, 
 who outclassed you in weight, alone and single-handed 
 in the old "spook-house" barn and brought him to jus- 
 tice. May you be crowned with glory now, as the re- 
 ward of an honest life, is the prayer of your boyish 
 friend. 
 
GARRETT VAN HOESEN. 
 
 SPEARING EELS AND TRAPPING RABBITS. 
 
 THE village boys called him Garry Van Hooser, 
 and I am not sure but the whole family pro- 
 nounced it in that way; but Garry could write, 
 and he spelled the name as it is given above. He had 
 been a clerk in the grocery of Thomas B. Simmonds 
 since my earliest memory, and had none of the Dutch 
 accent common to his people, for at this late day the 
 descendants of the original settlers of the Upper Hudson 
 often spoke Dutch, and their English had an accent 
 which Garry had lost by frequent contact with other 
 people. He was older than I by some six to ten years, 
 and was a shy young man, who never seemed to have 
 any companions, and often went fishing and shooting 
 alone or with his spaniel Coody, which was a good re- 
 triever. He told me where he got the dog, but where its 
 name came from even he did not know. He said: "Oh, 
 I do* know; he had to have a name, and I just called him 
 Coody." 
 
 That settled the matter to the satisfaction of Garry, 
 the dog seemed to be pleased with the name, and who 
 could object? 
 
 One day in '48, after the election of General Taylor 
 as President, when the ice was just thick enough for 
 skating, I had been told to stop at the grocery for some- 
 thing when I came home to supper, and Garry said: "I 
 am going up to the mill pond in the morning to spear 
 eels. How would you like to go with me?" 
 
 "First-rate; what must I take along?" 
 
 127 
 
128 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 "Nothing but a pair of woolen mittens; your hands 
 will freeze without them. I'll put up all the grub we 
 want. Meet me here about nine in the morning and 
 we'll start." 
 
 During the night about two inches of snow fell. The 
 morning was still and clear, and the snow was soft and 
 dry. Garry carried the basket and axe, while I 
 shouldered the long spear up past schoolhouse and along 
 the railroad, which then came down to the lower ferry, 
 to the mill pond away up by the red mill. The snow 
 was blinding as we faced the morning sun, and it also 
 reflected every sound. The far-off crows seemed close 
 at hand, a little sapsucker pecking on a tree made a great 
 rapping, and we could hear what the men were saying 
 down at the mill. "Why is it so still after a fall of 
 snow?" I asked. 
 
 It's always that way after a snowstorm," he answered, 
 and I went along not entirely satisfied with his laconic 
 answer, but accepted his statement of fact. Some philos- 
 ophers give us equally lucid explanations and take a 
 whole volume to do it in. 
 
 "A week from now the ice will be too thick to spear 
 eels," he said, "and it would take half an hour to cut a 
 hole. It's just right now, nearly four inches, and no one 
 has been spearing here this year. Down yonder, in the 
 bend, is where they bed; the water is deep there." 
 
 All eels bed in the mud in cold weather, and an eel 
 spear for soft bottom has a stout central tine barbed on 
 both sides; then come flexible tines, about five on each 
 side, with barbs on the inside only. The tines are nearly 
 a foot in length, and radiate from the pole-stock in a 
 flat plane, which is some 10 inches wide at the lower end. 
 Rigged with a light pole, twenty feet or more long, the 
 mud is sounded in a regular manner in a circle of per- 
 
GARRETT VAN HOESEN. 129 
 
 haps thirty feet in diameter. When an eel is struck the 
 spear does not pierce it, but holds it by the spring of the 
 tines, which open and clasp it. It was soon apparent 
 why woolen mittens were an essential part of the outfit. 
 As they became wet they were warm, even with ice on 
 the outside of them, just as a boy's foot will be warm 
 after the first chill when his boot is full of ice water if 
 his stocking is of wool. But continual freezing to an 
 icy spear handle is hard on a mitten. 
 
 I watched Garry begin sounding under the hole and 
 then increase the circle until the spear handle was at an 
 acute angle with the ice, throwing the spear strongly into 
 the mud and then withdrawing it. He brought up 
 sticks, brush and an occasional eel, which soon stiffened 
 on the snow. "How can you tell whether it's an eel or a 
 stick?" 
 
 "That's easy enough; try it." 
 
 He chopped me a new hole and I made a thrust. 
 "Harder," said he; "shove it hard or the barbs won't 
 snap on 'em," and I sent the spear into the mud. An 
 eel? No, a stick! After landing several sticks some- 
 thing was struck that wiggled and sent little thrilling 
 pulsations up the staff, and then I knew all that is to be 
 known about spearing eels through the ice. It is not a 
 high class sport, but it gives a boy an excuse for an out- 
 ing in winter and is a healthful exercise. This thing of 
 exercise is better understood to-day than when I was 
 a boy, and men who go out with rod and gun are not 
 thought to be idle, good-for-nothing fellows, as they 
 were thought to be half a century ago. Not that I was 
 not an "idle, good-for-nothing fellow," who preferred a 
 day's shooting or fishing to a week's r confinement in 
 school, but I am speaking in a general way, excepting 
 "present company." 
 
130 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 About noon Garry flung the spear in the snow and 
 said: "I'm hungry; what do you say?" 
 
 Now that the matter was mentioned, there did seem 
 to be something lacking, and without giving it that pro- 
 found consideration which Garry gave to questions, I 
 answered him in his own simple style: "So'm I." All 
 the morning I had been as silent as he; in fact, when a 
 fellow gets shut up with such short answers as are here 
 recorded there is nothing for him to do but to shut up. 
 But how I did want to talk about the habits of eels, what 
 they found to eat in the mud and other things. Away 
 up the pond, a quarter of a mile away, a man was chop- 
 ping wood. The sound of his stroke did not reach us 
 until his axe was raised again. I asked father about this 
 when I got home, but I did not intrude the question on 
 Garry. He did not then encourage talk. 
 
 We went ashore by a spring and made a fire. Garry 
 opened the basket and brought out bread, butter and 
 sausages. Just how he could cook the last was a mys- 
 tery, and they could not be eaten raw. Bolognas were 
 unknown then, as this was before the German invasion 
 and the era of limburger, schweizerkase, bolognas, 
 pretzels and lager beer. I gathered dry fire wood and 
 watched. He dragged two longs limbs and rested one 
 end of each upon a low stump. This was table and 
 chairs. Then he took birch twigs and ran them length- 
 wise through the sausages and stuck them up before the 
 fire. The ground being frozen, he held them nearly 
 erect by pieces of wood, and there they fried in their 
 own fat, the birch twigs imparting no bad flavor. A tin 
 cup of water from the spring served for both, and if a 
 hungry boy astride a branch of a tree with a big birch 
 chip for a plate did not do full justice to his appetite then 
 he never did. 
 
GARRETT VAN HOESEN. 131 
 
 Many a dinner did I eat after that one, but this was 
 so exceptionally good that it stands out in bold relief. 
 During weary months in military prisons the odor of 
 those sausages came in hungry dreams. The white 
 bread from Jonas Whiting's bakery and the butter from 
 Dennison's farm were often remembered in days when 
 such remembrance was more substantial than anything 
 in sight. 
 
 That dinner is memorable for another thing. It 
 opened up a human mind. John Atwood had said: 
 "Garry Van Hooser never talks because he doesn't know 
 anything to talk about. He just knows enough to weigh 
 a pound of tea and say, 'Yes'm, fifty cents.' ' When I 
 told John a little of this trip he was incredulous. The 
 eels were in evidence, however; he couldn't deny them. 
 
 After we had destroyed the dinner and Garry had 
 lighted his pipe, he remarked between puffs: "When 
 spring comes we will go down in the dead creek and 
 shoot ducks. I often go there alone, but have felt that 
 I wanted some one to be with me, some one to talk to 
 at times. I went down there once with John Atwood, 
 but he talked all the time and scared the ducks away. 
 Now you don't break in when a man is thinking, and 
 we've had a good time. I don't know what you were 
 thinking about when we were spearing, but I thought 
 that if it is true that this world is round and turns over 
 every day, how is it that the water does not spill out of 
 the holes we cut in the ice, and why the weight of the 
 trees does not pull 'em out of the ground when they're 
 upside down. I don't say that I don't believe it, but I 
 can't understand it; and men that know more than I 
 seem to believe it, but they can't tell just how it is. I 
 never had much schooling, and this thing has bothered 
 me for years. It keeps me awake nights and bothers me 
 
132 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 daytimes. If I ask about it they make fun of me. Now 
 you've had a good education and I want to know what 
 you think about this thing, and if you don't know how it is 
 don't tell that I asked about it; for there's a lot o' fools 
 that don't know the first thing about this business, and 
 don't care, that are always ready to make fun of a fellow 
 who does want to know." 
 
 This was the longest speech that I had ever heard 
 Garry make up to that time. I explained the rotation of 
 the earth as well as I understood it, and afterward gave 
 him what literature bearing on the subject I could find, 
 and his reserve was thrown off. He was a different man 
 to me, and I soon liked his simple, honest ways, his stu- 
 dious mode of looking into things and his philosophical 
 conclusions. Every man's mind is a study, a curiosity, 
 if you will, if you have time and inclination to look into 
 it. It is curious because it differs from yours. 
 
 After his long speech, delivered between puffs on his 
 pipe, and my explanations, there was a period of silence. 
 Then he asked: "Did you ever trap any rabbits?" 
 
 "No; I've shot a few, but never trapped any. Why?" 
 
 "What time do your folks have breakfast?" 
 
 Without seeing any intimate connection between the 
 
 trapping of rabbits and the hour when our family broke 
 
 their fast, I replied: "In summer at seven and in winter 
 
 at eight. What's that got to do with catching rabbits?" 
 
 "I was thinking that you'd have time to tend the traps 
 
 if you could get up about six o'clock. Then you'd be 
 
 back in time to get breakfast and go to school. There's 
 
 lots o' rabbits up in the woods back o' the rye field, and 
 
 I've got six box traps in the old barn there. If you'll 
 
 see to 'em every morning we'll go over there now 
 
 and set the traps before we go home. What d' you 
 
 say?" 
 
GARRETT VAN HOESEN. 133 
 
 "Tell me all about it, and I'll do it. It must be heaps 
 o' fun. Come on." 
 
 We crossed over to the rye field a field as well 
 known to every boy as the ball ground, where no one 
 drove us off, but which had been a pasture since my 
 recollection and carried the traps into the woods. 
 Garry had got some sweet apples, and we set a trap here 
 and there where rabbit signs were thickest. 
 
 "When you come to a trap in the morning," said he, 
 "if it is still set you want to see that the bait is there and 
 the cord or the spindle is not frozen so that it can't work. 
 If it has been sprung you want to go slow and find out 
 what's in it. If it's a skunk he'll let you know when you 
 touch it with your boot, and then you want to tie a long 
 string to the cover and let him walk out. If it's a rabbit, 
 put in your hand and take it out." 
 
 "Won't it bite?" 
 
 "No, they never bite. The best way to kill them is 
 to hold their hindlegs in your left hand, and hit 'em with 
 a stick in the back of the neck." 
 
 "I don't believe I could do it. I can shoot one, but I 
 know I could never do that." 
 
 "Yes, you could; it's easy enough. But if you are 
 afraid to do it that way, take a bag, put the mouth of it 
 over the trap, dump them into it, and bring them down to 
 me." 
 
 That seemed the best way. I was not afraid to kill 
 a rabbit by shooting it Garry did not understand me 
 but the bag scheme let me out and it was settled in that 
 way. We went back to the mill pond, gathered our 
 basket of eels and went home. I promised to let Garry 
 know how many rabbits I had and to let him do the 
 killing. 
 
 Next morning I was up very early. There had been 
 
134 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 a light, drizzling rain during the night, and now there 
 was a hard crust on the snow which crunched under foot 
 and made a great noise. The first trap was approached 
 with a quickening pulse, and my heart was beating high 
 as it was neared. Alas! it was unsprung and the cord 
 was frozen fast. The crust* did not tell if the trap had 
 been visited, but the apple was untouched. All the traps 
 were in the same condition, but I fixed them so that they 
 would spring, and on the way home reported the facts to 
 Garry. 
 
 "You needn't have gone to them this morning," said 
 he, "for you might have known that a rabbit would not 
 go out and get all covered with ice in a rain like that one 
 last night." 
 
 I might have known, but with a head filled with the 
 excitement of a first visit to rabbit traps, with the ex- 
 pectation that at least one rabbit might be found in each, 
 I never thought that they might prefer dry hides to my 
 traps. 
 
 The next night was clear and crisp, and, oh, how cold 
 that morning was! The stars seemed to echo my tread 
 on the crackling crust as I trudged along. The first 
 trap was unsprung, and my faith in taking rabbits in box 
 traps was shaken. Old tracks, made before the crust 
 was formed, were abundant, and there was "sign" on the 
 crust where no tracks could be seen. Surely there were 
 rabbits there, if they could only be caught. These were 
 the thoughts when the second trap was sighted. It was 
 sprung! The rapid puffing of an early freight train on 
 the railroad below did not exceed the beating of my 
 heart. Cold as it was, a perspiration broke out all over 
 me. Pshaw! Perhaps the string had broken or the 
 trigger had slipped from the notch! 
 
 I stood for a moment like one in a dream. Could it 
 
 
GARRETT VAN HOESEN. 
 
 135 
 
 be that the trap actually held a rabbit? I went up to it 
 and kicked it lightly with my boot. There was no indi- 
 cation of an "essence peddler" in the air and I peeped in. 
 There was the game crouched in the far end. I let the 
 trap down, and for a few moments enjoyed my triumph. 
 I was a mighty trapper ! Me ! 
 
 This was long before the deer episode, and a rabbit 
 was the largest game that I aspired to. Heart never 
 beat faster over a first grizzly or bighorn than mine did 
 then. As I have said, I had shot an occasional rabbit; 
 but this early morning tramp over crusted snow seemed 
 somehow to make the event seem like the life of a real 
 woodsman. A great part of Greenbush was asleep, and 
 here was I in the forest with its largest game in my 
 power! 
 
 I carefully adjusted the bag over the trap and then 
 opened it. There was a thud in the bottom of the bag, 
 and then a glimpse of something gray and a sound of 
 "zip, zip," and if that was really a rabbit it was gone. 
 The unexpected had happened. That was all I knew, 
 and there was a period of depression such as always fol- 
 lows intoxication. After pulling my scattered senses to- 
 gether, I reset the trap and went on. The third trap ( 
 held a rabbit, and with the last failure in mind great care 
 was exercised in arranging the bag. No mistake this 
 time ! I knew how to hold him. I knew how, but some- 
 how the same thing happened again. The second time 
 the unexpected occurred, and some old philosopher has 
 said that this is the only thing that ever does occur. I 
 was despondent and demoralized, especially when the 
 next two traps were found empty. As the sixth and last 
 trap was sighted, the fact that it was sprung started no 
 heart pumping. I was cooler now that I had seen just 
 where the last rabbit got out. The bag had been tight 
 
136 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 around the trap until the trap was opened; the top and 
 front end were nailed together, and the bag left a hole on 
 each side when the trap was opened. Twice was enough. 
 The mistake should not occur again. Remembering 
 what Garry had said about a rabbit not biting, I put in a 
 hand and brought the trembling animal out in some way, 
 either by the ears or the hindlegs; memory fails to recall 
 how, but it does bring back the pitiful cries that rang 
 through the woods. This troubled me, but I hardened 
 my heart and dropped the game in the bag, and started 
 for home with my prize, in triumph not unmixed with 
 other feelings. 
 
 With bag on shoulder I stopped at the foot of the hill 
 to drink the strong sulphur water of Harrowgate Spring, 
 of which Colonel Raymond and I were so fond in boy- 
 hood. Here the events of the morning were reviewed in 
 cold blood. Hardly two hours had passed, but the 
 crowded events made it seem ten times as long. The 
 little creature was still now, probably wondering what 
 would come next. After pondering for a while on the 
 escape of the two rabbits and taking another swig of 
 Harrowgate, the recollection of those pitiful cries came 
 up in full force. Then I seemed to realize that they 
 came from a poor, terrified and harmless thing that I was 
 taking to be killed without the excitement of the hunt. 
 I peeped into the bag. Two large eyes and a trembling 
 form were in the corner. Somehow the grip on the 
 mouth of the bag was loosened, the bottom was turned 
 up and a white lump of cotton in a field of gray went 
 bobbing off into the brush. 
 
 When I entered Tom Simmonds' store I said to 
 Garry: "Here's your bag; I haven't got any rabbits and 
 don't want any. I'll go up and spring the traps after 
 school; it's time for breakfast now." 
 
GARRETT VAN HOESEN. 137 
 
 It was months afterward before I told him the whole 
 story, and he said: "Well, I don't know as I'd like to kill 
 a rabbit if it cried like that. The fact is I built the traps 
 some two years ago, and after some such scrape as yours 
 I left them in the barn. Some boys like to trap rabbits, 
 but I don't care anything about it; I only thought you 
 might like it." 
 
 I am not so chicken-hearted as this story makes me 
 out. I have been a trapper for fur; will tell you about 
 this later, and I never had the slightest feeling of pity for 
 a bloodthirsty mink, marten or other animal of that class. 
 I have killed them in steel traps, found them frozen to 
 death in them, and have seen where they left a leg be- 
 hind, and never felt more pity for these merciless brutes 
 than I do for an oyster when I eat it alive. Somehow 
 the very helplessness of a rabbit appeals to a fellow, and 
 its plaintive cries I give it up! I let that rabbit go 
 that morning by the waters of Harrowgate, and that is 
 all there is of it. I have tried to make a story of it and 
 failed. 
 
 Once or twice after the eel spearing scrape Garry 
 asked me to fish with him, and the other boys wondered 
 at it. Some years later we shot ducks, yellow-legs and 
 rail along the dead creek, an inlet on the island below 
 Douw's Point, and above the hilly dwelling of "der Yaw- 
 cum Stawts wot lives on de Hokleberic."* 
 
 This creek is now filled up, and is known no more 
 except as a low, marshy spot. We had a good day once ; 
 two mallards, a wood duck and some half a dozen rail. 
 A very good day it was, for ducks were wild and not 
 
 *This is a phonetic spelling, as the Albany Dutch spoke it when they 
 referred to Joachim Staats, who lived on the Hogleberg, or "hog's hack," 
 the only hill on the island, just hack of the landing known as Staats' 
 dock. 
 
138 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 plenty, when Garry crawled up to a flock and got three. 
 Coody retrieved them, but unfortunately they proved to 
 be tame ducks, and the owner came down on Garry. I 
 was below and kept still, hoping for a shot if anything 
 came my way. After waiting a while a mud hen got up 
 below me, flying low, and I shot. I missed the mud hen, 
 but hit Garry in the back of the leg, and he promptly 
 yelled. He had paid the man for his ducks and then 
 went around back of me, hidden by the brush, and was 
 just in time to intercept a few shot that the mud hen 
 failed to get because of its haste. The shots, some half 
 a dozen, were only under the skin in the calf of his leg, 
 and I had no trouble in taking them out with a pocket 
 knife. 
 
 Said Garry: "It's lucky that I was below the bird, or 
 your lead would have gone in deeper." 
 
 "What were you doing down below me and how did 
 you get there? I didn't see you. I thought you were 
 up above squaring it with the man for his tame ducks. I 
 suppose he wanted twice what they were worth." 
 
 "No," said Garry, "he won't charge much; he trades 
 with us, and will bring me the ducks and settle to-mor- 
 row. I wouldn't like to take up a lot of tame ducks; 
 the boys would laugh. Now, see here! If you promise 
 never to tell that I shot into a flock of tame ducks I'll 
 give you my word that I won't say a word about your 
 shooting me in the leg. Is it a go?" 
 
 "It's a go!" Garry is dead and it's a long time ago. 
 As both stories are told now for the first time, I don't see 
 that any harm is done to him. Neither of us meant to 
 do it, and after all the intention, in a shooting case, is 
 always carefully considered by a jury. 
 
 Garry was short and stout, wore his face without hair, 
 and his teeth were stained by tobacco. I should think 
 
GARRETT VAN HOESEN. 139 
 
 he might have been born about 1825, but while I knew 
 of his death and attended his funeral, I have pressed 
 every button in memory for an approximate date, but the 
 wires seem to be crossed. Mr. Garrett M. Van Olinda 
 thinks he died in 1861, and that seems likely. 
 
 I only know that he married about three weeks before 
 he died. It was like this: I was in Greenbush one day 
 and he invited me into the back room. 
 
 "I want your advice," said he, "and I ask it because I 
 am only a raw countryman and you have more knowl- 
 edge of the world than I have." 
 
 This almost took my breath. If he was contem- 
 plating the opening of a grocery in opposition to Tom 
 Simmonds and Mat Miller it was useless to consult one 
 like me, whose only object in life so far had been to get 
 what fun he could out of it, and whose knowledge of 
 business was nil. Of course I did not formulate all this 
 then I was merely surprised and asked: "What's up, 
 Garry?" 
 
 He thought a moment and then said: "I am thinking 
 about getting married, and am in doubt whether it is the 
 best thing to do or not. What do you think?" 
 
 If memory reflects my mind at that time, I did not 
 think. Here was a man who was shy of men and boys, 
 one whose business compelled him to talk to women and 
 girls, but whose shyness cut the conversation to the 
 strictest business limits. I was astounded. Pulling my 
 scattered wits together, I said: "Why, Garry, I never 
 heard of your keeping company with a girl; who is she?" 
 
 He told me, but it was no one that I had ever heard 
 of. Said he: "She is the nicest girl I ever saw, and she 
 conies to the store every day and I can talk to her by the 
 hour. She is not a bit like the other girls that come in. 
 I wish you could see her." 
 
140 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 That settled the marriage question. Of course, I 
 had nothing to say, and he didn't expect I would have, 
 but he was compelled to confide his secret to a human 
 being of some kind, and the one before him served his 
 purpose. 
 
 In after years whenever a box trap was stumbled on 
 in the woods it brought up the picture of Garry Van 
 Hoesen, the shy, sensitive fellow who longed for human 
 sympathy, but from a lack of aggressiveness or an ex- 
 cess of diffidence, self-consciousness or whatever you 
 please to call it, seemed lonesome in this great bustling 
 world. If I'd brought him that rabbit he would not 
 have killed it. 
 
 In after years I fished with men of all conditions in 
 life, men of high character and men of no character 
 worth mentioning, men of education and intelligence 
 and those who had neither, but among them all I have a 
 warm spot in my memory for simple, honest Garry Van 
 Hoesen. 
 
STEPHEN MARTIN. 
 
 TRAP AND RIFLE SHOOTING THE WAR CLOUD. 
 
 STEVE was a different sort of fellow from any of the 
 boys of whom I have written. He came into our 
 boyish set after we went across the river to live, 
 and I naturally dropped into Scott's occasionally by day, 
 but frequently in the evenings. W. J. & R. H. Scott 
 made, sold and repaired guns on Beaver street, between 
 Broadway and Green street, and after their rival poor 
 Steve Van Valkenburgh died, theirs was the only place 
 of the kind in Albany. Gunners of all kinds had busi- 
 ness there, and every evening a few could be found in 
 the salesroom discussing all kinds of questions pertain- 
 ing to guns, their proper loads and powers, as well as tell- 
 ing their personal experiences while trying to conceal 
 the exact location of a bit of snipe bog or partridge 
 cover. 
 
 We boys soon got acquainted it never takes boys 
 long to do that, especially if they have a common interest 
 in anything. Martin was one that dropped in there, and 
 as he was about the age of our party he went with us 
 on a fishing trip to Normanskill, a brook which rises 
 somewhere off toward the Helderbergs and enters the 
 Hudson a few miles below Albany. We called it the 
 Normanskill Creek in ignorance that "kill" was Dutch 
 for creek, and that the added word was a repetition, but 
 then what would you do with Kaaterskill, anglicized into 
 
 141 
 
142 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 Catskill as the name of a village, a range of mountains 
 and a stream? And then the word creek is used in New 
 York for a bayou or arm of a river which forms an island, 
 like the Popscheny, and also for a brook or even rivers 
 like the East and West Canadas, which form the great 
 Mohawk. All this has nothing whatever to do with 
 Steve Martin, the subject now under the scalpel and 
 microscope. A cog slipped and some ink went astray 
 only this and nothing more. 
 
 The day was quite young when we reached the 
 stream near its mouth and some distance below the first 
 dam. , George Scott was going to try a new bait, and 
 had brought a lot of fresh-water mussels Unio "for," 
 said he, "if these things aren't good for bait, what good 
 are they? What do they have shells on 'em for if it is 
 not to keep the fish from eating 'em?" 
 
 "Lemme smell 'em," said Steve, and he took a sniff 
 and with a look of disgust said: "George, a fish couldn't 
 eat that thing; you can't eat it, and it's my opinion that 
 nothing will eat it. What do you think of it, Fred?" 
 
 "I dunno ; the only way to find out is to try 'em. Old 
 John Chase has used 'em for bait in his eel pots, and he 
 wouldn't fool his time with the things if they are no 
 good. I've seen him pick up a peck on the flats at low 
 tide. Hogs eat them, and Port Tyler said that some 
 kinds of wild ducks eat the little ones. I don't see why 
 they shouldn't be as good as clams or oysters; they live 
 like them." 
 
 "Oysters!" yelled Steve, "I'll bet you daren't taste 
 of one. Nobody eats them, and I believe they're 
 poison."" 
 
 "I'll eat one if you will." 
 
 "That's fair," said George Scott. 
 
 Pete Loeser remarked: "I dink Stefe he vas scart to 
 
STEPHEN MARTIN. 143 
 
 eat von of dose muschels, he don'd got some pepper- 
 sauce. Oh, Stefe, you vas scart und you pack oud!" 
 
 The question had assumed a personal form., and Steve 
 was getting warm. The reflection on his courage braced 
 him up, and after giving Pete a look which might have 
 meant that he would like to cut him up for fish bait, he 
 asked, "Where is the pepper and salt?" These things 
 put before him, he selected a mussel of medium size, 
 groped about until he found one to match it in size and 
 shape, and with one in each hand he offered me the 
 choice in the courtly manner that duellists are reported 
 to do upon the field of honor. My careless challenge 
 might have been passed by if only Martin and I had been 
 present, but the comment of Loeser settled it. A contest 
 was unavoidable. A choice was made, and each opened 
 his mollusk, salted and peppered it with deliberation. 
 Then, eye to eye, we raised the shells and took in the 
 contents. 
 
 Charley Scott, brother to George and the firm of gun- 
 smiths, watched the faces of the contestants closely, and 
 after the last morsel was swallowed by each said: "Well, 
 if mussels ain't good to eat, you fellows lie. I've been 
 a-waitin' to see one of you weaken on 'em, but you only 
 looked at each other as if you were chewin' oysters." 
 
 The truth is that we afterward acknowledged to each 
 other that fresh-water mussels might be good for fish 
 bait, but we had no very great desire to eat any more. 
 There is a remembrance of a combination of toughness, 
 sweetness and sliminess which did not provoke an appe- 
 tite for more. We put on a bold front and challenged 
 the other boys to try them. Martin even went so far as 
 to say that they were as good as oysters. This state- 
 ment was received with some doubt, and Charley Scott 
 suggested that if Steve thought so he could save money 
 
14:4: MEN / HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 by using them in place of the salt-water product. George 
 offered to eat one if we would each eat another, but the 
 German was mean enough to ask : "Oof Stefe dinks dose 
 dings was so goot we oysders, vy don'd he ede 'em some 
 more?" A yell turned the conversation; George had 
 thrown his line back in the wrong direction, and the hook 
 took Loeser in the ear, and tore a hole big enough to let 
 it be taken out easily. Years afterward, at a dinner of 
 the Ichthyophagous Club, we had a bisque or some other 
 preparation of Unios fixed up by the chef of one of New 
 York's crack hotels, and I tasted it, with a thought run- 
 ning back to an early day on the Normanskill. After 
 tasting it I looked around to see how the rest enjoyed 
 it. Frank Endicott made a show of taking frequent 
 spoonfuls, but his plate seemed as full as ever. Mr. E. 
 G. Blackford tasted it and said: "That is very fine," but 
 somehow let it go at that; and when the waiter removed 
 his plate you could not miss what had been eaten. No 
 doubt the mussels are good, but you've got to learn to 
 like 'em. I never persevered in this direction. As bait 
 that day they took a few fish, but the verdict of the boys 
 was that they preferred the old reliable angle worm. 
 
 Down in the lower end of Albany is a portion called 
 Bethlehem, and on the river road was the Abbey, a noted 
 road-house a couple of miles below the city. An Eng- 
 lish sportsman named Kenneth King lived in Bethlehem, 
 and the Abbey was kept by another English shooting 
 man named Sheldrick, who got up pigeon shoots, and 
 we boys used to attend them. At these affairs we used 
 to make matches to shoot at ten birds each, the loser to 
 pay for and the winner to have them. One day after 
 the shooting was done Martin said to me: "We are not 
 going to shoot any more because there are not enough 
 pigeons for a match, but as your gun is loaded and there 
 

 STEPHEN MARTIN. 
 
STEPHEN MARTIN. 145 
 
 are a few pigeons left,, I'll shoot you a match of two each. 
 We want to shoot off our guns, any way. What d'ye 
 say?" 
 
 I had left my gun standing in the corner while I had 
 gone on the front porch for something, and had just re- 
 turned when Steve made this proposal. "All right/' said . 
 I, "we might as well shoot at a couple more and empty 
 our guns before going home." He picked up his gun, 
 and as I reached for mine Ken King quickly passed me 
 his and with a wink said: "Take mine." 
 
 Without thought I went to the score after Steve had 
 killed one of his birds and missed the other, and killed 
 both of mine. The boys laughed, and Steve looked sur- 
 prised as I hastily walked back and put up King's 
 gun. While they were talking things over outside King 1 
 asked me: "Do you know why I gave you my gun to 
 shoot?" 
 
 "No, but you gave me a wink and I asked no ques- 
 tions. Why did you do it?" 
 
 "When you went out on the front porch Steve drew 
 the wads and took the shot out of both barrels of your 
 gun. See the joke? They're talking about it now." 
 
 I went out and took my three birds; Steve paid for 
 four and merely remarked: "Well, you beat me this 
 time ; we'll have to try it over again next Saturday." 
 
 As we got ready to start I stepped back and shot off 
 both barrels, and Steve asked: "What gun did you kill 
 the pigeons with? I thought it was your own." 
 
 "No, I used Ken King's to see how it shoots, as we 
 may want to trade. It shot very well; couldn't have 
 done better. When I shot off my gun just now it made 
 a light report; perhaps I forgot to put shot in it." 
 
 Steve made no reply, but Pete Loeser said: "I kess, 
 Stefe, he dinks dere vas no shot dere; hey, Stefe?" 
 
146 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 The laugh was on Stephen, and the boys guyed him 
 so that he had to own up, but after that event we each 
 kept our guns in sight at pigeon matches. 
 
 It was after this that I bought the pointer Nell from 
 Ken King, the one referred to in former sketches, and 
 King showed us the woodcock grounds on the Albany 
 side of the river, and we shot with him over his dogs and 
 Nell. Sometimes when he was not with us we consulted 
 Mrs. Sheldrick, who was well posted on these matters, 
 and far more communicative than her husband. In her 
 vocabulary "birds" meant woodcock only; all others 
 were spoken of by name. For instance, she would say: 
 "Well, boys, you won't find many birds in the swamps 
 this morning; you might get an odd one up in the corn- 
 field after the rain last night, but you can find plenty o' 
 pigeons in yon wood, an' mebbe some plover on the hill 
 or a few yellow-legs along shore. But birds '11 be scarce 
 to-day." 
 
 Steve was wonderfully good on woodcock, and usual- 
 ly beat us all in bringing down that bird of erratic flight. 
 He used a short gun of twelve-gauge. Just how short 
 the barrels were is more than I would like to say now 
 perhaps twenty inches while my gun was an extra long 
 one of twelve inches more. I once saw him drop five 
 "birds" in succession in a swampy thicket where this 
 swift, dazzling bird would drop out of sight within 
 twenty yards, and this was not an exceptional case. 
 Those who have shot this quick, zigzagging bird in close 
 thickets are the only ones who know just how quick and 
 unruffled a shooter has to be to get a fair proportion of 
 the birds he flushes. They had all learned from Ken 
 King the lesson which I had been taught by Port Tyler 
 in former years, to use small shot in small quantity, with 
 a very light charge of powder, for this kind of shooting 
 
STEPHEN MARTIN. 147 
 
 at close quarters, in order not to mutilate this royal game 
 bird. 
 
 Steve went with us on several fishing trips, but never 
 in the open season for game; fishing amused him when 
 there was nothing else to do; it was fun, but hardly sport 
 to him. He cared little for camping out, or for the fields 
 and streams outside of the fact that game abounded in 
 one and fish in the other; hence I said at the beginning 
 of this article that he differed from any of those of whom 
 I have written. He was impatient of any delay, and 
 eager to be stirring; hence some of the ingredients of a 
 good fisherman had been left out of his mental make-up. 
 
 In the early '50*5 there was an epidemic of rifle shoot- 
 ing in the State of New York. Not shooting at game 
 that is one of our steady and never-decreasing infirmities ; 
 but this prevalent disorder took the form of long-dis- 
 tance target shooting. Heavy rifles were shot on bench 
 rests at six hundred yards, mainly in winter on the ice 
 below the city. They had "patent muzzles," a detached 
 piece with pins to set over the true muzzle while seating 
 the bullet in order to leave the muzzle perfectly square, 
 the enlargement necessary to start the bullet in the way 
 it should go being entirely in the false muzzle. These 
 guns were all hand-made. If there were machine-made 
 rifles in those days I never heard of them. All rifles were 
 hand-made. Soldiers did not use them; their muskets 
 were smooth-bores, and it was believed that rifling was a 
 principle that would work well up to a certain calibre, 
 but was only practicable for guns which were shot from 
 the shoulder. For field pieces which threw a six-pound 
 shot it was believed to be useless, because it was thought 
 that the weight of the projectile would prevent it from 
 following the twisted groove. To-day they rifle not 
 only the largest cannon, but even mortars. In the '6o's 
 
148 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 I handled rifled guns up to those known as one hundred- 
 pound "Parrots/' but now such a gun is only a toy, and 
 our ten-inch seacoast mortars with their smooth bores 
 are obsolete. This digression is not for the benefit of 
 the old fellows who know all this, but is intended for the 
 boys of to-day who have the cartridges for their breech- 
 loading shotguns filled for them before they go afield, 
 and whose machine-made magazine rifles are wonderful 
 pieces of mechanism. Remember, boys, in my shooting 
 days we went afield with powder flask on one shoulder, 
 shot pouch on the other, cap box and either cut wads or 
 newspapers for wadding in the pockets. If we shot the 
 rifle we moulded our own bullets, measured our powder 
 and carried greased linen patches to envelop the bullet, 
 a ramrod and box of caps. Such a thing as buying pre- 
 pared ammunition was not dreamed of. 
 
 There was a little squad of rifle shooters from both 
 sides of the river which met in contests on the ice. There 
 was Billy Wish, the ferryboat engineer; William Tall- 
 man, Sr., a machinist; Steve Martin, and John Clark, a 
 printer, who, in spite of having but little color in his eyes, 
 was the best shot of all. It has been said that gray-eyed 
 men make the best rifle shots, but Clark's eyes were 
 lighter than gray. 
 
 The shooting was counted by string measure, and 
 the targets were displayed nightly at Scott's. Such dis- 
 cussions over the wind in explanation of a bad shot, and 
 such arguments over the merits of rifle makers, would 
 fill volumes of Forest and Stream. The merits of Lewis 
 and James as makers of rifles was the main point. One 
 lived in Troy and the other in Syracuse, and they were 
 always going to shoot a match with rifles of their own 
 makes, but like some gladiators of to-day it ended in talk. 
 Billinghurst, of Rochester, was another famous maker; 
 
STEPHEN MARTIN. 149 
 
 I remember him because he made the first open reel for 
 fishermen. Scott made a rifle for Martin, and he in- 
 duced me to join the shooting and use his gun. There 
 was no betting, just pure sport, and I tried it. The rifle 
 was sighted long and deliberately, then a rest of the eye 
 and it was gone over again until the shooter had it as fine 
 as he knew how. Then the flags were watched, with 
 the eyes off the rifle, until the long strings of muslin 
 hanging from the poles placed at intervals showed the 
 wind to be right, and the hair trigger was touched. 
 
 I never made much of a shooter of this kind ; my eyes 
 blurred at one hundred yards then and they do at twenty 
 feet to-day, although I read and write without glasses at 
 sixty-three. Black-eyed Steve Martin was a fair shot, 
 but that did not satisfy him ; he always had an excuse for 
 not being first the powder was not as good, the patch 
 was too thick or too thin, a puff of wind came just as he 
 pulled the trigger, etc. 
 
 Pete Loeser once said: "Stefe he shoot pooty goot, 
 but never so besser as he can ; dere vas alvays sometings 
 dot spile his string. Oof dot clout had not come der sun 
 between ven he make der sixt shot he peat Shon Glark 
 all hollow. I dink he makes besser string in te efening 
 by Scott's stofe, by shimminy!" 
 
 To this George Scott replied: "Pete, if you could 
 make half as good a score as Steve you might be proud. 
 There are his targets, look at 'em; they show a splendid 
 average, and one hard to beat. It's not a good one for 
 two or three days and then a durned bad one, but a 
 steady, good lot of shooting day by day." 
 
 "Dot's all ride," said Pete; "but he alvays got some 
 oxcuse for de one shot wot makes de oder nine figger 
 oop big on de averich." 
 
 Just then Steve came in and George said : "Steve, you 
 
150 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 are just in time. Pete says you can't hit a pancake if it's 
 tied over the muzzle of your gun." 
 
 "That may be so, but I'll tell you what I'll do, Pete. 
 If you'll stand one thousand yards down on the ice and 
 let me shoot a pipe out of your mouth, I'll buy you a 
 new hat if I don't break the pipe." 
 
 Another way in which Steve Martin differed from my 
 other fishing companions was that he was a practical 
 joker. Now, fun is one thing and "practical joking" is 
 another. In the mind of the p. j. they are the same thing, 
 but no other human being agrees with him because the 
 fun is all on his side, and the misery of others is his joy. 
 Therefore he is a selfish mortal and that settles him. We 
 were once rowing round Douw's Point against a stiff 
 current, just all that two pairs of oars could do to make 
 a bit of way at the extreme point. The scow had a 
 plugged hole in the bottom to let out water without tip- 
 ping her over when beached. As we were near the 
 shore Steve said: "I guess I'll lighten the boat," and 
 jumped ashore, taking the plug with him. The water 
 was up and wet our feet before we noticed it, and we 
 were only saved from a ducking by promptly beaching 
 the little scow. The author of the mischief was up the 
 bank and off. A new plug was whittled out and we 
 went our way scolding, not so much at what had hap- 
 pened as at what might have occurred. 
 
 Of course he was forgiven, although he never asked 
 to be, but for a time he was made to feel that his fun 
 was not appreciated by the boys that were in the boat. 
 We often shot together over Nell at woodcock, snipe, 
 golden plover and shore birds. He sometimes took her 
 out alone, and when I learned that he was trying to make 
 her retrieve I protested. Steve insisted that a pointer 
 could be taught to retrieve as well as a setter, and in- 
 
STEPHEN MARTIN. 151 
 
 stanced one that we both knew, but I still objected. She 
 was lost for about a month before I went West in '54, but 
 Steve found her after I had gone, and so she came into 
 possession of my father, as mentioned in a former sketch. 
 
 When I returned, over five years later, my old chums 
 were looked up. Steve had grown into a strong man, 
 Pete Loeser had gone West, George Scott had acciden- 
 tally killed himself while pulling a loaded gun from a 
 bed, and quite a number of changes had taken place. I 
 did but little at fishing or shooting for a year, and then 
 the war broke out. Some time in July, 1861, Steve told 
 me about the scheme of Colonel Hiram Berdan to recruit 
 a company of sharpshooters, every man of which must be 
 able to make a string of ten shots at a certain distance 
 whose united measurements from the centre of the target 
 should not exceed a certain number of inches. I forget 
 the figures, but they were not in excess of the scores 
 usually made by the riflemen on the ice. 
 
 "Now," said Steve, "you can pass this test; it is not a 
 severe one merely intended to get men who are fair 
 shots, and know how to use and care for a rifle. After 
 enlistment and muster every man will be given the rank 
 and pay of a second lieutenant, and will have a darkey to 
 carry his rifle and equipments. I've heard you say you'd 
 like to go, and here is your chance. I'll go if you will." 
 
 "Steve," said I, "there is much doubt if my score 
 would pass ; you know that I do not see well at a distance, 
 and besides this my family affairs forbid my going. 
 That's a queer story about the enlisted men ranking as 
 commissioned officers; where did you get that?" 
 
 "Why, that's the arrangement between Colonel Ber- 
 dan and the War Department; the men will all be com- 
 missioned after they are mustered into the United States 
 service ; at least that is what they tell me." 
 
152 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 While it was out of the question for me to think of 
 going at that time, and as there was then no doubt but 
 the trouble would be all over in a few months and my 
 services would not be needed, still this story of the rank 
 of enlisted men seemed strange. I knew little of mili- 
 tary matters, but I had friends who were well posted. I 
 met Colonel Michael K. Bryan, of the Twenty-fifth State 
 Militia, afterward Colonel One Hundred and Seventy- 
 fifth New York Volunteers, who was killed at Port Hud- 
 son on June 14, 1863, and sez I to Colonel Mike, sez I: 
 "Colonel Bryan, our friend, Steve Martin, tells me that 
 in the regiment of sharpshooters which Colonel Berdan 
 is raising every enlisted man will be a second lieutenant 
 after his muster into the United States service. How is 
 this?" 
 
 "Steve proposed to you to enlist?" 
 
 "Yes; said he would if I would." 
 
 Then Colonel Mike sez he to me, sez he: "That's a 
 beautiful bit of gossamer from Steve's workshop, spun 
 to catch such green bottles as you. A regiment of sec- 
 ond lieutenants! I suppose the corporals must be cap- 
 tains and the sergeants field officers, and just how they 
 would find rank enough for the drum major only Steve 
 could tell. Did he tell you that he had authority to raise 
 a company for this regiment and already had his com- 
 mission as captain?" 
 
 "No, that's all news to me. Is it so?" 
 
 "Yes, he has the company partly filled and his com- 
 mission has been issued." 
 
 "Thank you very much, Colonel; I think I under- 
 stand the situation now. Good morning." 
 
 This was some time in late July, and I talked with 
 Steve often and he appeared anxious to enlist if I would. 
 Nearly six years among men who were simple in their 
 
STEPHEN MARTIN. 153 
 
 ways had shown its effect. I was very green! The fact 
 was painfully evident, and after a month or more of lis- 
 tening to Steve and doing a little thinking, I said: "I 
 heard yesterday that the Governor had given you a cap- 
 tain's commission in Berdan's sharpshooters." 
 
 "Yes, I got it last week. You see, I had been at 
 work for the regiment because I was bound to go out 
 with it, and my friends told this to the Governor, and he 
 said that I deserved a captaincy and issued the commis- 
 sion at once. Now I'm in a position to make you a 
 definite proposition. The other company officers have 
 not been appointed, and will not be until the company 
 is full, and if you will enlist with me I will have you ap- 
 pointed first lieutenant before we leave the State." 
 
 "Thank you very much, Steve, old boy! I'll think it 
 over. Somehow it doesn't seem much to be a first lieu- 
 tenant in a regiment wholly composed of second lieuten- 
 ants; but you know that I know nothing of these things, 
 and if I should decide to go with you of course I trust all 
 this detail to you as an old chum, for I am ignorant of 
 all that pertains to soldiering." 
 
 "Very well! If you will go with me I'll fix you all 
 right and look after your interests as I would my own. 
 That story about the privates being all second lieuten- 
 ants is not true; it came from some fellow in the Ad- 
 jutant-General's office, but that's all right between us. 
 I'll fix it right for you." 
 
 I went home that night and in a dream John Atwood 
 and I were snaring suckers with a fine copper wire on the 
 end of a pole. We were landing them bravely for a 
 while, and then things got into one of those queer mix- 
 tures that dreams are only capable of and which never 
 untangle. John Atwood disappeared and Steve Martin 
 stood where he had been, and as he lifted an unusually 
 
154: MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 large sucker to the bank I felt that I was being choked 
 and awoke. 
 
 The rush of awakening thoughts brought Longfel- 
 low's lines: 
 
 " 'Twas but a dream; let it pass, let it vanish like so many others! 
 What I thought was a flower is only a weed, and is worthless." 
 
 And then the reply of Clarence to Brakenbury came 
 up: 
 
 "Oh! I have pass'd a miserable night, 
 So full of fearful dreams, of ugly sights, 
 That, as I am a Christian faithful man, 
 I would not spend another such a night, 
 Though 'twere to buy a world of happy days." 
 
 After this I never heard of Stephen. I looked for 
 him in the army, but never could find any who knew 
 him. When we lay in the trenches of Cold Harbor for 
 ten days within one hundred yards of the enemy a de- 
 tachment of Berdan's sharpshooters was our picket as 
 well as skirmish line, and as they could not leave their 
 pits in daytime and live, I used to ask after Steve when a 
 man came over to our works at night for rations or am- 
 munition, but none of them knew him. After the war 
 none of the boys seemed to know what "got" Steve. 
 Phisterer's "New York in the Rebellion," p. 517, says 
 of this regiment: "Company B, Captain Stephen Martin, 
 * * * was organized at Albany, and mustered into 
 the United States service for three years, November 29, 
 1 86 1." The official register of volunteer officers gives 
 his resignation as November 15, 1861. Therefore I am 
 not now surprised that I could not find him in the field, 
 when he resigned his commission fourteen days before 
 his company was mustered into the service. 
 
 Looking all this over in the light of riper years, I 
 
STEPHEN MARTIN. 155 
 
 have been impressed with the high-minded and honor- 
 able way in which John Atwood snared suckers. There 
 was no false pretence by John. He did not take the 
 sucker into his confidence. Not he! The loop was 
 lowered in plain sight, drifted down behind his gills in 
 broad daylight the pole jerked, and there is your fish. 
 
 As I recall the things which happened years ago I 
 have great respect for John's honest, straightforward 
 methods. 
 
GEORGE RAYNOR. 
 
 DUCK SHOOTING AND A TRAGEDY. 
 
 THE time came when school was left and business 
 began. The happy days were in the past. No 
 more Saturday holiday, and the grind of record- 
 ing shipping marks, weighing goods and signing re- 
 ceipts, when ducks were flying down the river and car- 
 loads of venison were coming in, was getting too much 
 to bear. In that vast and vague country called the West 
 there was freedom and game. Finding opposition 
 useless, father sent to Michigan for his rifle, the one that 
 William and Joe Brockway had used for years, and gave 
 it to me when I left. 
 
 Said he, "You may have this rifle, if you are bound 
 to go, and the only thing I ask of you is never to join 
 any expedition that goes out to murder poor Indians." 
 
 That was an easy thing to promise because there had 
 never been such a thought or desire. I was twenty-one 
 and bound for the great West, with no definite idea what 
 part of it would be best to go to or just what was to be 
 done when the journey ended. Pete Loeser, the Ger- 
 man boy mentioned in the last history, wanted to go to 
 some relatives in Wisconsin, and he went along. At 
 Chicago we could decide what would be best to do, and 
 there we stuck. 
 
 One day while fishing in the lake off the breakwater 
 an old gentleman of eighty years named George Raynor, 
 who had frequently fished with us, told me this story: 
 "At the massacre of Wyoming, in 1778, my old parents 
 
 156 
 
GEORGE RAYNOR. 157 
 
 were killed,, and I, a boy of about four years old, was 
 taken by the Seneca Indians and then sent to Canada by 
 a British officer, where I lived with a farmer until I ran 
 away and shipped on a vessel that went to England. 
 There I worked in a cutler's shop and learned the trade. 
 How many years passed I don't know, but the desire to 
 get back to America grew strong, and I went to Liver- 
 pool and shipped for New York. By this time I was 
 a young man, and I worked at my trade until I saved 
 money enough to try to seek my relatives, if I had any. 
 I remembered a sister, Susan, and a brother, John, both 
 older than I, and I longed to see them. I had forgotten 
 the name of the place where the massacre occurred, and 
 I did not know in what State it happened. There was 
 an indistinct recollection of an alarm at night, a hurrying 
 to arms, and the burning of buildings and killing of 
 people. I had kept a little picture book with my name 
 in it. One day a lady came in the New York shop, and 
 bought some cutlery to be shipped to some point in Lu- 
 zerne County, Pa. The name of the place seemed fa- 
 miliar, and I talked with her. She knew of my people, 
 and the result was that I went there and afterward mar- 
 ried her daughter That's what we call an eel-pout 
 
 that Pete's got. The fish is not eatable. Excuse me, 
 where was I? Oh, yes; we prospered, and all went well 
 until our eldest boy was killed in the Mexican war and 
 our daughter was burned to death in a fire that destroyed 
 my business a year later, and with my wife and only boy 
 I left New York for this place in 1848. In a railroad 
 accident my wife was killed and injuries about my head 
 hurt my eyes, so that it was uphill work to make a liv- 
 ing until my boy William helped out by singing in the 
 church choir. Now that I am nearly blind he is my sole 
 support. You've heard his wonderful tenor voice in 
 
158 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 Warner's Hall, on Randolph street, where he now sings 
 with 'Northrup's Metropolitan Minstrels/ " 
 
 During this tale the fish had taken my bait unnoticed, 
 although Pete had attended to business and taken several 
 fish. The story as told by the old man had made me 
 wish he would stop, for there was no fun in the way he 
 told it, and it had started a leak in my eyes. But down the 
 breakwater an old one, not in existence now came the 
 sprightly young tenor, who put his arms around the old 
 man's neck and kissed him, saying: "Well, father, what 
 luck to-day?" 
 
 "Billy," said the old man, "I fear I have not fish 
 enough for breakfast; I have been telling your friend the 
 family history because he seemed to take an interest in it, 
 and I forgot to put my line out. Here is the hook and 
 the bait by my side now. My old eyes do not see well 
 enough to tell if a hook is baited or not, and certainly 
 cannot see if the line is in the water or is coiled up at my 
 feet. Now, Fred, don't you honestly think that an old 
 man who has lived his life and can't see " 
 
 "Here, father, stop that. You must meet the in- 
 firmities of age and accident in a philosophical manner. 
 I can and will care for you while I have life and strength, 
 and I don't want to hear any more of that talk." 
 
 The young man baited his father's line and we fished 
 on. This eel-pout, as he called it, was a new fish to me 
 then, and its long, flattened head and eel-like fins made 
 it an object to be remembered. This specimen was 
 twenty inches long. Pete said: "Py chimminy! he's cot 
 a whisker on his chin, so like a pullhead, on'y de pullhead 
 he cot fife oder six." And this was a wonder to us, for 
 there were no fish with barbels where we had fished ex- 
 cept the bullhead or catfish. We found the fish quite 
 common in the lake. In other parts it is called "lawyer," 
 
GBORGE RAY NOR. 159 
 
 "ling/* and has several names besides that of Lota, which 
 the scientists have taught us to believe is its true name- 
 Twirling the sinkers vertically, and letting go at the 
 proper time, we cast our bait as far as possible from the 
 breakwater and hauled in hand under hand, and a good- 
 sized pike perch or a big eel-pout made quite a fight at 
 the end of a long line. Even the common yellow perch 
 ran larger than we were accustomed to see them, and we 
 green Eastern boys voted it the finest fishing we ever 
 had. 
 
 Mr. Raynor told me that there was very good fishing 
 in the South Branch of the Chicago River near where he 
 lived on Van Beuren street. Those who only know the 
 Chicago River as it is now may doubt this statement, for 
 in its black and ill-smelling water a self-respecting mud 
 turtle would decline to live. Yet I ask to be believed 
 when I say that many good fish were taken from the 
 docks in the South Branch by myself and others forty- 
 four years ago. As a rule, the fish were not as large 
 as those taken in the lake, and just what kinds they were 
 is partly forgotten, but yellow perch were plenty, and so 
 were small dogfish Amia. These latter even the om- 
 nivorous Pete could not eat, although he pronounced the 
 eel-pout "Pooty goot." 
 
 The old gentleman was greatly pleased when I called 
 at his house for him to go and fish. He said : "It is very 
 good of you to come for me; very few care to bother 
 with a man when he is no longer young and is nearly 
 blind. I often think I've stayed here too long, and only 
 for Billy " 
 
 I interrupted with: "Yes, Billy is a good boy, one in 
 a thousand, and you may be proud of such a devoted 
 son." Then he was led from that depressing line of 
 thought by a story of a deer hunt in northern New York, 
 
160 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 and of jolly times in camp with Port Tyler, until he forgot 
 his infirmities and told stories of fishing in salt water and 
 of shooting bay birds on Long Island, which were un- 
 known sports to me. He became enthusiastic and final- 
 ly said: "I'll sing you a hunting song which I learned in 
 England/' and after crooning for the key sang in a rich 
 baritone, a little shaky with age, the following, which I 
 never heard before nor since: 
 
 Some love to roam over the dark sea's foam, 
 
 Where the shrill wind whistles free. 
 But a chosen band, in a mountain land, 
 
 Oh, a life in the woods for me. 
 The deer we mark thro' the forest dark, 
 
 And the prowling wolf we track, 
 Our right good cheer is the wild boar, here; 
 
 Then why should the hunter lack? 
 
 Billy Raynor, the exquisite tenor, came honestly by 
 his voice, that was certain, and I induced the old gentle- 
 man to sing it until both words and tune are as familiar 
 to-day as then. A tolerably musical ear told me long 
 ago that if I ever attempted to sing the police would pull 
 the house on the suspicion that there was a dog fight in 
 the back room, and therefore whenever asked if I can 
 sing I quote the Hon. Bardwell Slote and reply: "Those 
 who have heard me say I can't." But in my house is a 
 young lady and a piano, and on the wall of my den hangs 
 a banjo of the vintage of 1860, and its strings seem to 
 have treasured up the air of that hunting song so that the 
 piano sympathizes with it, and the young lady sings the 
 words occasionally to the accompaniment of the afore- 
 said implement of torture. There was a sort of "yo, ho" 
 chorus which is forgotten. The second verse ran: 
 
GEORGE RAYNOR. 161 
 
 When the morning gleams o'er the mountain streams 
 
 Then merrily forth we go, 
 To follow the stag o'er the slippery crag 
 
 And chase the bounding doe. 
 For with steady aim at the bounding game, 
 
 And a heart that fears no foe; 
 Thro' the darksome glade in the forest shade, 
 
 Oh, merrily forth we go! 
 
 The little we know of it serves to bring up the mem- 
 ory of the dear old singer who sang it amid the unpoetic 
 surroundings of the Chicago River one day when his 
 poor heart was lighter than usual. 
 
 One day he said: "Billy is going to have a week off, 
 the hall is to be renovated, and he will spend his vacation 
 down at Kankakee shooting ducks, and last night he 
 said that he would like to have you go with him if you 
 could get off. Poor boy! he needs a week off if anyone 
 does; working in the office of the grain warehouse all 
 day and singing at the minstrels six nights and in the 
 church choir twice on Sundays keeps him so busy that he 
 never has an hour to himself. Only for me he would not 
 have to work so hard, and I sometimes think " 
 
 "Now see here, Mr. Raynor, this is only an idle fancy 
 of yours. Billy is a busy boy, to be sure, but he likes it, 
 and his main delight is to see you happy. You are not a 
 burden to him, but it is his pleasure to see you made com- 
 fortable. He has no bad or expensive habits, and I 
 know that his first thought is about you. Drop the idea 
 that he would be better off without you. I believe that I 
 know him better than you do." 
 
 "It seems good to hear you say so," said he, "and it is 
 no doubt true; but my mind has outlived my body, and 
 at times I feel morbid, blue, or whatever you may call it. 
 If you will go down there with Billy I will know that you 
 
162 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 and he will look out for each other. I will take a vaca- 
 tion if I know that you two boys are together taking one. 
 Will you go?" 
 
 "I will find out. Like Billy, I must consult others. 
 To-morrow night you will know, but it might be well to 
 have the invitation from Billy. Surely, he cannot expect 
 me to go with him without a direct invitation ; I was with 
 him last night and he did not mention it." 
 
 "Not to you, but he first consulted me as one whose 
 approval of a companion for a week seemed to him to be 
 necessary. No matter how much Billy might think of 
 you he would want his father to know the kind of com- 
 pany he was in and have my approval. His business as- 
 sociates are not always his social ones, and like the wise 
 boy that he is he separates them. He doesn't care to ask 
 your companion, Pete, to go because he overheard him 
 say something about his kissing me. Billy was brought 
 up that way, and doesn't like any comment on his kiss- 
 ing his father. We are all there is left of the family, and 
 our customs are our own." 
 
 A ten-gauge gun was hired, and we went down some 
 fifty miles south of Chicago to the great ducking grounds 
 of the Kankakee, of which I had heard so much. Even 
 the preparation for the start was a revelation to one 
 whose idea of duck shooting about Albany had been that 
 it was a large day if he got ten shots and four ducks. 
 Then one pound of powder and four pounds of shot was 
 a great allowance, and more than half of it was lugged 
 home at night unless it was expended on blackbirds, rail 
 or other small game. Therefore, when we talked over 
 the trip and came to the detail of ammunition I was 
 astounded when Billy said : "Let's see, six days ; well, say 
 twelve pounds of powder, fifty pounds of shot ounce 
 and a quarter to each load that's fifteen ounces of shot 
 
GEORGE RAYNOR. 163 
 
 for a dozen charges, say a pound for a dozen loads and 
 a hundred shots per day ; yes, fifty pounds will do to start 
 with, and we can get more down there if we need it, but 
 these things can be bought cheaper here." 
 
 There was a belief which I cherished that I had done 
 some shooting, and had on one occasion loaded up with 
 two pounds of powder and eight pounds of shot for a 
 week's sport, but Billy's figures staggered me meta- 
 phorically speaking, "they took my breath away." As 
 soon as I could come up to the surface I ventured to 
 ask: "Have you ever shot down there at Kankakee?" 
 
 "Oh, yes; I go down there in spring and fall; the 
 ducks are plenty, I assure you. Did you think that I 
 didn't know anything about the place?" 
 
 "No, I only asked for information because the 
 amount of ammunition seemed somewhat larger than I 
 have been accustomed to use, but if you think it is what 
 we will need it's all right; you know best." 
 
 "You'll need it all. Have everything packed for the 
 eleven P. M. train Sunday night, and I'll meet you at the 
 station and we'll have a good time for a week." 
 
 Such flights of ducks! Such flocks of ducks! The 
 sky, the lower air and the water was full of them. As 
 Billy rowed our little boat along the marshes in a small 
 stream it seemed to me that he was wasting time and 
 missing shots, but when he pulled up on a dry point of 
 land and we hauled the boat ashore and propped it on 
 edge, the reeds and rushes with which we covered it 
 made a splendid blind to shoot from. No decoys were 
 necessary; the ducks were uneducated in the matter of 
 artificial blinds, and came past ours without a thought of 
 danger. We two were not up to the modern plan of 
 having several guns, or the slaughter might have been 
 greater. Where I had shot, along the Popskinny, a half 
 
164: MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 dozen ducks was a large day's shooting and one was not 
 considered bad. Day after day no duck was bagged, 
 and a few rail and blackbirds were accepted as better 
 than nothing with the hope of better luck next time. 
 On those trips mud hens and hell-divers, or even a shel- 
 drake, was counted as a duck, and it was a new sensation 
 to be told: "Don't shoot; they're only sawbills." 
 
 Accustomed to taking in everything which came 
 within range, this was something new. The fact that a 
 gunner could sit down in cold blood and select the kind 
 of waterfowl on which to expend ammunition was a nov- 
 elty. Instead of wishing for any sort of duck to come 
 within shooting range, here we were refusing shots to all 
 except a favored (?) few. 
 
 It was cruel shooting cruel because it was waste- 
 ful We shifted our blind so that we shot against the 
 wind as it changed, and the dead ducks drifted to us. A 
 cripple that escaped the first fire could not be chased, for 
 we had only one boat, and if not killed before it got out 
 of range it crept into the marsh to be eaten by mink, 
 gulls or hawks. A philosopher might ask what differ- 
 ence all this made to the duck: whether the mink or the 
 birds got him, or whether his carcass passed into the 
 hands of a hotel chef and was served to a convivial party, 
 with the accompaniment of celery and juice of the vine? 
 
 We shot only at mallards, pintails, widgeon and teal, 
 letting all other fowl pass. At night we counted out 153 
 ducks of these species the number is remembered be- 
 cause it was the most wonderful duck shooting for two 
 guns that I had ever dreamed of and we could have 
 taken in a number of butterballs, whistlers and other 
 ducks if we had wished to kill them, but Billy said they 
 were not worth wasting powder on. 
 
 Heretofore there had never been more game than 
 
GEORGE RAY NOR. 165 
 
 could be taken care of and consumed at home or given 
 to friends, and the presence of about 350 pounds of ducks 
 in the boat and the prospect of five days' more 
 shooting presented a problem. What could we do 
 with this mass of game? We could not eat much of it 
 and we had but few local friends. In the excitement of 
 shooting these questions had not obtruded themselves as 
 they did now. Pondering on these things, I asked: 
 "Billy, what will we do with all the ducks?" 
 
 "They are all right; there'll be a man at the landing 
 to meet us who will take care of them; there he stands 
 now waiting for us. He will send them to market every 
 day, and on Saturday we will keep out what we want to 
 take home."' 
 
 The man took the game and put it in his wagon and 
 drove off to the railway station, and after supper he came 
 in and settled up, paying us $15.30 for our ducks, or 
 about what it had cost for the expenses for ammunition 
 and travel. This was certainly paying expenses, and 
 just what I had hoped for in going West, but somehow 
 it was not satisfactory. It brought into the transaction 
 a mercenary spirit which had never before been con- 
 nected with my sport. At first the feeling of dissatisfac- 
 tion was vague and without shape. We divided the 
 money and talked it over. The expedition was more 
 than successful from a financial point, but there was 
 something in my manner which caused my companion 
 to say: 
 
 "You don't seem as enthusiastic as you did. What's 
 the matter? Don't you like the table they set here, or 
 did something happen down in the marsh which dis- 
 pleased you? Be frank with me, and spit it out if any- 
 thing has gone wrong; don't sulk, fire it out." 
 
 Up to this point I really did not know the cause of a 
 
166 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 change of demeanor which had been noticed. There 
 was only a dim consciousness of something unpleasant. 
 
 "Billy," said I, "if I have appeared to be depressed it 
 is because our ducks were carted off by an unknown man 
 to be sold to unknown consumers in the market. Every 
 duck, pigeon or rabbit that I ever killed before to-day 
 was either eaten by my own family or given to a friend. 
 Part of the triumph of the hunt lay in the bringing of 
 the game to the table, and as my friends enjoyed the treat 
 I also enjoyed being the treater. If I was at the feast 
 every mouthful eaten by each individual was enjoyed by 
 me as a contributor, whose hard work on shore or upland 
 was rewarded by the knowledge that others were enjoy- 
 ing the fruits of my skill and " 
 
 "That you are a blooming egotist whose personality 
 enters into every duck or other game. Is that what you 
 mean?" 
 
 "Billy, you have put it into words which are strictly 
 true, but were in a nebulous condition in my brain. You 
 have summed up the case in a masterly way. Never be- 
 fore did I measure the value of game of any kind in 
 money, although I have had a desire to turn my love of 
 field sports into a way of making a living. This desire 
 was in a crude form before this, but now that the man 
 has carted off my game to be eaten by men who do not 
 thank me for it, do not know me, and may be drunk 
 when they eat it, I wish I had my ducks and he had his 
 money " 
 
 "Well, you'll go out in the morning and shoot some 
 more, won't you?" 
 
 "Yes, but I'll build a blind and use the boat to chase 
 cripples. I don't like to see a wounded duck go off into 
 the marsh to die or to be eaten by minks or gulls. It 
 isn't right." 
 
GEORGE RAYNOR. 167 
 
 "All right," said he; "anything to keep peace in the 
 family, but down here ducks are too plenty to go chasing 
 cripples. The gunners here will think you are crazy to 
 waste your time in that way and scare off a flock to get a 
 cripple. Go ahead, though; I don't care." 
 
 I tried it, but it did keep flocks from coming our way. 
 Some gunners one hundred yards below protested, and 
 the chasing of cripples was stopped. 
 
 We shot six days. The first day more than paid all 
 expenses of the trip, and there was a good balance in our 
 favor as well as thirty ducks among our plunder on our 
 return Saturday night. The ducks we gave to friends, 
 and when Pete Loeser received a pair and heard the story 
 he said: "Py shimminy, de air must pe so full mit ducks 
 dere vos no room for shot to co between dem ven dey 
 fly. I never dinks dere vos so many." 
 
 I had an invitation to dine with Mr. Raynor and his 
 son next day, and the old gentleman was very jolly and 
 sang the hunter's song and that sweetest of old English 
 ballads, "Sally in Our Alley," while the son, who, like all 
 professional singers, usually declined ,to sing on social 
 occasions, at the earnest request of the ladies gave us 
 "Mary of Argyle" and several other songs. When the 
 others had retired Mr. Raynor beat me at two games of 
 chess, the clock struck midnight and the vacation week 
 ended. 
 
 The winter closed in and before spring I could now 
 and then checkmate my elderly friend, and when that 
 happened he would explain how it could not have been 
 done if he had not made a certain move some ten moves 
 back of the finish. He was a delightful old man when 
 his mind was off his physical troubles, and he and his 
 son were devoted to each other. As soon as the ice was 
 out of the river he sent me word to come up and fish 
 
1G8 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 with him the first moment possible. His bodily infirm- 
 ities had increased, and he had now but one eye that was 
 of service, and that was very poor. I baited his hooks 
 and threw out his line, and when he pulled in a fish saw 
 that the hooks did not enter his hands. He was quite 
 despondent one day. Said he: "Freddy, my boy, I won- 
 der that the good Lord doesn't take me. Many a time 
 I've asked Him to call me, but for some reason He does 
 not do it. I am only a burden on Billy, and the pains in 
 my head from that railroad accident are more than I can 
 bear. Billy has a severe cold, and has been laid off sev- 
 eral days ; if anything should happen to him I " 
 
 Things were getting uncomfortable, and to turn the 
 tide I ventured to say: "Don't worry about Billy; we all 
 have colds and get over them ; of course, he couldn't sing 
 in his present state, but he'll be all right i,ext week. 
 There! That fish is off and your bait is all right again." 
 
 Billy's cold did not get better, and I was called to sit 
 up with him. Pneumonia developed and the old man 
 had to be removed from his room. Pete had gone to 
 Wisconsin, and the minstrel boys and the church choir 
 sent watchers in such numbers that they could not be 
 , used. 
 
 It was my duty to superintend the watchers and com- 
 fort the father, but the end came in a few days. Rela- 
 tives from Boston came to the funeral, but Mr. Raynor 
 clung to me and insisted on my being with him at the 
 last sad rites. 
 
 The next day, while walking up Market street, I 
 heard a little girl say: "They've found a drowned man in 
 the river; come on, Maggie, let's go down and see him." 
 I followed along in idle curiosity and saw the man. It 
 was the body of an old man, and I gave his name to the 
 coroner. 
 
CHARLES GUYON. 
 
 GIGGING FISH IN WISCONSIN SHOOTING A PEER WITH 
 WOODEN PLUGS. 
 
 THE little mining town of Potosi lies in the south- 
 west corner of Wisconsin. It ha* three streets 
 in the only possible places for streets; the three 
 narrow valleys which meet in the centre of the village 
 afford outlets for travel. Some two miles to the west 
 one valley leads to the Grant River, near its mouth, and 
 here a Mississippi steamer came for freight occasionally. 
 A stage came from Galena down another valley, and thus 
 Potosi was connected with the outside world. Here I 
 drifted in the spring, and found good fishing and shoot- 
 ing. My friend Loeser had gone a few miles further 
 north to Fennimore Grove, near Lancaster, where he 
 settled down into a farmer's life. 
 
 Charles Guyon was one of the French-Canadian col- 
 ony which formed the largest portion of the village. 
 There was a settlement of Cornish miners in one of the 
 outskirts called British Hollow, but the two peoples 
 mixed very little except in the way of trade and in the 
 gambling rooms, which were then run wide open. 
 Charley was a strong young fellow about my age, and 
 he proposed that we should go jacking for fish some 
 night. 
 
 "I don't know the first thing about jacking, Charley. 
 I'll go and try it. Tell me all about it." 
 
 "Well, it's this way," said he (very few of the French- 
 Canadians spoke anything like a dialect). "We have a 
 jack light on one side of the bow and it hangs over the 
 
170 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 water, so that no fire drops into the boat. One man pad- 
 dles and the other stands in the bow, and when he sees a 
 fish he gigs it." 
 
 The jack was a cresset made of strap iron a twelve- 
 inch ring to which half a dozen strips were riveted to 
 form the bowl, which was fastened to an iron staff long 
 enough to bring the bowl above a man's eyes as he stood 
 in the boat. Charley had gathered a lot of bark from 
 the shell-bark hickory, which he said made the best of all 
 lights, and we got a ride to the landing with our traps. 
 The "gig" was a spear of some six or eight prongs, with 
 a wooden handle about eight feet long, to which a small 
 cord was attached to the upper end to recover it by. 
 
 As soon as it was dark enough we lighted the jack 
 and started. The boat was a light-bottomed scow and 
 I used the paddle. Guyon stood in the bow and gave 
 orders; he did not use nautical terms, but said "right" 
 or "left" as he required the boat to go. Soon he said, 
 "Steady, left, hold up," and then after a pause, "Go on 
 slow; there's a big pike about here, but he was shy and 
 I couldn't get a crack at him. Hold on, right a little," 
 and he poised his gig and sent it buzzing into the water. 
 "A clean miss. I didn't strike low enough. Go toward 
 that tree top up there; there may be some buffalo 
 near it." 
 
 Surely I must have misunderstood ; he could not mean 
 that buffalo might be grazing in that tree top, but I was 
 in a strange land, and my new friend might be having a 
 little fun at my expense, so I kept still. Soon the orders 
 came, and as the spear left his hand it struck and gave a 
 little tremble, and my companion yelled out: "I got 
 him!" and taking hold of the string, which was tied 
 to the gunwale, he pulled the gig staff to him, and 
 then landed in the boat a huge fish of about twenty 
 
CHARLES GUYON. 171 
 
 pounds huge to me. "There's your buffalo/' said he. 
 I looked at the great, ungainly fish, with a hump on 
 its back and a mouth like a sucker, and asked if it was 
 good to eat. 
 
 "Oh, yes; it's better than red-horse, but not as good 
 as bass and pike. Here, you take the gig and I'll pad- 
 dle. Now you've got to put the gig into the fish, and not 
 in the place he looks to be at. If he's nearly under you 
 throw right at him, always with the gig across his body 
 and not in line with him. The further he is away the 
 more you must throw under him, because he's deeper 
 than he looks to be. You know how a board appears to 
 be bent when half of it is in the water; the lower end 
 seems to be higher than it is. Well, it's just so with a 
 fish; unless he's right under you he's deeper than he 
 looks, and the further off he is the deeper under him you 
 must strike." 
 
 I took the gig, with some doubt of my ability to 
 gauge the depth of a fish and judge his true position, for 
 I knew what Guyon said was true, only I had never 
 thought of it before. I did think of his names of fishes; 
 we had a buffalo and he spoke of red-horse. I had seen 
 dogfish and catfish, but where was this kind of nomen- 
 clature to end? Soon I saw several large fish. There 
 had been plenty of small ones seen, but with a twenty- 
 pound fish in the boat as a pattern my ideas were no 
 doubt enlarged. Soon I said: "Steady, stop!" and 
 plunge went the gig and missed. 
 
 "I knew you wouldn't touch that fish," said Guyon; 
 "you threw too far from the boat, and it went clean over 
 him by two feet. Next time aim two feet below where 
 he looks to be at and you may get him. It's very seldom 
 that a man throws the gig under a fish that lies ten feet 
 away from the boat. Try it again." 
 
172 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 At the next chance I was bound to miss the fish by 
 throwing under it, if I missed it at all, and I plunged the 
 gig in the water at what seemed an absurd low point and 
 struck a pike of some five pounds. 
 
 'There/' said the man at the paddle, "I knew you 
 could do it if you could only believe the fish was a foot 
 or two below where he looked to be at." This use of the 
 word "at" was new to me then, but I found it common 
 in the West and South. Lately it has had attention 
 called to it by its use in Congress. It sounds odd to 
 those who hear it for the first time. 
 
 And so we passed the first half of the night, and re- 
 turned to the warehouse and slept in it, for Charley had 
 the key; but we took the precaution to take our fish in- 
 side, too, for he said: "The moon will be up in an hour 
 and she'll spoil the fish, and then we don't want minks 
 and wildcats carryin' 'em off or chewing them up. We'll 
 get a ride up in the morning, for Joe Hall's going to 
 bring down some potatoes and there'll be teams down 
 with lead." 
 
 Morning came and we went back with the first empty 
 wagon, taking over two hundred pounds of fish bass, 
 pike, buffalo and big red-finned suckers, which proved 
 to be the "red-horse;" and I had been initiated into the 
 mysteries of jacking for fish, handling a gig, had re- 
 ceived a lesson in practical optics, and knew positively 
 that a fish in the water was not always in the place which 
 it appeared to be u at." 
 
 Somewhere in an omnivorous course of reading I re- 
 member a statement that "Man shall not live by bread 
 alone," and in the practical every-day life it began to be 
 painfully evident that no matter how desirable it might 
 be to hunt and fish forever, there were needs other than 
 what the chase afforded. There was a man who really 
 
CHARLES GUYON. 173 
 
 demanded pay for letting me live in his house. Of 
 course the house was built, and I did not hurt it by living 
 in it; but he had put a man out because he did not 
 pay. Then there came a day when a really serious bit 
 of thinking over the sordid spirit of man had been in- 
 dulged in for fully ten minutes, when Charley Guyon 
 came along. 
 
 "Say/' he began, "you ain't doin' anything, an' I want 
 a pardner to sink a shaft. I think I know where we can 
 make a strike, an j I've got all the tools. What d'ye say, 
 will you jine me?" 
 
 "Well, Charley, I was just thinking that it was about 
 time that I went at something; but I don't know the first 
 thing about lead mining. Tell me all about it; how do 
 you do it?" 
 
 "It's just like this: A man owns a piece of land, and 
 he throws it open for mining or he keeps it for other pur- 
 poses. Suppose he throws it open; then any one can 
 dig, and he takes one-tenth of the mineral for rent. A 
 windlass, rope, bucket, pick and spade are all the tools 
 we use. Mineral may be struck at ten feet, or it may 
 be at sixty; but we go down until we come to hard pan; 
 it never lies below that. You may get some "drift" that 
 will pay or may not; it's all chance. You may work a 
 week and not get a dollar, and you may strike a lead*; 
 and then you drift in and follow it. You see, there are 
 lots of abandoned shafts which were sunk ten years ago, 
 when mineral was worth ten dollars per thousand. Now 
 it is worth thirty dollars, and two men can make wages 
 if they get a thousand pounds per week." 
 
 "And a fellow has to work down there under ground 
 like a mole to do this?" 
 
 , *This is pronounced leed in the mines, and is a corruption of lode. 
 
MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 "Yes, but pardners take turns, one in the shaft and 
 one at the windlass, and of a hot day you'll prefer to be 
 below. There's men here who hire other men to 'tend 
 windlass, and they take the chances make it all if they 
 strike it big, or lose their time and the man's wages. It's 
 all chance, just the same as when you go into Coons' 
 and sit in a keno game; you may win or you may not. 
 But all business is chance anyway, just like gambling; 
 the only man who's got a sure thing is the man who 
 works for wages, and he gets left sometimes." 
 
 Behold the mighty hunter, with a band and candle 
 socket on his hat, grubbing away like a well-digger, and 
 assorting an occasional lump of "drift," with its white 
 coating, from the earth and clay, and depositing it in a 
 "hen's nest" until there was a bucketful always hoping 
 that the next stroke of the pick would cut into a bright 
 bit of galena; or at the windlass waiting for the word 
 "up," and dumping the earth on the down-hill side and 
 keeping an eye out for stray bits which had escaped the 
 eyes below. So passed the summer, with occasional 
 fishing trips with Henry Neaville and his brother Frank, 
 for Guyon cared little for the sportsmanlike methods of 
 fishing; gigging and netting them in quantities was his 
 delight, yet the fun of it was ever uppermost in his mind. 
 He thought fishing with a hook and line was too slow 
 work; his mind was active and required more exciting 
 sport. 
 
 In considering what constitutes sport, a question on 
 which the doctors disagree, it might be well to allow a 
 little latitude for individual notions; I was about to say 
 idiosyncrasies, but if Guyon read this he would ask: 
 "What's them?" and so we will let it go at "notions." 
 Please remember that this was forty years ago, and none 
 of us had given thought to the possible exhaustion of a 
 
CHARLES GUYON. 175 
 
 source of fish supply which seemed only to invite the 
 slayer by appearing next year in undiminished numbers. 
 This is the only excuse 1 have to offer for our destruction 
 of life in those days of its plenty, and an excuse seems 
 necessary to-day. If it is sufficient,, well and good; it is 
 all I have, and I throw myself on the mercy of the court. 
 We all needed education in the matter of fish and game 
 preservation in those days, and I hope that I have atoned 
 for the misdeeds of my youth by both precept and ex- 
 ample in later years. 
 
 In sketching Charles Guyon, who was an honest, 
 sturdy fellow, not averse to a fight if it was forced upon 
 him, but not a quarrelsome man, it is only fair to him to 
 say that, having been reared in a mining town, gambling 
 came as a natural thing, just as luck in mining did, and 
 if his week had been successful Saturday night found 
 him at the keno table staking the last sovereign that he 
 had earned. The smelters sent wagons to weigh and 
 gather the mineral every Saturday afternoon, and the pay 
 was in British sovereigns, which passed for $5, for no 
 miner would accept paper money for his mineral, al- 
 though he sometimes did in exchange for his gold. 
 
 Saturday nights the gambling places and the drunk- 
 eries kept open until morning, and the Cornish miners 
 from British Hollow rested from their labors by drink- 
 ing, gambling and fighting. These were the highest 
 forms of sport known to them, and in fact to the majority 
 of men who work underground all the week in all parts 
 of the world. One night I dropped into Sam Coons' to 
 look on. Here I want to say that I have never won or 
 lost one dollar in any form of gambling except at the 
 house of a gentleman in Germany, where a small stake 
 was the custom, and there was no escape. I don't claim 
 any special credit for this because I never had a desire to 
 
176 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 gamble was too cowardly to risk my wealth, if you wish 
 to put it in that way. Plenty of good men gamble, and 
 I have other faults, but am not one of those who, as 
 Butler ("Hudibras") says: 
 
 "Compound for sins they are inclined to 
 By damning those they have no mind to." 
 
 I have occasionally played cards in a perfunctory 
 way, without caring for them, and have engaged in 
 games to decide who should pay for oysters, cigars and 
 such other goods as an army sutler possessed, but a book 
 always suited me better. Speaking of games in connec- 
 tion with Potosi wakes me up. In the sketch of General 
 Martin Miller the fact was recorded that Herr Dries- 
 bach, the great lion tamer, used to come to my father's 
 house to play chess, and to my great surprise Bill Pat- 
 terson pointed out a finely-built, powerful man whom 
 we had just passed and said: "That's Driesbach, the lion 
 tamer." I hurried after him, and the result was that I 
 often went out to his farm of an evening and had a game 
 of chess, the only game that I ever thought worth the 
 candle. Chess players were very scarce in Potosi, and 
 Driesbach and I were out of practice, but if I won one 
 game out of five it was sufficient. 
 
 One evening he said: "You aren't one-half the man 
 your father was; he must have been over six feet." 
 
 "Yes; six feet two inches, and no spare meat." 
 
 "Well, I remember once when we crossed the river 
 to Albany in a small boat, and a 'longshoreman was 
 smoking a pipe in the faces of two ladies who sat in the 
 stern, your father spoke to him about it and got an 
 impudent reply, and he then jerked the pipe from the 
 fellow's mouth and threw it overboard. Then threats of 
 vengeance came when we should get on shore. Your 
 
CHARLES GUYON. 177 
 
 father hurried up, and ran up the steps to the dock and 
 waited. Then he said: 'My friend, you were going to 
 lick me when you got on shore. I'm in a hurry to go 
 to business and have only got a few minutes to spare, 
 and I would like you to do it now.' The man looked 
 him over and said: 'Be jabers, it isn't worth while for the 
 likes of us to be foighten' about an ould pipe.' Now, 
 Fred, that 'longshoreman would have cleaned you up in 
 about two seconds. Why, you ain't a bit like the old 
 man." I learn from my old friend, Hon. J. W. Seaton, 
 who still lives in Potosi, that Driesbach died something 
 like fifteen years ago, and the vest made from a pet 
 leopard skin was given by Driesbach to Judge Seaton, 
 who has it now. 
 
 When we went to work in the woods near the river 
 I took my rifle as soon as September I came around and 
 it was lawful to use it. This was the one that father gave 
 me. I only remember that the barrel was half round 
 and half octagon, an unusual departure from the general 
 make of rifles, which were generally all octagon, and 
 were stocked to the muzzle, although short stocks were 
 coming into fashion. Calibre was a word little used in 
 connection with hunting rifles, but we reckoned them 
 by the number of round bullets to the pound. Squirrel 
 rifles ran as small as 120 to the pound; mine was thirty 
 to the pound, and that was considered very large. I 
 never used any long bullets in it "slugs" we called 
 them for the theory was that they were only good in the 
 open country, and that contact with a twig would de- 
 flect them more than it would round bullets. A modern 
 rifleman would not know how to tell the calibre of a rifle 
 by our measure, and I can't inform him. I only know 
 that with such guns, and many smaller, the old-time 
 hunters killed the biggest animals on the continent, often 
 
178 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 when the first shot must disable a grizzly or a panther, 
 for it took time to measure powder and reload. 
 
 I had to go to the village for something, and left the 
 rifle loaded, also the powder horn and box of caps. The 
 bullets and patches were in a leather box in my belt, 
 which I wore. On returning I heard several shots some 
 distance from our shaft. Guyon and the rifle were gone. 
 The shots kept up, and I started at a lively gait until I 
 came in view of the shooting match. There was Guyon 
 in among the branches of a fallen tree; crack went the 
 rifle, and a big buck charged into the branches, but could 
 not reach him. His back was toward me, and I hailed: 
 "Hello, Charley! What are you doin' to that deer?" 
 
 He turned and said: "You are a great fellow to go 
 off with all the bullets. Got any with you? If you have, 
 throw me one. Don't come in here too close or that 
 deer will kill you; he's fightin' mad now." 
 
 I did go in on a run and got into the tree top just in 
 time to avoid the charge of the buck, and handed Guyon 
 a bullet, which he rammed down without a patch, and 
 planted it in the deer's frontal bone and dropped him. 
 
 Such a looking deer I never did see. Guyon's only 
 bullet had broken one antler close to the head and 
 angered him. The tree top was fortunately at hand 
 and made a natural abattis, behind which the man could 
 carry on the offensive and shift to avoid the enemy as 
 occasion required. But the deer! His head was liter- 
 ally skinned all around his eyes, and from his forehead 
 to his nose. 
 
 Charles said: "When he came for me and I was safe 
 in this treetop I whittled green plugs for bullets, and 
 thought if one took him in the eye it would drop him. 
 Every time a plug hit him he would snort, shake his 
 head and come at me. See how he has wet me. I think 
 
CHARLES GUYON. 179 
 
 I shot more than twenty plugs at him, and I don't know 
 how I would have got out of this brush if you hadn't 
 come." 
 
 The story was too good to keep. He didn't hear the 
 last of it for some time. 
 
 Bill Patterson said: "Charley, that venison was very 
 good, but there was a taste of wood about it. How do 
 you suppose it got that flavor?" 
 
 Joe Hall hailed him with: "Hey, Charley! That ven- 
 ison tasted as if he had broken into Darcy's shop and had 
 eaten his shoe pegs. What d' ye s'pose he'd been feedin' 
 on?" 
 
 The multitude of islands between Wisconsin and 
 Iowa at this point renders it difficult to tell where Grant 
 River ends or loses itself in the Father of Waters. It is 
 several miles from shore to shore, and channels of many 
 depths and widths separate the islands. These water- 
 ways, the "kills" of New York and the "bayous" of the 
 lower Mississippi, are here called sloughs, pronounced 
 sloo. One of the beauties of our language is that this 
 word may be pronounced sluff, slouw or sloo, each hav- 
 ing a different meaning. In a recent letter from Mr. 
 Seaton he says, Jn reply to a question : "The inland island 
 waters, most of which go dry in summer, I think, are 
 properly called sloughs, and the name is not a provincial- 
 ism peculiar to this part of the Mississippi valley. Web- 
 ster gives the pronunciation 'slou,' and here it is spelled 
 sloo, and means a sink or depression in the islands in 
 which the water gathers and in some cases remains all the 
 time, and in others it signifies channels or sluiceways in 
 which part of the waters pass from one stream to the 
 other, i. e., the over-swollen Mississippi to the depressed 
 Grant River and vice versa-, hence we have 'Swift sloo,' 
 'Hay sloo' and several others known to the fishers and 
 
180 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 hunters. They are the natural habitat and breeding 
 places for frogs, reptiles and mosquitoes, as well as a 
 great resort for ducks in the spring and fall. During the 
 spring freshets the fish gather in them in large quantities 
 and are entrapped when the water falls, which is usually 
 in August and September. This year a large number of 
 German carp and black bass were taken in willow woven 
 nets by the boys, although this is prohibited by law. The 
 upper waters of the Mississippi were stocked a few years 
 ago with these fish by the Government. It is in April 
 and May, when the 'spring rise' overflows the banks and 
 spreads over the bottoms, that the fat catfish, buffalo and 
 other fishes are found out of the channels and main 
 streams feeding in the grassy bottoms. Then the boys 
 wade in and have their fun catching them. Sloughs are 
 creations of the great river and are part of it." 
 
 The domesticated hog ran wild on these islands, and 
 once a man said to me: "Now, you will want some pork, 
 and you ought to buy a claim of hogs. I've got five 
 marked sows on the islands, and I'll sell you a claim in 
 'em fur a dollar." 
 
 On inquiry Charley said: "That's all right. There's 
 about ten claims o' hogs on the islands. It's this a-way : 
 a man turns out a sow with certain ear marks, and all 
 the pigs found with her in the fall are hers if there's a 
 hundred. Give him a dollar and you can kill all the pigs 
 you want, only don't kill an old one with marks in its 
 ears." I bought in, and was part owner of, all pork on 
 the hoof that had two V's in the right ear and a round 
 hole in the left. 
 
 Guyon, Bill Patterson, Henry Neaville and I went for 
 pork about the middle of September. Charley and Bill 
 skinned theirs, and this was the usual custom; but I agree 
 with Neaville that a properly dressed pig looked best, 
 
CHARLES GUYON. 181 
 
 but "How can we dress them on these islands?" I asked. 
 Henry said, "I'll show you/' and we pulled the scow up 
 high and dry, filled it with water, made a roaring fire and 
 heated a lot of stones which had been brought to the isl- 
 and for the purpose, and boiled the water to scald the 
 pigs. How easy it is to do things if you know how! 
 Fresh pork was cheap in those days, and I have seen 
 where a hog had been killed and only one ham taken 
 and the rest left in the woods, perhaps by some fellow 
 who never paid his $i to "buy into a claim o' hogs." 
 
 Once, while alone going down to the marshes with 
 my rifle to get a duck or two for dinner, for it was the 
 only gun I owned, I went a little way up the side of the 
 bluff to get a view of the overflowed lands, and make a 
 reconnoissance of the flocks of ducks and of such cover 
 as might conceal an approach to them. I sat on a log 
 to view the scene and recover some lost breath. It was 
 early in the afternoon, and the log was so comfortable 
 that I sat some time. Four half-grown foxes were play- 
 ing in the leaves like kittens, and a move would have 
 spoiled the show. Suddenly there was a shot close by 
 and the foxes vanished; a pig squealed, an old hog 
 grunted and a boy screamed. I jumped at the shot and 
 started slowly to see who was shooting, but ran when I 
 heard the boy. There he was on his back, and a big 
 sow chewing his arm. Quicker than I can tell it I shot, 
 and fortunately hit the hog in the eye and she dropped 
 dead. Then I became excited at what might have hap- 
 pened if I had missed the hog or killed the boy. He had 
 fainted, and, having no water, I fanned him until he came 
 to. His arm was badly torn, but no bones were broken, 
 and the doctor soon had him repaired. A hog will 
 charge a man any time if he makes a pig squeal, and then 
 they are dangerous animals. On telling this pig scrape 
 
182 MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 to Charley he showed me some great scars on his legs 
 where he was bitten under similar circumstances, only 
 that he seized a hanging limb and drew himself into a 
 tree, and fortunately some strangers heard his yell and 
 came to his rescue, or he would have bled to death. 
 
 Charley Guyon inherited the taste of his countrymen 
 for the violin, and he and another noted fiddler named 
 Montpleasure had played with a travelling minstrel 
 troupe which went up through Wisconsin and Iowa, and 
 some of his experiences were laughable. Said he: "We 
 struck a little town in northern Iowa just in time for a 
 late supper and to get to the hall. The box of burnt 
 cork couldn't be found, and there wasn't corks enough 
 in the single hotel to make 'paste' for the troupe of ten. 
 Yes, we had ten, all good men, too, if we did take in small 
 towns; but what was to be done? The hall was filling, 
 and we had small boys out looking for corks and coming 
 back saying, 'Mother says she ain't got no corks/ or 
 Tap says he'll get you a cork ef you'll give him six 
 tickets/ The hall was full and the people began to get 
 uneasy, when in came the landlord to the dressing-room 
 with four boxes of shoeblacking and asked if that 
 wouldn't do. Charley French thought it would, and we 
 wet it up, and used it and rushed on the stage. The 
 overture went off well, and the opening chorus was half 
 way through when the boys began to feel uncomfortable. 
 The stuff had stiffened and we felt as if we were var- 
 nished, and soon it began to peel off. Such looking nig- 
 gers you never did see. We got laughing and the audi- 
 ence roared; our tenor tried to sing 'Swanee River/ but 
 it was uphill work; he looked like a darkey with the 
 smallpox; we shook our sides, and the people screamed 
 until he got mad and left the stage. It was well for us 
 that it hit the audience as being funny, but we got 
 
CHARLES GUYON. 183 
 
 through somehow, and as they wanted to dance we 
 played for them until morning, after we washed up. 
 They had never had such dance music, and they wanted 
 us to promise to come again, which we did, and had a 
 grand reception." 
 
 Once when we were discussing the chances of sinking 
 a shaft in a new place he burst out laughing. I waited 
 to hear what the cause of this hilarity was, and as soon 
 as he could pull himself together he tried to say, between 
 shrieks: "Bones asked why this troupe of minstrels was 
 like a gang of burglars which had been discovered. Ha, 
 ha! ho, ho! Oh, I can't tell it. But the answer was 
 because we he, he! Oh, my! because because we're 
 spotted!" And then he couldn't stop. A roll on the 
 ground and a kicking of heels was the only sedative, and 
 it always got in its quieting work if no one started a 
 laugh ; if they did it took longer. 
 
 I think Charley never tired of this yarn, for he would 
 laugh all the time until he cried; it was the great event 
 in his uneventful life. 
 
 He was as happy as that happy race, the French- 
 Canadian, usually is happy if it rained or if the day was 
 bright ; happy in luck of any kind, if he had strings for his 
 fiddle and rheumatism and the toothache kept away. In 
 my sketch in Forest and Stream I presumed that he was 
 dead. Judge Seaton has written me that Charley is still 
 fiddling away in Highland, Iowa County, Wis., "happy 
 as ever and vigorous." As this goes to the printer I am 
 waiting for an answer from my old-time, honest and 
 cheerful companion in the lead mines. 
 
CORPORAL HENRY R. NEAVILLE. 
 
 SIPPI. 
 
 HENRY had the taste for observing the habits of 
 beasts, birds and fishes which leads a man to 
 study them, a taste which may, if not checked, 
 cause him to count the fin-rays of a fish or the scales on 
 the tarsus of a bird, and then inflict his fellow man with 
 a monograph on fin-rays and scales. Henry never 
 reached that stage, but loved the woods and waters just 
 the same, and was a very quiet, companionable fellow of 
 my own age. His father kept the only hotel in Potosi 
 at that time, and Henry and his younger brother Frank 
 were kept by the hotel. Few things troubled Henry; 
 with him it was "always afternoon/' and pleasant visions 
 floated in his mind; yet he was not indifferent to the 
 passage of time if aroused by something which interested 
 him. In still-hunting deer he was tireless, and no 
 amount of fatigue dulled his ardor. If, however, wood 
 was to be cut for the house, Henry somehow never took 
 an absorbing interest in it, and it soon turned out that 
 Henry and I had many traits in common. 
 
 We fished for crappies, another fish new to me, and 
 one which I considered the best pan fish in the Missis- 
 sippi. This is the fish, or brother of the one, called 
 "strawberry bass" in western New York, and if my 
 youthful judgment was correct it is a fish worthy of more 
 attention from fish-culturists than it gets. There is a 
 chance that my more mature palate would confirm the 
 verdict of forty years ago, for I never did care to eat a 
 
 184 
 
CORPORAL HENRY R. NEAVILLE. 185 
 
 black bass if perch could be had, and residence by salt 
 water has intensified this preference. My friend, Pro- 
 fessor Jordan, says the crappie should be called Pomoxys, 
 and in his "Manual of Vertebrates" gives what he thinks 
 the word means in Greek; but I guess the name comes 
 from the Latin Pomum, fruit, for the crappie is, in the 
 argot of the day, "a peach;" a few years ago it would 
 have been "a daisy," and so in the process of evolution 
 the fruit succeeds the flower. Darwin, "thou reasonest 
 well!" 
 
 A tree top was a favorite place to find the crappie and 
 incidentally to lose fish-hooks. We used short rods, cut 
 in the woods, but not over seven feet long, for fishing 
 in the tree tops, and the crappies were flat as a pancake 
 and sometimes a foot long. In a tree top if one of them 
 was allowed a bit of line the angler was lucky if he saved 
 the hook. They fought fairly well, too; of course, not 
 to be compared to the fight of a black bass nor of some 
 perch, but it was sport to take them. We strung the 
 fish through the gills, and hung them in the water to 
 keep alive. Once while pulling in my string to add 
 another it pulled heavily, and a catfish, which looked 
 to weigh ten pounds, came to the surface. It had 
 swallowed one crappie, but let go when it saw us. Soon 
 after this Henry put his hand in the water, and a big cat- 
 fish seized it and tore the skin badly, causing him to 
 make remarks calculated to hurt the feelings of all cat- 
 fish which heard them. 
 
 As my mining partner, Charley Guyon, never ob- 
 jected to having a holiday, it happened that Henry and I 
 fished frequently in the summer, and hunted for ducks, 
 deer and other game in spring and fall. Shortly after 
 Guyon's adventure with the buck Henry and I were fol- 
 lowing deer up the Grant River, and I saw three of them 
 
186 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 cross to my side within easy shot. There was a buck and 
 two does. As they came out of the water I dropped the 
 buck, and like an echo of my shot one of the does fell. 
 Henry took off his clothes, and swam over and found me 
 talking with a man about fifty years old, who had killed 
 the doe. He proved to be a French-Canadian named 
 Antoine Gardapee, with whom I struck up a friendship 
 which will be related "in our next." He was a trapper, 
 and like my old friend, Port Tyler, was a "character." 
 We dressed our deer, and Henry and I swam the river 
 with it and took turns with the heavy saddle wrapped in 
 the skin and the lighter forequarters. 
 
 Gardapee came to town with us and sold his veni- 
 son. In those days many men threw away the fore- 
 quarters of a deer. I asked Antoine to come to my 
 house for dinner and he did, but he insisted that a rib 
 chop out of a fat deer was the best portion, and we had 
 them broiled. He was right, and to-day I follow his ad- 
 vice when venison is in season and buy rib chops. He 
 took a fancy to me because our tastes were in common 
 and I had education enough to write his letters to his 
 friends, and would talk to him on subjects in which he 
 was interested. I looked up to him as a combined Port 
 Tyler and Natty Bumpo rolled into one. It was a sort 
 of love at first sight, or like that of Desdemona for 
 Othello, of which he says: 
 
 "She lov'd me for the dangers I had pass'd; 
 And I lov'd her that she did pity them." 
 
 Henry had that sense of humor which often accom- 
 panies a poetic temperament and permits one to both 
 enjoy a sentiment and to burlesque it at the same time. 
 This is a possibility unknown to solemn souls who think 
 burlesque or travesty irreverent or disrespectful, which 
 
CORPORAL HENRY R. NEAV1LLE. 187 
 
 it is not always intended to be. Byron had this faculty 
 in perfection, and lets you down from a poetic flight with 
 a d. s. thud. Shakespeare turns from heroic Hotspur 
 to fat Jack Falstaff and Henry Neaville, who had a 
 considerable knowledge of Shakespeare, often para- 
 phrased him. This is what called up the above quota- 
 tion. Henry once said : 
 
 "She lov'd me for the fishes that I caught, 
 And I lov'd her that she did pickle them.'' 
 
 Frank Neaville, Henry and I one summer day went 
 fishing, and we rowed up against the current of Swift 
 Sloo and around into more quiet waters, made fast to a 
 tree top and dropped our lines. Tree tops in these 
 waters were abundant where the freshets had washed the 
 soil from the roots, and the tree toppled into the water, 
 usually kept on growing, or at least in full leaf during 
 the season, and afforded a good place to tie a boat and 
 fish either among the branches or further out. A queer 
 tapping noise came from the boat's bottom. I suspected 
 Frank of making it, because he was full of tricks of that 
 kind, but it kept up and he did not seem to be the 
 cause. "Are there spirits among us seeking communi- 
 cation with mortals?" I asked. 
 
 "Yes," said Henry, "and I'll try to call that particular 
 spirit from the vasty deep, and find out why he knocks 
 on our boat." 
 
 "He wants to come in," Frank explained, "and he's 
 too polite to do it without knocking first." 
 
 Henry put on a plump worm, took the little bullet 
 which served for a sinker and let his line drift under the 
 boat. In a short time it was evident that something was 
 tugging at his line, and his little rod bent as the spirit, or 
 whatever it was, struggled to get loose. Soon a large 
 
188 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 fish was pulled from under the boat, and made several 
 kicks and splashes before it was flopping at our feet, 
 showering water and scales. It was a "red-horse," and 
 would weigh about two pounds, guess-weight. 
 
 "Is that the cause of the spirit-like raps on our boat?" 
 
 "Yes; he was sucking off snails and water worms. 
 Did you never see 'em do it?" 
 
 "No; never heard of such a thing before." 
 
 "Here's another at it now; come over this side and 
 you can see it. Come still, and don't rock the boat or 
 you'll scare it." 
 
 I went and saw about half of the fish extending 
 beyond the boat. It was on its back, and its red fins 
 looked bright against its white belly and straw-colored 
 sides. At every tap on the boat a slight contraction of 
 the body was observed as he sucked his food from the 
 boards. Frank thought he could capture the fish with 
 his hands and tried it, but had to fish his hat from the 
 water instead. "Golly," said he, "that fish was quick. 
 He jumped when I touched him, and slipped through my 
 hand like an eel." After this the drumming of the red- 
 horse was often heard, not only on the boat, but upon 
 logs that were several feet from us. This sucker is the 
 "mullet" or "red mullet" of western New York. It is 
 eatable in cold weather if it is the best you can get. 
 
 Henry threw the fish overboard, saying: "Might as 
 well let it go; we never eat 'em in summer. I only 
 hookeM it for fun and to show you what made the tap- 
 pings on the boat. Don't you have red-horse where 
 you've fished? There! Look over on the bank of the 
 sloo. Keep still, Frank; sh!" 
 
 A queer-looking object was rolling about on the 
 shore in a singular manner. It grew large and then 
 small. Sometimes it was the size of a small cat, and then 
 
CORPORAL HENRY R. NEAVILLE. 189 
 
 would increase until as big as an old Thomas. It 
 twisted, rolled sideways and back until it reached the 
 water, where it kicked up a great bobbery. 
 
 "I'm durned if I know what that is," said Henry; "I 
 never saw such an animal before. What do you think 
 it is?" 
 
 "It's a 'coon rolling in the dirt and then washing him- 
 self off," said Frank. 
 
 Henry sneeringly replied: "'Coon! yer granny! A 
 'coon's got a big, bushy tail and is gray. Frank, you 
 don't know a 'coon from Driesbach's pet leopard." 
 
 By this time the splashing ceased, and one animal 
 crawled out of the sloo dragging another. Henry and I 
 said in chorus: "It's a mink!" So it was, but he had a 
 muskrat with him, and musky was dead. Our exclama- 
 tion startled the mink, and it jumped into the grass with 
 its prey. I said to Henry: "That sight is worth more 
 than all the fish we have caught and all the mineral 
 Charley Guyon and I might have dug to-day, or for a 
 week. I knew that mink were fond of muskrat meat, 
 but a fellow might fish for a lifetime and never see a 
 mink kill one." 
 
 "What made the mink hurry off so?" asked Frank; 
 "he wasn't in any hurry about killing the muskrat. I'd 
 like to have seen him eat it." 
 
 "Frank," said Henry, "that mink had several good 
 reasons for hurrying off. It was dinner time, and Mrs. 
 Mink and all the little minks were wondering why papa 
 didn't come home from market with the dinner. Then 
 Mr. Mink may have thought his family might mistrust 
 that he was lingering at Sam Coons' bar, and would for- 
 get to bring the dinner at all; but the chances are that 
 when we spoke he looked over at us and thought: 'It's 
 best to hurry home before that durned fool, Frank Nea- 
 
190 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 ville, asks me a whole mess of questions/ That's the 
 reason he went off so suddenly. Frank, he took one 
 look at you, and saw your mouth wide open, ready to ask 
 him a question, and he sneaked." 
 
 Frank looked at me and said: "Henry knows a heap 
 o' things, but somehow nobody seems to realize it but 
 himself. He knows just why that mink hurried off as 
 well as I do, but he won't tell the truth. Now, I'll tell 
 you why he skipped out. The mink was so interested 
 in his fight that he did not notice us until Henry called 
 out. Then he looked over here and said to himself: 
 'There's that mean Henry Neaville, and he'll take my 
 musquash if I don't get out. That fellow is mean 
 enough to take acorns from a blind sow/ And so that 
 mink, which would have been delighted to have eaten his 
 dinner in decent company, sneaked off with it into the 
 woods for fear he would be robbed." 
 
 I had taken my rifle along because the boys thought 
 it would be well to kill a pig on our return, and, as I 
 had "bought into a claim o' hogs," we went ashore, and 
 after some work among these very wild animals I got a 
 shot and dropped a "likely shoat" that would dress about 
 sixty pounds. After skinning the pig we laid it across 
 the bow, and rowed around into Swift Sloo about sun- 
 down. The strong current was taking us along toward 
 home, when Frank saw a wounded pelican near the 
 shore, and grabbed a tree top to hold the boat. Quicker 
 than it can be told the sudden check in the swift current 
 filled the boat, and it left us in the water. Henry was 
 in the stern steering with one oar, and fortunately 
 grabbed the painter and held on. Frank and I got out 
 from the tree top and struck for the nearest shore. A 
 bend hid the boat and Henry from sight by the time we 
 landed, and then Frank began to cry: "Henry is 
 
CORPORAL HENRY R. NEAVILLE. 191 
 
 drowned; I know he is, and all on account of my fool- 
 ishness!" 
 
 I consoled him as well as possible by saying that his 
 brother was a good swimmer and must be on land below 
 the bend, and then we heard his yell: "Yee-e-e hoo-ooo," 
 and answered it. We went down to him, and found that 
 the boat and one oar was all there was left, except the 
 three strings of fish which were tied to the gunwale. 
 
 "Well, we might as well go on home," said Frank. 
 
 I thought a moment and said: "You boys can go if 
 you like, but my rifle is in the sloo near the tree top, and 
 I'm goin' to stay on this island and try to get it when 
 morning comes." 
 
 The boys decided to remain after I produced a little 
 bottle of matches a trick learned from my old precep- 
 tor, Port Tyler. Said Port: "You don't never want to 
 go a-shootin' nur a-fishin' with yer matches loose in yer 
 pocket, nur in one o' them metal match boxes ; they leak, 
 an' if ye get caught in a rain or tumble in the crick yer 
 matches are all wet when ye want 'em most." The les- 
 son had been firmly implanted by a neglect to follow it 
 on one occasion, and here was proof of the wisdom of the 
 old woodsman. At such a time, when wet, cold and 
 hungry, one good match was worth a king's ransom, and 
 I had it. Dead wood was plenty, and the little breeze 
 which kept the mosquitoes from the open sloo was not 
 felt in the underbrush. Before the fire we stripped and 
 spread our clothing on poles cut for the purpose, and 
 then there is a dim remembrance of three fellows try- 
 ing to keep their bodies in the smoke and their eyes out 
 of it. 
 
 This was a mosquito paradise for them. For us 
 the term might be reversed, and it would require the pen 
 of Dante to describe the place. Still, most readers of 
 
192 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 Forest and Stream have sat in smudges, and have won- 
 dered whether it were nobler in the mind to suffer the 
 stings and poisons of tormenting 'skeeters or by smudg- 
 ing end them. "Smoke follows beauty/' is the adage; 
 but when sitting in a smudge of dry fungus we old cam- 
 paigners know that we are not beautiful because the 
 smoke dodges us. Sometimes it is a question whether 
 the insects are not to be preferred to smarting eyes, but 
 eventually the ayes have it, and more smudge is made. 
 
 Our lunch was saved, and there was plenty of it but 
 the bread was soaked too much to use, the pies which 
 Mrs. Neaville had put in the basket had disintegrated, 
 and the ham and chicken had been eaten. We slapped 
 mosquitoes and roasted fish and shifted to keep in the 
 smoke. When the fish were cooked we ate supper. 
 
 " Where's the salt?" asked Frank. 
 
 Henry looked up and quietly said: "Frank, look in 
 the basket; you'll find the salt tied up in a rag; bring us 
 some;" and he never cracked a smile while his brother 
 held up the soaked rag, looked at it and threw it down. 
 "I never like salt on fish," said Henry; "it makes me 
 think they're not fresh." Frank and I ate fresh fish and 
 made no comment. After dinner Henry took his felt 
 hat, and went to the sloo and brought it up full of water. 
 Said he: "I always want a drink after a fish dinner, and 
 of all drinks in this world there's nothing like Mississippi 
 River water; it's rich food and drink, too and there's 
 no better place to get it than from Swift Sloo. Boys, 
 here's fun!" 
 
 It was desirable to get our clothes on at the earliest 
 moment, so that there would be a minimum of cuticle 
 exposed to the enemy, and after dressing we could dry 
 the garments from the inside as well as by the fire; so we 
 dressed and dragged the boat ashore, turned it over and 
 
CORPORAL HENRY R. NEAVILLE. 193 
 
 slept the sleep of the just under it, leaving the hordes of 
 mosquitoes to sing us a lullaby on the outside, while only 
 a few of them found entrance from the ground. 
 
 Frank said: "I've had enough of this, and I'm going 
 to get up!" And it was morning broad daylight. The 
 dawn had been obscured by the heavy timber and the 
 overturned boat. A breakfast which somehow was much 
 like the supper, in the presence of fresh fish and the 
 absence of salt and everything else, was satisfactory to all 
 but Frank. He said: "If I only had a cup of coffee I 
 wouldn't care." 
 
 "Frank," I replied, "you are not an epicure. There 
 is no more delicious breakfast known than roasted crap- 
 pie cooked without salt and washed down with water 
 from Swift Sloo. Your palate is not educated; coffee 
 just now hot coffee, I mean would spoil the combina- 
 tion; you don't want coffee, nor anything else." 
 
 "Coffee!" exclaimed Henry, "why, coffee would spoil 
 the taste of those delicate crappies, which all epicures eat 
 without salt." And then he added: "Coffee would queer 
 the whole show," a remark which made me ask if he had 
 gone off with Charley Guyon, Montpleasure and the 
 others on their trip into Iowa, and he admitted that he 
 had been the treasurer of the troupe. How little things 
 serve to show what will "queer" a larger thing! I asked: 
 "Henry, what was it that 'queered' our trip?" And he 
 simply answered: "Frank." 
 
 Don't think that Frank was any sort of a "hoodoo" 
 because we guyed him in this way. He was a good, 
 honest boy, but had no taste for camp life hunting, fish- 
 ing and mosquitoes. He afforded plenty of sport to his 
 brother and I because he was green at these things. He 
 wanted to know what there was interesting in seeing a 
 mink kill a muskrat. 
 
194 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 Henry replied: "Why, you bloomin' idiot, you might 
 live in the woods for fifty years and never see such a 
 thing but once." 
 
 "Well/' drawled Frank, "after you've seen it what 
 does it amount to? You knew that mink killed musk- 
 rats, and what more is there to it?" 
 
 Henry was dazed at this practical question, and no 
 one replied to Frank. What could you say? If a man 
 has no liking for a thing, what can be said to prove that 
 he ought to like it? We could only feel sorry for a fel- 
 low who had no care to observe animals in a state of 
 nature when they were unaware of the presence of man. 
 If a man doesn't care for literature, science or art, there's 
 no use talking to him about them. This may be illus- 
 trated by the following story: Two fellows had journeyed 
 from New York to see Niagara Falls, of which they had 
 heard much. As they came in sight of the mighty cat- 
 aract one said: "There, Jim! them's the falls!" The 
 other asked: "Is them the falls?" and added: "Them's 
 nice falls; now let's go and get some beer." That, I 
 think, puts the case fairly perhaps as strongly as that of 
 "casting pearls before swine," but not in such an offen- 
 sive manner. If Henry Neaville was alive to-day he 
 would spend a week to see that solitary animal a mink 
 capture and kill his prey in the manner one did when 
 we were fishing near Swift Sloo. Frank had no interest 
 in such things. 
 
 We cut a stiff pole, and with our remaining oar poled 
 and paddled back to the tree top where Frank capsized 
 the boat in order to look at the wounded pelican. After 
 a survey of the bottom we found the spot where the rifle 
 lay, and I undressed and brought it up at the first dive, 
 for the water was not more than six feet deep; there was 
 no mud to cover the gun in the swift water, and it lay 
 
CORPORAL HENRY R. NEAVILLE. 195 
 
 within three feet of where the boat upset. We then saw 
 where a board had lodged in the last freshet, and as our 
 loose seats were gone I proposed to replace them with 
 the board. 
 
 "But you have no saw. How are you going to cut 
 that board to make two seats?" asked Frank. 
 
 I showed him how to cut a board off square with a 
 pocket knife by taking the measure and following the 
 mark with the point of the knife. Then slightly bending 
 the board at the mark and drawing the knife in the cut, 
 taking care not to bend it too much, the fibres separated 
 with a snap under the point of the knife, and we had two 
 seats with ends as square as if sawed. It was done so 
 quickly that he was surprised, and I showed him how a 
 small tree could be cut by a sharp-pointed knife if the 
 tree could be bent so as to strain the fibres, and he very 
 ungrammatically remarked: "Well., I'm be blowed!" 
 
 Henry Neaville was one of those rare fellows who are 
 charming companions in camp one of those cheerful 
 men who never grumble, no matter what happens. It 
 might rain, and wet him to the skin when there was no 
 chance to make a fire; he might lose his fishing tackle 
 when no more could be had, and he would joke about it. 
 He would be happy when it was a choice between being 
 eaten alive by mosquitoes or being smothered and 
 blinded by smoke. Mark Tapley could not have been 
 jollier under adverse circumstances than was Henry 
 Neaville. I was with him a year and a half later in camp 
 in northern Minnesota with a surveying party, and saw 
 him come in with both feet frozen so badly that I feared 
 amputation might be necessary, and as I dressed his feet 
 afterward, when they were swollen almost to bursting, 
 he said: "If you should have to cut these feet off just box 
 'em up, and send 'em back to Potosi and write father to 
 
196 MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 tell the girls that I'm not dancing this winter." That I 
 loved such a cheerful companion is not strange; any 
 sportsman would have taken him to his heart, for if there 
 is a disagreeable quality in a man it will show itself in 
 camp. If he is cranky, cross or grumbly it will come out 
 in time, and if he is a hog who will take the choice corner 
 of the tent every time, or the best fish in pan, it is soon 
 known, and right here let me say I have met many such 
 men who seemed to think that no one was wet and cold 
 but themselves, nobody tired and hungry except their 
 own carcasses; one trip with them is always enough. 
 They are the fellows who will shoot across you at your 
 birds, throw out their lines alongside yours if they see 
 you have a nibble, and in many ways, beside bragging of 
 their personal prowess, make themselves disagreeable. 
 You've all met "em and dropped 'em. I will tell you 
 more about Henry later. 
 
 We drifted down Swift Sloo,and poled and paddled to 
 the landing, made the boat fast, and marched through the 
 partly deserted villages of Lafayette and Van Buren 
 to picturesque Potosi. Mr. Kaltenbach, who had been 
 postmaster for some twenty years then and who recently 
 died in office, the oldest postmaster known to the ser- 
 vice, hailed us with: "Hello, boys! Did you get so 
 many fish that you couldn't carry 'em?" But Henry 
 told him that several wagons were on the way with our 
 catch. John Nicholas and Bill Patterson wanted to 
 know if we forgot to spit on our bait, but they got no' 
 reply. We had enjoyed the trip that is, Henry and I 
 did it was not certain about Frank, and it was useless 
 to try to explain it to people who measure your fun by 
 the amount of game brought back a most false meas- 
 ure, and one that should come under the supervision of 
 the State "sealer of weights and measures." 
 
CORPORAL HENRY R. NEAVILLE. 197 
 
 In the fall Pete Loeser, who, you will remember, came 
 from Albany with me, sent an invitation to go up some 
 fifteen miles to Fenimore Grove and shoot prairie 
 chickens. Henry went along, and was enthusiastic 
 about the sport, which could not be had in the heavily 
 timbered district near Potosi. We met Pete and he said: 
 "The tay vos yust ride, und dere was t'ousands of bra'rie 
 shickens in de wheat stubble und de cornfields." We 
 were elated. 
 
 We had no dog, but we spread out at proper distances 
 to take in cross shots without interference, and walked 
 the birds up. The ease with which they were dropped 
 surprised me after being wrought up by Henry's ex- 
 travagant talk. On our return with big bags of this fine 
 bird, Henry asked what I thought of the sport, and I 
 summed it up in about this style: "Henry, the prairie 
 chicken is a fine large bird and a good game bird, but as 
 a bird to shoot it is easier than the little quail; it flies in 
 the open, and in such a way that a duffer could hardly 
 miss it if within range. It doesn't compare with wood- 
 cock shooting in a thicket as a test of skill, and as for 
 partridge, I tell you that there is a feeling of triumph in 
 downing a wary old bird, which starts like a rocket and 
 puts a tree between you and himself before he has gone 
 ten feet, if the tree is there, that the killing of one hun- 
 dred prairie chickens cannot equal. Come with me 
 some day and try them back of the river bluffs toward 
 Cassville, and if you don't agree with me when we return 
 I'll eat my hat." 
 
 Since that day I have shot prairie chickens in Kansas 
 and in other States, and still adhere to my opinion con- 
 cerning the merits of the two birds from the standpoint 
 of a sportsman whose object is to bag a difficult bird 
 regardless of whether he gets two or twenty. For the 
 
198 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 table I prefer the dark-meated prairie fowl, but that is 
 another question. Also I would say that up to that time 
 I had never seen nor heard of the practice of treeing 
 partridges with a dog. It is only in sparsely settled dis- 
 tricts where this can be done, and it was many years after 
 that I had practical knowledge of this method of shoot- 
 ing. About the thickly settled districts of New York, 
 where I learned to shoot, the ruffed grouse would never 
 take to a tree for a yelping spaniel; they crouched for a 
 spring at the approach of a man or dog, and often the 
 thunder of their wings was the first intimation the gun- 
 ner had of their presence, and he was lucky if he could 
 flesh his shot before the swift bird had put a tree between 
 them. It was largely snap shooting, and, as I have said, 
 the feeling of triumph in dropping one under such con- 
 ditions was great, and there were men in that day and 
 there are men to-day who will agree to every word of 
 this. At the risk of calling down a host of antagonists 
 who will go for my scalp, I will say that the grandest 
 game bird of America is the ruffed grouse, called "par- 
 tridge" in New York and New England, and "pheasant" 
 in Pennsylvania and the South. The wild turkey is a 
 wary bird, and carries more meat about his person; but 
 an experience in shooting both makes me put the turkey 
 in the second place. 
 
 This talk has led me from Henry Neaville, whom I 
 wanted you to know, but a vagabond pen wandered from 
 the subject. I will tell you something of him later on, 
 for he and I joined a party of Government surveyors a 
 year later that explored a portion of northern Minnesota; 
 but before we get to that I must, in the natural order of 
 events, tell you about a winter spent in trapping for fur 
 with Antoine Gardapee, whom you met in the first part 
 of this article. Henry was my intimate companion on 
 
CORPORAL HENRY R. NEAVILLE. 199 
 
 the surveying trip and afterward; we had so much in 
 common that we could not keep apart if we had tried. 
 
 In gathering information about my old-time friends I 
 was pleased to find that Hon. J. W. Seaton is still living 
 in Potosi. During the time of which I write he pub- 
 lished a weekly paper there, and was afterward a member 
 of the State Senate for several terms. He writes me as 
 follows: "BiH Patterson is living at Portland, Ore. All 
 your other friends are dead except Thomas Davies, who 
 went with you on the surveying trip. Henry and Frank 
 Neaville went out with Company C, Second Wisconsin 
 Infantry, afterward part of the famous 'Iron Brigade/ 
 Henry was made a corporal, and Frank was first ser- 
 geant. Frank was killed at Bull Run August 28, 1862, 
 and Henry was killed at Antietam nineteen days later." 
 
 "The neighing troop, the flashing blade, 
 
 The bugle's stirring blast, 
 The charge, the dreadful cannonade, 
 
 The din and shout are past; 
 Nor war's wild note, nor glory's peal, 
 
 Shall thrill with fierce delight 
 Those breasts that never more may feel 
 
 The rapture of the fight." 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 
 
 IN THREE CANTOS. 
 CANTO I. TRAPPING FUR KILLING A WOLVERINE. 
 
 IT is possible that there may be another way to spell 
 this name. Antoine never spelled it, but then he 
 couldn't spell any other word; so we just take it as 
 it sounded. After the time when he killed the doe that 
 was with my buck we often met. Early in October I 
 dropped into his cabin, and found him overhauling a lot 
 of steel traps, putting in a rivet here and there, filing the 
 catch to hold the pan stiffer, or to make it go off easier, 
 as seemed best. His back was to the open door, and I 
 watched him a few minutes before announcing my pres- 
 ence by knocking on the door frame of his little log 
 shanty. He whirled around on the box which served 
 as a bench and said: "Come in! You jess a man I want 
 for see. Whar you be'n so long tarn? I was go for look 
 you up." 
 
 "I've been working hard for the past week, and have 
 
 not been up the river until to-day, when my partner, 
 
 Guyon, wanted a day off ; so I thought I'd drift over your 
 
 way and see if I couldn't get a deer, but haven't seen any 
 
 fresh sign this morning. About a mile down the river a 
 
 big flock of geese got up and came over my head very 
 
 low, and if I had had a shotgun I might have got three 
 
 or four, they were so thick; but here's one that dropped." 
 
 "You don' eat heem, he's a t'ousan' year ol'; look a 
 
 200 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 201 
 
 here," and he tried to tear the skin under its wing with 
 no effect. "I'll tole you; give a-heem to ol' Miss'r 
 Knight; he's tough, too. How much a-mineral Charley 
 an' you clean up dis a- week?" 
 
 "Oh, we had a big week, and cleaned up about fifteen 
 hundred. Why?" 
 
 "Yas, all drif; nex' week you don' get noding, hey?" 
 
 "Perhaps so, but that's miner's luck; we can't expect 
 to get as much every time. It's the biggest week we've 
 had, and only five days at that." 
 
 "You like-a dat work no?" 
 
 "No, I don't like it; but it helps a fellow to live." 
 
 "I tole you. You go 'long o' me dis winta an' trap. 
 You haf good time an' make more dan dig fur de lead. 
 I no dig fur lead." 
 
 And so it happened. He was getting ready to spend 
 the winter in the wilds of the Bad Ax country to trap. 
 After hearing his scheme I agreed to go with him, and 
 we started in to get ready. He had all the steel traps 
 necessary for small animals, and was an expert at making 
 dead-falls for the larger ones. We drifted down to Du- 
 buque, where we put our boat and other things on a 
 steamer for Prairie du Chien. From that place we took 
 a supply of provisions, mainly of flour, coffee and sugar, 
 for Antoine said we would not need pork nor lard be- 
 cause we could get fat from coons, ducks and perhaps 
 other animals. Our outfit was simple, but it loaded our 
 boat, and two heavy tarpaulins protected the provisions. 
 It was a hard pull up the Wisconsin River, some twenty 
 miles, to the mouth of the Bad Ax River, but we took 
 it easy, and the second night we camped a mile or so up 
 the Bad Ax. This camp is memorable because of a 
 storm which wet us to the skin, but the provisions and 
 the ammunition were kept dry. 
 
202 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 We went on up the little river some fifty miles, more 
 or less, hauling over or around falls, when we hid our 
 boat and a portion of the provisions and started on foot 
 to some spot which Antoine seemed familiar with, for he 
 had been over the ground before. The way he stored 
 the provisions was curious. After dragging the boat 
 back from the river we hung it bottom side up between 
 two trees, and then put out lines from each side to pre- 
 vent it turning over. Then we cut poles and made a 
 shelf on the seats, covered these with a tarpaulin and 
 stored our provisions in the boat. 
 
 "Now," said Antoine, "Miss'r Bear, Miss'r Coon and 
 Miss'r Mouse, you doan git no flour and you doan git no 
 sugar, an', Miss'r Rain, you doan spile noding." 
 
 We took our rifles, a frying pan, axe and some flour, 
 coffee and salt, and started up the river into Bad Ax 
 county, which some man with no regard for historic 
 names has had re-christened "Vernon county," a change 
 that destroys the individuality of the county, for there 
 might be forty Vernon counties in the United States, but 
 there would be only one having the old name, which 
 savors of the settlement of the region by the whites and 
 had the merit of being unique. I have no idea how the 
 old name came to the river and afterward the county, 
 but will predict that some man with a little poetry in his 
 soul and a love for originality will arise and have the his- 
 toric and beautiful I say beautiful advisedly name of 
 "Bad Ax" restored to the county. I really don't know 
 if the river has been renamed, but hope not. 
 
 We selected our camping spot some few miles above 
 the fork of the river, on the east branch, where several 
 small streams came in. There are, no doubt, names for 
 all these now; we had no map and no name for anything 
 but the main river, yet we named them for our own pur- 
 
ANTOINE CARDAPEE. 203 
 
 poses ; that was necessary in order to be understood, and 
 I elaborated a map on my powder horn which showed 
 all the streams, swamps and hills to the best of my ability. 
 This horn was left in Potosi, as of no further use. Just 
 what I would give to see it hanging on a wall of my den 
 to-day I cannot say. We measure the things of the mo- 
 ment by their utility or their cash value, but those of the 
 past which formed a part of our lives become treasures 
 beyond price when they serve as links to connect us with 
 a time far removed. A sword that was "held by the 
 enemy" for over a quarter of a century is on my wall. It 
 may be sold for old junk, but not before I am put to bed 
 with a spade and sodded over. 
 
 Let's see; we were talking about an old powder horn. 
 It cost only the time to bore out the tip, fit the bottom 
 and to polish the thing a mere nothing but it's so easy 
 to get off the track. I was only going to say to the boys 
 of to-day: Never throw away anything that you can 
 keep. A trifling thing becomes priceless after forty 
 years have passed. That's all ! 
 
 When the old trapper threw down his load and said, 
 "We make here our house," his partner, who had begun 
 to think that there was no end to the journey, rejoiced. 
 On a little knoll we laid the foundation for the cabin. 
 Antoine was one of those men who are so handy with an 
 axe that you wouldn't be surprised to see a clock made by 
 him with that tool alone, and he measured and notched 
 the logs and showed me how to put the small ends, that 
 made the sides, to the rear, and so help the slant of the 
 roof. He split the long three-foot shingles, a few 
 "puncheons" for part of a floor, on which we slept, and 
 also for the door frames and the door. We chinked the 
 logs, and plastered them with clay mixed with coarse 
 grass, made a fireplace and stone chimney, and then 
 
204 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 we were in a ten-by-twelve cabin, with a shed roof kept 
 in place by weight poles. A stone oven was made in the 
 fireplace, where we could not only bake bread, raised 
 with cream o' tartar and soda, but could also roast a 
 goose or a venison ham. 
 
 Not until we began to build our camp would the old 
 man let me kill a deer, although we saw plenty of them, 
 because he said that we could not carry any part of it; 
 so we had lived on partridges, rabbits and a coon on the 
 journey, and a change to venison was good. The bed 
 was made with hemlock boughs on the puncheons, and 
 covered with a tarpaulin and blankets. A swinging 
 shelf was made to hold the remaining provisions secure 
 from rats or other intruders, and we started down stream 
 for supplies, taking only one rifle, an axe and enough 
 salt, matches, etc., to last a week, for we had been three 
 days going up from the place where the boat was left. 
 After a two days' tramp we found our provisions as we 
 had left them, and loaded up again and started for camp. 
 Just how it happened, no one knows; my rifle had only 
 one trigger, and that could be "set" by pushing it for- 
 ward, and the "set" was so light that a breath would al- 
 most let it off. Of course it could be used without the 
 "set," and then it took about a two-pound pull to let it go. 
 I had started ahead, and in my pack was the frying-pan, 
 which projected over my shoulder alongside my head. 
 Suddenly a shot startled me close to my ear, and on look- 
 ing around at Antoine he said: "What for he go so easy? 
 I t'ought I kill one pa-tridge on de tree yonder, an' I on'y 
 make a hole in dat fry-pan; de t'ing go off too quick, an' 
 mos' kill you, hey?" 
 
 The grouse had not stirred, and I loaded the rifle, 
 showed Antoine how a single trigger could be set to a 
 "hair," and he picked the head off the partridge, saying; 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 205 
 
 "Ba gosh! he go so easy as a gun wit' two trigger; I doan 
 on'stan dat." He learned the trick, and after beating 
 down the edges of the hole in the frying-pan and putting 
 in one of the trap rivets and battering it down with the 
 poll ot the axe we went on. It took four trips to get all 
 our plunder from the boat to the camp, and the snows 
 had fallen before the last one was made, and our snow- 
 shoes were worn instead of being carried, for without 
 them we would have been there until spring, for the snow 
 was two feet deep and still falling when we reached our 
 cabin. To our surprise there was smoke coming from 
 the chimney, and when we opened the door there was an 
 Indian cooking a rabbit by the fire. 
 
 He arose, shook hands with Antoine and then with 
 me, and the Frenchman and he sat down and talked in 
 the Ojibwa tongue for a while, and then my friend ex- 
 plained the matter in this way: The red man was an old 
 acquaintance who had found our camp and entered, as 
 was their custom; he knew Antoine's rifle, saw that the 
 camp was new, and waited for our return. He tapped 
 his breast and said to me, "Nidgee," which I understood 
 to be his name, and so called him, although I afterward 
 learned that the word meant simply "friend." 
 
 It is difficult to get at the way these Indian words 
 should be spelt; for instance, they call themselves O-jib- 
 wah, and the white man first twists it into Ojibway 
 and then into "Chippeway." The word which I spell 
 "Nidgee" is sometimes given as "Nitchee," and so it 
 goes ; it's a question of how it sounds and how it may be 
 twisted at second hand. When I was among them they 
 pronounced the tribal name with an almost impercep- 
 tible "O," and the accent on the second syllable, as given 
 above. Our red friend came and went at intervals all 
 winter, never saying a word at leaving and only giving a 
 
206 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 salutatory grunt on arriving. Antoine explained that his 
 friend's name was Ah-se-bun, or Raccoon, and that he 
 was a good man to know; I gave him a big plug of to- 
 bacco, and we were friends. 
 
 After getting the cabin well fixed for the winter we 
 started to put out a line of traps up a branch of the little 
 stream, which was to be my line. We were gone three 
 days, and had good dry weather, covered about thirty 
 miles in all fifteen up one stream, then over a divide 
 and down another, which came into the first one near our 
 shanty but we set about forty steel traps of different 
 sizes, for otter near falls and rapids, for mink under tree 
 roots and other covered places, and for "black cat," pine 
 marten and ermine in their haunts. We made many 
 dead-falls for some of these animals where it was possible 
 to drive stakes or arrange them on stumps, and for these 
 we carried bait of venison and fish. This was my first 
 three days on snowshoes, and the weight of them, added 
 to the unusual gait which they require, made some mus- 
 cles that had not been used to a loping gait very sore. 
 But the truth came out when we reached the cabin and 
 hung the snowshoes up, for Antoine asked: "You tired, 
 hey? I t'ink t'ree day' on snowshoe' pooty good fur fust 
 time; he make me sore fust, but, like de skate, you git 
 used to dat kine, an' bime-by you t'ink de snowshoe de 
 best fur de walk. Jess so me w'en I be in de wood all 
 winter. W'at you say, hey? S'pose we res' two, t'ree 
 day' an' fish, den I go put my line o' trap an' you run 
 yours; what you say, hey?" 
 
 "Well, Antoine, I do feel tired in my legs, and if you 
 are tired, too, I'll do just as you say. We'll fish a day or 
 two, and get a change of feed, and then you go and lay 
 out your line and I'll run over mine." 
 
 This put it in such shape that the tired feeling was 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 207 
 
 mutual, as indeed it was, for the first skating or snow- 
 shoeing of the season strains muscles in an unusual 
 way. And we rested and fished. We used bits of veni- 
 son for bait, and laid in a stock of trout and some other 
 small fish, which we stored in the snow when frozen. 
 
 A portion of a deer had been hung on the north side 
 of the cabin, and it had been torn and picked in a way 
 that neither dogs, wolves nor bears could nor would have 
 mutilated it, because the tearing had been done from the 
 upper side. I called my partner's attention to it, and 
 suggested that ravens had found us out. 
 
 He looked at the meat and said: "Miss'r Raven he 
 doan lak come near shanty, but dem mis'able meat hawk 
 he come an' take de meat out yo' mouf. I hate dat cuss, 
 de meanes' bird in de wood, 'cause he no 'fraid. You 
 keep a' eye out an' see how I fix him wid a flip." 
 
 I saw the bird the same day. It was the "Canada 
 jay," "meat hawk," "whiskey jack," etc., a relative of our 
 blue jay, tmt not so noisy. As I have since known this 
 Northern bird on its extreme Southern limit in winter, 
 in Michigan and Minnesota, it is of an ashy gray color, 
 with black and white markings, and so unfamiliar with 
 man as to be impudent, and therefore very interesting. 
 This is all very well when a bird visits you in a winter 
 camp where birds are scarce, and one drops down by 
 your feet, hops around and swipes a venison chop or a 
 fish which has been laid out ready for the pan; but when 
 it invites all its sisters, its cousins and its aunts to a feast 
 on a saddle of venison, which you have left out for safe- 
 keeping entirely for your own purposes, the familiarity 
 of the bird breeds a feeling which differs from contempt. 
 Somewhere back in memory the word "flip" seemed con- 
 nected with some sort of a beverage, and I imagined that 
 Antoine intended to give "whiskey jack" a drink that 
 
208 MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 would paralyze him; that was a natural conclusion, al- 
 though we had no whiskey. 
 
 "I tell you; come see me fix de flip; he come here for 
 heat my meat an' he'll get de flip; I fix him." He re- 
 moved the chinking from between the logs for a foot, 
 and ran out a long shingle and put a piece of meat on the 
 outer end. Soon the enemy alighted on the shingle, 
 when down came the axe on its inside end, and a dead 
 "meat hawk" was tossed in the air. "I tole you he got 
 de flip he want no more, an' now all hees brudder got 
 to get de flip, an' den we got no trouble no mo'." Dur- 
 ing our three days' rest we killed about twenty with the 
 "flip," and went our rounds of traps knowing that there 
 were a few less meat hawks to prey upon our stores. 
 
 I stayed in camp alone for three days after our rest, 
 while Antoine went over his line and set his traps. The 
 first trip was the greatest labor of all, for it involved 
 selecting places and building dead-falls, but I was get- 
 ting my tired muscles into condition by a rest which was 
 merely a change of occupation. The rifle was to be 
 cleaned and oiled; knives were to be sharpened; wood 
 to be cut; bullets to be moulded from bar lead, and other 
 things to be done, besides cooking and washing under- 
 clothing. 
 
 While fishing in the stream on the third day after An- 
 toine left, there suddenly appeared seven Indians, in com- 
 pany with my friend Ah-se-bun. None of them could 
 or would speak English, and after a repetition of the 
 word "Tah-so-je-ge" and some gesticulation I began to 
 understand that they were asking for Antoine. Later I 
 learned that "je-ge" meant "he who does," and that "tah- 
 so" referred to traps. As I gradually picked up some 
 of their words and tried to use them, I often began a 
 sentence to Antoine with "Nidgee Tah-so-je-ge t would 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 209 
 
 you like fish or venison?" etc. That day when I was 
 tound fishing my red friend had named me "Kego-e- 
 kay," or he who fishes, and I arranged with Antoine to 
 always use the native tongue when possible; and before 
 spring it was our common camp talk, he helping me over 
 the hummocks. I entertained our red friends as well as 
 possible, and their appetites were enormous. Antoine 
 had fully informed me on all the points of O jib way eti- 
 quette, and when I offered tobacco the exact amount 
 was cut off and handed to each individual, or he would 
 have considered that the whole plug was given him; and 
 the same circumspection was necessary when a loaf of 
 bread was cut. 
 
 I tried to get our visitors to follow Antoine's trail and 
 meet him, as the prospect of feeding eight hungry In- 
 dians was not pleasant, but they waited. I had two 
 loaves of bread; one for me to take next morning when 
 I ran my line, and one for supper when Antoine came. 
 A venison ham was boiling in the fireplace to have for 
 supper and breakfast, and to keep me three days if neces- 
 sary; but when I got ready to set it out to our guests 
 Antoine came in. There was a grunting salutation, and 
 then Antoine said: "I don't bin hungry, but ba gosh if 
 I'll bin starve; it was good I come now 'fore dey heat all 
 dat grub we got. You don't know w'at happetite dey 
 got, I'll tole you." And I certainly didn't know. An- 
 toine first cut bread and meat for himself and me, and 
 then divided the rest into eight portions, which were 
 hardly chewed, and had disappeared before we had fairly 
 begun. 
 
 Antoine then told me: "Dey ha'n't had half plenty, 
 but dey all say 'nish-ish-shin;' dat means 'good.' We 
 doan got much meat, on'y for you free day, an' I doan 
 cook no more." 
 
210 MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 A smoke followed, and then it transpired, as Antoine 
 translated it, that one of their friends had somehow 
 broken his leg, and they wanted him to go and set it. 
 The distance to their camp was only five miles, and if I 
 didn't mind he would go at once. It seems that he had 
 a reputation for surgery among these people, and I had 
 three good reasons for wishing him to start immediately. 
 Of course the humanity of fixing the man's leg was one 
 reason; keeping on good terms with men who could rob 
 and destroy our traps and drive us out of the country 
 was another, and I fear that the third was a desire to get 
 rid of guests who would devour our stores and breed a 
 famine was as strong a reason as the other two. 
 
 After the exodus I cooked a partridge and some veni- 
 son chops to take on the line, baked two more loaves of 
 bread, and had the kettle boiling to make coffee when 
 Antoine should return. A light rain the night before 
 had made a crust upon the snow and snowshoes were not 
 needed. It was long after dark when his step was heard 
 crunching in the crust, and in he walked with his rifle 
 and a coon. I told him that it was well that he had the 
 coon, for I had cooked all the meat in sight, and there 
 was only enough for our supper and for me to take on 
 my trip. There were fish enough for breakfast, and now 
 there was coon fat enough to fry them in. In the words 
 of that old hunting song of Mr. Raynor's: "Why should 
 the hunter lack?" 
 
 Antoine said: "Dat make no difF. Wen I'll got 
 hunger I'll catch de feesh or I'll kill a deer or pa'tridge, 
 or I'll go hunger. It makes no diff', I'll come along, 
 you doan min' me, no." 
 
 After supper we smoked in silence. I had said all 
 that could be said about the camp larder in order that 
 he might not put off replenishing it before he got hun- 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 211 
 
 giy, and was anxious to know all about the broken leg 
 and why so many Indians were so close to us. Not a 
 question would I ask of the old man. He would tell it 
 all in his own way if left alone, and would be better satis- 
 fied to do it in that way. We sat in front of the log fire 
 on three-legged stools which his axe had fashioned, and 
 smoked in silence until he said: "Han' me that plug 
 tobac." I passed him the tobacco, and he slowly sliced 
 a pipeful, ground it in his palms, filled his pipe and 
 lighted it with a sliver from a dry pine stick. I emptied 
 my pipe and followed suit. As he contemplated the 
 smoke curl up and mingle with that of the fire, he re- 
 moved the pipe and said: "Dese Injun jess lak w'ite man, 
 some smart an' some tarn fool." He was thawing out, 
 and to assist the process I kept silent and let him go on 
 thinking until he got ready to tell as much as he wished. 
 After a few more puffs he said : "De big fella dat was 
 here, hees name was 'She-kog,' an' dat mean de skunk; 
 but he ain't got no sense like a skunk. All dese men dey 
 go on up on a Flambeau riv', dey no stay on a Bad Ax 
 riv, an' She-kog he go fur to break a stick an' hit O-ge- 
 ma, the head man, an' broke his bone in his O-bwam, 
 w'at you call dat bone here?" indicating his thigh. 
 "Well, when I foun' ole O-ge-ma he say 'ugh'* an' I feel 
 hees laig. Sho 'nuff she was broke. I get some wood 
 f'um dry pine an' make splits an' tear up blanket, an' den 
 I take hees foot in bote han's an' put ma foot in hees 
 crotch an' I pull lak de dev' till bones slip togedder an' I 
 feel 'em all rite. Den de woman win' hees laig in 
 blanket, an' I put on some split wood an' more blanket 
 an' hees laig it get all rite. Dey go 'way in mornin' an* 
 carry O-ge-ma 'longside. Gimme dat tobac." 
 
 *This Indian salutation has been Anglicized into "how," and further 
 polluted into "here's how." 
 
212 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 In the morning I started to run my line. Two days 
 would do it easily if the weather was good, but rations 
 for three was a wise provision. A rifle and ammunition 
 for a dozen shots was also needed. Matches in a vial, 
 blankets, some strong twine and a belt axe completed 
 the outfit, except the snowshoes, which were slung on 
 the back in case of need, for the crust might soften or 
 fresh snow might fall, and snowshoes were now in the 
 same category as the traditional pistol in Texas. This 
 made a fairly good load for a novice, and it was increased 
 by several skins before noon. 
 
 Night came; and as I ate supper by a little fire and 
 crawled under my blankets with my feet to the fire and 
 the upper half of my body in the hollow of a big tree 
 there came a sense of loneliness that is indescribable. 
 Perhaps there was some fear, but as near as I can recall 
 it the main feeling was one of helplessness. The night 
 was still, cold and clear. The stars shone through the 
 top of the leafless, hardwood trees. I looked over the 
 rifle. It was a big and tolerably accurate one; the cap 
 was sound and "Pshaw!" I thought, "a man armed as I 
 am is the most dangerous animal in these woods; now 
 go to sleep." That was truly philosophical, but philos- 
 ophy and sleep are not identical. Not a twig or an 
 acorn dropped within hearing that escaped my over- 
 sensitive ear. The fire was replenished several times, 
 and it seemed as if day would never come. 
 
 If I lost consciousness for a moment that night it 
 must have been the briefest of moments. Camping out 
 with Port Tyler and the boys was one thing, but this was 
 another. Every owl that ventured a remark seemed to 
 be making reference to me. If a rabbit ran on the hard 
 snow and cracked his joints as a call or challenge I heard 
 it but then the fact is I was not sleepy. No man can 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 213 
 
 sleep when he isn't sleepy; there's nothing queer in that. 
 Near daylight I was startled by the tramp of some 
 animal, and I sat up and listened. The sound came 
 from the stream below, which glinted in the starlight, 
 and I made out a moving form going down stream. I 
 thought it must be a bear, and if I could kill it then life 
 would be worth living, if only to tell of it. I stood up 
 in the hollow of the great tree, and tried to get the rifle 
 sights in line with the animal's forequarters, but the dif- 
 fused light from snow and stars made it seem impossible 
 to tell where the gun was sighted. The thing stopped; 
 it had probably scented my camp, and partly at random 
 I fired. A mingled cry and growl, a floundering in the 
 snow and a hasty reloading of the rifle followed. On 
 reaching the spot, not more than fifty yards distant, blood 
 could be seen on the snow and I followed. Morning 
 was visible in the east, and by the time the sun was up 
 I had run down my game, which was weak from copious 
 bleeding. It turned at bay. It was not a bear, but what 
 could it be? It made a feeble charge on me, which I 
 dodged, and then dropped it with a bullet in the head. 
 Now that it was dead I had no idea what it could be. 
 Of lions, tigers, elephants and other animals of Asia and 
 Africa I had knowledge, but here was a beast in an 
 American forest of which I had never heard nor read of in 
 my school books. It was bear-like, but not a bear. Its 
 body was heavy; its legs thick and clumsy; its tail bushy, 
 and it had a round head with eyes wide apart. The hair 
 was shaggy and thick, the color being almost black, with 
 a light stripe along the sides which met at the insertion 
 of the tail. It was about three feet long, and might have 
 weighed 150 pounds. This is how I remember it, and 
 under such circumstances a young fellow with tastes of 
 the naturalist notes such izhings. I skinned the beast, 
 
214: MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 and the smell of the meat said plainly that whatever this 
 thing may be I would starve before I would eat it. It 
 was an odor like that of mink, weasels and other beasts 
 of prey, or rather, those which live on flesh exclusively 
 for the flesh of the bear, coon, hog and other omnivora 
 has no such smell. One hindleg had been broken and 
 the other injured a most fortunate shot in the uncer- 
 tain light, and one of pure and unadulterated luck. 
 
 After a toilet in the brook and a good breakfast 
 such a breakfast as only one with an appetite such as I 
 had, after the morning's work, can appreciate I crossed 
 the divide, and struck the other stream, which led home- 
 ward; yes, that's the word; it was home now. Soon I 
 came to a dead-fall which had been wrecked ; the back of 
 it had been broken into and the bait taken. I thought 
 that some animal had approached it from the rear, and 
 in ignorance that the other side was open and that the 
 trigger held a hospitable log, which would induce him to 
 remain by falling and breaking his back, had considered 
 that the only way to get at the desired bait was to break 
 in from the side he first came to. After finding a dozen 
 or more dead-falls entered in the same manner I began 
 thinking. The more I thought of the matter the further 
 I was from any conclusion. The crust on the snow was 
 now too hard to show any tracks except of deer, whose 
 small hoofs cut through it and often left bloody marks 
 where the crust had retaliated. 
 
 When I reached camp, Antoine had just finished his 
 laundry work and was hanging it up. Here I want to 
 tell the young boys that a trapper's life is a hard one, 
 aside from the exposure in running lines of traps. With 
 two it is lighter because of a division of labor, but to run 
 a line two or three days, skin, stretch and then flesh the 
 skins so that particles of fat do not injure them, cook for 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 215 
 
 yourself and partner, wash your underclothing, mend 
 clothes, moccasins or shoe packs and snowshoes, besides 
 cleaning guns, running bullets and doing the hundred 
 and one things that must be done, keeps one busy every 
 hour of daylight and often afterward. It is an inde- 
 pendent sort of life, free from being bossed ; but it is hard 
 work in a healthy climate, and full of adventure to one 
 who loves it. 
 
 Antoine looked over my skins. They comprised one 
 otter, two mink, one ermine or white weasel, one fisher 
 or "black-cat," which he called by the Indian name of 
 o-jig, and is a strange animal of the mink or weasel fam- 
 ily which the naturalists know as Mustela canadensis, but 
 it also called "pekan" and other names. There was also 
 a foot and part of a leg, saved for Antoine's identifica- 
 tion, which he called sable, an animal better known as 
 pine marten. Then came the skin of the unknown 
 beast. When he saw that he jumped and yelled. Then 
 he shook hands with me and said: "You b'en done it; 
 you killed de ole dev', old Carcajou; he break all de trap 
 you set; he know all 'bout trap, an' he go in on hin' end 
 and steal bait. He follow you' track to all you' trap, 
 and w'en he fin' he break 'em, mebbe he steal 'em. Oh, 
 he spile our trap all a time, but you got-a heem. Shake." 
 
 It was a wolverine, an animal with many names, and 
 the worst enemy the trapper meets. The badger is also 
 called carcajou. 
 
 A day spent in stretching and fleshing skins, and then 
 Antoine started to run his line. Our bake oven had 
 fallen in, and I brought better stones from the brook and 
 built it anew in the fireplace, cooked my dinner and sup- 
 per from the carcass of a deer, which Antoine had killed 
 and dressed, sat by the fire, smoked a while and turned 
 in and slept the sleep of the just. Tired and worn out, 
 
216 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 acorns might fall, rabbits might snap their legs and wol- 
 verines might prowl around. I had killed a wolverine, 
 a stealthy night prowler that from pure deviltry destroys 
 the work of the trapper, and that was glory enough for a 
 first trip. I have no remembrance of any dreams that 
 night. I could have said with Sancho Panza: 
 
 "Blessings light on him who first invented sleep! It 
 covers a man all over, thoughts and all, like a cloak; it is 
 meat for the hungry, drink for the thirsty, heat for the 
 cold, and cold for the hot; in short, money that buys 
 everything; balance and weight that makes the shepherd 
 equal to the monarch and the fool to the wise; there is 
 only one evil in sleep, as I have heard, and it is that it 
 resembles death, since between a dead and a sleeping 
 man there is little difference." 
 
 The sun was high when I awoke, and by my side 
 stood Ah-se-bun; but I'll tell you about that another 
 time. 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 
 
 CANTO II. ANOTHER WOLVERINE SNOW BLIND. 
 
 I WOULD ask all such "tenderfeet," in whose ranks 
 I was then a recruit, although the term had not 
 been invented, how they would feel to awake in a 
 cabin in a forest where there was no white man within 
 forty miles, except a partner who was off running a line 
 of traps, and find an Indian standing silently by the bed? 
 Just put yourself in his place. 
 
 After the choking sensation which comes with such a 
 scare, and a partly paralyzed heart had begun its regular 
 work, the firelight, which, by the way, the intruder had 
 replenished, showed the features of our friend Ah-se- 
 bun, who gave a saluting grunt and turned toward the 
 fire, where he sat until I arose, washed and dressed and 
 prepared to get breakfast. The door had been held shut 
 against wind and snow by a prop, for there was no fear 
 of animals where there was a man and a fire, and our 
 guest had somehow removed that without disturbing my 
 sleep, but how long he had been in the cabin was un- 
 known. He held down a stool by the fire, while I cooked 
 breakfast, and he sat there and ate enough for half a 
 dozen laboring men, and drank coffee until there was 
 none left. Antoine had taught me never to betray any 
 curiosity, and so I handed over a pipeful of tobacco and 
 waited. Old Raccoon looked at me inquiringly, and I 
 at once filled my pipe, although I never could endure 
 
 217 
 
218 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 tobacco in the morning, and I took a few puffs and 
 awaited his pleasure, curious to know why he had made 
 such an unconventional call at so early an hour. He 
 smoked his pipe out, emptied it, and sat for what seemed 
 a long time before he spoke. 
 
 After some repetition and much gesticulation, it ap- 
 peared that he had met Antoine, and that the latter had 
 killed a bear, and I must go with him and help get it to 
 camp, and after arranging things in the cabin, I took 
 down my rifle to start when my guest shook his head 
 and said, "Kowin," and I replaced it at the door. I un- 
 derstood then that there would be load enough without 
 a ten-pound rifle, and we went off to bring in the bear. 
 
 Enough snow had fallen during the night to make 
 hard travelling without snowshoes, so we tied them on 
 and started Ah-se-bun in the lead up a stream on the 
 west side where I had never been, but where my part- 
 ner's line of traps began. A tramp of some five miles 
 brought us to the place where Antoine had killed the 
 bear, about a mile off his line. He was there cooking 
 his breakfast when we arrived, for he had been up and 
 had the bear skinned and dressed before he started in to 
 cook. It happened that he had run his first line of traps 
 some fifteen miles, and was crossing the divide to his 
 homestretch when he found a fresh bear track in the 
 snow, which had begun to fall late in the afternoon, and 
 he turned and followed it. The track led him back 
 toward camp, and he came upon bruin about sunset and 
 killed it where we found him. 
 
 When we came up to him he said: "I t'ink you better 
 come up and take ole Afum to camp, an' I'll go on an' 
 run my trap, hey? What you want? Bre'kfuss? I 
 t'ink yes." 
 
 I said to him: "I have been to breakfast, but can eat 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 219 
 
 a little more after the long tramp on snowshoes; but if 
 you'll only let our friend the Raccoon have a fair whack 
 at that bear the load will be lighter to carry. He's had 
 one big breakfast about five times as much as I could 
 ea t but just let him fill up on bear meat, and our load 
 home will be light." 
 
 Antoine thought a minute and replied: 'Til tole you. 
 I'll doan lak bear leever, but a Injun he lak him bes' of 
 all. I'll cook-a heem dat leever, an' you'll heat my col' 
 pa'tridge w'at I roas' las' night w'en da bear was warm. 
 I'll tole you I'll have long chase for Afum, an' I t'ink I'll 
 loss him in a dark, but he stop to look roun' an' I get 
 him. He good an' fat, an' w'en he freeze I lak heem jess 
 so good as de pork, an' he make some good fat for fry 
 de feesh an' roas' de pa'tridge." 
 
 For years the name "Afum" bothered me. The 
 Ojibway name for the bear is muckwo, and, as the word 
 was neither French nor Indian, it was a puzzle until in 
 later years I learned that Western hunters call the griz- 
 zly bear "Ephraim," and this must have been the name 
 which the trapper tried to use. 
 
 Antoine rigged a couple of light, flexible poles to a 
 piece of bark, on which we placed the hindquarters of the 
 animal, wrapped in its skin. A short, light rope was 
 attached to the poles, and with the rope as a collar and a 
 pole under each arm a man could haul quite a load over 
 the snow where a sled would have cut in. The front 
 edge of the bark was rolled up sled fashion, and by fol- 
 lowing the stream and trail it was mainly a down-hill 
 haul, with the exception of a few knolls. When all was 
 loaded Antoine went his way over his line, and I pointed 
 to each load and then to Ah-se-bun to take his choice, the 
 hindquarters and skin being the heaviest. Which do 
 you think he took? 
 
220 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 It has been said of a man who is so unfortunate as to 
 have to carve at his own table: "If he takes the best cut 
 for himself he's a durned hog, and if he doesn't he's a 
 durned fool." Now, in making choice of loads as well 
 as in some other things I will bear witness that my red 
 friend was not a "durned fool." There was a sort of 
 straightforwardness among the Indians whom I met that 
 I've never been able to acquire. They knew what they 
 wanted, and they went for it without being hampered by 
 etiquette. If there was carving to be done they could 
 never be ranked with the d. f.'s, and when the choice of 
 loads was offered I got "the lion's share." With more 
 experience in the ways of "Mr. Lo," he would not have 
 been offered the choice of loads; at the the risk of being 
 thought a d. h. I would simply pick up the poles of the 
 lighter load, leave him to choose the other. 
 
 It was quite a pull, and our freight had to be un- 
 loaded several times to get it around the bad places on an 
 Indian trail, for an old path ran along this stream which 
 somehow was indistinctly visible even in winter by 
 marks, such as fallen trees, which showed where they had 
 been worn by being stepped upon or by having lodge 
 poles dragged over them, clumps of bushes which had 
 been avoided, and the many things which an observing 
 eye notes. At times it required both of us to take hold 
 of one load, and lift or drag it over or around an obstruc- 
 tion, and then do the same with the other. I gave my 
 companion frequent opportunities to exchange, but he 
 didn't take them. I was too polite to pick up his poles, 
 but Antoine said afterward: "By gar! Wen you want 
 for change load, you mus' change. He t'ink you big 
 fool w'en he gotta da light one all a tarn. Nax tarn you 
 tak-a de small load. He lak-a de big one w'en dat's w'at 
 he got. He gotta lak heem." 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 221 
 
 When we came to the cabin the sun was well past 
 meridian. Clocks and watches had been left far behind 
 us. "We took no note of time save by its flight." Ah- 
 se-bun, the Raccoon, was hungry. What does half a 
 dozen pounds of bear's liver eaten in the morning amount 
 to half a day later, after hauling part of a bear five miles 
 over crusted snow that often had a sidelong slope toward 
 the stream, and over a crooked and log-barred path? I 
 was hungry also, but had never got into the Indian habit 
 of eating enough in one day to last for three, and so I 
 started in to get dinner. I plucked up courage and told 
 Lo to go and get some dry wood. He pointed to a pile 
 in the corner that was kept for such an emergency as 
 severe weather, and intimated that there was plenty. I 
 was tired, hungry and cross, and just in the humor to lay 
 aside all notions that I must treat an Indian as a gentle- 
 man, and I then put away the bear steak, hung up the 
 frying-pan and merely said "Nish-ish-shin" (good) and 
 lighted my pipe and sat down ; in other words, "I struck." 
 I thought it out something like this: Here was a lazy, 
 gormandizing Indian who came and went at pleasure, 
 and could eat as much as four hard-working white men 
 and then sleep for a week after it, who would probably 
 stay by me as long as the bear lasted and eat the greater 
 part of it, after shirking the heaviest load on me, and 
 now he was too lazy to get wood to cook his dinner be- 
 cause there were a few sticks in the cabin which were 
 kept for bad weather. After smoking a few minutes and 
 feeling no less angry I lay down, and slept as only a tired 
 man can sleep. A noise awoke me; it was my red friend 
 bringing in wood. It was dark outside; he had thought 
 the matter over, and had concluded that he wanted to get 
 some wood, and had got it. This was comfortable to me, 
 and I cooked a great lot of bear steaks, baked some 
 
222 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 bread and we had dinner. He cared nothing for bread 
 unless soaked with fat, but the amount of meat he could 
 secrete was enormous. It is surprising what an amount 
 of animal food a white man can consume in the clear, 
 cold winter air of the woods, whether in Wisconsin, 
 Maine or the Adirondacks, especially if he is running a 
 line of traps or hauling half a bear over a trail that is 
 covered with crusted snow, but an Indian can discount 
 him. From that time forward I had no fear of asserting 
 myself, and of bossing the ranch when our guest and I 
 were left alone. I dropped all my civilized notions of 
 etiquette and got along nicely. This, of course, does not 
 apply to Antoine, for he and I vied with each other in 
 doing camp work, and he had all the consideration for a 
 companion that could be expected of a man who had 
 been reared among different surroundings; but for an 
 Indian I began to entertain different feelings. I under- 
 stood and appreciated them better afterward, but just 
 then I was in the transition state of being disillusioned. 
 
 When Antoine came, two days later, he had some 
 skins, and a woeful tale of broken dead-falls and of traps 
 carried off. Ah-se-bun had gone. A wolverine had 
 struck Antoine's line, and the old man was tired and 
 cross. He sat with his head in his hands before the fire, 
 while I made him some coffee and broiled him some 
 venison chops on a grill made from some wire we had 
 brought for tying traps or other purposes, and then I 
 fried some fish in bear fat and set out the tin cups and 
 plates, and we ate in silence. It was a good dinner, fit 
 for a hard-working trapper who had come in tired and 
 angry at having lost the fruits of his labor. I would not 
 use the hackneyed phrase, "Fit for a king," because it 
 was too good for most of the kings who have come to 
 my notice the dinner was good for Antoine and for me, 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 223 
 
 two American kings of the forest, who held dominion 
 over all the beasts and exacted tributes of fish, flesh and 
 fur from them. And another marauding wolverine was 
 invading our realm! 
 
 By some unwritten law my stool was always at the 
 left of the fireplace and Antoine's on the right. The 
 tobacco bag hung on my side, and when we were in ex- 
 ecutive session it was my duty to hand out "the weed of 
 Ole Virginny." So after we had removed our stools 
 from the table, which was half an oak log, with legs set 
 in holes made by an inch auger, we sat down in our 
 places, and I handed the old man the plug. After his 
 pipe was filled and emptied he said: "You stop here till 
 I keel de dev'. I go watch for heem. My trap all fix, 
 all right he come to-night an' I keel a-heem, he keel 
 a-me, it make no dif . He run my line all a-tam an' I no 
 git heem; he break all our trap like hell a'most. Gimme 
 some tobac." 
 
 Tobacco had a soothing effect on Antoine, as it has 
 on many men, and a second pipe quieted his anger, but 
 did not interfere with his determination. I filled his 
 haversack with provisions, and with blankets and snow- 
 shoes on back and rifle on shoulder he started on his 
 mission of revenge. He did not say with Shylock: 
 
 "If I can catch him once upon the hip, 
 
 I will feed fat the ancient grudge I bear him." 
 
 He had never heard of Shylock, but he had in his heart 
 all the revengeful feeling that the poor, persecuted Jew 
 felt for his enemies. 
 
 It was well along toward sundown when he left, and 
 I cleaned up our table and got in the night wood, and 
 spent the evening in the unpoetic work of darning my 
 woollen socks, filling the box in the stock of my rifle with 
 
224 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 greased patches of proper size, putting new strings on 
 the ear-laps of my cap, overhauling my mittens, exam- 
 ining suspenders and buttons, and doing all those little 
 things which men wholly cut off from the deft hand of 
 woman must do for themselves in their own bungling 
 way or have a breakdown when there is neither time 
 nor opportunity for repairs. It is wonderful what a man 
 can do when thrown on his own resources, when there is 
 the same imperative word "must" which always con- 
 fronts the soldier. He must, or 
 
 Rolling up in my blankets, I fully expected some 
 adventure or visitation before morning, but nothing hap- 
 pened. Three nights passed in this way. I fished, cut 
 firewood and busied myself with other things, but always 
 with a thought of Antoine. He was a long time coming; 
 perhaps he might be caught in the bear trap there was 
 a big one on his line or perhaps he might be crippled 
 by some accident and be starving! He did not come, 
 and these thoughts by repetition became probabilities. 
 I filled my sack with provisions and shouldered my rifle. 
 I would meet him on the back track, and I followed his 
 returning trail all day and crossed the divide between 
 his two streams and crawled into his camp at night. His 
 trail was plain, although I had never been over it before. 
 He had rigged a sleeping place beside a huge log, and 
 had made a shelter with poles and brush. A bed of 
 leaves was inviting, and I rolled into my blankets and 
 slept until morning. 
 
 He had not left the trail so far that was plain. After 
 breakfast I started down his line on the other stream, 
 and after a few miles found one of his dead-falls broken. 
 Here was the first evidence of the robber. Further on I 
 found where Antoine had left the trail and gone off to 
 leeward, and had made himself a sort of breastwork camp 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 225 
 
 in good range of the rear of a trap, and on examining the 
 latter there was evidence of a tussle and some blood, but 
 about an inch of snow had fallen in the night, and the 
 affair had occurred at least twenty-four hours before; but 
 Antoine was still missing. I saw where he had left the 
 trail, and where he had returned to it one hundred yards 
 below, and again where he had stepped on the stones in 
 the brook, which lead a long way down as well as across, 
 and I took the trail down the valley home. He was not 
 there, and it was nearly night of the fourth day. He 
 had been out four nights, and I was alarmed perhaps 
 "scared" would express it better. Here I was hundreds 
 of miles in the wilderness alone. The feeling was not 
 entirely one of selfish helplessness now. I could care 
 for myself fairly well in the woods, and did not mind the 
 solitude; but I found that I had a feeling of love for my 
 companion which had been latent and only brought out 
 by his long absence, which it seemed must be caused by 
 some accident. I ate supper and tried to sleep, but for 
 the second time in the woods I was tired, but not sleepy. 
 
 Morning came. I cooked enough to last me several 
 days on a trip after my companion. I would go back to 
 the stepping stones where I had lost the trail, and find 
 it. Dead or alive, I must know where Antoine was. 
 He had not been hurt in a dead-fall, that was sure, for I 
 had seen them all; but, if living, he would surely have 
 been back before this. I slung my haversack and 
 blankets, and started back on his outgoing trail, deter- 
 mined to find him if possible, and to look closer along 
 the banks of the stream, where the new snow might have 
 covered his track for a short distance. I had hardly got 
 one hundred yards from the cabin when I heard Antoine 
 call: "Hello! where you go now? Come back here; I 
 want some grub for to heat. You run 'way w'en I come 
 
226 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 lak you doan want a see me. Wat for you go off dat 
 a-way?" 
 
 He had come in on my branch of the stream, and if I 
 had got out of sight or hearing before he arrived there 
 would have been a long and useless tramp for me and 
 perhaps one for him to find me. Who knows but we 
 both might still be going the rounds in the wilds of Wis- 
 consin on each other's trails? I made him hot coffee, 
 while he unslung his pack and washed, and then it was 
 good to see the old man "heat." Slices of cold boiled 
 bear ham, hot broiled venison steak, tin cups of coffee, 
 and more bread than I dare tell, went in quantities, and 
 it seemed a long time before he pulled his stool to the fire 
 and said: "Gimme dat tobac'." 
 
 It took three pipefuls before he felt like talking, and 
 then, seeing that I betrayed no curiosity, he said: "I got 
 dat ole dev'," and then paused. I knew him too well to 
 make any reply or ask a question. He had taken his 
 first liking to me because I had happened to betray no 
 curiosity, and I knew that if he was questioned he would 
 give short answers; but if let alone he would tell it all in 
 his own way, and be anxious to do it. His pack of skins 
 lay on the floor unopened. I sat and looked at the fire, 
 for I could not smoke as much as he, and when the spirit 
 again moved him he said: "I got hees skin dere in de 
 pack; w'en I hopen it you see heem. He make me hard 
 run all-a night after I break his laig f'um where I hide 
 by my trap, an' it was his front laig; so he go 'long good, 
 an* I'll run all de night w'en I can see heem or hees 
 track, an' I shoot-a heem t'ree time on a run an' I no hit 
 heem. W'en day come I see da track plain, an' I stop 
 for res' an heat my grub. Ole Carcajou he no lak-a day- 
 tarn for be hout, an' I t'ink me he fin' some hole for lay 
 hup in. So I go 'long slow for give heem tam to fin' 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 227 
 
 hole, an' he go all-a day 'way off to nor'eas' lak he go 
 to-a Wiscons' Riv'. Nex' night I fin' hees hole, an' I 
 make fire an' sleep by heem. Mornin' I see it was all a 
 rock an' not hees deep hole in a groun' for to have to 
 smoke heem hout; so I pull some rock down and see 
 heem, an' he growl, an' I shoot. He was too much tire 
 to go on to fin' deepes' hole. I'll tole you, hees skeen 
 a'n't wort' much, but w'en I no getta heem we no do 
 more trap in dis part. Dat was good hunt. Wat you 
 say, hey?" 
 
 That was a long story for Antoine, but he felt proud 
 that his enemy's hide was in his pack; for this wolverine, 
 sometimes called "glutton," seems to take delight in de- 
 stroying traps, or in befouling the bait if he does not care 
 to eat it, and the trapper who finds one on his range must 
 kill it or go elsewhere. It is very cunning and has great 
 strength a combination of bear and fox and is well 
 characterized by Antoine as "de ole dev'." The skin 
 has some value for robes and rugs, but to the trapper 
 whose line it has discovered its hide has a greater value 
 than any fur dealer would give for it a hundred times 
 more. 
 
 When Antoine unrolled his pack he had a lot of skins, 
 mainly from one of my lines, which he had come down. 
 In the lot was a silver fox, the first I had ever seen, and 
 several pelts of the white weasel, which we call "ermine." 
 It was my turn next day, but as one of my lines had been 
 recently run by my partner the work was light, because 
 there were few traps to reset. 
 
 In the morning I thought to make a quick run, and, 
 as there was only a couple of inches of snow on top of the 
 hard crust, I left my snowshoes in the cabin, but An- 
 toine called me back, saying: "I'll tole you, w'en I'll see 
 da ring on da moon las' night we go gat some snow 
 
228 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 bambye, and you'll want some ah-gim for walk home. 
 I'll tole you." So I went back, and slung my snow- 
 shoes and started again. 
 
 About a mile from camp a fox had killed a rabbit, and 
 left the story of the tragedy recorded in the snow. There 
 was the track of the rabbit, with its three holes in the 
 snow made at each jump, but as the leaps were only one 
 and a half feet apart it was evident that it was not fright- 
 ened. The ambush of the fox was plain where it had 
 crouched in the snow, and the hole scooped out where it 
 had struck its prey; and then the single line of footprints 
 where it had trotted off with the rabbit, all the feet set in 
 one straight line, fox fashion. 
 
 I amused myself in picturing the midnight scene by 
 the evidence of the snow, and went on to the first trap. 
 It was a strong double-spring steel trap set under a log 
 in a place which a mink or fisher would be likely to take 
 on its way to or from the creek. The snow had drifted 
 lightly over the pan, concealing it, and in the trap was 
 the foreleg of a fox and a rabbit lay near it. Here was 
 another story of the woods, briefly told. I reset the trap, 
 smeared rabbit blood about it, took the rabbit for bait for 
 other traps and went on. About noon it began to snow, 
 and I ran the rest of the line in haste, taking out a mink 
 or a fisher, resetting traps and rebaiting some, and 
 pushed on for my old resting place. I had improved my 
 first night's camp with poles and bark, and now had a 
 good, warm shelter, free from snow, which now came 
 thick and fast. Antoine was right. If the storm kept up 
 all night no man could move next day without ah-gim on 
 his feet, and I thought myself in luck. The intense still- 
 ness of a snowstorm we have all noticed. How every 
 sound is muffled, and all Nature seems hushed by its 
 white mantle! 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 229 
 
 "Lo! sifted through the winds that blow, 
 Down comes the soft and silent snow, 
 White petals from the flowers that grow 
 
 In the cold atmosphere. 
 These starry blossoms, pure and white, 
 Soft falling, falling, through the night, 
 
 Have draped the woods and mere." 
 
 The night was grand for sleeping, for it is never very 
 cold when the snow comes in big flakes, and the morn 
 was also grand. The snow had ceased falling, and the 
 air was bright and clear. The same silence brooded 
 over the woods, and was only emphasized by the tapping 
 of a woodpecker or the hoarse croak of a raven. I would 
 cross the divide and run the line down the other stream 
 after all, for it only meant a few more miles, and then 
 the week's work was done. It was in heavy timber all 
 the way; my old trail was hidden, but I knew the bear- 
 ings, and had only to keep the sun on my right until I 
 struck the stream, and then follow it eastward. After 
 breakfast I started. The sun was bright and dazzling 
 too much so for comfort. The traps were under twenty 
 inches of snow, and I dug most of them out with a snow- 
 shoe and got a few skins and set things in shape as well 
 as possible. When I stopped for a noon lunch my eyes 
 were so inflamed that they were painful. My soft cap 
 was pulled down in front, and I went on in the bright 
 sunshine and the drip of the trees, using one eye at a 
 time, until I could no longer see. I could not be more 
 than two miles from home, but could not avoid logs or 
 choose my steps, and I was in despair. I shot off my 
 rifle and yelled. Surely Antoine should hear a shot that 
 distance in such clear weather. I shot again and again, 
 perhaps a dozen times, and then I heard an answering 
 shot down the valley. My eyes were streaming, and I 
 
230 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 could not have gone a rod further. It seemed hours 
 before I heard Antoine's inquiring yell, and then he 
 found me. 
 
 "So you gone snow blin', hey? Why, you don' take 
 some sof inside bark, an' make some spectacle an' make 
 leetly hole in him w'en de ole sun come on a snow, hey?" 
 
 "Oh, Antoine, get me into camp! My eyes are 
 ruined, and I'll never see again ! I felt 'em getting weak 
 and sore, but never thought I'd get stone blind; but 
 maybe if I get a chance to rest I'll come out all right." 
 
 "Yes, you com-a all right. I t'ink you was got ketch 
 in dead-fall, or got into some hole an' break you laig 
 w'en I hear you shoot nine or 'leven tarn. Gimme you' 
 pack an' you' gun, an' keep hoi' dis string an' come 'long 
 o' me. Dat snow blin' make no dif w'en you keep in 
 camp ten day. Come 'long." 
 
 And so he towed me into camp by a string, stopping 
 and helping me over a fallen tree or other bad place, for 
 he had bandaged my eyes and all was dark. When we 
 reached the cabin he sat one of the wooden troughs, 
 which his handy axe had made, by me and told me to 
 bathe my eyes with the cool and soft snow water it con- 
 tained, and not to look at the fire or anything else. A 
 fever came on, and for the first time in my life I knew 
 what it was to be perfectly helpless in a wilderness. 
 Coming into it in the full strength of youth and health, 
 no idea of anything that could disable me ever came to 
 mind. Here I was, laid up and despondent. There was 
 no belief that youth and an iron constitution were suf- 
 ficient to cure my ills ; all I knew was that I was a wreck 
 and a hindrance to my partner. 
 
 "I'll tole you dat make no dif," said Antoine; "you 
 doan min' a-me; keep-a still. I'll get some bark an' stop 
 dat feve', an' you come 'long all rite. I'll tole you, you 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 231 
 
 lie down an' doan min' noding. Keep-a eye shut dat 
 snow blin' he make no dif'; I'll tole you he'll be all right 
 in ten day." 
 
 This was consoling, and might be true. Antoine 
 cared for me like a mother. He steeped some bark per- 
 haps white oak, I knew at the time and my fever left me 
 in a few days, but my eyes could not even bear the fire 
 light. Ah-se-bun came into the cabin. He was hungry, 
 as usual, for I never saw an Indian that wasn't, and after 
 filling himself with bear meat he rested, and Antoine 
 said: "Ole Miss'r 'Coon, he says he stay here an' take care 
 you, an' I'll run my trap. Ba gosh, day hain't been run in 
 long tarn, I'll guess. I'll tole you der is plenty for heat, 
 and Miss'r 'Coon, he mus' cook w'en he got hunger. All 
 you got for do is keep-a eye shut an' wash heem in snow 
 water. I'll be back in free day, an' here is plenty for 
 heat, an' you eye he make no dif; he come good w'en 
 you doan' go on de snow." 
 
 The Ojibway tongue had seemed very easy to use with 
 Antoine, who could translate what I did not understand. 
 It seemed to be merely to learn another name for a thing, 
 and I had only learned some nouns. To talk with a 
 native was another thing. Ah-se-bun wanted the axe 
 and came to me and said: "Au-gua-kwet?" I answered: 
 "Au-gua-kwet is over behind the pa-que-shi-gun," but in 
 my mixture of English he failed to understand the last 
 word to mean wheat flour, bread or anything else. That 
 kind of talk did first rate with Antoine, but the Raccoon 
 did not understand his own language. That was very 
 queer. 
 
 The light in the cabin was very dim when the fire was 
 not bright, for our "windows" consisted of two holes, one 
 in the door and one opposite, over which were stretched 
 the dried "caul," or what surgeons know as the periton- 
 
232 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 eum, of a deer. When the fire was not bright this gave 
 "a dim, religious light/' such as steals into some silent 
 crypt through stained glass in an old cathedral, and my 
 eyes improved daily. After some days I could get about 
 the room and do a few things, such as washing out my 
 rifle and oiling it, and it was a surprise to see the Indian 
 eat and sleep. He would rouse up and get wood to 
 cook. The provisions were unlimited, as part of the bear 
 was left, and Antoine had buried a deer in the snow. So 
 it was a picnic for our friend, and he did not even have 
 to hunt nor fish. 
 
 When Antoine came he whittled a huge pair of spec- 
 tacles for me out of dry spruce. They were solid except 
 a small longitudinal slit for each eye, through which one 
 could see all that was necessary, and all lights from points 
 outside the range of vision were excluded. They were 
 fitted to my eyes with exactness, and where glasses 
 would be in ordinary spectacles there were hollows 
 which were blackened with charcoal, and with these I 
 could venture out even in strong sunlight, and next day 
 I ran my line of traps with them, seeing perfectly every- 
 thing that I wished to see, unharmed by the light of the 
 snow. The only unusual event on this trip was seeing 
 where several deer had crossed my trail on the jump, 
 followed by some wolves, as shown in the snow. As the 
 deer were yarded up during such deep snow, the wolves 
 must have stampeded some of them; but we had not seen 
 nor heard a wolf in our part of the woods all winter. 
 
 Returning to the cabin the day afterward, Antoine 
 said: "I'll tole you, Chris'mas he come to-morrow, and 
 we stop home an' heat good Chris'mas dinner; what you 
 say, hey?" and he showed me where he had kept a record 
 of the days on a stick. I had not given a thought to the 
 matter further than to note that it was midwinter by the 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 233 
 
 sun being at its southern limit, but my partner was a 
 more devout man, and told his beads at proper times, 
 kept count of the days, and knew that this was Christmas 
 Eve. And so it was settled that we should not hunt nor 
 fish on the morrow, but would observe the day in a 
 civilized manner, just as the folks at home were doing. 
 Antoine had hung some evergreens over the fireplace 
 and over the bed, and with thoughts of those at home we 
 crawled under our blankets, and morning came. 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 
 
 CANTO III. CHRISTMAS IN THE FOREST. 
 
 THE Christmas sun was not too bright for a winter 
 day, and there was no wind. I was roused by 
 the loud tapping of the great northern wood- 
 pecker on one of the logs of our house. This large bird 
 is almost extinct to-day, and few young men have seen 
 it alive. Its length was eighteen inches, and its tappings 
 were in proportion. Antoine had been up some time, 
 and was smoking his pipe by the fire, for he was one of 
 those who can smoke before breakfast. When he saw 
 me up he rose, and with a hearty shake said: "Merry 
 C'ris'mas; I'll hope you'll be all well/' and he prepared 
 the breakfast. As I went to the spring to wash I looked 
 at my unshaven face in its glassy surface, and wondered 
 what the good people at home would say if such an ap- 
 parition should walk in on them, for we had no razors 
 nor mirrors, and had been all winter in the wilds of Wis- 
 consin, with only an occasional Indian visitor to look 
 at us. 
 
 The spring near our cabin was the head of a bit of 
 marshy ground which was so filled with springs that it 
 never froze nor was even covered with snow, as it soon 
 melted and drained off into a tributary of the Bad Ax. 
 But on this Christmas morning of 1855 there was a wood- 
 cock feeding in that marsh. I saw it plainly, flushed it, 
 and know that it was a woodcock. Those who have fol- 
 lowed these sketches will credit me with knowing this 
 bird when I see it. Why it was there is a question. It 
 could fly well. 
 
 After breakfast, and the meditative smoking which 
 
 234 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 235 
 
 seemed part of Antoine's religion, I thought of fleshing 
 some skins, but Antoine said: "Let da skin res' to-day; 
 all res', all man he res' on C'ris'mas; you doan' do no 
 work w'en he come in you' home; no, sare, you doan' do 
 not'ing but res', all a peep' da res'. Wat you say, hey?" 
 
 "I say that I can't sit by this fire all day just because 
 it's Christmas; I wouldn't sit down that way if I was 
 home among my people; I'd walk around, and if I'd been 
 at hard work all the week I might go and spear eels 
 through the ice. A live man can't sit like a lump on a 
 log all day. There's no place to go here, and these last 
 skins want fleshing and I want something to do, that's 
 all." 
 
 "You go spear da heel on C'ris'mas, hey? Well, he's 
 all right in da hafternoon, but I go in da church on a 
 C'ris'mas mornin', and mebbe I'll got drunk in a hafter- 
 noon; I'll doan' work on no ole skin an' I'll doan' spear 
 no heel; on'y res'." 
 
 "Do you ever go to church any other day in the year, 
 Antoine? I'll bet fifty mink skins you don't, and the 
 chances are that you go to a dance on Christmas Eve 
 and sleep all the next morning and don't get to church 
 at all." 
 
 "Wat you talk? Did you say some prayer w'en you 
 got hup dis mornin? No! I'll bet nine or 'leven mink 
 you ha'n't said prayer all da wint'. I'll count all a-my 
 bead 'fore you'll git hup. I'll tole you I'll got s'prise wot 
 make you' eye bung hout. Dat make no dif w'en I'll go 
 in da church, I'll show you some C'ris'mas dinna till you 
 bu'st you' belt, you bet. I'll been look hout all-a wint' 
 for see da day come w'en we res' an' heat jess lak' da 
 peep' way down da riv' by Potosi." 
 
 Our food had been simple, but always in plenty. Ven- 
 ison, 'coon, bear, rabbit, partridge and fish prepared in 
 
236 MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 several ways, as boiled, fried, broiled or roasted; and we 
 had good bread, coffee, sugar and an occasional bean 
 soup. The fat of the bear and the 'coon was as good as 
 lard, and often our stale bread was soaked and fried. So 
 we had a good substitute for butter and lard, and the only 
 thing that might have been lacking was the potato, which 
 would be difficult to keep, and was too bulky to carry. 
 Surely this was good living for healthy men in a wilder- 
 ness in winter. But from hints which Antoine dropped 
 from time to time this profusion might not last. This 
 was the first idle day of the winter, and as my partner had 
 intimated that he was going to surprise me with a Christ- 
 mas dinner I left him to arrange it, and wandered out 
 with my snowshoes and snow-blinders. 
 
 Heretofore I had always gone up the several little 
 streams which formed the east and west branches of the 
 Bad Ax River, where our traps were set. To-day I 
 would go down the stream, which I had not seen since 
 we brought our provisions up its valley in the fall. I 
 had gone about about two miles when a log invited me 
 to rest. The winter landscape was beautiful; the bluish 
 tints of the twigs against the sky and along the stream 
 relieved the whiteness, and the day was perfect. A rabbit 
 came slowly jumping along, and passed within twenty 
 feet of my log, and soon a fox appeared following its 
 track, but took the alarm at several times twenty feet and 
 trotted off over the hill, with an occasional glance over his 
 shoulder to make sure that the man on the log was not 
 following. I fell to thinking how animals differ, just as 
 men do one dull and unperceiving, and another alert 
 and watchful. A child could have shot the rabbit, but 
 only a rifleman could have touched reynard. 
 
 Then came a thought that food might be scarce with 
 us, as what Antoine had said was recalled. As I under- 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 237 
 
 stood the case, the deer were in "yards/ 5 where they had 
 trampled the snow so that the crust did not cut their legs, 
 and as they could not forage far they were getting poor. 
 And these yards were some distance off, so that a special 
 trip of twenty miles or more would have to be made to 
 get venison. Bears had gone into winter quarters, and 
 would not stir out for a couple of months. Partridges 
 found food scarce, were poor, and were eating bitter 
 buds, which made them unpalatable. 'Coons were laid 
 up, like the bears, and there was a prospect of scant ra- 
 tions. Antoine said that some trappers ate the flesh of 
 the pine marten, or sable, and the related species called 
 pekan, fisher, black cat, etc.; but Antoine wouldn't eat 
 them, and very naturally I refused them. I should think 
 that a man would have to be very hungry to eat any of 
 the tribe to which the mink and weasel belong. We do 
 not care to eat the animals whose diet is exclusively flesh 
 such as the cats and dogs whether we call them tigers 
 or wolves, but the deer and the sheep are vegetarians, 
 while the bear and the hog eat similar food, and we eat 
 them. It looked as though we must live on rabbit and 
 our present store of venison and bear the rest of the win- 
 ter, and rabbits were not plenty. 
 
 While engaged in such thoughts a gray squirrel came 
 in sight, and I watched it run up a tree and jump into 
 another, and then it stopped at a hole in a tall tree and 
 seemed to want to enter it, and then appeared afraid and 
 would draw back and then peer in again. The tree was 
 an oak, and the hole was small, like a woodpecker's. I 
 noted that the bark on it was torn, and as the sun was 
 high I went back home. 
 
 "Hello!" said Antoine, "I'll t'ink you go got los', an' 
 I mus' heat a C'ris'mas din' all 'lone. Jess in tarn, an* 
 glad for see you! Bon jour!" 
 
238 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 We shook hands like old friends long parted, and he 
 motioned me to my seat at table with courtly grace, and 
 it began to dawn upon me that I was, for this occasion, 
 not his partner, but his guest. He had prepared the din- 
 ner alone, as he had intimated he would, and he was host, 
 chef, garcon and companion all in one on this Christmas 
 Day in the wilds of Wisconsin. The first course was a 
 soup of deer shanks with the marrow-bones cracked; but 
 I will try to put that memorable dinner in the shape that 
 some chef of to-day would put it, when it would be like 
 this, with my translation: 
 
 MENU. 
 
 POTAGE. 
 
 Consomme du bois. (Deer shank soup.) 
 
 POISSON. 
 Saumon du font, au naturel. (Brook trout fried.) 
 
 RELEVE. 
 
 Tranches d'agneau montebello. (Venison steak, sweet sauce.) 
 Aqua pura. (Bad Ax water.) 
 
 ENTREES. 
 
 Poularde a la chevreuse. (Boiled partridge.) 
 
 Haricots. (Baked beans.) 
 
 Vin du Bad Ax. 
 
 ENTREMETS DE DOUCEUR. 
 
 Pouding de ris au fruites. (Rice pudding with raisins.) 
 Cafe. Tobac. 
 
 Now I ask you I mean you sportsmen, old and 
 young how does that seem to you for a Christmas din- 
 ner either in the woods or in the wildest restaurants of 
 New York city? 
 
 Most of these things we had cooked in one shape or 
 another, but never such a lay-out as that at one feed. 
 The great surprise came with the rice pudding with 
 raisins, for I had no idea that these things were in camp; 
 but Antoine had smuggled a handful of rice and a few 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 239 
 
 raisins among the things bought at Prairie du Chien for 
 just such a treat, and the old man enjoyed my surprise. 
 The whole dinner was a surprise, for that matter; but the 
 rice and raisins well, they more than filled the bill. The 
 "tobac" was burned by the fire, and after such a gorge 
 we laid ourselves down and slept until dark. 
 
 We were awakened by the entrance of Ah-se-bun, the 
 Raccoon, who accepted the invitation to dinner, and he 
 not only cleaned up what we had left, but he put a polish 
 on every bone until he could work no more. There was 
 a big lot of the rice pudding left, but when he finished 
 the last of it he grunted, "Nish-ish-shin," and curled up 
 to sleep. 
 
 As Antoine and I sat by the fire while the Indian 
 snored I told him about the oak tree and the squirrel 
 which I had seen in the morning. I might not have 
 thought of it again but for the fact that the tree was so 
 scarred, as by some large animal climbing it. 
 
 "Ba gar," said he, "ole pard, I'll tole you what. 
 Shake ! You done foun' a bee tree an' we got da honey. 
 Whoop ! I'll tole you we'll got no bear meat no mo' w'en 
 de las' one he all heat up, an' da deer he all in da yard 
 an' poor, I'll tole you da honey he come in good an' I'll 
 cut da bee tree w'en da day come. You do good t'ing 
 w'en you go down da riv'. Shake!" 
 
 I was curious to know why Ah-se-bun was the only 
 Indian who visited us except the party which once came 
 with him, and why he seemed to be wandering up and 
 down, and never carried a gun. Antoine told me that 
 there was an encampment of Indians about 150 miles 
 north on the Flambeau River, a branch of the Chippewa ; 
 another some sixty miles due east on the Wisconsin 
 River, and a third one thirty miles southeast on the same 
 stream. Our friend was a sort of messenger between 
 
240 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 the three camps, and our cabin was a convenient point 
 for him to stop, eat and rest. As Antoine put it, our 
 guest did not carry a rifle because he always started with 
 some "grub," but would prefer to go hungry for a few 
 days, if necessary, to carrying a rifle and such game as 
 he might kill. Then it was all plain. Ah-se-bun could 
 go hungry for two or three days, eat enough to last a 
 week and go on, and he was too lazy to hunt and carry 
 his gun and game. Afterward I learned that he was not 
 peculiar in all this, but that they were the common traits 
 of his race. As near as I can make out from the map of 
 Wisconsin in a school atlas of to-day we were on the fork 
 of the Bad Ax River in what is now Vernon county, and 
 just north of Readstown; but there was no town, village 
 or settlement on the river that we saw or heard of when 
 we went up it in 1855. At any rate, we were near the 
 main forks of the river, and our cabin was between the 
 streams. 
 
 Our Christmas festival was ended. The morrow 
 would bring the regular routine work, only varied by the 
 conditions of weather. 
 
 "We ring the bells and we raise the strain, 
 We hang up garlands ev'rywhere 
 And bid the tapers twinkle fair, 
 And feast and frolic and then we go 
 Back to the same old lives again." 
 
 It was a happy Christmas, because all our simple 
 wants were filled. We were warm and well fed; every 
 wish had been gratified as far as we had wishes, for we 
 could say with Biron, in "Love's Labor's Lost:" 
 
 "At Christmas I no more desire a rose 
 
 Than wish a snow in May's new-fangled shows." 
 
 And so with minds at peace and bodies prepared for 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 24-1 
 
 rest we stepped over the sleeping Indian by the fire and 
 crawled into our own blankets, and if there were any 
 visions they were of the loved ones at home. 
 
 In the morning Antoine used a file on his axe while I 
 prepared the breakfast, and then Ah-se-bun went down 
 the stream with us as far as the bee tree, and continued 
 his journey without even a goodby grunt or the slightest 
 expression of interest in our work. This sort of thing 
 had ceased to exasperate me, and I was getting used to 
 what Antoine termed "Injun unpoliteness," for said he: 
 "Dem Injun he t'ink it smart to be unpolite, but he lak 
 you an' he doan lak you, an' he doan tole you how much. 
 Hit make no dif. Ole Ah-se-bun, he say, 'Kego-e-kay 
 nish-ish-shin,' an' he mean you good man." 
 
 "That may be all right, Antoine; but when the hun- 
 gry cuss comes into camp he is polite, and gives us 
 the bon four, which he learned from your people; but 
 when he's got his belly full he goes off, and never gives 
 us a grunt which is the salutation of his people. It 
 may be all right, but I don't like it. Your people and 
 mine give as warm a shake at parting as they do at meet- 
 ing, and when we have been entertained we say 'goodby/ 
 if no more." 
 
 "Wen you know Injun better you fine heem hout 
 more, an' you doan mind. You know w'at make da 
 scratch all-a bark f'um da bee tree an' roun da hole? I'll 
 tole you. He's a bear, an' he'll clam hup for getta da 
 hun' an' fine da hole too small. Da bee he on'y come las' 
 year, 'cause da bark on'y scratch hoff dis a-wint'." 
 
 Antoine cut down the big oak without help. I was 
 fully as strong as he was, but when it came to handling 
 an axe my wild blows counted but little, while not one of 
 his was wasted. I could strike once in a place, but An- 
 toine's stump was a level one; and the tree, if straight, 
 
242 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 would be weakened to the proper point on the side he 
 wished it to fall before the other side was touched. An 
 expert axeman is a mechanic in a broad sense. I never 
 was an expert with the axe like Gladstone, Len Jewell, 
 Antoine and other great men. 
 
 The great oak fell, and limbs which kept the trunk 
 from the ground were cut, and then the question was : Is 
 the store of honey above or below the small hole, which 
 was not large enough to admit a man's hand? A careful 
 examination of the hole showed that a dead limb had left 
 a place which woodpeckers had followed into the heart 
 of the tree, and the rains and the frosts had helped them 
 to enlarge their excavations in the decayed heart, but the 
 yearly growth of sap-wood had kept the outer hole small. 
 The bees had so closed the hole with wax that the rain 
 was shed outwardly, and when we cut off a section two 
 feet above and a like distance below the hole, and split it, 
 we found a store of honey that made us cut poles in order 
 to carry it home in a roll of bark. It not only helped us 
 out through the season of scant game, but we took some 
 honey home to Potosi. What's that? You want to 
 know what became of the poor bees which had laid up 
 this store to keep them through the winter? In the 
 name of man, what do you think? They simply died 
 from cold and hunger; what's that to us? You fellows 
 who think that because a bee had laid up a store for the 
 winter by hard work he is entitled to use it to preserve 
 his life make me tired. What is the suffering or death 
 of any animal to man, if he wants the product of its labor 
 to tickle his palate, or its fur to supply the demands of 
 fashion? What is the suffering of his fellow man to him 
 if he fills his coffers? Yet this spirit of selfishness exists 
 throughout all nature; the fox eats the rabbit, but there 
 are men who have sacrificed self for principle, a motive 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 243 
 
 beyond anything that is possible for one of the "lower 
 animals" to do, and after all there are men who are really 
 honest as the world goes who will rob a hard-working 
 bee of the fruits of its summer labor and leave it to perish 
 in the winter. 
 
 A month later there was a thaw, and I got caught in 
 it. The thongs in the snowshoes softened and stretched, 
 and in places where the shade of hills or trees preserved 
 the temperature the snow packed and froze on the thongs 
 until it was severe work to lift a foot. Frequent recourse 
 to the stream removed the snow, but it was only a tem- 
 porary relief, and progress was slow and painful. The 
 crust had softened, and without snowshoes a man would 
 sink down at least twenty inches, which was knee-deep 
 for me, and in snow packed by laying all winter this 
 made travel impossible without snowshoes, while with 
 them a thaw like this clogged them so that they were of 
 little use. It was evident that I must make a camp for 
 the night before the regular camping place could be 
 reached, and before nightfall I had a shelter constructed 
 against a huge log by means of poles and brush, and a 
 bed of balsam boughs kept my blankets from the snow. 
 I was out three nights on this trip, and was lame and 
 sore on reaching the cabin. The stream was so high and 
 rapid that it would have involved some extra miles of 
 travel to find a crossing place if Antoine had not felled a 
 great oak across the swollen brook at the point where he 
 knew I would reach it. 
 
 Antoine had a severe toothache. It had troubled 
 him a little for some weeks, but now it was raging. To- 
 bacco had no effect upon it, and he suffered in silence 
 except when an extra twinge forced a sacre or a big D 
 from him. He ate little, but sat by the fire and thought. 
 Pipe after pipe was filled and emptied, and still he 
 
244 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 thought. My sore muscles kept me still until it was 
 about time to turn in, and as I moved Antoine looked up 
 and said: "I'll tole you. You gat pull dis toot'. I can't 
 stan' heem no mo'; you mus' pull a-heem. Wat you say, 
 hey? I'll t'ink I'll wait till you come back; but he hurt 
 lak da dev'." 
 
 Here was a strange job indeed. In the course of my 
 short experience I could remember going down the 
 Greenbush bank to Dr. Getty and seeing him wrap a 
 handkerchief around what he called a "turnkey," and 
 then I nearly fainted when he told me to open my mouth 
 while he applied that villainous thing, which was like a 
 "cant hook," which lumbermen use to roll logs, or like a 
 stump puller, and twisted a molar out of my jaw by turn- 
 ing such a handle as a corkscrew has. Later, Dr. Fris 
 bee had used the more modern forceps on one of my in- 
 cisors, and these recollections were vivid, as they called 
 up the sensation of nerves pulled until they snapped like 
 a harp string. I ran these things over rapidly and said : 
 
 "Antoine, I haven't got a tool to pull a tooth with, 
 and wouldn't know how to pull it if I had. I've seen the 
 loose teeth of children pulled with a thread, but that tooth 
 of yours is solid in your jaw. I can't do it; no use talk- 
 ing about it." 
 
 "I'll gat da t'ing all plan," said he, "I'll tole you. 
 'Fore you come I'll run up all da lead in bullet for you' 
 big gun an' mine. Dan we gat no use for da mole. 
 .You'll tak da mole an' pull da toot', hey?" 
 
 "Antoine, I can't pull that tooth with a bullet mould; 
 it isn't the right shape, and it won't hold. I'll only tor- 
 ture you, and you'd better wait until we get back to civil- 
 ization. The tooth may be better in a few days. Try 
 and bear it; we'll be home in a few weeks, and then if it 
 troubles you there will be a chance to have it pulled by 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 245 
 
 some dentist; I can't do it, and that is all there is 
 about it." 
 
 "Now look-a here. See how I'll fix da mole for 
 pull-a toot'." And he showed me how he had ruined a 
 good bullet mould to make a poor pair of forceps. He 
 had taken one of the files which we brought to sharpen 
 our axes, and had filed off the outsides of the mould into 
 the cavity until the thing resembled a blacksmith's 
 pincers. Then he had roughened the tips to make a grip 
 for them, and had actually hollowed the edges to fit his 
 tooth. I looked the thing over with conflicting emo- 
 tions. Here was an instrument of torture which in ex- 
 pert hands might relieve suffering, but in mine seemed 
 sure to increase it. One thing was certain, Antoine was 
 in earnest; he was desperate; no suicide was ever more 
 so. He watched my face, and after a while said: "Wat 
 you say, hey?" 
 
 "I say that I want to help you out of your agony, but 
 I don't believe I can do it." 
 
 "You 'fraid you hurt me, hey?" 
 
 "Yes, Antoine, that's just it; I'm afraid I will hurt 
 you, and not do you any good." 
 
 "I'll tole you, he mak' no dif. I'll gat all da hurt. 
 Wat for you 'fraid? You no getta hurt; come on, I'll 
 tak' da chance; you tole how you want me for set down 
 so you pull da bes'." 
 
 Putting fresh logs on the fire, and bringing in some 
 brush to make a bright light, for the old man would not 
 wait until morning, I looked at the offending tooth. For 
 the benefit of my dentist friends, who have given me the 
 most exquisite form of torture applied to man in modern 
 days, I will say that the offending tooth was a pre-molar 
 on the right side of the lower jaw. 
 
 Antoine laid himself on the floor, and I sat with my 
 
246 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 back to the logs of the cabin. If they did not give way 
 I was all right. I pulled him up to me, put a wooden 
 plug between his molars to keep his mouth open, planted 
 both feet on his shoulders, put the improvised forceps on 
 the tooth and pulled. There was a howl as I pulled with 
 arms and pushed with legs, but the "pullicans" slipped 
 from my hands. They were all right as far as a grip on 
 the tooth went, but they were not made for a strong pull 
 on their handles. 
 
 Let us pass over, in a spirit of charity, any remarks 
 that Antoine made. No doubt the recording angel 
 blotted them from the book, as he did the one made by 
 "my Uncle Toby/' and I have no desire to go behind the 
 record further than to say that Antoine really did say 
 something when his tooth was started from its socket, 
 but still throbbed with violence. 
 
 Antoine arose and looked at me, "more in sorrow 
 than in anger," and I hastened to say: "The mould 
 slipped in my hand; there is no grip on the handles, but 
 if you can stand another go of this I will fix the thing so 
 that the tooth or the bullet mould will break, or I will 
 bring out the tooth or your jawbone. What you say, 
 hey?" 
 
 Antoine merely nodded assent, and I put the handles 
 of the bullet mould in the fire and then turned them out- 
 ward so that they could not slip through my hands. 
 Something must come now if Antoine had not had 
 enough. I was not sure that I could have stood another 
 such a trial if our positions had been reversed, but it is 
 easy to stand it when the other fellow does the suffering. 
 When the handles were cool and all was ready I looked 
 at Antoine, who had resumed his seat by the fire with his 
 jaw in his hand. He arose and said: 
 
 "W'en you ready I'll come one odder tarn. Mebbe 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 247 
 
 you'll t'ink da ole Frenchman got no game an' he no 
 stan j da gaff.* Come on; I'll be all a-ready." And he 
 lay on the floor in the proper place. His nerve gave me 
 confidence, and again I put the plug in his mouth, braced 
 my back against the logs and my moccasins on his 
 shoulders. Carefully pushing the "pullicans" down as 
 far as I could get them, I gripped the handles, straight- 
 ened my legs, and with a snap the tooth came out and my 
 head made a tunk on the log behind that seemed hard 
 enough to have left a dent in either head or log. An- 
 toine jumped up and yelled with joy. He took the tooth 
 and threw it in the fire, saying a verse in his French 
 patois which I did not understand, and after a comfort- 
 ing pipe we went to bed. 
 
 Spring came. The melting snows filled the streams. 
 The drumming call of the woodpeckers on a dead tree 
 sounded frequently, and the thunder of the cock par- 
 tridge or ruffed grouse was frequent. Ducks flew up 
 and down the stream, and the snow in places was not a 
 foot deep. Antoine said: "I'll tole you. Wen you go 
 on you' line it's las' time to-morrer, an' you bring in all-a 
 steel trap an' let down all-a dead-fall. Da fur he get 
 loose an' begin to shed, an' it's no use to stay here longer 
 w'en you no get da prime skin. We go home. I t'ink; 
 yes?" 
 
 I ran my line for the last time, and came in and packed 
 up for the home trip. Our packs were arranged, and 
 were not as heavy as on the up trip. The provisions- 
 were about gone, and the furs were dry and light, so we 
 only had to make two trips instead of four from our cabin 
 to the boat. 
 
 *The expression "stand the gaff" was a relic of Antoine'9 cock-fight- 
 ing days in Canada, and when he wished to imply that,a man had no grit 
 he would say, ""He notan' da, gaff." 
 
248 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 Our provisions and cooking utensils with one rifle 
 were taken on the first trip, and the furs on the second. 
 The otter skins had been stretched on long "shakes" 
 split by Antoine's axe; the other skins, except those of 
 the two wolverines, the deer and bear skins, were 
 "cased" and had been stretched on forked twigs, and 
 therefore the flat hides made a large, broad pack, which 
 was more difficult to get through the forest than the more 
 valuable furs, which were cased. Just here it has oc- 
 curred to me that there are technical terms used in the 
 above that a small boy in the back seats might not under- 
 stand, and for his benefit I will say that a "flat hide" is 
 one that is split on the belly as a butcher skins an animal. 
 Fine furs are "cased," i. e., only cut on the hinder edge 
 of the hindlegs, and the skin drawn off over the head, 
 leaving it like a mitten without a thumb and wrong side 
 out that is, with the fur inside. 
 
 There was a feeling of regret at leaving the cabin, 
 even though it was for home. It had been a home to us, 
 and Antoine fastened up the door, saying: "S'pose we'll 
 come nex' wint'. Who knows? Wen we come we 
 gotta da good ole shanty. Come on." And we turned 
 our backs to our winter home. We stopped a day at the 
 boat to soak it up and swell the seams, and stowed our 
 furs and provisions under the two tarpaulins, and cast 
 loose. The Bad Ax was swollen, and the current was 
 swift. There was no expenditure of muscle in rowing, 
 but there was an anxiety lest pole or paddle should fail 
 and wreck us on a bend or a rifHe. Some of the latter, 
 which we had to make a portage round in the fall, we 
 could shoot now, with more or less risk. When we 
 reached the Wisconsin River we camped, and felt that all 
 danger was over. It was plain sailing after this. We 
 killed five mallards with our rifles, and that gave us 
 
ANTOINE GARDAPEE. 249 
 
 plenty of fresh duck, and we caught a large pike by 
 trolling a minnow. Next day we merely guided our 
 boat down the river and into the Mississippi, and after 
 one more night out the Father of Waters brought us to 
 Dubuque, some eighteen miles below Potosi, where An- 
 toine had a bachelor's cabin and I had dearer ties. 
 
 When we tied up at the wharf at Dubuque and went 
 ashore we met Frank Neaville, and learned that all our 
 loved ones were well. Frank went home that night, and 
 carried the news of our arrival. There were serveral fur 
 buyers about Dubuque, and they came to see us. I was 
 for selling to the first one, but Antoine would not have 
 it. The buyers came down, and handled our furs and bid 
 on them, and finally they were sold for cash one morn- 
 ing. There was a steamer to go up in the afternoon 
 which would run up the Grant River to Potosi. I woufd 
 go on that, but Antoine had struck some Canuck friends 
 and had got drunk, and I did not want to leave him with 
 the chance of his being robbed by those thieves which 
 then infested the river towns, and I went in search of 
 him. I got him on board the boat with one of his friends 
 and gave the steward a good tip to entertain them, and 
 before Antoine knew where he was he found himself 
 ashore at La Fayette, the landing for Potosi, with the 
 major portion of his winter's earnings in his pocket. 
 
 Once during the next summer Antoine came to jne, 
 and made me a proposition to go down in Louisiana and 
 trap next winter. He said that fur was plenty there, and 
 in the spring we would take our skins to St. Paul and 
 sell them to some green fur buyers, who would think 
 they were Northern furs. I did not do it, but will tell 
 you where I went the next winter later on. 
 
 My good friend, Hon. J. W. Seaton, of Potosi, Wis., 
 whom I knew in the days of which I am writing, sends 
 
250 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 me this note in response to a question: "I can give you 
 but little information about Antoine Gardapee, the 
 French trapper you went North with the winter you 
 write about. I remember you both very well, and the 
 fact of your going up on the Bad Ax the year before 
 Tom Davies, and you went with the surveying party 
 when Henry Neaville froze his feet; but I can't recall 
 what became of Gardapee further than this: He ran a 
 private ferry on the Mississippi River from Cassville, 
 Wis., to the mouth of Turkey River, la., some years after 
 you left Potosi. The generation in which he lived has 
 passed away the trapper, hunter and Indian have gone 
 to the happy hunting grounds, and have left scarce a 
 trace behind them; their names, places, kindred and 
 friends are alike forgotten, and the pall of oblivion hangs 
 over their resting-place." 
 
 There seems to be nothing to be added .to the very 
 good obituary note of Judge Seaton. 
 
SERGEANT FRANK NEAVILLE. 
 
 FISH, 'COONS AND PAWPAWS. 
 
 THE snow had left the south side of the hills, and 
 there were evidences of spring overhead and 
 underfoot when I parted with Antoine, he to 
 visit some friends up the river and I to settle down in Po- 
 tosi to civilized life. To get shaved again, to sleep in a 
 bed and renew acquaintance with a potato after a winter 
 in the woods, was an agreeable change. Few men who 
 have once lived the life of a hunter and trapper ever care 
 more for civilization than to keep on its outside edge, 
 and they move on as it drives them to seek new fields. 
 I imagine such men find it dull in summer, for they are 
 seldom reading men, and when fur is not in season their 
 lives must be monotonous. I soon dropped into my old 
 way of life in the quaint little mining village of Potosi. 
 
 "Coin 5 a-fishin?" asked Frank Neaville, as he saw 
 me selecting some fishing tackle in one of the stores. 
 "Henry has a new boat, and he's goin' to take it down to 
 the landing soon; maybe you can get him to go to-mor- 
 row ; you know he's always ready for a fish or a hunt, no 
 matter what's goin' on." 
 
 We walked down to the hotel kept by the father of 
 these boys, and found Henry in the backyard putting a 
 painter into a ring in the bow of a new boat and making 
 a neat eye-splice in it, for Henry could do many such 
 things when he chose. "Hello, Henry!" said I, "you've 
 got a nice sharpie there, but in our talks since I came 
 down from the Bad Ax you haven't mentioned it." 
 
 251 
 
252 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 "What's that name you called the boat?" 
 
 "A sharpie. What do you call it?" 
 
 "I call it a skiff, and it is a skiff; sharpie is some of 
 your New York language, I suppose; did you ever hear 
 of a skiff?" 
 
 "Yes, and they are two different boats in the New 
 York language, but we won't fight about that. I want 
 to go fishing to-morrow, and if you want to try the new 
 shar skiff, I mean, just fill her full of water to swell the 
 seams and get her on the wagon in the morning; that's 
 all." 
 
 Frank called attention to the fact that there was room 
 for three, and intimated that he would go if his company 
 was earnestly desired. 
 
 "Frank," replied his brother, "you know that you're 
 the durn'dest fool in a boat that lives in Wisconsin. Last 
 year you upset us when we were coming down Swift 
 Sloo by grabbing a branch to look after some wounded 
 bird, and we had to stop all night on the island and be 
 eaten by mosquitoes because Fred's rifle was in the bot- 
 tom of the sloo. We don't want any more of that funny 
 business, and you had better stay home." Then turning 
 to me, Henry explained: "Frank's all right to weigh out 
 sugar and coffee in a grocery, and he can figure up how 
 many papers of tacks would balance a pound of nails; but 
 you had a sample of him last year; he hasn't got good, 
 sound sense, like a mule, for a mule can take care of him- 
 self any time, and wouldn't dump us all in the drink to 
 look at a pelican. If you can stand him, all right; I 
 won't object." 
 
 Then it was Frank's innings. He was the younger 
 but larger of the two, and he replied: "Henry is the 
 bright boy of the family, and very few families have more 
 than one bright boy, if they're so fortunate as to have 
 
SERGEANT FRANK NEAVILLE. 253 
 
 even one. He is the oldest, and there are several little 
 fellows growing up, and if I'm not as brilliant as Henry 
 I can't help it; but I hope some of the little fellows may 
 come near his high standard. I don't want to go if I'm 
 not wanted." And he turned off, and went into the 
 house. 
 
 This was the first time that I had seen Frank resent 
 Henry's good-natured chaff, and I hurried after him and 
 brought him back. Said I: "Henry, I want Frank to 
 go with us, and, confound you, you want him to go, but 
 your temptation to roast him over that upset is fun for 
 you; but Frank doesn't like it. As a student of Shakes- 
 peare, you will remember that somewhere he says that a 
 joke requires a good listener, or something of the kind, 
 to make it go. Frank thinks you are bearing too hard 
 on him for his mistake, and it's time to let up." 
 
 Henry laughed and said: "Frank never knows a joke 
 when he hears it; he wouldn't know one if he found it in 
 his soup. What Shakespeare said was: 'A jest's pros- 
 perity lies in the ear of him who hears it, never in the 
 tongue of him that makes it,' but if Frank wants to go 
 fishing with us, all right; I've no objection, and in fact 
 would like to have him go; but since the time when we 
 slept out on the island I have gone fishing a dozen times, 
 and he has never asked to go. I think he likes your 
 company. Come along, Frank; I only wanted to knock 
 a little fun out of you, and you go off mad." Frank 
 winked at me; he was not angry the least bit, but this was 
 his joke on his brother. 
 
 In the morning we walked behind the wagon which 
 carried the boat to the river, for it had a load of lead. I 
 took my rifle along, because I wanted some meat, either 
 of duck or hog, or both. As related in my sketch of 
 Henry, there were hogs on the islands, and I had bought 
 
254: MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 an interest in them. I also had several cane "poles," as 
 we called them,, and loaned one to each of the boys. I 
 was inclined to be a "dude" sportsman in that early day, 
 if we interpret that abused term to mean a man who likes 
 to own the best things that he can get, and who will pay 
 a quarter of a dollar for a light natural cane in preference 
 to using a heavy sapling cut in the woods to be thrown 
 away after using. In fact, I would to-day, if not then, 
 rather be a "Sunberry Fisher" than his opposite. In 
 these days of game hogs and of men who fish for count 
 and brag, I say with due deliberation and with full knowl- 
 edge of the ridicule to which a man with fine fishing 
 tackle is subjected if he is unsuccessful in a day's fishing, 
 that I would rather be in his place and own tackle to be 
 proud of than to be the proverbial boy with an alder pole, 
 a "letter in the post-office," and a big string of trout; but 
 the fact is that a good angler with good tackle can beat 
 the boy, if he knows the stream well. 
 
 With the man who loves fishing for itself and not for 
 the fish, the capture of a record-breaking string is of no 
 consequence. The old story of the "funny man" catches 
 the popular fancy. To-day when I fish for trout I use a 
 rod which cost $35, and it is worth every cent of it. My 
 reel, line and book of flies cost as much more, and on a 
 trout stream there is no bare-footed farmer's boy with 
 his alder pole and worm who can, day after day, take 
 more trout than I or thousands of other anglers can. He 
 might on an odd day, where he knew all the trout holes 
 but not as a rule. And if he did? Still I say: I would 
 prefer to be the Sunberry Fisher who "caught nothing 
 at all," for why do we prefer a gold watch to a silver one? 
 It may keep no better time. We like elegant harness on 
 our horses, but they pull the carriage no better than if 
 tied to it with bits of rope. Now you young anglers can 
 
SERGEANT FRANK NEAVILLE. 255 
 
 see just what I mean. There is pleasure to the sports- 
 man in cleaning and caring for his rod and gun; he has 
 a feeling of companionship for it he gets to love it for 
 the memories it brings, and to throw it aside after a fish- 
 ing or shooting trip would be base ingratitude. There 
 is a high and noble affection for old companions in the 
 forest and on the stream, and the man who truly loves the 
 sport for sport's sake, and not for the amount of meat he 
 gets, cherishes the implements which aided him. Even 
 a savage will ornament his pipe and his war club but 
 my pen is straying again, and has led me off from the 
 story of this particular fishing trip. Let it go ; the editor 
 will probably "blue pencil" all the extraneous matter, 
 and so we get back to the mouth of Grant River, Wis., 
 in the spring of 1856, with the Neaville boys. 
 
 Henry watched the boat after it was launched and 
 seemed satisfied with its balance in the water, and we 
 rowed off to one of the islands which are so numerous 
 along the great Mississippi at this point. When we 
 pulled up on the island Henry asked: "Where do you 
 want to fish? Here you can get swift water or still 
 water, just as you want it." A bend where water plants 
 were just struggling to get to the top of the water caught 
 my eye, and it looked like a good spot for pike, so I 
 replied: "I've got some small minnow hooks, and if we 
 stop right here and get about fifty small fish, we may get 
 some good pike over in that bend among the weeds." 
 The result was similar to that recorded in the sketch 
 entitled, "The Brockway Boys." Skittering for pike or 
 pickerel was a new thing, and all new methods are dis- 
 trusted. The old woman who saw a patent machine for 
 milking cows looked at it and declared, "The old- 
 fashioned way is the best;" and in this case she was 
 right. Henry did not say a word against it, but, like 
 
256 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 William Brockway, he thought there might be a thing or 
 two that he had not learned, but Frank said : 
 
 "When you put one of these little fish on your hook, 
 and let it down in the water where the big fish live, you 
 may get one; but to 'skitter' a little fish over the surface 
 and scare all the big ones below looks like foolishness, 
 but if you say it's a good plan we'll try it. Mother will 
 expect some fish for breakfast, and I want to go over in 
 a tree top and get some crappies. I don't want to go 
 back without a thing." 
 
 Henry had listened to all this, and after some delib- 
 eration said : "Let's land Frank in a tree top, and then go 
 over and try for the pike. Mother can't have any of our 
 fish for breakfast to-morrow, because we've got provis- 
 ions for two days, and we propose to stay and eat 'em up, 
 if Frank doesn't see another wounded pelican and upset 
 the boat. Yes, Frank, you get in that tree top and fish for 
 crappies, and we'll stop and get you day after to-morrow. 
 We'll leave you grub enough, and there's a good big limb 
 to straddle, so you'll be comfortable until we come back. 
 The mosquitoes are not out yet, and you'll be very happy. 
 If the limb gets to be uncomfortable, you can change and 
 sit on it side-saddle fashion." 
 
 Frank looked at me and asked: "Are you going to 
 stay out to-night and not go home until Saturday morn- 
 ing?" 
 
 "That was our arrangement, and I thought you un- 
 derstood it; when the axe was put in the wagon you 
 asked what it was for, and Henry told you it was to cut 
 wood for camp, and we would not need a fire if we were 
 going home to-night; I'm sorry if " 
 
 "No, don't be sorry about me; I'll stay out as long as 
 any of you if you'll only make Henry let up about that 
 accident last summer. If he doesn't stop it I'll duck him 
 
SERGEANT FRANK NEAV1LLE. 257 
 
 again, when I can do it without wetting you. Every 
 man, woman and child in Potosi knows about that upset 
 of the boat, and that's enough. I don't care about it 
 since I said I was sorry, but all winter, while you were 
 away, he would grin as he passed me and quote from 
 Byron : 
 
 'Then rose from sea to sky the wild farewell- 
 Then shriek'd the timid, and stood still the brave; 
 
 Then some leap'd overboard with fearful yell, 
 As eager to anticipate their grave.' 
 
 "He used to spout that in school, and he thought it 
 would annoy me, but it didn't well, not as much as he 
 thought it did." 
 
 Frank was more sensitive to Henry's exasperating 
 nagging than he would own. It was not so much 
 Henry's quotation from "Don Juan" as the "grin" which 
 accompanied it, and by constant repetition Frank had 
 become sensitive, as "the touched needle trembles at the 
 pole," and this sort of thing is not conducive to con- 
 genial fishing. I told Frank that Henry would find 
 some other outlet for his humor. When Henry came 
 back with some minnows, after we had landed, I took 
 him one side, and Frank's peace of mind about the upset 
 was undisturbed afterward. 
 
 We caught some minnows and skittered for pike, or 
 "pickerel," as we called them in New York, and took six 
 or seven that day fish that would weigh from three to 
 six pounds. We had no reels we weren't up to that 
 in those days but we had a ring on the top of the rod, 
 and gave line or hauled in through it. Once Frank 
 struck a big one. He yelled: "Come and help me! 
 He'll get away! The line is cutting my hand," etc., and 
 
258 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 I took his coat-tail in my palm and checked the fish. 
 When it was safe in the boat Frank drew a long breath 
 and said: "Well, I'll be durned if that fish won't weigh 
 twenty pounds. If you hadn't helped me he would have 
 broken something, or I would have been pulled over- 
 board. Yes, by jing! He'll weigh twenty-five pounds." 
 
 My own estimate was that the pike might weigh about 
 ten pounds, but what was the use of putting a damper on 
 the boy's enthusiasm? My new mode of skittering a 
 minnow on the surface had won; his skepticism had van- 
 ished, and it was a triumph for both. We went ashore, 
 rolled a log down to the water, and dug out a basin 
 behind it, where our fish could be kept alive, their splash- 
 ings in the water serving to circulate it through the small 
 openings at each end of the log; for we didn't want to 
 kill our game until we started for home. 
 
 The day was a fine one, and the fishing was fair for 
 those days; it would be called excellent, grand, to-day, 
 and considering the high state of the river we did well. 
 The bend where we fished was comparatively still water, 
 just the place for pike, which prefer quiet nooks and 
 ponds and avoid the quick waters. The geese had 
 passed north, and so had the great bodies of swans and 
 pelicans; but to our surprise a small flock of sandhill 
 cranes went over us, high in the air and glistening in the 
 sun. Most likely the last flock of the season. Frank 
 called attention to them and wondered what they were. 
 
 "Sandhill cranes," said Henry. 
 
 Frank grinned and replied: "I never saw such a fel- 
 low to know everything as Henry is. That flock of birds 
 are too high up to see their shape, and he'll tell you just 
 what they are. He thinks he can play anything on me. 
 What do you think they are?" 
 
 "Just as Henry named them. Henry is more of a 
 
SERGEANT FRANK NEAVILLE. 259 
 
 hunter, naturalist, or whatever you are a mind to call 
 him/' said I. "He notices things which you don't see. 
 Watch the flight of that flock. See! They all flap their 
 wings in unison, and then all stop at once and sail, seem- 
 ing to follow the 'stroke oar.' Did you ever see any 
 other birds do that?" 
 
 "I never noticed them. It is queer, though, how they 
 all work together that way. Don't geese fly like that?" 
 
 "Oh, no; a goose is a heavy-bodied bird that couldn't 
 sail a minute up there; it's hard work for a goose from 
 the time it starts until it stops. If you watch the flight 
 of different kinds of ducks and the way they flock you 
 will soon be able to tell what they are. There goes a 
 dozen mallards; see how differently they fly from the 
 bluebills coming up behind them. I can't tell you the 
 difference, but you can see it." 
 
 "Well, by jing! That's so. I thought all ducks flew 
 alike. I can tell ducks from crows by the way they fly, 
 but never noticed them as close as that. Henry, old boy, 
 you know a heap more than people think you do; they 
 haven't found you out yet." 
 
 Henry made no reply to this, but suggested that it 
 was time to go ashore and make camp. It was quite a 
 job to find a camping spot on the island. It had been 
 well soaked in the spring freshets, and the lower leaves 
 of the underbrush were covered with dried sediment, 
 where they had been submerged. Henry knew these isl- 
 ands well, and led us to a knoll near a pond which was 
 dry in summer, but was filled now, and afforded a good 
 feeding place for ducks. We had hauled the boat well 
 up, and tied it fast in case the river should rise in the 
 night. We made a little bough house and a bed of dry 
 leaves, made a pot of coffee and ate supper before dark. 
 
 As I remember the geography after an absence of 
 
260 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 forty years, it is some five or six miles from shore to shore 
 near Potosi, the main channel of the river being on the 
 Iowa side. On the Wisconsin shore the Grant River 
 came in, and there was a lot of wooded islands along 
 there with channels of all degrees of swiftness between 
 them. In the days of which I write the ducks congre- 
 gated here in great numbers in spring and fall. We 
 were well out, and preferred to stay on the island than to 
 row over to the mainland. After supper I told Henry 
 that I had never slept on any of these islands in duck time, 
 and if he did not object we would not light our night 
 fire until after dark, so that we could see the ducks come 
 in. It was about half an hour before sundown, and some 
 of the flocks began to arrive, and such a babel! The 
 heavy mallards would come in, back wind with their 
 wings and drop down with a splash, and then the loud- 
 voiced females would raise a din. Swift bluebills and 
 butterballs would rush over our heads, circle around and 
 settle down. The swiftest of all ducks, the little green- 
 winged teal, would suddenly appear from nowhere, and 
 splash down into the water without circling about, com- 
 ing into it much as a stone would. The high-voiced 
 widgeon, the bass of the frogs, the heavy quack of the 
 mallard and the lighter one of the bluewing, which 
 sounded like an echo, and the curious burr! of the blue- 
 bill made a concert to be remembered. The pond might 
 have covered three acres, and two thousand ducks, at 
 least, rested on it that night. We did not try to shoot 
 any, for we thought we could get what we wanted any 
 time. After dark we lighted our fire, but it did not seem 
 to disturb the ducks. Our talk was not heard in the 
 racket they kept up, and we turned in on our bed of 
 leaves. Frank said that several birds or flocks flew 
 around our fire in the night, but Henry and I slept too 
 
SERGEANT FRANK NEAVILLE. 261 
 
 soundly to hear them. Such life was new to Frank, and 
 he didn't sleep much. 
 
 A rifle shot awoke me in the morning, and there was 
 a thundering sound of rising ducks. Henry had killed a 
 mallard, and then the problem was to get the bird. The 
 shore was soft black mud, deep and treacherous, and al- 
 though the duck was not over thirty feet away, and stone 
 dead, it was no easy matter to get it. Frank and I ad- 
 vised him not to attempt it, but he vowed he'd have that 
 duck "if it took a leg." He began to gather driftwood, 
 brush and limbs and threw them in to make a bridge, and 
 as he was in earnest we helped him. When he thought 
 his bridge was long enough, so that from its end he could 
 reach the duck with a pole, he started. I whispered to 
 Frank a caution not to speak to him, and we watched. 
 The passage was a success; he reached his pole for the 
 duck, something rolled, and he was floundering in the 
 mud. There was only a couple of inches of water where 
 he was, and as he struggled he sank to his waist. We 
 could not tell how much further he might sink if he 
 struggled. 
 
 I called to him: "Don't move or you may go deeper; 
 keep perfectly still, and we'll get you out. Is there a 
 grapevine on this island?" 
 
 "Not a vine," said he, cool as a cucumber. "Take 
 your time ; I won't stir." 
 
 He was over twenty feet from sound footing, and we 
 cut a sapling and shoved the end to him and pulled until 
 he could hold on no longer. He let go so suddenly that 
 we sat down. He had bent forward so that the mud 
 covered his breast. Frank began to fear for his brother, 
 but I had another plan. I cut a green cottonwood, or 
 perhaps it was an aspen, which had a fork at about 
 twenty-five feet, and these two limbs were of an inch or 
 
262 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 more in diameter. These limbs I crossed and twisted, 
 making a loop big enough to go over Henry's shoulders, 
 and lashed them firmly together with strips of bark at 
 several points. With this around him and the grip of his 
 hands, together with the use of his legs, we pulled him to 
 solid ground, the mud being plowed up by his shirt collar 
 so that his clothing was filled inside and out. I remained 
 to get breakfast, while Frank went with Henry over to 
 the cleaner waters of the sloo, where he washed himself 
 and his clothes, while Frank returned for breakfast for 
 himself and brother. When we reached him his gar- 
 ments were all hung in the sun, but he was shivering, 
 for the morning was cool. Frank gave him his trousers 
 and sat in his drawers, and I loaned a coat. 
 
 After he had some hot coffee and breakfast he said: 
 "The hogs gobbled all our fish last night, Frank's big 
 pike and all," and we found it to be so. Hogs' tracks 
 were numerous in and about our pool, and portions of 
 fish were scattered about. Frank said: "Well, I'll be 
 durned! That pike would weigh about forty pounds, 
 and was bigger than one Bill Patterson shot up in Grant 
 River last fall." 
 
 "Yes," said Henry, "Bill's fish weighed eleven and a 
 half pounds on Mallet's scales; I saw it weighed, and if 
 yours weighed forty pounds there was a little difference 
 of twenty-eight and a half pounds ; not much, to be sure, 
 but still a difference." 
 
 "Don't you think my fish was as big as Bill's?" 
 
 "Not quite," said Henry. "I think your pike would 
 weigh nearly as much as his if you fed him half a dozen 
 pounds of shot when no one was looking." 
 
 Frank appealed to me. I replied : "I am not as good 
 a judge of the weights of fish as Henry is, and I didn't 
 see Bill Patterson's pike. I am of the opinion, how- 
 
SERGEANT FRANK NEAVILLE. 263 
 
 ever, that if your fish was bigger than Bill's the scales 
 would show that it weighed more, but as the hogs have 
 eaten it there is nothing left but the memory of it, and 
 you know that we can't weigh memory. Still I remem- 
 ber thinking at the time that your fish would go full 
 twenty pounds if he had been left to grow for a few 
 years." 
 
 "I see," said Frank; "if Henry was as wise as Daniel 
 Webster he would know just as much. All right! We 
 are three great sportsmen, and have fished one day and 
 shot a duck the next morning, and have only our mem- 
 ories to show for it. Not a scale nor a feather; 'though 
 I s'pose Henry will count the duck he shot and the duck 
 he had in the mud as two ducks, and both were lost. 
 No; I'll be durned if we don't take home that mallard, 
 for Henry said he'd get it or lose a leg. How's that, 
 Henry; which leg will we take off if you don't get that 
 duck?" 
 
 Henry was busy getting into his half-dried clothes 
 and said : "Frank, you may have that duck." 
 
 We fished that day, and shot ducks with my rifle in 
 the evening, slept out next night, and took home in the 
 morning eight mallards and all the pike and crappies we 
 could carry. 
 
 I regret that we cannot print portraits of these boys. 
 I have daguerreotypes of them, taken in 1860, sent me 
 by their younger brother, Carlos E. Neaville, now living 
 at Brodhead, Wis. The photo-engraver says that they 
 cannot be reproduced with any effect because of the lack 
 of shadows. Henry was about five feet six inches, broad- 
 shouldered; a long, oval face, with a profuse head of dark 
 hair, which came down to a point in the middle of his 
 forehead. Frank, the younger, was larger. His fore- 
 head was broader and his ears were lower. What I mean 
 
264: MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 by this is that my frequent comment on the picture of a 
 man is: "There is much (or little) of his head above his 
 ears." Just what ethnological value this has let others 
 say. Frank did show evidences of the mercantile in- 
 stinct, for Judge Seaton, now living in Potosi, speaks 
 highly of him as an employee of his during the few years 
 that he was a merchant. But Henry, he was the com- 
 panionable fellow; no business for him if he could help it. 
 He and I were alike in this respect. The woods and the 
 streams were good enough for us, and the habits of their 
 denizens were of more importance than dollars. What 
 poet has ever written in praise of the slave to lucre? 
 There I go again off the track. A dollar is a big thing 
 when you don't own one. The boy said: "Salt makes 
 your potatoes taste bad when you don't put any on." 
 
 Once a drunken miner lost his purse in the streets of 
 Potosi, and Frank found it. Henry, John Nicholas, 
 Frank and I were talking about it with the old post- 
 master, Mr. Kaltenbach, when the miner came up asking 
 if anyone had found his money. "Yes," said Henry; 
 "we found it. How much was there in it?" The man 
 called Henry a thief and struck him. About the same 
 instant Frank handed the miner one under the left jaw 
 that paralyzed him. We took the man into Jo. Hall's 
 livery stable, and it took Dr. Gibson over an hour to 
 bring him around. Henry scared Frank into thinking 
 he had killed a man, and Frank went over to Constable 
 Darcy and gave himself up. 
 
 As the summer waned and the first chill days of Sep- 
 tember approached Frank asked me: "Did you ever eat 
 a pawpaw?" 
 
 "No; what is a pawpaw?" 
 
 "They are a fine fruit, and grow on a small tree. They 
 are shaped like a cucumber and are like custard. There 
 
SERGEANT FRANK NEAVILLE. 265 
 
 is a pawpaw grove down by the river. They'll be ripe 
 now in a few days, and we'll make up a party and go 
 'coon hunting. 'Coons like 'em, and you can always 
 start one in the pawpaws when they're ripe." 
 
 I had seen the trees when out after wild plums, which 
 were plenty in that part of Wisconsin, and were large and 
 excellent, but the pawpaws were merely wondered at 
 and passed. I think there was a dozen in our party when 
 we started for 'coons on a moonlight night. Except 
 Frank and Henry, Charley Guyon, John Clark and Bill 
 Patterson, the names are forgotten. Half a dozen dogs, 
 some of no particular breed and others that seemed to be 
 of all breeds mixed without regard to proportion, went 
 along as a necessary part of the outfit. 
 
 I tasted my first pawpaw, but have yet to taste the 
 second one. The others ate them with a relish. All I 
 remember is that the fruit was shaped something like a 
 banana, but shorter, and had the taste of a raw potato 
 ground into a paste; its seeds were as large as a lima 
 bean. Of course I might learn to like them, but Potosi 
 boys acquired the taste in infancy. 
 
 Soon the dogs remarked that a 'coon had gone off, 
 because it did not care to eat pawpaws while such a noisy 
 crowd invaded the woods ; for in hunting 'coons the more 
 noise the better, as it puts them afoot, while if you are 
 still they will squat on a limb at your approach. The 
 'coon soon treed, and hid so that it could not be shot. 
 John Clark's axe on one side and Henry Neaville's on 
 the other soon dropped the tree, and the dogs made a 
 rush. We had a fire started to light up the conflict, but 
 couldn't see a thing in that tree top but a mass of fighting 
 dogs. Cheers and yells from the men encouraged the 
 dogs. "Coin, Tige!" "Shake him up, Skip!" "Hang 
 to him, Buster!" and such cries cheered on the dogs. 
 
266 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 "There's two of 'em!" yelled John Clark, as two knots 
 of dogs were seen, but it turned out that one knot was 
 merely a little scrapping of a couple of dogs among them- 
 selves, perhaps occasioned by one dog's jealousy of the 
 other fellow. The 'coon broke away and ran up a limb, 
 and a rifle ball dropped him. And then such a row! 
 Every dog had hold of him, and a man had hold of every 
 dog's tail, and each dog got a kick in the ribs to admon- 
 ish him that a fallen foe should be respected. I thought 
 of the old story: "Never strike a man when he is down," 
 said Mulcahy. "Never," replied O'Hooligan; "just 
 sock the boots to him." 
 
 The 'coon was not badly mangled after all this; the 
 dogs were chewed up much worse. It reminded me of 
 Corny Lannigan, one of my father's ship carpenters, 
 when father said to him one morning: "Cornelius, you 
 must have had some trouble last night; your eyes are 
 blacked, and your nose is all plastered over." 
 
 "Yes, Captain," said Corny; "there was a little mis- 
 understanding, but you ought to go up to the hospital 
 and see the other fellow;" and I then remembered read- 
 ing that the great General, Pyrrhus, once said: "Another 
 such a victory and I am ruined." 
 
 Another 'coon was started, and was finally found in a 
 tree by the water, whose base had been so washed that it 
 leaned out over Grant River. After lighting a fire and 
 consulting as to the mode of attack, Frank offered to go 
 up the leaning tree and shake the 'coon off, while the 
 dogs were to be held so as to see him drop, and then be 
 loosed to tackle him in the water. The plan worked 
 well. The 'coon dropped at the first shake, and so did 
 Frank. The dogs rushed in, but no man dared shoot, 
 and after a short fight in the water and on the other shore 
 the dogs came back, and we went home. 
 
SERGEANT FRANK NEAVILLE. 267 
 
 "I tell you," said John Clark, "it takes an almighty 
 good dog to whip an old he 'coon, and not one in a thou- 
 sand can do it. Sometimes a little she 'coon will give a 
 dozen such ornery dogs as we've got a good tussle and 
 get away." 
 
 "Look a-here, John Clark," said Charley Guyon to 
 his brother-in-law; "do you call my dog ornery?" And 
 so we talked on the way home. 
 
 "Ornery" is Wisconsinese for "ordinary," but has no 
 such meaning. It implies baseness; it is a term of re- 
 proach. An "ornery cuss" means a low-down fellow, 
 and an "ornery dog" is one of no possible account. If a 
 man in New York should describe me as an ordinary 
 man, he would hit it right; an every-day sort of man, not 
 distinguished for anything in particular; but if a Wiscon- 
 sin man stigmatizes you as "ornery" he means another 
 thing, and if he is not a corn-fed fellow you should "let 
 go your left and follow it up with your right." 
 
 I have already told how Frank and Henry went out 
 with the Second Wisconsin Infantry, and both were 
 killed in Virginia. 
 
 "Sound, sound the clarion, fill the fife! 
 
 To all the sensual world proclaim, 
 One crowded hour of glorious life 
 
 Is worth an age without a name." 
 
TAY-BUN-ANE-JE-GAY. 
 
 IN NORTHERN MINNESOTA FISHING THROUGH ICE. 
 
 WE named him Henry Neaville and I. We 
 had to call him something to distinguish him 
 from other Indians who begged about our 
 camp, and we did not think the name he gave as his own, 
 Ah-mik-wash, "a beaver house/' described him as well as 
 the one we concocted, which means: "He-who-takes-so- 
 much-at-a-mouthful." Ours was a perfect fit, and before 
 long I'll tell you how he got it. 
 
 Mr. James McBride, then living in Potosi, Wis., but 
 who lived in Washington, D. C., for the past thirty years, 
 until his death, which occurred last March, had a con- 
 tract to subdivide some townships in what is now Crow 
 Wing county, Minn. The township lines had been run, 
 each township being six miles square, and these were to 
 be crossed by lines a mile apart into square miles, with 
 the half miles marked on both north and east lines. The 
 northern line was near where Brainerd now stands, the 
 Mississippi River was the west boundary, and the survey 
 took in the village of Crow Wing, which was then an 
 Indian trading post. 
 
 The party included Thomas Davies, now living at 
 British Hollow, Wis.; Pierre Gibbs, of Dubuque, la.; 
 
 Crosby, I think originally from Boston; Henry R. 
 
 Neaville, and the writer, both of Potosi. We started by 
 steamboat from Dubuque, in September, 1856 I forget 
 the day, but Tom Davies thinks it was the I2th with 
 two horses, wagon, pack saddles, tent and camp equipage 
 and a supply of provisions that surprised me: Half a 
 
 268 
 
TAY-BUN-ANE-JE-GAY. 269 
 
 dozen barrels of flour, three barrels of pork, a ten-gallon 
 keg of molasses, one-gallon keg of vinegar, sugar, beans, 
 rice, grain for the horses, and all in profusion. At St. 
 Paul half the provisions were stored, and we took a 
 wagon load, all but the driver walking up the big military 
 road that led to Fort Ripley, about one hundred miles 
 north of St. Paul. Our first night out we camped on 
 Rum River, and Henry Neaville tasted it and said: 
 "Hum! it's nothing but water." From Fort Ripley to 
 Crow Wing the road was not so good. Making a base 
 of supplies at the trading post, we struck into the woods, 
 and afterward Tom Davies drove back to St. Paul for the 
 food left there. We took camp and grub on our backs. 
 At the place to begin work I made camp, and Neaville 
 went back for more supplies. There was about four 
 inches of snow, and this lay without thaw or addition 
 until we left the woods late in December. 
 
 I had expected to furnish game for camp, and took 
 my rifle, naturally thinking that this far-off region 
 abounded in game as the Bad Ax country did, where I 
 spent the previous winter. I lugged that rifle for two 
 months, and only killed four ruffed grouse. I saw one 
 deer and two rabbits, but did not get a shot at them. 
 The country was destitute of game. Indians swarmed 
 all over it. At Crow Wing the great trail from Lake 
 Superior crossed the one coming down from the Red 
 River of the North, and the trading post was visited by 
 scores of Indians every day from each of the four 
 branches of the trails. 
 
 It was on the second day out. Henry had returned 
 quickly, as we were not yet far from our base, and I was 
 baking bread and getting dinner for two, as the linemen 
 had theirs with them, and would not return until night, 
 when in walked the American whose name heads this 
 
270 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 chapter. As before stated, that was not his name then, 
 but he didn't know it. He squatted by the fire and 
 grunted: "Bon jour, Nidgee," a salutation of mixed 
 French and Ojibway that all those Indians used. Henry 
 returned his salute, and said to him in Ojibway that he 
 was welcome. 
 
 "Where did you learn to speak that?" I asked. 
 
 "Off up the Wisconsin River with a logging party one 
 winter. Why?" 
 
 "Nothing, only I was surprised, that's all. If I'd 
 known you spoke it we could have knocked lots of fun 
 out of your brother Frank on our fishing trips. But 
 you have made this man welcome, and that he will inter- 
 pret to mean free feeding, perhaps all winter, and as I am 
 camp keeper, McBride will ask questions if we feed too 
 many. He doesn't like an Indian, and told me not to 
 have them hanging around camp, so don't do this any 
 more." 
 
 "All right," said Henry; "I spoke without thinking. 
 If there's lots of pork boiled let's fill this fellow up and 
 see how much he can hold." 
 
 I told him that I had boiled enough pork for all hands 
 to have cold to-night, but if his guest ate half of it I 
 would boil more. 
 
 I made all ready, and our aboriginal American an- 
 nounced himself as Ah-mik-wash, or "Beaver House." 
 Henry remarked: "He differs somewhat from a beaver 
 house, and as to the last part of his name I'll bet he 
 hasn't washed in ten years." 
 
 "Henry, keep quiet!" Then tapping my breast I 
 said: "Kego-e-kay," and then touching Henry, intro- 
 duced him as Ke-tim-ish-ke (He-is-lazy). Old Beaver 
 House grunted, and I served an equal portion of bread, 
 baked beans and pork to each. There was enough for 
 
TAY-BUN-ANE-JE-GAY. 271 
 
 Henry and me at the first serving, and long before we 
 had finished I piled another big chunk on the plate of our 
 guest. 
 
 "Henry/' said I, "your friend's doctor has recom- 
 mended him to take something for his appetite, and he's 
 struck the place to get the prescription put up. Just see 
 what he takes at a mouthful, and how he swallows it 
 without sticking a tooth in it! I'll limit him to the pork 
 and bread, for I'll be dingswizzled if I'll boil and bake 
 any more beans!" 
 
 Henry thought a minute he was a meditative man 
 and therefore a born angler and said: "He is filling his 
 beaver house for the winter, but he can swallow chunks 
 of pork that would choke a deerhound. He must have a 
 new name. These Injuns don't get a name early in life 
 as we do, and when they get one it never sticks through 
 as ours do, and we must name him anew. See that last 
 chunk go down ! Give him what there is left of the pork 
 and put the rest away, and let's see him get away with 
 what you had provided for six men to-night, in addition 
 to what he has eaten." 
 
 I will publicly confess to being a sinner if that Ojib- 
 way, or "Chippewa," as his name has been corrupted, did 
 not clean up every bit of the pork. There was no such 
 discrimination between the component parts as was made 
 by Jack Spratt and his wife. He removed the plate from 
 his lap and said: "Koo-koosh, nish-ish-shin," or "Pork 
 very good." 
 
 While our guest sat by the fire in full enjoyment of 
 physical comfort Henry and I concocted the new name 
 for him, and this is the way we christened him. I said, 
 leaving out as much of his tongue as possible: "You no 
 Beaver House no more, you Tay-bun-ane-je-gay" (He- 
 who-takes-so-much-at-a-mouthful). This name, which 
 
272 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 we evolved in a spirit of ridicule, was accepted by our 
 simple-minded friend as a tribute to his prowess after he 
 had scanned our faces and found no trace of levity, and 
 he was so known, not only by us, but by his tribe. 
 
 He had caught Henry's name, and smiled as much as 
 an Indian can smile, but seemed in doubt about mine. 
 Perhaps my pronunciation was at fault, for "kego" means 
 fish, and also is a negative, as "do not," "never," "beware 
 of saying," etc. Henry said: "We have many words 
 which mean the same thing, and so have they. Old 
 Swallow-'em-slick is in doubt. Show him your fish lines 
 and he will know that you are a fisherman." 
 
 When our guest had seen my tackle he pointed to me 
 in pride at his understanding and touched my shoulder, 
 saying: "Kego-e-kay." Then he proceeded to tell what 
 great pike, "kinoje," could be caught in a small lake a 
 short distance away, and we arranged to try it next day 
 after the men had gone on the line. 
 
 The ice was not thick, but would bear us well, for it 
 was about the last of September or the first of October 
 in that cold country, and this reminds me that McBride 
 wanted to know about the winters in that region and 
 asked a half-breed who spoke English how the weather 
 was likely to be. He replied: "October, he pooty cole; 
 November he cole as de dev'; and December, he col'er 
 'an ." I had heard the name mentioned as a com- 
 parison for heat frequently, and wondered what kind of 
 a place the half-breed thought it might be. The snow 
 had fallen since the lake froze, and we could not see the 
 depth. I asked old Mouthful where there were springs 
 and he showed us one, where we caught a lot of minnows. 
 
 We cut holes and rigged about a dozen lines with tip- 
 ups and waited. The holes froze over, and we cut them 
 open, but no fish came to our lures. It was noon, and 
 
TA Y-B UN-ANE-JE-GA Y. 273 
 
 not a pike, big or little, had sampled our minnows. We 
 were like "Ye Sunberrye Fysher," our tackle was cor- 
 rect, but the fish were either absent or something else. 
 It was time to eat. 
 
 I asked Henry: "Do you think that old Mouthful, as 
 you call him in shorthand, has brought us out here on a 
 fool's errand? This lake should contain pike, lake trout, 
 brook trout or perch, but we get no bites. The water 
 is not very cold, or the ice would be thicker; the springs 
 below keep the ice from getting too thick. Perhaps our 
 friend is only playing it on us for his grub." 
 
 "If I was sure of that," said Henry, "I would advise 
 that we leave him, and go back and eat ours at camp, or 
 sit down here and eat, and only give a little bite, so that 
 he could not take so much at a mouthful." 
 
 The luncheon was fairly divided. One of the tip-ups 
 showed the flag, and Henry jumped and ran for it. The 
 hook was bare ; a minnow had been taken. Old Mouth- 
 ful had probably divined our thoughts, for he arose and 
 said: "Kego-e-kay-e-mah," there are fish there. We let 
 our lines lower down, but got no fish. It was time to go 
 back to camp to prepare for the hungry linemen. Our 
 new friend went with us ; it was evident that he was fond 
 of our company or our pork it was not easy to tell 
 which. He saw the men come in and eat their dinner, 
 but got no invitation to join, for our chief did not wish 
 to encourage Indians to hang round the camp. Two 
 such men as He-who-takes-so-much-at-a-mouthful would 
 breed a famine in our commissary in a short time. They 
 would eat more than our six healthy white men, who 
 had the abnormal appetite that comes with a life in the 
 woods and active exercise in cold weather. The farm- 
 er's expression, "I'm as hungry as a hired man," fell 
 short of our appetites. 
 
274: MEN / HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 We had a tin bake oven, made in flat sections for 
 packing on a man's back, which, when set up before a, 
 camp-fire, flared out so as to reflect the heat from top and 
 bottom on a bread pan, in which we not only baked 
 bread, but beans, pork and 'coons. Imagine a yawning 
 front of eighteen inches sloping to a back of five inches, 
 in the middle of which was the pan, and you have the 
 idea. Mixing soda and cream of tartar with the flour 
 and then wetting it up well! If you don't believe that 
 I made the best bread that was ever baked on this planet 
 just write to my compagnon du voyage, Thomas Davies. 
 Mark the letter "private," because Tom has been married 
 since that time, and he might not wish Mrs. Davies to see 
 his reply; he is eating her biscuit now. Married men 
 will appreciate this caution. 
 
 Four men went on the line McBride, the chief or 
 compass man; one axe man to clear a place for him to 
 see through and to blaze the line, and two chain men. 
 There was then an extra man to bring supplies from our 
 base, and he was in camp with me a great deal. Henry 
 Neaville did most of this work, because he was a very 
 good woodsman, and could find me when I moved camp. 
 Sometimes we stayed several days in a place, and lines 
 would be run in all directions. In the morning I would 
 get an order to "Keep camp here to-day," or to move 
 it. If moved, it might be "two miles east and one mile 
 north," and then before sundown I would clang the cow 
 bell, which we sometimes used on the horses when hob- 
 bled. We used the horses to pack our camp at first 
 while in the country of solid ground, but sent them to 
 Crow Wing when we got into the swampy country, 
 where the springy swamps were frozen enough to permit 
 a man to travel safely without snowshoes, but would not 
 hold the greater weight of a horse with its smaller foot. 
 
TAY-BUN-ANE-JE-GAY. 275 
 
 It would have been almost impossible to run these lines 
 before the swamps were frozen. I saw corner stakes set 
 and "witness trees" marked, and when the man removed 
 his hand from the top of the stake it fell. There were 
 no stones to be found for markers; but the trees told the 
 story, and the exact place of the stake could be found. 
 
 I can't say when it was that we met a train of Red 
 River settlers on their way from Pembina perhaps it 
 was on our way up, but it was an event. We heard the 
 creaking of their carts for at least ten miles before we 
 met. There were eighteen carts in the train drawn by 
 ponies, and not a bit of iron in the whole outfit! Not 
 even a nail. The wheels had wooden tires held by 
 wooden pins, and if one gave out there was the forest to 
 furnish material. Some of the carts had a ham rind 
 under the axle, but that was a foolish concession to the 
 god of silence. The others shrieked and wailed like lost 
 spirits, and miles before we met them we were wondering 
 what could make such unearthly sounds. We halted 
 and talked with the priest who was in charge of the ex- 
 pedition, and seemed to be the only man in the party who 
 could speak English. The other men were French, In- 
 dians and half-breeds, and they spoke such a patois of 
 mixed Ojibway and Canadian French that Crosby 
 couldn't understand a word, and he spoke Boston French 
 fluently. The priest was a jolly old fellow, a well-read 
 man who, it seemed to me, was wasting his life among a 
 very dirty lot; but if he was contented we should be. I 
 listened to him talk of his mission work, and of his hope 
 that there would be a weekly mail up from St. Paul into 
 his frozen region before many years. His people had 
 sold their furs; the Hudson Bay Company had a 
 monopoly of the trade in British America, and they 
 brought nothing to sell. They were going to St. Paul 
 
276 MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 to buy coffee, sugar, clothing, garden seeds and other 
 things; but why they didn't buy of the company I don't 
 know. His great good nature and hopefulness made 
 him very interesting, for he was a good and lovable old 
 man. Ah, me! If the camera and dry plates had been 
 invented in those days, and I had owned an outfit, what 
 treasures I would have to-day! 
 
 Tom Davies went to St. Paul for the rest of the pro- 
 visions early in October, and was gone ten days. Henry 
 froze both his feet by riding on the hind end of the wagon 
 with his feet hanging out after he had met Tom at Crow 
 Wing, for we were still in a country where the wagon 
 could be used. It was night and Henry had told Tom 
 that Crosby was lost in the woods, and he hurried on at 
 once because there were but three men on the line. They 
 reached camp while we were breakfasting, but Henry 
 could not stand. He had foolishly worn leather boots, 
 while the rest had shoe-packs of elk-skin, soft and warm 
 in dry weather. This reminds me to say that the In- 
 dians about us wore moccasins of buffalo, which cost one 
 dollar a pair at Crow Wing, but did not wear well. After 
 the men were gone on the line I took Henry's boots off, 
 and put his feet into snow and by chafing them got the 
 blood started. He joked about my cutting his feet off, 
 and his mfssing the dancing that winter, as they swelled 
 so that there seemed to be danger; but in a week he was 
 able to walk, and by cutting one boot for a favorite toe 
 he was soon ready for duty. 
 
 I kept up half-hourly rifle shots and cow-bell ringing 
 for Crosby, and he came into camp, having been out one 
 night without matches or blankets. He had kept from 
 freezing by walking, and had got turned around and fol- 
 lowed the blazed lines the wrong way. Hunger had 
 made him colder, and he had thrown a stick at a bird, 
 
TA Y-BUN-ANE-JE-GA Y. 277 
 
 probably a Canada jay, hoping to kill it and eat it raw. 
 He had an appetite of great length, breadth and thick- 
 ness, one worthy of the man whose name heads this 
 article. 
 
 Gibbs was very fond of staying in camp with me when 
 Henry went on the line and he could do it. An excuse 
 to mend his trousers or other clothing served. He was 
 the youngest of the party and fresh from school. He 
 knew all about Indians, for he had read about them, but 
 was curious to study them in the woods. He was a gold 
 mine to old Mouthful or any other Indian. When he 
 offered a pipeful of tobacco he handed over a whole plug 
 of Navy or such part of one as he had, and when the 
 Indian cut a pipeful and kept the rest Gibbs thought that 
 he didn't mean to do it, but couldn't ask for its return. 
 He continually gave me advice on the subject of getting 
 on with them, and I enjoyed it. Once as we sat down 
 to a midday bite Gibbs passed the pan of hot biscuit to 
 old Mouthful, who dumped the lot in his dirty blanket. 
 I had frequently told him that an Indian always under- 
 stood that what you handed to him was his, but there the 
 biscuit were. 
 
 "Explain it to him," said Gibbs; "I can't speak his 
 lingo, but we've got to have some bread for our dinner, 
 and I don't really fancy getting it back after he has 
 handled it and had it in that blanket." 
 
 "Gibbs," I replied, "there is no need to explain it. 
 You gave them to him; of course, you didn't intend to 
 give him the whole output of the bakery, but you did. 
 Now the only thing to do is to go and take what you 
 want without any more ceremony; replevin them; use 
 force if necessary, but get back our biscuit. We need 
 not eat the outside of them; there's a lot of good bread 
 inside which his dirty hands haven't touched." 
 
278 MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 He looked at the bread and then said : "I don't like to 
 be impolite to him. Why can't you tell him that it's all 
 a mistake; what's the word for mistake in his patter?" 
 
 "Oh, just say to him: 'Nidgee, pungee iskoodah 
 wabo,' and it will be all right." This was an invitation 
 to old Mouthful to have some whiskey, an article which 
 we did not have, but this was my joke on Gibbs. 
 
 The red man had not paid much attention to our talk, 
 which he could not understand, but my last words must 
 have had a familiar sound, for he turned his head and 
 looked at me. 
 
 Gibbs arose and repeated the words in his purest 
 Chippewa. Old Mouthful also arose, as befitted such an 
 important occasion, grunted, shook hands and replied in 
 fairly good Ojibway that he "didn't care if he did." 
 
 "What's that he says?" asked Gibbs. 
 
 "He says that he begs your pardon, and hopes that he 
 has not offended; and he begs that you will take the 
 bread, and give him such a portion as will not rob your- 
 self." The situation was growing interesting. As the 
 interpreter I had the game in my hands. 
 
 Gibbs struck an attitude and exclaimed : "Now, by my 
 halidome! Our guest is a gentleman of right courtly 
 manners. I tell you, Fred, you don't know these people 
 if you have been around a few of them long enough to 
 pick up some of their talk. I've read up on 'em, Scool- 
 craft, Cooper and these authors; have studied 'em, and the 
 noble red man has all the high-bred instincts of the most 
 chivalrous knight, but these men who come among them 
 to trade are not sufficiently educated to see and appre- 
 ciate it." He then took up the bread, broke off a third 
 of it and gave it to our guest. 
 
 Old Mouthful looked surprised. Evidently he didn't 
 mind the bread as long as there was whiskey in prospect. 
 
TAY-BUN-ANE-JE-GAY. 279 
 
 After a pause he looked at Gibbs in a way that the Gov- 
 ernor of North Carolina might have done at that historic 
 meeting with the Governor of South Carolina, and mere- 
 ly remarked: "Pungee 'scutah wabo?" 
 
 " What's that he says?" asked Gibbs. 
 
 He asked you for some whiskey, and he thinks you 
 promised him some in exchange for the bread. I begin 
 to think so myself, since I compare your pronunciation 
 of Ojibway with his and mine. There are some very 
 nice shades of inflection in Ojibway which make a word 
 mean several things. You have told me how revengeful 
 an Indian is, and you have mortally offended this man, 
 and unless you give him what you have promised it may 
 go hard with you and, in fact, with all our party, for we 
 are only six." 
 
 "What will I do? I haven't any whiskey, and there's 
 none in camp." 
 
 "He won't believe that. He has seen a ten-gallon 
 keg of molasses, but you don't suppose for a moment he 
 believes it to be molasses? The kegs he has seen with 
 white men have always contained whiskey. I don't 
 know how you can square it with him. You've got 
 yourself into this scrape, but I'll help you out if I can." 
 
 I told our guest that Gibbs had not understood, "go- 
 win kendun," but that instead of whiskey he meant to 
 offer tobacco. That was satisfactory it had to be and 
 Gibbs gave up a whole plug of Navy, and there was peace 
 in the land. Gibbs felt that I had successfully arbitrated 
 the case and averted a calamity. What our guest 
 thought was impossible to tell, but Henry and I enjoyed 
 the thing by ourselves, and afterward Henry guyed Gibbs 
 about it at every chance. 
 
 We had left civilization early in a Presidential cam- 
 paign. The Democratic party had nominated James 
 
280 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 Buchanan, and the newly-formed Republican party had 
 named John C. Fremont as its candidate. Our little 
 party of six was divided in its choice, and in the evenings 
 the argument waxed warm, but always in respectful 
 shape. The date for the election had passed, but we 
 knew nothing of the result. But what hundreds of 
 bushels of oysters were bet! It would have required sev- 
 eral smacks to have carried all these oysters if the stews, 
 fries and raws had all been eaten. The fact is that no 
 record of bets was kept, and each night the old score 
 was forgotten and new bets were made. When we got 
 back in the vicinity of Crow Wing about December 
 20 we first heard the result, and the Buchanan men were 
 jubilant. It served us well as a topic of interest, for it 
 was not a jolly crowd, and what it would have done for 
 amusement without the election is a question. 
 
 Unless Henry or Gibbs was in camp I did not dare 
 leave it. These Indians might be honest enough, but in 
 our case it was well not to take any risks on our pro- 
 visions. One day, while out with my rifle, I came to a 
 lake of which I had a glimpse through the trees. Stand- 
 ing awhile, there came a faint whining sound, which I at 
 once diagnosed as the talk of a bear. Here was a chance 
 to get a shot at bruin, and perhaps some fresh meat. 
 Carefully looking at the cap on the rifle, I cautiously 
 worked down into the marshy ground and underbrush in 
 the direction of the sound. The marsh was frozen, or 
 the passage would have been impossible. The sound 
 came from one direction, but did not seem to increase as 
 I advanced; but it was a bear, sure. Getting near the 
 edge of the lake, as could be seen off to the right, the 
 game must be close, and that creepy, trembling feeling 
 came on. I halted and listened; it was but a few feet 
 away. Through the brush a dark object could be seen 
 
TA Y-BUN-ANE-JE-GA Y. 281 
 
 on a log, and the whining kept up. If it was a bear I 
 wanted to see how it stood in order to plant the bullet 
 right ; but in stepping one side I made a slight noise, and 
 an Indian boy about six years old turned around. He 
 dropped, crawled behind the log, and then jumped into 
 the brush and out of sight. Probably it was the first 
 white man he had ever seen. Then I knew that what 
 I mistook for the whining of a bear was the boy's low 
 singing. The story he told his mother would be interest- 
 ing, if we knew it. 
 
 Getting back to the higher land again, I sat awhile on 
 a log enjoying the clear, cold air and the glimpse of the 
 frozen lake. After awhile there was another sound of 
 life, and I saw a sight which I never have seen recorded 
 by any writer of the woods. Below, in an open spot in 
 the underbrush, perhaps of twenty feet diameter, and not 
 over twenty feet away, came a troop of about thirty ruffed 
 grouse or partridges of the Eastern States, and they were 
 clucking and chattering at a great rate. The males were 
 strutting with tails spread out like turkey cocks, or more 
 like tame pigeons. I was in plain sight, and tried not to 
 breathe for fear of disturbing them, for it was the treat 
 of a lifetime. Among these birds was a male, I had no 
 doubt the same species, which was black. Of course I 
 can't at this late day, and in view of my very slight knowl- 
 edge of such things at that time, be certain that this was a 
 case of melanism in Bonasa, but I believe it. 
 
 Later I saw several ptarmigan, which I then thought 
 to be white ruffed grouse, but did not kill any. Some- 
 thing alarmed the partridges, and they flew into the trees, 
 and I picked off three. The shots brought an Indian, a 
 stranger, who begged for a bird, and I gave him one. 
 These men were persistent beggars; they thought every 
 white man was wealthy. They seemed to roam the 
 
282 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 woods without either gun or bows, and I afterward 
 learned that they lived mainly on fish, which they dried 
 for winter. No doubt they knew how scarce game was, 
 and that it was useless to hunt for it. I was greatly dis- 
 appointed; I had left the East two years before because 
 of the scarcity of game, and here I was in a primeval 
 forest where there was no game, hardly a rabbit. Dis- 
 appointed hardly expresses it. Why, we could go out 
 from Albany in that day, in most any direction during 
 the winter, and bag a few ruffed grouse, some rabbits 
 and a squirrel or two; I began to think the far West a 
 fraud; Minnesota was then "far West." The biggest lot 
 of game I saw in northern Minnesota that winter was 
 four young 'coons that Tom Davies killed with an axe 
 as they huddled near a tree on an extra cold morning. I 
 parboiled and baked them,, and oh, my! 
 
 Our friend, who possibly might bite off more than he 
 could chew, but never more than he could swallow, had 
 ceased to be interesting. He found our camp at every 
 move, and seemed to regard himself as part of it, or at 
 least one of the volunteer staff. Neaville and I paid lit- 
 tle attention to him, but his eyes brightened when he 
 found Gibbs in camp. Gibbs was curious about him, 
 wanted to learn his language, and would touch objects 
 and ask their names by looking up and saying, "Ojib- 
 wa?" Then, of course, he could do no less than "divvy" 
 on pork and tobacco a very good arrangement for his 
 friend. Speaking of tobacco, we once found old Mouth- 
 ful with the native article, the "killi-ki-nic," or inner bark 
 of the red willow. Henry and I tried once. It was most 
 pungent, and I can only compare it to smoking rattan 
 and elm root, which we schoolboys used before we as- 
 pired to tobacco, and it almost burned our tongues off. 
 I think some of the old boys, and perhaps some of the 
 
TA Y-BUN-ANE-JE-GA Y. 283 
 
 younger ones, will recall their brave attempts to smoke 
 things, no matter how pungent, which did not upset and 
 invert their youthful stomachs. Fifty years ago most 
 boys in America thought it smart to chew tobacco, and 
 they acquired the disgusting habit; but the younger ones 
 would get licorice ball, and spit in imitation of a tobacco 
 chewer, and then some unbeliever would challenge him 
 with, "That ain't tobacco you're a-chewin'; it's on'y lick- 
 orish!" Yes, I was a boy once. 
 
 These Northern Indians must smoke, but tobacco 
 was an exotic which positively declined to grow so far 
 North, and, like the boys, they found a substitute. After 
 they found the Southern weed it was too costly to use 
 alone, and they mixed it with killi-ki-nic merely for 
 economy; but preferred pure tobacco when they could 
 get it. 
 
 "This reminds me." In my young days, when I was 
 particularly fond of negro minstrelsy and burlesquing 
 things, and shortly after the time of which I write, Long- 
 fellow published "Hiawatha," a poem which I never tire 
 of reading, but one whose meter urgently invites bur- 
 lesque; and with hundreds of others I essayed it. Else- 
 where I have said that some people seemed shocked at 
 seeing a thing which they love burlesqued. That means 
 that their sense of humor is only partially developed. 
 Then and to-day I regard "Hiawatha" as the great Amer- 
 ican epic, but I wrote: 
 
 "Should you ask me whence I got them, 
 
 Got these yarns of old James River; 
 
 With their flavor of tobacco, 
 
 Of the stinkweed, the mundungus, 
 
 And the pipe of Old Virginny, 
 
 And the twangle of the banjo; 
 
 Of the banjo, the goatskinnit, 
 
284 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 And the fiddle, the catgutta, 
 And the noisy marrow-bonum, 
 I should answer, I should tell you: 
 By one John-smith they were written. 
 John-smith, soldier, sailor and explorer, 
 Editor of his own adventures 
 In the land of Po-ca-hon-tas, 
 In the realm of Pow-ha-tan, 
 Where old John-smith had a big time, 
 Filled the red man full of whisky, 
 Stole his daughter and sailed eastward 
 To the far-off land of John-bull," etc. 
 
 There were yards and yards of this stuff, but we will 
 content ourselves with that. It's easy to write any boy 
 can do it and the grandest of themes are the easiest to 
 burlesque. That is a fact that human owls fail to under- 
 stand. What is easier to travesty than "Chronicles?" 
 And it is often done without intending irreverence; the 
 humor of the thing is the only thought of the writer ; but 
 "a jest's prosperity," etc. 
 
 Here you see the evil effect of tobacco, how it will 
 lead a man off the track to talk about Pocahontas and 
 other irrelevant things. It's fortunate for some one that 
 my pen did not go off after Sir Walter Raleigh and the 
 story of his weighing the smoke which came from Queen 
 Elizabeth's pipe, but every schoolboy knows all about 
 that. 
 
 We found another thing that the Indians used ; it was 
 the "man-o-min," or wild rice. This is mighty good feed 
 for wild ducks or Indians, but, as they ate it, there was a 
 grit in it which detracted from its value to men who don't 
 like to eat the hulls of grain. Hardly a night but half a 
 dozen Indians slept by our fire and cooked their wild rice 
 over it, but if they could get our Southern rice they were 
 glad. It's many a day since I ate the man-o-min, but the 
 
TAY-BUN-ANE-JE-GAY. 285 
 
 impression now is that if it had been properly hulled it 
 would have been good. 
 
 Along the streams we saw where the wild rice had 
 been tied up in bunches to keep it from bending over and 
 being eaten by wild ducks while it was in the milky state 
 or after. Then, later in the year, the women paddled up 
 the stream, bent the heads of rice over, and with a light 
 stick threshed them into a canoe. 
 
 Gibbs was always curious to taste their food; he had 
 the true instincts of an investigator, and got more infor- 
 mation in that line than we, who were more cautious of 
 getting too intimate with the aborigines, for fear of our 
 stock of provisions. 
 
 We came out all right on the rations, and had all we 
 wished to use ; but the story of the winter is too long for 
 one telling. 
 
WE-NEN-GWAY. 
 
 A MUSKRAT FEAST THE TRIP HOME ON THE ICE. 
 
 AFTER a while we got into a swampy region which 
 was frozen, or we couldn't have run lines 
 through it. Lakes were frequent, and we saw 
 many wigwams where there were high frames for drying 
 fish. Crotches about ten feet high held poles, and across 
 these were laid others, forming a rude platform, on which 
 the fish were dried for winter use. As near as I can re- 
 member the fish were whitefish, lake trout and either pike 
 or mascalonge, for I then knew as little of the differences 
 between the two latter species as an Adirondack guide 
 or the average fish dealer does. Now I could trade 
 bread, flour, pork or sugar for an occasional fish, but 
 McBride always wanted to be assured that they had been 
 thoroughly scrubbed, for he was a little shy of eating any- 
 thing which an Indian had handled. 
 
 Our old friend, whom we had named He-who-takes- 
 so-much-at-a-mouthful, still followed us up, and I had 
 become more than tired of him, and was wondering how 
 he could "be shook." Some little things had been 
 missed, such as forks and spoons; there was no evidence 
 that he had taken them, but when I once left a jackknife 
 sticking in a log where I had been using it and it was 
 gone an hour afterward, I suspected Mouthful, because 
 he was the only man around camp beside myself. I said 
 nothing about it, but resolved to keep an eye out for him. 
 If, after feeding him for over a month, and sharing my 
 tobacco with him, he would steal from me, I wanted to 
 know it. I began to hate him, and he soon saw that he 
 was not welcome; but he rejoiced when Gibbs was in 
 
WE-NEN-GWAY. 287 
 
 camp. One day when Gibbs stayed in I put a new 
 handle in a little belt axe, and then began sandpapering 
 a handle for the larger camp axe, for we had extra ones. 
 The little axe lay by the fire and I was sitting in the door 
 of the tent, when old Mouthful came up and grunted his 
 salute, and sat down so that his blanket covered the axe. 
 I noted the fact, and said to Gibbs: "Go talk to him; give 
 him a pipeful of tobacco, anything to keep his mind off 
 his appetite, and when I smooth up this axe helve I'll 
 play you a game of euchre." 
 
 While we were playing cards old Mouthful arose, 
 wrapped his blanket about him, and walked off. The 
 belt axe was gone. I called after him, "Nidgee !" several 
 times, but he didn't look around, and I grabbed the axe 
 helve and started after him. He was in a well-worn 
 path, bordered with prickly ash, and when he found me 
 close behind him he sprang into the bush, but not in time 
 to escape a whack on the shoulders with the hickory 
 helve, and he dropped the hatchet. When I returned to 
 camp Gibbs was indignant. Said he: "If I was where I 
 could get out of these woods I'd go. You are always 
 knocking the Indians around, shoving them out of the 
 way if they crowd around the fire, and now you've struck 
 one of them, and we may all be murdered. These In- 
 dians are revengeful, and that man will remember you if 
 he meets you ten years from now." 
 
 "You think he will remember me as long as that?" 
 
 "Yes, he will; he'll treasure that up against you as 
 long as he lives, for their memories are long, and they 
 never forgive an injury." 
 
 "Well, Gibbs," said I, "when I ask him to forgive me 
 it will be time for him to do it. Just now I'm not asking 
 any favors of him, and, as for his remembering me, that's 
 all right. I hope he will, and I'll remember him, and if 
 
288 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 he ever comes to this camp or I meet him in the woods 
 I'll lick him again. I'm just as mad as he is, and I've 
 suspected him of stealing from us all winter, and now 
 I've caught him in the act. I don't want to argue this 
 case, but what I've told you is just what I'll do, and you 
 can bet on it." 
 
 "Suppose a dozen of his friends take this thing up, and 
 come down on us in the night and kill us all. What can 
 six men do in such a case?" 
 
 "I tell you," said I, "the case is not a supposable one. 
 You know that their head chief, Hole-in-the-day, lives 
 near Crow Wing, and that he told McBride, through an 
 interpreter, that if any of his men molested us in any 
 way he would punish them, and every Indian from this 
 place to Lake Superior has been notified of this. There 
 is a whole mass of stuff in your head about Indians that 
 I don't suppose you could get out with a fine-toothed 
 comb; but you will never find that fellow around our 
 camp again; he is a lazy, thieving beggar, who can't have 
 any standing among his people." 
 
 Just how far this satisfied Gibbs is a question. His 
 mind was filled with romantic ideas of the red man which 
 he had obtained from books, and he had no idea of the 
 degraded ones who hang around a trading post, too lazy 
 to hunt, trap or fish. I saw many Indians that winter 
 who were too proud to beg, and this only proves that the 
 red man is human and differs in mental make-up as other 
 men differ. A very different man was We-nen-gway, 
 whom I met on the border of one of those immense cran- 
 berry marshes, which were common where we then were. 
 Some of these marshes might have contained a thousand 
 acres, and were red with frozen berries. As we had 
 sugar in plenty, you may imagine what an agreeable 
 sauce we had with our boiled pork, roast pork, baked 
 
WE-NEN-GWAY. 289 
 
 beans, etc. His name meant Dirty-face, and he looked 
 it. I wondered if he took pride in his name, and kept his 
 face in that condition by some vow to abstain from wash- 
 ing, but on closer acquaintance it was evident that the 
 dark spots were birth marks, for which he was not re- 
 sponsible. He watched me gather a quart of berries, 
 and accepted a piece of tobacco in a dignified sort of way. 
 He was evidently a superior man to Mouthful, and one 
 not disposed to look too favorably on the invasion of his 
 ancestral domain by the white man, but his tribe had sold 
 this land to the Long Knives, and that settled it. I took a 
 fancy to this man ; here was the ideal man that Gibbs had 
 read of. 
 
 Some days afterward he visited our camp, which was 
 moved a few miles most every day to one of the cardinal 
 points of the compass, and he brought me a fine lake 
 trout. It was a fresh one, and I was interested at once. 
 There was no game in the country, and my rifle was a 
 useless burden in moving camp, but there must be fish 
 near by. 
 
 I asked Dirty-face to eat, and set out some cold boiled 
 pork and beans, as well as hot coffee. This was a treat 
 to him, but it was evident that he had eaten during the 
 previous week, and was not filling up for the week to 
 come. We naturally talked about the fish, and he told 
 me that over by his wigwam was a lake with plenty of 
 fish; and as our move next day would bring our camp 
 near his, he would show me where and how to catch 
 some o-gah. This was a new name, and after drawing 
 pictures of fish as well as I could on a piece of birch bark 
 I drew a pike or pickerel and said, "Ken-o-shah ;" he said 
 it was the same. "O-gah" I never met before as a name 
 for pike; but kenosha, kenoje or kenozha was the more 
 common name for the fish. If those who wish to trace 
 
290 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 the derivation of the names of fish as used in popular 
 nomenclature will take down their volumes of Forest and 
 Stream, and look at the articles on the name of masca- 
 longe, maskinonje, etc., they will find all that is known 
 of the Indian name from which the various spellings are 
 derived. See Vol. XXVI., page 149, March 18, 1886; 
 and Vol. XXVL, page 268, October 28, 1886. 
 
 From our new camp on the shore of a nameless lake 
 I could see the wigwam of my new friend on the other 
 side, about half a mile off, and after getting things in 
 shape I went over to him. His wigwam was a typical 
 Ojibway residence, made of skins laid over many poles, 
 which came together at the top, where there was an open- 
 ing for the smoke to go out. It was circular in form, 
 much like the cumbrous Sibley tent which some of our 
 troops used in 1862. On the outside there were records 
 of hunts or fights in black and red pigments, which could 
 be read by those versed in their pictorial histories, but 
 which were a huckleberry beyond my persimmon. A 
 skin flap kept out the cold; a small fire in the middle 
 diffused all the heat it had to spare, and a goodly portion 
 of it went out with the smoke. They made small fires 
 of twigs and squatted over them, freezing one side while 
 warming the other, and said that ours were so hot that a 
 man could not get near them to warm himself; but I no- 
 ticed that many nights our big fires were patronized by 
 travelling Indians to sleep by, instead of making small 
 ones for themselves. Did you ever notice that man is 
 the only animal which lies with his feet to the fire? If 
 you haven't observed this, just look at your dog bake his 
 head under the stove. 
 
 I was invited inside. Besides the flavor of smoke 
 from burning wood there were several other perfumes 
 which you never smelled in a barber's shop. Mentally 
 
WE-NEN-GWAY. 291 
 
 I quote a couplet from Tennyson's "Maud" as I recall the 
 combined odors: 
 
 "The woodbine spices are wafted abroad 
 And the musk of the roses blown." 
 
 The family consisted of Mme. Dirty-face and two 
 girls of sixteen and eighteen, and three young boys. By 
 a most convenient arrangement the parlor, sitting-room, 
 bedroom, dining-room and kitchen were all on one floor, 
 with no partition nor stairs to climb when the head of 
 the house came home with a load. I took this all in at 
 a glance the architectural beauties, I mean the odors 
 came in through a different sense. When I described it 
 to Henry Neaville I could only compare it to a flavor 
 met in boyhood days when I dug up a nest of young 
 woodchucks. 
 
 "Yes," said Henry, "I've been in a wigwam in winter, 
 but the flavor, as I remember it, was more of an orni- 
 thological character, and seemed to resemble that of a 
 nest of young woodpeckers." 
 
 Dirty-face took down a couple of spears and an axe, 
 and we went up the lake to an open air-hole, where it was 
 probable that a spring boiled up from the bottom and 
 kept the ice from forming over its warmer waters. He 
 advanced cautiously, and sounded the ice with the poll of 
 his axe until it broke; he chipped off the edge which 
 would not bear us, and we had firm footing at the margin 
 of the water. His spears were not like the gig which 
 Guyon and I used, but were made with a single point 
 with two barbs, like an arrow-head; they appeared to be 
 made from saw blades, and were fastened in clefts in the 
 handles, which were of some heavy wood. Our ice cut> 
 ting had scared away any fish which might be near, so 
 we waited and smoked. The snow on the ice prevented 
 
292 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 our seeing into the water except where it was open, and 
 it also shielded us from being seen by the fish. Once I 
 stamped a foot and my friend said "Kego," and, as the 
 word means both "fish" and "don't," it was a caution 
 either way. Soon we could see an occasional fish of 
 good size in the clear water, but too deep to be reached 
 with a spear. 
 
 His patience exceeded mine, and it began to be 
 monotonous to see the fish swimming below out of range 
 in the clear water, and I said to him: "Kego-de-me," the 
 fish are very deep. He grunted an assent, and pulled 
 out a thin white stone not unlike a fish in general shape, 
 and tied it to his spear with a few feet of string. This he 
 moved gently about, and several fish gave it respectful 
 attention without being impertinent, and then a large lake 
 trout rose and I struck and missed it; its tail was toward 
 me, and my spear went on one side. I knew that my 
 friend must be more expert, and I took his spear and 
 played the lure in the water, drawing it near the surface 
 if a fish arose. Soon he plunged his spear into a fish 
 which stood broadside and was about to seize the decoy. 
 The cord ran out rapidly, but the flight was soon checked 
 and a fine nay-may-goos lay upon the snow. I spell the 
 name as I learned to speak it. Scientists call the lake 
 trout Salvelinus namaycush, softening the original word. 
 Dirty-face insisted that I should try it again, and I did, 
 for I wanted to learn how to handle this new kind of 
 spear. A large pike came up to the lure, and I sent the 
 steel into it and secured it. We took three more fish, 
 and then it was time for me to go to camp to get things 
 in shape for the return of the linemen. I went back by 
 way of the wigwam, and stopped awhile and gave Mrs. 
 Dirty-face some tobacco, and she ordered the girls to 
 clean the fish for me. I took two enough for our sup- 
 
WE-NEN-GWAY. 293 
 
 per, with the rice and beans and would take no more. 
 I have always been in doubt whether her action was 
 genuinely generous or not, for the whole party visited 
 me next day, and again when we moved to the upper end 
 of the lake, and if a balance was struck between those 
 two fish (which may have weighed twelve pounds) and 
 an unknown quantity of bread, beans, rice, coffee and 
 sugar really, I don't know if there would be any bal- 
 ance. 
 
 I have remarked on the absence of game and other 
 animal life. The snow which fell in September, and had 
 lain without addition or melting, had become too hard 
 to record the passing of small animals, such as mink, 
 rabbits or even the heavier 'coons, but I saw a mink and 
 a fox, and heard the great gray timber wolf several times. 
 The Canada jay and the raven were the most common 
 birds, and I saw the little chickadee and a bird which I 
 did not know, but now think might have been the shrike, 
 or butcher bird. I never ceased to be surprised at the 
 absence of life in this wilderness. 
 
 December came and the cold increased. One morn- 
 ing th.e trees were bursting with a sound like rifles, and 
 Gibbs thought we were attacked. He and Crosby 
 jumped up out of bed before daylight, but soon returned 
 when the rest of the party laughed at them, for we knew 
 what the noise meant, having heard it before. After 
 reaching Crow Wing we learned that the thermometer 
 had been 40 below zero on several occasions. There 
 was no wind in the heavy timber, and we were warmly 
 clad and could hardly realize how cold it was. Coats 
 were discarded, but no man knew how many flannel 
 shirts he had on; and as long as the body part of a pair 
 of trousers held together the legs of them were reinforced 
 by cylinders made of bed ticking fastened at top and bot- 
 
294: MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 torn; these were not removed when worn out, but other 
 reinforcements were added outside them until a cross 
 section of a leg might have shown half a dozen strata of 
 bed tick above the original deposit of trousering. 
 
 We had now reached the northern line of our survey 
 at its eastern end, over by Mille-lacs, and were working 
 the upper tier of townships toward the Mississippi. One 
 day I was out with my rifle in the hope of finding game 
 when I came across a wigwam by a small stream. I en- 
 tered without ceremony, in accordance with Indian eti- 
 quette, and found a party of perhaps a dozen bucks and 
 squaws, seated on the ground around a small fire in the 
 centre, over which a sheet iron camp kettle was boiling 
 and sending forth a savory odor. I was hungry after the 
 tramp, although I had bread, pork and beans in plenty, 
 but had not eaten. After giving the mixed French and 
 Indian salute which they commonly used, I invited my- 
 self to sit down, and this was also correct Ojibway form. 
 There was an oppressive silence oppressive to me, at 
 least. 
 
 "The silence of the place was like a sleep, 
 
 So full of rest it seemed; each passing tread 
 Was a reverberation from the deep 
 
 Recesses of the ages that are dead." 
 
 How different these people were from a party of white 
 men waiting for a feast. There was no chat, jest, song 
 or story. For idle men they take life seriously, and yet 
 they are like children in many of their moods. I could 
 never learn to live their way; that impassive, self-con- 
 tained manner seems to be a continual sort of dress 
 parade, so to speak, for they can be roused to enthusiasm 
 by war or the hunt. I can't say that I like such people ; 
 they are not cordial, and seem to be sitting in cold and 
 unsympathetic judgment on not only you, but every 
 
WE-NEN-GWAY. 295 
 
 other thing on earth. During the winter it had been 
 evident that I was not a favorite with the native Ameri- 
 can. He-who-takes-so-much-at-a-mouthful evidently 
 preferred Gibbs to me, and some others whom I had 
 bounced out of camp because of persistent begging had 
 no great love for me, and so there was no amount of love 
 lost between us. I stood, as the commissary of our 
 party, the custodian of its supplies, which would have 
 melted away in a week if all-comers had been regaled as 
 our friend Gibbs would have entertained them. They 
 would have stayed by him as long as the provisions 
 lasted; they liked Gibbs. 
 
 In this party in the wigwam I recognized Dirty-face 
 and others who had been at our camp and had eaten of 
 our pork, their great dainty, which they called koo- 
 koosh; but there was no cordial handshake only a nod 
 and a grunt, which is their limit of welcome. A squaw 
 arose, thrust a stick into the kettle and brought up meat; 
 she was satisfied that it was sufficiently cooked, and took 
 the kettle from the fire and went outside with it. I had 
 curiosity enough to get up and follow. She put the ket- 
 tle in the snow, and scraped up snow about it to cool it. 
 I asked her what meat she was about to serve to her 
 guests, at the same time giving her what pork I had. 
 We were friends. Pork was good, and she had only 
 muskrat to offer. Muskrat was not fat like pork and 
 bear meat, but it was warm, and she hoped I would like it. 
 
 Away back in the fourth article of this series I told of 
 Bill Fairchild's experience with the muskrat as food, as 
 he related it at a seance in Port Tyler's cabin, in Green- 
 bush. If you remember, Bill could follow the French- 
 man's advice could "skin da mus'rat, bile him a leetle, 
 den fry a-heem an' eat him, an' oh !" Right here I wish 
 to record my first experience with the musquash as an 
 
296 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 epicurean dish. I ate it years afterward from choice 
 while camping with Mort. Locke, John Fish and Wm. 
 Downey on Cayuga Lake, N. Y., as the two last named, 
 now living at Honeoye Falls, N. Y., will testify, if they 
 have any regard for the truth; but that is another story, 
 and there's no use telling how we played it on one of the 
 party for something else in the way of game. 
 
 When the contents of the camp kettle were cool the 
 squaw brought it in, and a group formed around it on 
 one side of the fire. I was not only hungry, but was 
 curious to taste muskrat, which is a very clean feeder; 
 but somehow the cook and the surroundings were not 
 conducive to much appetite; but they asked me to join, 
 and I joined. They dipped their hands in the kettle, and 
 it is doubtful if they had been manicured recently. Dirty- 
 face handed me a piece, and I wondered if any in the 
 party might be named Dirty-hand. I wasn't hungry 
 now, and said so, but felt a delicacy about refusing to eat 
 with these friendly folk, and also felt a delicacy about 
 eating food served in this manner. They omitted nap- 
 kins and finger bowls, and somehow didn't seem to miss 
 them. I ate a little, very little; said it was good, but I 
 wasn't hungry just then, and went out. The air outside 
 was excellent. 
 
 I could have said with Petruchio : 
 
 "Where is the rascal cook? 
 
 How durst you, villains, bring it from the dresser, 
 And serve it thus to me that love it not?" 
 
 Gratiano, in "The Merchant of Venice," asks a ques- 
 tion to which he evidently expects no answer: 
 
 "Who riseth from a feast 
 With that keen appetite that he sits down?" 
 
WE-NEN-GWAY. 297 
 
 I pungled off, and ate my little cold luncheon beside 
 a spring on the lake side. There were no napkins nor 
 finger bowls there, but there was that satisfying knowl- 
 edge that the hands which handled the food had been 
 bathed since they skinned the last muskrat. On relating 
 this to Henry Neaville he remarked: 
 
 "I don't care what any of these writers on health say 
 about too frequent bathing being injurious; I believe that 
 a man ought to wash his hands once a month, whether 
 they need it or not." 
 
 Our surveys were nearly finished, and nothing was 
 left to be done but to meander the river and figure the 
 fractional sections which it cut, and to do a little work 
 around Crow Wing. Henry Neaville and I were to 
 pack up, and get back to the trading post and meet the 
 party there. An Indian, a stranger, came to camp and 
 begged for whiskey. I told him we had none, but he saw 
 the molasses keg, and kept on begging until Henry said : 
 "Give him some pepper sauce." I had put the liquor 
 from several of the bottles into one and had thrown away 
 the peppers, and taking up the bottle, Henry and I pre- 
 tended to drink, and then he was wild for some. I 
 showed him with my thumb on the bottle how much or 
 how little he must drink, and he grunted assent, seized 
 the bottle with both hands, and such swallows as he took 
 before it burned him I never saw. If one swallow 
 doesn't make a summer, those he took made it hot 
 enough for him. He drew a long breath and snorted 
 "woof," like a bear, and started for the river. Three 
 times he stopped and snorted, and then ran out of sight. 
 Henry roared, rolled over and roared. When he got his 
 speech he said, between spasms: "Golly, but that Injun 
 thinks there was more fire than water in that 'scutah- 
 wawba; oh, dear! he's gone for a doctor; he thinks you've 
 
9-98 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 poisoned him. Oh, if Gibbs was only here to tell you 
 how Mr. Lo will remember that drink!" 
 
 We stopped a couple of days at Crow Wing, and I 
 became acquainted with the brothers who kept the trad- 
 ing post. I think their name was McDonald, but am not 
 sure, and Mr. Davies isn't. They told of an Indian who 
 died there some winters before when the ground was 
 frozen too hard to bury him, and how they stood him up 
 all winter against the north side of the house and buried 
 him in the spring, and some other cheerful stories of dead 
 Indians. A Mr. Morrison lived there, one of the leading 
 men of northern Minnesota, for whom the county below 
 Crow Wing is named. He had married an Ojibway 
 woman, and had two grown-up daughters, who had been 
 educated in St. Louis, and they played the piano for us, 
 and our visit was an event in Crow Wing life. Bishop 
 McElvaney was there, and preached on the birth of 
 Christ in Morrison's house, while Davies and others 
 sang. I didn't sing; when I sing the police always pull 
 the house, thinking there must be a dog fight in the back 
 room. 
 
 I went up to see Hole-in-the-day, and he showed me 
 a Colt's rifle, made like a revolver, inlaid with gold, which 
 was given him by President Franklin Pierce a year or 
 two before. I understood that it was taken from the 
 Patent Office by consent of Colonel Colt. He talked 
 about trading it for my rifle, if I added enough dollars 
 to suit him. He was poor, or pretended to be, and I 
 wanted that rifle very much, but thought best to consult 
 with the brothers at the post. One of them said: "It's 
 against the law to trade with these people without a li- 
 cense, and if you trade with him for the gun he can send 
 a man after it, and you will lose both rifles and all you've 
 paid, and then may have some trouble with the law." 
 
WE-NEN-GWAY. 299 
 
 That settled the trading, but when I saw the old chief 
 again he wanted to know, in confidence, if we had any 
 whiskey left. I doubt if a single Indian believed that six 
 white men, who had so many things they thought to be 
 luxuries, spent half the winter in the woods without 
 whiskey. To them it seemed an absurd proposition. 
 The Indians who hung around trading posts were not 
 of the best class, and had readily copied all the vices of 
 the white man from a class whose virtues were not so 
 apparent. They had not then adopted the white man's 
 dress except the calico or the flannel shirt. They wore 
 the breech-clout and leggings, a shirt and the invariable 
 blanket. 
 
 When we were up along the river we were near the 
 great northern trail from the Red River of the North, and 
 Henry said that the mail was due in a day or two, so he 
 had heard from a half-breed. 'This mail," said he, 
 "comes down in a dog sledge, and if we can put out some 
 pieces of pork in the snow you'll see some fun." 
 
 That did seem the proper thing to do, and in fact it 
 was the only way possible to extract any fun out of a dog 
 train, and we planted pieces of pork at intervals of one 
 hundred feet, more or less, and waited. It was next 
 morning before we heard the driver calling to his dogs 
 a long way off, for sound travels far in the cold and over 
 snow. On he came, with five wolfish-looking dogs har- 
 nessed tandem, with rawhides traces and soft collars, to 
 a flat-bottomed sledge made of thin birch boards turned 
 up in front, and lashed together with thongs and covered 
 with a skin tied over all, and without runners. The 
 driver ran beside the team, touching a dog here and there 
 with a long lash fastened to a handle about one foot long. 
 The leader struck a piece of pork, and in a moment four 
 dogs were on him fighting for it, and the harness was all 
 
300 MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 tied up. He plied the whip, and made appropriate re- 
 marks while doing it. Some dog bolted the meat, and the 
 fighting stopped, for there was no pork in sight. The 
 half-breed muttered something, evidently not a prayer, 
 while he put each dog in its place, and on he went in no 
 pleasant mood, and the scene was soon repeated. He 
 was near us this time, and we could see that the second 
 dog won the prize, while the rest had to be contented 
 with a bite of or from his neighbor. It was fun for the 
 dogs and for us, but from what the half-breed said I doubt 
 if he enjoyed it. If he had seen us he might have in- 
 dulged in more oratory, but he had to waste his elo- 
 quence on the dogs. It was fun to do this at that time, 
 because we thought it fun. To-day we wouldn't do it, 
 because there would be no fun in it. Thus we view 
 things at different periods of life. The fire-crackers we 
 shot off half a century ago don't sound as joyful as they 
 did, and we go into the country to avoid them ; so we go. 
 McBride sold our provisions I think there were two 
 barrels of flour and one of pork left and if memory 
 serves he got about $20 per barrel for the flour, and twice 
 that for the pork. Long prices ; but transportation from 
 St. Paul, over one hundred miles away, over a winter 
 road, and no way of getting from St. Louis to St. Paul 
 except by teams when the river was frozen, made things 
 come high. The wagon was sold and a bob sleigh 
 bought, the box filled with straw and blankets, and on 
 December 22 we started for home. Two days later we 
 stopped just outside St. Paul. It did seem good to get 
 in a bed again, but we couldn't stand a room with win- 
 dows closed. We had slept in the pure, cold air too long 
 for that. We left the river at Red Wing, and took the 
 west side, avoiding the hotels in the large towns, stop- 
 ping at country taverns, and we had what Henry called 
 
WE-NEN-GWAY. 301 
 
 "dead loads of fun." At these rural hostelries we struck 
 a dance nearly every night. At a small place not far 
 from Rochester, Minn., the fiddler didn't show up, and 
 some country roughs proposed to wreck the hotel, and 
 the landlord appealed to us for protection. We were at 
 a late supper, and Tom Davies finished first, and went 
 out and talked with the turbulent spirits ; but he was only 
 one man, and he came back for reinforcements. We 
 went out in a body at the landlord's suggestion, and after 
 he had said a few words in a conciliatory way I winked to 
 Henry and he came; we took the leader of the gang one 
 side, and I said to him: 
 
 "This party of ours has just come out of the woods, 
 and they're peaceable enough if there isn't any fighting 
 going on; but if there's any fighting you can't keep 'em 
 out. We don't know any of the people here, but the 
 landlord is a white man, and if a fight is started we're 
 with him. Do you see that dark man over there? Well, 
 he's a Welshman; look at the build of him; he can kill a 
 steer with one blow of his fist," and I pointed to Tom 
 Davies. 
 
 "I've seen him do it three times down in Wisconsin," 
 said Henry. 
 
 "It's just here," said I. "There isn't going to be any 
 fighting in this house to-night unless we all take a hand 
 in it, and if we do I tell you as a friend to keep away 
 from that Welshman." 
 
 "Buried was the bloody hatchet; 
 Buried was the fearful war club; 
 Buried were all warlike weapons, 
 And the war cry was forgotten; 
 Then was peace among the nations." 
 
 Just what delayed the fiddler is lost in memory's fog, 
 
302 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 but the lads and lassies were impatient; a thought struck 
 my old bosom-block, Henry. Could the landlord get a 
 fiddle? The landlord could, and did. Behold Henry 
 seated on a chair on top of a table, tuning up ! Such tun- 
 ing and such playing! He was not Ole Bull, but he 
 pame as near to him as he could. I can see him now, 
 beating time with his boot which had been cut open to 
 allow his frozen toe to expand and calling off: "First 
 two forward!" etc. After a while the missing fiddler ar- 
 rived, and relieved Henry without any perceptible im- 
 provement in the music, but there was an era of good 
 feeling, and it was 
 
 "On with the dance! 
 
 Let joy be unconfined! 
 
 No sleep till morn, 
 
 When Youth and Pleasure meet." 
 
 We went through Pleasant Grove, where me met 
 Hiram Gilmore, of Potosi, who gave us late news of our 
 families, and on the 28th we stopped at Decorah, la. ; we 
 struck the Mississippi at Clayton City with sick horses; 
 they would neither eat nor drink, and what the matter 
 was I don't know, only that we were delayed. From 
 there we took the ice to Cassville, Wis., where we stopped 
 all night, and then struck out for home, which we reached 
 just after sundown on the last day of the year, and, as the 
 King says in "Hamlet:" 
 
 "At night we'll feast together: 
 Most welcome home." 
 
SERGEANT WILLIAM PATTERSON. 
 
 A "BAD MAN," A LOAD OF FISH AND A DEAD CHILD. 
 
 THERE is some reason for believing that his name 
 was William, although I do not know it. The 
 reason is entirely from analogy; he was always 
 known as "Bill" Patterson, and I had known other men 
 to be called "Bill" whose real name was William. Fur- 
 ther than this I find upon the rolls of Company H, 
 Twenty-fifth Wisconsin Infantry, the name of Sergeant 
 William Patterson, of Potosi; and my old friend, Judge 
 Seaton, who has kindly posted me on affairs in the village 
 since I left it, says: "Bill Patterson went out with the 
 Twenty-fifth Wisconsin Infantry." Therefore, as I have 
 said, there is reason for believing his name to be William. 
 If living, he is near Portland, Ore., but letters to him 
 have been returned to me after being opened by another 
 William Patterson. 
 
 On that New Year Eve, when our surveying party re- 
 turned to Potosi from northern Minnesota, there was 
 quite a little visiting done by neighbors, who were anx- 
 ious to learn of adventures among the Indians, and as I 
 lived in the middle one of three cottages, all under one 
 roof, owned by a Mr. Knight, who lived on one side, and 
 Bill Patterson on the other, both neighbors called. Bill 
 was then, I think, about thirty-three years old, I was 
 twenty-three, and "Old Poppy Knight," the only name 
 that memory recalls him by, was probably sixty; but lit- 
 tle, weazened and dried up, and "meaner 'an pusley," as 
 
 303 
 
304: MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 farmers say. Bill was a strapping, broad-shouldered fel- 
 low, who had been on the West Coast in that early day, 
 perhaps with the "Argonauts" who went to the gold- 
 fields of California in 1849; a rough, swaggering fellow, 
 just the opposite of Old Poppy Knight, whom he seemed 
 to dislike in a superlative degree. 
 
 Mrs. Patterson and Miss Rowena Knight, daughter 
 of O. P. K., were in the family circle. The conversation 
 'had been general, and I had tried to reply to three or 
 four questions at once, when Pop asked: "Are them In- 
 jun girls good lookin'?" 
 
 "See here, Pop/' said Bill, who had been where the 
 evening had been more bibulously observed, "what does 
 an old duffer like you want to talk about Injun girls for? 
 I've been all through Sonora, New Mexico and the whole 
 West Coast, and I never see a squaw that was worth a 
 second look. I want to find out what them Injuns live 
 on up in that cold country, where Fred says there's no 
 game. I've ast that half a dozen times, and you don't 
 give him a chance to answer. Now you let up for a little 
 till we get at this problem of eating." Then to me: 
 "What can they get to eat up there?" 
 
 "Mainly fish," I answered; "they dry it for winter, 
 and eat it without anything except salt, of which they are 
 fond; but where they got salt before the white man came 
 is a question. The Indians on the sea coast got it in 
 their fish and oysters, and those about the interior salt 
 springs had it to trade with other tribes; but when you 
 look at it you will see that the dwellers in some parts 
 must have eaten their meat without it." 
 
 "Bill says he never saw a good-looking squaw," said 
 Pop. "Now there's lots o' half-breeds up there, and are 
 the half-breed girls better looking than the squaws?" 
 
 "Pop," said Bill, "you had better go up there and see 
 
SERGEANT WILLIAM PATTERSON. 305 
 
 for yourself; this thing of beauty is a personal matter. 
 Some o' them squaws might take a fancy to you, for they 
 ain't got the first bit of taste. I've seen men that has 
 married squaws, but I don't think I ever saw an ugly old 
 squaw that would marry you. I'll be obliged if you will 
 shut up." 
 
 Put yourself in my place! As the host, I did not 
 fancy this sort of talk; but what could I do? Although 
 Mr. Knight was Bill's landlord as well as mine, I knew 
 that it would only need a word more for Bill in viola- 
 tion of all rules of hospitality, in which he was not well 
 read to take the old man by the collar and trousers, and 
 set him outside. I turned the tide by telling of Henry 
 Neaville's frozen feet, and we got along harmoniously 
 until the clock said it was time for congratulations on 
 the new year. As the good-nights were said Bill 
 whispered that we should have a deer hunt on the first 
 day of the new year, and after the rest were gone we 
 sat down over our pipes and arranged for it. 
 
 A couple of inches of snow fell early in the night on 
 top of the old snow, which was about the same depth, but 
 not hard. The new year of 1857 opened still and mild, 
 without being bright; as perfect a day for a hunt as it 
 was possible to have. Every rabbit that had ventured 
 out since midnight left evidence of its wanderings, and 
 we saw where the quail had huddled on the ground and 
 had risen in the morning. The partridge left a broad 
 trail until it tired of wading and took to a tree. All 
 these things were noted as we went off to the northwest 
 to strike the Grant River. Bill wanted to talk about 
 "Old Poppy Knight," and I tried to keep him still. Two 
 winters in the woods had the usual effect of making a 
 fellow think more than he talks. We were on a ridge 
 and were about one hundred feet apart. 
 
306 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 Bill said: "Old Pop made me mad last night, bustin' 
 in the talk to know if squaws was good-lookin'. What 
 'n thunder is that to him?" and then he launched out in 
 his rough way and "swore like our army in Flanders." 
 There was a crackling of brush, followed by several 
 thuds, and Bill's rifle spoke. I saw nothing; the deer 
 had been lying down on Bill's side of the ridge listening 
 to what Bill thought of the propriety of O. P. Knight's 
 inquiry into the physical attractions of the Ojibway 
 maidens, and no doubt feared that Bill's indignation 
 might take a wrong direction, and so considered it best 
 to leave him to settle it with Mr. Knight without being a 
 party to the row. We went to the place where the deer 
 jumped, but found no blood. Going back to the ridge, 
 about fifty yards, I looked the range over, and then found 
 where the bullet had cut a twig and then raked up the 
 snow half way to the spot where the deer jumped, no 
 doubt when it was several rods on its journey. 
 
 "Who'd think there was a deer lyin' down in that 
 thicket?" asked Bill. "Why, I s'posed we'd have to 
 track 'em after we found where they'd been?" 
 
 "If they're not afoot you never know when you may 
 jump one along a ridge," said I, "for they seldom lie in 
 the hollows, and you can look for 'em on the sheltered 
 side of a ridge 'most anywhere. Now let Old Poppy 
 Knight rest, and keep still for a while. Your shot has 
 been heard by every deer within three miles, and it may 
 have put some of them afoot, but you will have to tramp 
 before you see one. We're nearing the river now; the 
 ridge forks here; you take the left hand one, and we'll 
 come together at the river." 
 
 After going about half a mile and seeing no track I 
 heard Bill's shot from the western ridge, stopped and 
 cocked my rifle. A buck came dashing down the hill 
 
SERGEANT WILLIAM PATTERSON. 30 7 
 
 and I slipped behind a tree. Great bounds he took, and 
 up the hill on my side he came, panting with the effort. 
 Gaining the ridge, he stopped, turned to look back, and 
 presented a full broadside view to me at not over one 
 hundred feet. As I fired he leaped into the brush, but 
 the great spurt of blood on the snow told the tale. I 
 gave a whoop, and got an answer, then called, "Come 
 over here!" and sat down on a log. It seemed hours 
 before Bill made the journey across the valley that the 
 buck had made in a very few minutes, if he really con- 
 sumed any time at all. We took the track, and down 
 by the river we found the deer, dead. Bill's bullet, shot 
 on the jump, had grazed the breast just back of the shoul- 
 der, cutting the hair and marking the skin an excellent 
 shot at a jumping deer, for no doubt it jumped before Bill 
 saw it. 
 
 The buck was a fair-sized four-pronged one. We 
 dressed it, and then went to a spring, washed, and ate 
 our luncheon, for it was far past the noon hour. As we 
 lighted our pipes Bill remarked: "We'll divide that deer 
 when we get up, and it's about all we will want to carry 
 home. Under the rule that the first bullet hole takes the 
 hide it's mine, but you can have the head if you want 
 it." 
 
 "All right, Bill; show up the hole and take the hide; 
 that's the rule." 
 
 "Didn't I make a hole in his belly just behind the 
 shoulder? Do you mean to say I didn't hit him?" 
 
 "There's a scratch there that a jury might decide was 
 made by your bullet, or might have been made by a pine 
 knot when the deer stepped over a log. I don't want the 
 hide; Charley Mallett wouldn't give over $i for it, any- 
 way. I am sure your bullet made the mark, for there 
 was fresh blood there, and the cut was across the breast, 
 
308 MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 not lengthwise, as it would have been done when the deer 
 was on the run. Take it; I only spoke in that way be- 
 cause of your claiming the hide so promptly." 
 
 "Now, see here," said Bill, "I don't want that hide. 
 I ain't no hog! All I thought of was that I didn't miss 
 that deer slick and clean as I did the other one, and I 
 wanted you to know it. I'll tell you what we'll do; let's 
 give a quarter of the deer and the hide to old John Jami- 
 son, who has been sick all winter an' hasn't earned a dol- 
 lar; send a quarter to that widow up there on the British 
 Hollow road; I forget her name, but her husband died 
 before you got back from the North. Then we'll keep 
 the rest, and if Old Poppy Knight would like a steak 
 no, I'll feed it to Charley Guyon's 'coon dog first. Say, 
 I wouldn't let that old pelican have a smell of it. No, 
 sir, not by a mill privilege." 
 
 His charitable proposition was carried out; we had 
 our hunt and all the meat we needed. It's not hard to 
 give away what you don't need; the difficulty often oc- 
 curs in deciding what it is that you don't need when your 
 neighbor is destitute, and is in desperate need of things 
 which you don't here I get off the track, and go to 
 moralizing over what struck me as a good streak in the 
 nature of Bill Patterson, who took good care that no one 
 should discover that he had what he would have con- 
 sidered a weak spot. He would have fought me for that 
 deer skin, but you see how it went. 
 
 February had come, and Henry Neaville's feet had 
 got over their October freeze. He drifted into my house 
 one day on a south wind when Bill was profanely reciting 
 his adventures in Sonora and New Mexico, and said: 
 "There's a lot of fish in a pond hole down by the river, 
 and they're all a-crowding up to a little spring that keeps 
 an open place and gives 'em air. There's a lot o' bass, 
 
SERGEANT WILLIAM PATTERSON. 309 
 
 pike, dogfish and all the other kinds, an* you can just dip 
 'em up by the scoopful; what do you say about going 
 down and getting some?" 
 
 "All right," said Bill; "we'll go in the morning. I've 
 got a dip net that only wants a handle, and I'll put one 
 on in the morning. Come down after breakfast and 
 we'll go. I haven't had a fresh fish this winter, and have 
 forgotten just how they taste." 
 
 Our outfit consisted of a dip net, or a landing net of 
 coarse mesh strung on a fourteen-inch ring, with a rake 
 handle attached; an axe, a spear, or "gig/' and some mos- 
 quito netting, which Henry brought. What the latter 
 was for I had no idea, but then I had not seen the place. 
 It was snowing a little, with hardly any wind. The pool, 
 or pond hole, as Henry called it, might have covered two 
 acres, and had been washed out of the soft soil by the 
 great river some time when it overflowed its banks, and 
 in summer it was dry. A spring came in its eastern edge 
 and kept the ice from making up to the shore. Thou- 
 sands of large fish crowded to this opening for air, and I 
 never saw such a sight before nor since. There must 
 have been many thousands of the different fishes which 
 inhabit the Mississippi River crowded into a small space, 
 those in the rear pushing up to the open place and forcing 
 the others to the shore and around to the rear, as if they 
 said: "You have had your chance to breathe, now make 
 way for us." 
 
 I stood in amazement at the scene. Bill took the axe, 
 and cut the opening larger until the thin ice at the mar- 
 gin was gone and we could stand at the edge. I took 
 the net and dipped up a few fish, trying to select my fa- 
 vorite crappies and small catfish. 
 
 "Let me take that net," said Bill, and he proceeded to 
 lift the fish by the netful. The spear was of no use; it 
 
310 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 would only mar the fish, and we could take all we wanted 
 with the net. 
 
 After a while, when there was about one hundred 
 pounds of fish on the ice, I thought it time to quit, and 
 mentioned the fact that we had all we could carry and 
 enough for ourselves and friends. There seemed no use 
 to kill more. 
 
 "I don't intend to stop short of a ton," said Bill. 
 "Henry, you go back to the village, and get a team from 
 Jo Hall and a bob-sled, and we'll take a load of the best 
 of these to Dubuque, and if they take well we'll give 'em 
 another load this week. Keep it still, or there'll be a big 
 gang down here to take a share in the fish." 
 
 This was taking a commercial view of the fishing, and 
 I said to Bill, after Henry had gone: "I never liked to 
 see men rob the woods of game and the waters of fish to 
 send to market, and I only thought to come down and 
 get a few for our own use. It's this wholesale slaughter 
 for market that has made the East barren of fish and 
 game, and I've talked against it there and I don't want 
 to engage in it here. Fur is a different thing from 
 game, and I could trap for a living easy enough, but 
 somehow it doesn't seem right to take advantage of those 
 fish and market them, when if we take what we want and 
 leave the rest to breed, there will always be plenty for us." 
 
 Bill's remarks, carefully expurgated, were something 
 like this, but contained more adjectives, for in his ordi- 
 nary conversation he "swore like our army in Flanders:" 
 "Look a-here! What are you chinnin' about, anyhow? 
 I've been all over Sonora, New Mexico and Californy, 
 and fished in more rivers than you ever see, but these 
 Mississippi bottoms are different. It's this way: In the 
 spring and fall there's a heap o' water comes down this 
 valley, an' it overflows all these bottom lands, and the fish 
 
SERGEANT WILLIAM PATTERSON. 311 
 
 come up close to the bluffs to keep from being swept 
 down in the current. When the water falls they get 
 trapped in these holes, and thereTthey are." 
 
 "Yes; but when the spring freshet comes don't they 
 swim out and go to their breeding grounds, and so keep 
 the river stocked?" 
 
 "Not by," and he referred to a spot where a mill 
 might be placed. "These ponds freeze over tight and 
 the fish die. They die in thousands of just such holes all 
 along the river, and they have died in this hole year after 
 year. This spring water coming in here is a new thing; 
 it wasn't here last winter, and it may stop or cold weather 
 may close it; I don't care whether it does or not, there's 
 a chance to send a sleigh load of fish to Dubuque, and 
 that's all there is of it." 
 
 I saw it was as he said. I cut into some of these pond 
 holes later in the winter, and found a stench of decaying 
 fish. Within the past few years the United States Fish 
 Commission, through the urgent requests of Colonel S. 
 P. Bartlett, of the Illinois Commission, has sent a car up 
 the river, and seined the imprisoned fish from these holes 
 and returned them to the river as good a work as hatch- 
 ing millions of fish eggs; perhaps better, for it saves the 
 parents, and allows them to breed next spring. 
 
 Henry came with the team, and found us on the shore 
 cooking fish and frying sausages for dinner. Bill thought 
 he was as good a camp cook as I, but we differed on that 
 point. Without discussing the question, I feel impelled 
 to go off the track to say: Our open-air appetites, whether 
 in the woods or on the waters, make camp cooking seem 
 superlative. Benedick says in "Much Ado About Noth- 
 ing:" "But doth not the appetite alter? A man loves the 
 meat in his youth that he cannot endure in his age." 
 
 This leads me to say that after many years' experience 
 
312 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 in all kinds of dining strike me if you will it is now 
 my mature judgment that taking a dinner in the abstract, 
 without any of the poetical surroundings of the chase, 
 and the sentiment which hovers about game killed and 
 cooked by yourself, a grand dinner served by a com- 
 petent chef to gentlemen in evening dress has a charm 
 for me that increases with age. Not that I have lost all 
 taste for an al fresco feast in camp style; but there are 
 pleasures of many kinds, and they are not always com- 
 parable. I only draw the line at those messes called 
 clam chowders, fish chowders and the nightmare provok- 
 ing clambake. These may be classed as coarse feed- 
 ing, but I have had as delicious trout, venison and other 
 game served in camp as ever tickled a tongue. Yet a 
 service in courses, the varied products of the vineyards, 
 the fruits and desserts I like all good things, but the 
 best of all is good company, whether in evening dress or 
 flannel shirt; yet I can't admit that camp cookery excels 
 the best hotel cookery, taking each on its merits outside 
 of sentiment. We deceive ourselves in this; we come 
 in hungry enough to eat a bear before his skin is off, and 
 "hunger is the best of sauce." 
 
 You have often come into camp with a string of trout 
 and had to clean and cook them before you could eat 
 supper. You stuck a stick in the gills with a bit of pork 
 in the mouth, and stood them up before the fire and 
 turned them when necessary. When you thought they 
 were done you sat down, and ate them half raw and half 
 burned, and your hunger prompted you to say that you 
 never ate such trout before in your life. If trout cooked 
 in that same way were set before you in a restaurant you 
 would reject them as unfit to eat. But the memory of a 
 camp dinner with an appetite only six hours old, but very 
 large for its age, has a halo around it that should properly 
 
SERGEANT WILLIAM PATTERSON. 313 
 
 encircle the appetite. Though not a taxidermist, I have 
 stuffed several thousand first-class appetites, but never 
 could preserve one. 
 
 Henry sat down and helped us out on the dinner, and 
 told how he had thrown the villagers off the track by 
 saying that we had killed two deer and a bear, and needed 
 a sleigh to bring them in. A mink trotted down along 
 the shore to the hole where he usually fished, stopped 
 short of it, looked over at us and took the back track. 
 Henry said: "That mink made a mistake, and thought it 
 was Friday. When he saw us eating sausage the fact 
 that it was Thursday dawned on him, and he left for the 
 landing and Chapman's chicken house." 
 
 We sorted the fish, throwing all gars, dogfish, red- 
 horse and other poor kinds aside, and loaded the sleigh- 
 box with bass, pike and crappie, and my two companions 
 started down the river on the ice for Dubuque, la., some 
 dozen miles below, and after waiting a while I got a team 
 which had brought pig lead to the landing to take up a 
 good lot of fish and our traps to the village. Besides 
 these things there was a bag with about a bushel of young 
 fish of many kinds, which had been seined out of the 
 spring by the mosquito netting which Henry had 
 brought. None of these were over two inches long, and 
 I was in doubt what they were intended for until Bill 
 said: "You spread these little fish out so that they don't 
 heat nor freeze, and when we get back I'll have 'em 
 cooked as the Mexicans used to cook 'em down in So- 
 nora. I've seen lots of things out there that you fellows 
 never dreamed of, and here I am wasting my time in 
 these old lead mines. What's lead worth? Thirty dol- 
 lars a thousand! I mined for gold worth $20 an ounce. 
 Say, when you get them fish to Potosi and go to dividin' 
 'em, just lay out some o' the best for old John Jamison 
 
314 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 and the widow on the British Hollow road. We'll be 
 back to-night or to-morrow, and if this trip pays we'll 
 do her again. Goodby." 
 
 The team I found at the landing was from British 
 Hollow, and the driver gladly went over to the fishing 
 place. I told him to pick out all the fish he wanted, and 
 put them in front so that they couldn't be given away. 
 I had the fish assorted for the different people, and deliv- 
 ered all but the last two lots. We stopped at Jamison's, 
 and at my call a man came out to know what I wanted. 
 
 "I've a lot of fish for John that Bill Patterson has sent 
 up to him; Bill knows John well, and here they are; I 
 s'pose you're John, and you will remember that we sent 
 you up some venison about the New Year." 
 
 The man took the fish and said : "John died early this 
 morning, but his children may use them, and no doubt 
 will be glad of them, for John left nothing; he's been an 
 invalid so long. As a friend of the family, I thank Mr. 
 
 Patterson and you " but I had started the horses on, 
 
 saying to the driver: "Get out of this quick! We can't 
 do any good and let the horses go." 
 
 A few rods brought us to the cabin of the widow. 
 She came to the door in response to a knock, and I 
 stepped in and explained my errand. Something in her 
 manner made me lower my voice, and she began to cry. 
 By the light of a tallow candle I saw that she was a poor, 
 thin, careworn woman, and I fumbled the cap in my 
 hands awkwardly, hardly knowing how to get out of the 
 house without indecent haste. She was prematurely old, 
 and it was doubtful if she had ever been even passably 
 good-looking. Poverty and care were stamped in every 
 line of her face. She might have been thirty, but looked 
 to be twice as old. Her little girl, an only child, was very 
 ill. Would I look at it? 
 
SERGEANT WILLIAM PATTERSON. 315 
 
 I followed her to a back room, and found a child of 
 about six years lying on a bed and apparently asleep, 
 but twitching violently. Then came a muscular spasm 
 which doubled the little sufferer up, and I was alarmed. 
 
 "Has a doctor seen the child?" 
 
 "No; I thought she'd get over it without the expense 
 of a doctor, for I am very poor. My husband was hurt 
 a year ago by a fall down a shaft, and died last October. 
 I've worked when I could get work, but have not been 
 strong enough to do much. It's a hard world for the 
 poor and weak, and if my little girl goes from me I want 
 to go, too." 
 
 I don't know that it did any good, but I took the girl 
 in my arms, and walked the floor with her, trying to help 
 her unconscious struggles. When the spasm passed I 
 laid her on the bed, and went out to find some one to go 
 for a doctor. I found a man going to Potosi on foot, 
 and told him to send Dr. Gibson out at the earliest mo- 
 ment, and returned to the house. If the doctor would 
 only come, and let me get out! The time passed so 
 slowly. I was not fitted by nature to be either a doctor 
 or an undertaker, and suffering which I could not relieve 
 was a thing to be left to itself; but I could not leave it. 
 The child had several spasms, and the night passed over 
 a little cabin with sorrowing mother and a dying child 
 in the arms of a rough, untrained fellow, who would help 
 both if he only knew how to do it, but who wished him- 
 self a thousand miles away. 
 
 It had never occurred to me that I would be missed, 
 so busy was my mind with the misery in the cabin, and 
 when a jangle of sleigh bells stopped in front of the cabin 
 long after midnight I mentally said: "There comes the 
 doctor." 
 
 I was walking the floor with the child in my arms, 
 
316 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 when the door opened and the doctor came in, followed 
 by Bill Patterson, Henry Neaville, Mrs. Patterson and a 
 dozen other men and women. 
 
 "What had kept me so long?" "Why didn't you come 
 home?" Bill said: "When we sold them fish in Dubuque 
 for less than we've got to pay Jo Hall for the team, I 
 said: 'I'll be blessed if I ever take another load of fish to 
 Dubuque.' If you've got them little fish all in good 
 order we'll have 'em fried at Johnny Nicholas' restaurant 
 to-morrow night, and I tell you they'll be fine. Hello! 
 What's the matter?" 
 
 While he was talking to me the mother of the child 
 dropped fainting to the floor, for she had seen the women 
 take the child from my arms dead ! 
 
WILLIAM WARREN. 
 
 SHOOTING FISH IN KANSAS BACHELOR'S HALL THE 
 BORDER WAR. 
 
 IT is a blessed privilege to be past the meridian of life 
 to-day. What a store we white-headed fellows 
 have of things which a younger generation of men 
 can never attain! In the charmed recesses of remem- 
 brance lie the vast flocks of wild pigeons, and of game to 
 be had in an hour's walk, where now there is naught of 
 life save the abominable imported sparrow. And then 
 there was the grand and glorious Civil War but I must 
 not write of that further than to say to the young men 
 who were born too late to take part in it that I am sorry 
 for them. Still they have the compensations of youth, 
 and if they are fortunate enough to live where there is 
 still some game left, or if they have the means to travel 
 to the far-off places, they will, after they get past the 
 noon of life, have the same feeling of commiseration for 
 the boys who are forty years in the rear of them which 
 I have expressed. 
 
 There are two reasons for writing the above para- 
 graph; one was because I accompanied Warren on my 
 first and only buffalo hunt, and the other was because 
 while taking "a cold bottle and a hot bird" with my old 
 army companion, Baron Berthold Fernow, once of Po- 
 land, but later Major of United States Volunteers and of 
 the Topographical Corps of Sherman's army, last winter, 
 the Major, in response to a question if he was still living 
 in Albany, said: "No, I am now living at 151 West Sixty- 
 first street, in this city, a place where I used to shoot rab- 
 
 317 
 
318 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 bits when I first came to America, and where I once got 
 lost in the underbrush and strayed away off to the north- 
 east, where the Astoria ferry now is." Think of it! The 
 street is near the lower end of Central Park, and right in 
 the middle of the city. The late ex-President Chester 
 A. Arthur told me that he had shot woodcock where the 
 Fifth Avenue Hotel now stands, and that is only at 
 Twenty-third street. All this has nothing whatever to 
 do with my fishing with William Warren further than to 
 show what changes take place in our rapidly growing 
 country. As a historian, in a feeble way I record it. As 
 an American and a naturalist, I regret it. Emigration 
 has been encouraged to build great cities where the buf- 
 falo should still range over territories which ought to 
 have been left for Americans who will be born a century 
 hence. These sentiments prove to you that I am an 
 "old fogy," but one who believes that we should not give 
 away our great farm when we have children growing; 
 but that is "politics," and so we will go on to tell about 
 this man with whom I fished in Kansas in the year 1857. 
 
 I was boarding with a man named Serrine, on the 
 Cottonwood, while looking up a suitable place to claim 
 a quarter-section, and Warren came there often. He 
 was from Chicago, and had a claim over on the Neosho. 
 
 He was a big, strong fellow, about twenty-five years 
 old, with a dark, pleasant face and a habit of clipping his 
 words. A favorite way to begin a sentence was with 
 the word "Betcher," which stood in his vocabulary for 
 "I'll bet you." So one day in the spring he said to me : 
 
 "Betcher da'sent take a day off o' land-lookin' an' go 
 shootin' buffler fish; they're just comin' up on the riffles 
 now and a-wallerin'. They're thicker 'n hair on a dog; 
 'f you never shot 'em you'll like it. What yer say?" 
 
 My rifle had been packed in a chest and sent by 
 
WILLIAM WARREN. 319 
 
 freight from Potosi, Wis., and the chest had been stolen 
 somewhere on the rivers or at St. Louis, and I had only 
 a Colt's navy revolver to shoot with. From what I had 
 seen of these big, unwieldy buffalo fish on the riffles it 
 was certain that the revolver was good enough for such 
 work. The fish were very plenty, and were mating and 
 spawning on every riffle, but at the least alarm would 
 dodge down into the pools below. The Cottonwood was 
 a series of deep pools and gravelly riffles, over which the 
 water flowed swiftly, and sometimes these were so shal- 
 low as to leave the hump-backed buffalo partly out of 
 water. The river may have averaged sixty feet across, 
 and it cut through a deep alluvial soil, forming high 
 banks in most places, except at the inside of curves, 
 where the current had made a gentle slope to the water. 
 The riffles were at these points, and we could get near 
 them by approaching the fish from the low side. It was 
 not a particle of sport, but Warren thought it fun, and 
 wanted to go on killing after we had more than we could 
 carry; but I said no, and we strung our fish and went 
 home. 
 
 "Betcher I c'ld kill a thousand bufHer in half a day an' 
 not go over two mile on the river. What's the reason 
 you wouldn't kill any more? Don't yer like the fun?" 
 
 "No; there's no fun in killing things that you don't 
 want to use, unless they're rats or other vermin which 
 annoy you. My idea of sport is to hunt something 
 which is hard to find, and is some use after you have 
 found it. Shooting these fish is good enough when you 
 want a change of diet from ham and salt pork, but they're 
 too easy for sport. As you say, you could probably kill 
 a thousand in half a day, but shooting at a mark is just 
 as much fun; in fact, it would be more fun for me than 
 to kill things for the mere sake of killing." 
 
320 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 This buffalo fish is a coarse thing, a relative of the 
 sucker tribe, with a similar mouth ; perhaps it is as good 
 as the carp, but then we had not the carp, and the taste 
 of the buffalo has faded too much in forty years for com- 
 parison. My present notion is that both are worthless 
 as food, but a residence by salt water may have spoiled 
 me for enjoying most fresh- water fish, especially carp 
 and suckers. 
 
 Warren sold his claim and took another while I was 
 still undecided, and we put up a little cabin on the bank 
 of the river and "batched" together. Within a few miles 
 several town sites were laid out with pegs, each with 
 grand parks, court house squares and grand avenues on 
 
 paper. 
 
 "Behind the squaw's light bircK canoe 
 
 The steamer rocks and raves, 
 And city lots are staked for sale 
 
 Above old Indian graves." Whittier. 
 
 The genius of speculation was abroad, and within a 
 radius of five miles there were at least a dozen "future 
 railroad centres" laid out. I only remember "Columbia" 
 on the Cottonwood, where there was a grocery and gin- 
 mill combined, kept by a man named Jeff Thompson. 
 He had maps, and sold lots in the Eastern cities and took 
 in what he could gather. He offered me ten lots in the 
 heart of his "city" for my revolver, but somehow I 
 thought I needed the pistol more than I did town lots. 
 Then there was "Chicago," on top of a bluff, where I shot 
 sandhill cranes later on, which never got beyond the peg 
 and map stage. Warren had a big interest in this, and 
 traded some lots for a yoke of cattle and a wagon. I 
 doubt if there is even a farm house there to-day. Em- 
 poria was laid out high on the open prairie, between the 
 Cottonwood and Neosho, with no water in sight. It was 
 
WILLIAM WARREN. 321 
 
 not a promising place for a town, but when my father 
 offered to send me his double fowling-piece I traded the 
 revolver for a block of lots in Emporia. 
 
 Warren said: "Betcher your revolver is gone, lost, 
 vanished, an' vamoosed. Why, that place will never 
 amount to a hill o' beans, but if you'd invested in Chi- 
 cago you'd have been O. K. They've dug over one hun- 
 dred feet for water there in Emporia, and didn't get it. 
 Whatter they goin' to do without water? Just dry up, 
 that's all. Betcher'll wish that revolver back 'fore long, 
 for that was worth something." 
 
 There was a big push behind Emporia. A lot of 
 Eastern capitalists spent money to find water, and they 
 found it. As soon as it was struck I was offered $150 for 
 my lots, and I shook the money under my friend's nose. 
 That find of water after nearly a year's digging made a 
 great railroad centre, and the neighboring "p e g" towns 
 were heard of no more. 
 
 Meanwhile I had located a claim, and filed it at the 
 land office. This gave me the privilege, as an actual 
 settler, of pre-empting or buying the quarter-section of 
 160 acres at the Government price of $1.25 per acre be- 
 fore the tract in which it was situated was offered at pub- 
 lic sale. That spring there had been discoveries of great 
 deposits of lead in the Ozark Mountains, and among the 
 miners of Potosi, Wis., there was much excitement and 
 considerable emigration. I had written father that I 
 would go to the mines in Missouri. That shirt of Nessus 
 which causes the restlessness of border life impelled me to 
 go somewhere. I had tired of life as it was lived in 
 the mines and woods of Wisconsin and Minnesota, and 
 a new field of adventure was opened. With the average 
 miner, who is a born gambler, there was the prospect of 
 gain. I was not an average miner, nor a born gambler, 
 
322 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 and only wanted change and adventure. I had read all 
 about Daniel Boone, Davy Crockett, Kit Carson and 
 Cooper's men of fiction, and dollars cut no figure in my 
 calculations. I was young; old age and its needs seemed 
 to be centuries away, if indeed it was ever thought of. I 
 revelled in my youth and strength, and thought they 
 would last forever. The quarter of a century that I had 
 lived seemed to comprise the whole existence of the 
 world, and all that had gone before my recollection was 
 merely a fairy tale. 
 
 When I left Albany, in 1854, my father had exacted 
 a promise that I would not join an expedition against the 
 Indians. He knew that I loved a fight of most any kind, 
 and when he learned that I proposed to go to the Ozarks 
 he wrote me that he wanted me to go to Kansas and 
 select a farm on which he could pass his declining years. 
 This was not funny then, but it is to-day. My father was 
 reared on a farm, but left it when eighteen years old, and 
 always looked to getting back on one. Now, when I am 
 six years older than he was then, I know that his nervous 
 organization, after years of absence from farm life, was 
 no more fitted to it than my very different temperament 
 was. But he wrote me that he had a land warrant from 
 the War of 1812 (not his own by right of service, for he 
 was born in 1800), and that he wanted me to select the 
 place in Kansas. 
 
 The newspapers had been filled with accounts of 
 "bleeding Kansas," and the troubles were not entirely 
 over when our surveying party came out of the Minne- 
 sota woods in the last month of 1856. There was a fight 
 there over the slavery question a matter that I had paid 
 no attention to, but there was a fight. I looked around 
 and got letters of introduction to General Jim Lane, the 
 "Free State" leader, and went to Kansas; we spelled it 
 
WILLIAM WARREN. 323 
 
 Kanzas in those days, and my tongue has never been 
 able to accommodate itself to the modern soft way of 
 speaking the name. 
 
 I put up a log cabin on a good quarter-section which 
 had a stream running through it, and also had several 
 acres of timber two valuable things in that prairie coun- 
 try. Warren helped me in this, and also in splitting 
 enough black walnut and mulberry rails to fence in ten 
 acres. The land cost $1.25 per acre, but it cost $3 per 
 acre to break the heavy prairie sod. I was playing 
 farmer! , 
 
 "One man in his time plays many parts, 
 His acts being seven ages. * * * " 
 
 Warren and I kept bachelor's hall until past mid- 
 summer, when my house was in order for business, and 
 my little family came on from Wisconsin. Our work 
 was at a distance, and we took turns at cooking, and on 
 Sundays we cleaned up and washed the dishes. A very 
 good housekeeper to whom I told this asked in undis- 
 guised astonishment: "Didn't you wash your dishes every 
 day? Why, how did you get along?" 
 
 "My dear madam," I replied, "you are a most excel- 
 lent housekeeper here in the effete East, but know little 
 how to manage a bachelor establishment in Kansas in 
 that early day. If we had washed our tin plates after 
 every meal, as is the custom in some places, the microbes 
 set free from the newly-turned sod would have attached 
 themselves to the tin, and our lives would have been in 
 danger from tintinambulacra. No, my dear madam, we 
 did not dare risk it; so we turned our plates over after 
 each meal to protect them, and only dared to wash them 
 once a week. This was a fearful risk, but we did it; I 
 now think it would be safer not to have exposed the plates 
 
324: MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 to the influence of hot water and soap at all, but for- 
 tunately we escaped all harm perhaps because we had 
 youth on our side." 
 
 She paused a moment, drew a long breath and said: 
 
 "You don't tell me . Oh, men are horrid, anyway! 
 
 I don't believe a word of it!" 
 
 Warren said : "When you take the ox team up to Em- 
 poria after the mail and provisions, see if you can't get 
 some vegetables. The cows got into my garden, and 
 cleaned up what the 'coons, bugs and other things left, 
 and we want some green stuff; see if you can get some 
 onions, beets, cucumbers, or anything." 
 
 Among the things which I brought was a fine bunch 
 of early beets, and we promised ourselves a treat. We 
 peeled and sliced them, and put them in vinegar. Next 
 day they were set out for the evening meal, when we 
 talked about them. 
 
 "Betcher," said Warren, "them beets is more'n a hun- 
 dred years old. I've seen lots o' beets, but they wuz 
 allers tender an' good." 
 
 "They can't be old. They don't keep beets over a 
 year like dried beans; besides, didn't you see the tops 
 were green? I think they're a new kind, or else the soil 
 here is not good for beets." 
 
 "Betcher they ain't cut thin enough for the vinegar to 
 sof'en 'em. These cukes are all right; they're cut thin, 
 and the vinegar goes right through 'em and they're ten- 
 der." 
 
 "Yes, the cucumbers are good enough, but what ails 
 the beets I don't know. I've often eaten 'em at home 
 when mother cut 'em up in vinegar ; perhaps they want to 
 be soaked in vinegar longer to make 'em tender; I don't 
 know just how long they have to stay in vinegar before 
 they're fit to eat." 
 
WILLIAM WARREN. 325 
 
 "Betcher right! Let 'em soak awhile an* they'll get 
 tender, an' beets is a mighty good relish, too; they're 
 good for what ails you; for a man can't live on salt pork, 
 ham and all that stuff, salt codfish and mackerel and 
 sich like, without a little vegetable food, or he will go to 
 the bad; betcher life he wants a change. Just put them 
 beets away until they get tender; that's all they want." 
 
 The beets were set aside in vinegar until such time as 
 they might be fit to eat. We sampled them daily, but 
 there was no perceptible improvement, and Sunday 
 came. After cleaning house, or kitchen and dining- 
 room for our 10x12 cabin was not only these, but also 
 our grand salon we brushed ourselves up, and walked 
 up to Serrine's ranch, where Mrs. S. and Mrs. Judge 
 Howell were discussing some abstruse question, of 
 which we were ignorant, when they both turned and in 
 the same breath asked how we were getting along with 
 our "batching." Warren went into details about the bis- 
 cuit, pancakes, roasts, fries and stews, and finally men- 
 tioned the difficulty with the beets. 
 
 There was an instantaneous duet of soprano and con- 
 tralto: "Didn't you boil 'em first?" 
 
 I sneaked outside at once, and have no idea of how 
 Warren stood off the two women ; but the logs of the 
 house were not chinked tightly enough to keep out a 
 whole mess of laughter, which came through in ripples 
 at first, then in waves, and finally in shrieks that toppled 
 the barrel from the chimney, and then the cabin filled 
 with smoke. 
 
 On our way down the Cottonwood we said little until 
 we got to the door of our castle, when Warren turned 
 and said : "Did you know that beets should be boiled be- 
 fore they were sliced and cut up in vinegar?" 
 
 "Well, no; not exactly boiled, but I knew that some- 
 
326 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 thing ought to be done to them like baking or frying 
 or " 
 
 "Betcher didn't know but what they were just cut up 
 in vinegar like cucumbers, just as I thought. Betcher 
 Mrs. Howell will spread that story, an' every woman up 
 both rivers will know the beet story before a week. 
 Well, let 'em. There's a whole mess of things that they 
 don't know. How in Gibraltar do they s'pose a fellow is 
 to know that the tender beets that he finds on the table 
 have been boiled, any more than the cucumbers have 
 been boiled?" 
 
 The slavery troubles, which had partly subsided, be- 
 gan to break out afresh, and it was evident that another 
 great effort to make Kansas a slave State would be made. 
 Congress had already abrogated the Missouri Compro- 
 mise, and this opened the Territories of Kansas and Ne- 
 braska to the slave power, as it left the question to be 
 decided by the actual settlers. Two conflicting Terri- 
 torial governments had been established. Blood had 
 been shed at the first election, when armed invaders had 
 taken possession of the polls and elected a lot of non- 
 resident pro-slavery men as a Legislature, which passed 
 a law making it a capital offence to harbor or assist run- 
 away slaves; and they had the backing of President 
 Buchanan, and the support of General Harney, then in 
 command at Fort Leavenworth. But against this was a 
 great majority, who had determined that Kansas should 
 enter the Union as a free State or not at all. 
 
 Our section was comparatively quiet. We were run- 
 ning short on provisions, and, as the staple articles were 
 costly owing to the long haul by teams, we would take 
 our teams to Fort Leavenworth, lay in half a dozen bags 
 of flour it came in one hundred pound bags sugar, 
 coffee, pork, bacon and other things, saving the trans- 
 
WILLIAM WARREN. 327 
 
 portation and the profit of the local trader. The prairie 
 roads were good in June, and at the frequent streams 
 good camping places were always found with the three 
 prime requisites wood, water and grass. At Lawrence 
 we fished in the Kaw River, and caught seven catfish, 
 one of which weighed nine pounds; we ate the smaller 
 ones, and gave the big one to a passing family in a prairie 
 schooner. 
 
 There was a municipal election while we were in 
 Leavenworth. The Free State men won, but there was 
 a lot of beautiful fights. A border ruffian named Lyle, 
 who had murdered several men, provoked a fight with 
 an old man, and was killed by a Free State man named 
 Hallen, who was arrested. 
 
 The excitement was intense and contagious. Few 
 slept that night. Warren and I volunteered, with others, 
 to guard Hallen ; but there was no attempt made to lynch 
 him. Next morning Hallen was refused bail, and was 
 committed to Fort Leavenworth for safe-keeping, and 
 only our respect for the uniform of Uncle Sam allowed a 
 sergeant and a squad to remove him; but Hallen bribed a 
 guard and escaped, went to Lawrence and was never dis- 
 turbed. 
 
 The buffalo country was west of us, but there re- 
 mained a few deer and antelope, as well as wild turkeys, 
 along the Cottonwood and Neosho, and Warren and I 
 each had a Sharps rifle, which had been sent from the 
 East to help make Kansas a free State, and which had 
 been issued to us at Leavenworth while guarding Hallen. 
 October had come, and one morning there was a light fall 
 of snow, and Warren came to my cabin. "Hurry up," 
 he called, "there's a deer's track going straight for that 
 bunch of willows in the buffalo wallow over there to the 
 west, where we shot the prairie chickens a week ago." 
 
328 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 We struck the track in the fast melting snow, and came 
 up to within one hundred yards of the wallow, which was 
 a small one not over fifty feet in diameter, and then con- 
 sulted in a whisper how we should form for the attack. 
 We had come up against the wind, and there seemed 
 ample time to consult, when a flash of gray bounded 
 out on the prairie from the other side of the wallow, 
 gathered its legs and leaped again as two rifles called 
 "Halt!" The buck halted and never went again. One 
 bullet nearly severed a hind hoof, and one plowed up 
 from below through his heart. Both rifles were of the 
 same calibre, and who it was that killed that deer remains 
 as obscure as "the mystery of Gilgal." 
 
 We bought Indian ponies, cheap but serviceable, and 
 accustomed to any amount of abuse, for an Indian never 
 has a particle of regard for a saddle sore, but claps on 
 the saddle in the same old place in perfect indifference 
 to the suffering of an animal, and this trait has hardened 
 my heart against the red man; he has no sympathy for 
 suffering not even his own. He has served the pur- 
 pose for which he was placed here just as other created 
 things have, and he dies out before civilization and must 
 go, as we must when we have exhausted the coal which 
 was stored up for our advent, and our planet falls in line 
 with the dead worlds which have no Indian ponies. 
 
 A little castile soap and water, with tallow afterward, 
 soon put our ponies in shape for travel, and as the winter 
 came on the troubled times increased. The bogus Legis- 
 lature of Lecompton had authorized a convention to 
 form a State constitution during the summer, and things 
 were getting red hot. Warren and I decided to go to 
 Lawrence, and offer our services to General Jim Lane. 
 At that time we thought Lane to be the best and greatest 
 living American. He could sway men by his impas- 
 
WILLIAM WARREN. 329 
 
 sioned oratory, to which his profanity added the charm 
 of emphasis. We had met old John Brown down at 
 Osawatomie, and would have none of him. Brown was 
 sitting by the roadside singing "Blow ye the trumpet, 
 blow," through his nose, and Warren said: 
 
 "B etcher he's an ole feller that turns his camp into a 
 Sunday-school half a dozen times a day; I don't want 
 any of him; if you want to go with him, all right; Jim 
 Lane is good enough for me." 
 
 Said I: "Billy, I've got no more use for old Osawa- 
 tomie than you have. There wouldn't be a bit of fun 
 with him. He's a religious fanatic, and says that the 
 Lord has sent him here to do things. I don't object to 
 his doing things, but he won't get me to serve under 
 him. I don't like him, and that's all there is of it. He's 
 in dead earnest; but so is Jim Lane, and Jim is the man 
 to make things hump." 
 
 We went back home. To-day the fame of John 
 Brown, who freely gave his life for a cause, is sung all 
 over the North, while my hero, General Jim Lane, is re- 
 membered by a few as a political trickster, who killed a 
 man that contested his claim to land, was tried and 
 acquitted (for that was a frontier custom), and then for six 
 years represented Kansas in the United States Senate. 
 Then, following the lead of President Andrew Johnson, 
 he received the indignant reproval of his constituents, 
 and died by his own hand. How differently we look at 
 men and things when they are as widely separated as then 
 and now, when the cool judgment of sixty-three sits upon 
 the rash impulses of the boy forty years ago. 
 
 It was in the southeastern portion where things were 
 hottest, and where there was more or less desultory fight- 
 ing, but party feeling ran high up the Cottonwood, and 
 several Free State men had notices pinned on their doors 
 
330 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 warning them to leave the territory, or they would be 
 killed. I had a Sharps rifle and a double shotgun, and 
 bought a revolver from a soldier who had come down 
 our way on some business and had no money to get back. 
 It was a Colt's army, big of bore and not very accurate. 
 Every man carried a revolver, and I would as soon think 
 of going to the spring for water without a pail as without 
 a pistol in my belt. I destroyed the notice found on my 
 door; it wasn't just the thing for a woman to see; you 
 L know how they are about such things; so I closed my 
 castle, and left the little family in Emporia, giving as a 
 reason that Warren and I wanted to examine some land 
 further west, and might be away a month, and so 
 smoothed it over while we started for Lawrence to con- 
 sult General Jim Lane. James W. Denver had super- 
 seded Walker as Governor in December, and he struck 
 a snag on the start. About a year before this the pro- 
 slavery officials had seized a wagon containing 150 
 muskets and carbines from an emigrant train, and had 
 stored them in the cellar under the Governor's residence 
 in Lecompton. 
 
 "Boys," said Lane, "you are just in time. Colonel 
 Eldridge is going to start with a battalion to get a lot of 
 rifles that belong to us, and he may have to fight to get 
 'em; but we'll have 'em, sure. Do you want to go?" 
 
 "Betcher," said Warren; "we came up to take a hand 
 in anything that's going on; didn't we, pard?" 
 
 "Yes," I answered, "and down our way they're threat- 
 ening us, and we've got to do some cleaning out down 
 there or abandon our homes and be cleaned out. So far 
 they only threaten, but we know how every man stands 
 in the whole valley, and if they kill one of us the cleaning 
 out will begin at once, and will be thorough." 
 
 We went to Lecompton, a motley crowd, some on 
 
WILLIAM WARREN. 331 
 
 foot and others, like Warren and I, on ponies; I should 
 think the "battalion" numbered about one hundred. 
 "Colonel" Eldridge made a demand for the guns as pri- 
 vate property, and wound up by saying: "Governor, we 
 merely demand our own, and are fully armed and deter- 
 mined to have those arms. Whether there will be a 
 fight for them rests with you to say." That was an ar- 
 gument that decided the case in our favor. The history 
 of Kansas shows that it was only by illegal voting "re- 
 peating," as it was called that the Lecompton constitu- 
 tion was adopted ; but I can't dwell on this. 
 
 A peculiar state of affairs existed. The Territorial 
 Legislature was now under a Free State majority, and it 
 declared the last election to be fraudulent and ordered 
 the Lecompton constitution to be submitted to the people 
 on January 4, 1858, which somehow happened to be the 
 same day named by the pro-slavery authorities for the 
 election of officers under that constitution. 
 
 Said Warren: "This thing has got to be fought out. 
 Voting is no use. For every man our side can get here 
 from Boston or Chicago the 'Border Ruffians' can pour 
 in twenty from Missouri. If Congress admits Kansas 
 in as a State, it will be under the Lecompton constitu- 
 tion, which permits men to be held as slaves. If we 
 don't vote for officers we can claim our rights and fight 
 for them; but if you take part in the election you must 
 abide by it." 
 
 I favored voting, and we discussed this in our feeble 
 way until Warren said: "Betcher da'sent go up to Law- 
 rence and see what Lane says." We went and found a 
 convention in session that was as divided as we were, 
 and that Lane had a body of men down near Fort Scott. 
 Colonel Eldridge told me that Lane was prepared to 
 fight the United States troops if necessary if the Le- 
 
332 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 compton men called them out to assist them, and that he 
 thought it best to vote. Again the volcano subsided, 
 and a peaceful victory was won at the polls, the Free 
 State men winning every office under the hated Lecomp- 
 ton constitution. The officers elected promptly peti- 
 tioned Congress not to admit Kansas as a State under 
 the present constitution, and the petition being granted 
 it put them all out of office from Governor down. Times 
 were not dull there at that time. 
 
 Warren sold his second claim, and came to live with 
 me. Game was plenty, and from the ridge pole away 
 from the fireplace there was always a turkey or two, some 
 part of a deer and as many prairie chickens as could be 
 used before spoiling. Antelope were plenty, but I killed 
 only one; we preferred venison. Near the timber rab- 
 bits abounded, but we rarely shot them. In summer 
 flocks of screaming paroquets went swiftly through the 
 woods, but boys have been raised since and have no 
 doubt stopped all that. The mourning dove was too 
 common for comfort if one was splitting rails in the 
 woods; its melancholy note only ceased at night. A 
 graceful species of kite sailed over the prairie looking 
 for snakes, and there is a doubt if one of these is left. 
 The only snakes I can remember seeing was a striped 
 one, perhaps the "garter snake," a "blue racer," which, 
 I think, is a form of our common blacksnake, and the 
 small rattlesnake called massasauga, which inhabits 
 prairies, and seldom exceeds two feet in length. 
 
 Occasionally a train of a dozen wagons would pass 
 our cabin going to and from the buffalo ranges, and 
 often left us a quarter of beef, but neither Warren nor I 
 had any desire to go on these hunts. Perhaps it was 
 because everybody else went, and we did not want for 
 fresh meat. In the summer the little prairie wolves could 
 
WILLIAM WARREN. 333 
 
 be heard running deer or antelope most every night. 
 No one called them prairie wolves there; they have 
 another name, perhaps Mexican or Indian, but people 
 in the East make such a mess of pronouncing it that the 
 name ought not to be printed. I'll tell you: the name is 
 ki-o-ty, but, confound 'em, the scholars spell it "coyote," 
 and that leads a man to make only two syllables of it. 
 He lives in the ground, like a fox, and, if not as cunning 
 as reynard, is as fleet and tireless, and it is said that he 
 hunts deer in relays, one gang resting till the other brings 
 the quarry back on the circle. He doesn't hunt rabbits; 
 just picks 'em up. 
 
 One day Warren came in with four little pups in his 
 coat. I didn't need a "dog" just then, but somebody 
 sjaid they were "just the cutest little things this side of 
 the Santa Fe trail," and one was left for us. The young 
 
 c grew on a liberal diet of milk and table scraps, but 
 
 when the first setting hen came off with a brood he 
 realized his place in nature. He was the fittest and 
 survived. 
 
 The old hen protested, but he ignored the pro- 
 test, and ate her as a piece de resistance, to which the 
 chickens had been merely an entree. I also protested 
 with a switch, but Lupus could not be made to under- 
 stand that chickens were not proper things to eat. At 
 my advanced age I don't understand why chickens should 
 not be eaten, and yet I tried to force that opinion on my 
 protege. He disliked discipline in all its abhorrent forms 
 of switch, club or boot, and before long, perhaps the time 
 required to set several chicks free from their imprison- 
 ment in the shell, it was apparent that there was an ab- 
 sence of cordiality in our intercourse. Lupus was kind 
 to all but me after I put a chain on him and fenced the 
 chickens from his domain. He preferred to chew my 
 
334: MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 hand when I set a saucer of milk before him, and only 
 touched the milk when my hand was no longer available 
 as food. Perhaps, poor fellow, his epicurean palate 
 longed for live chicken, and resented the offer of their 
 bones after his master had taken the choice parts. Gurth, 
 the swineherd, had some such feeling toward Cedric, the 
 Saxon. 
 
 We passed the summer, and the corn had nearly 
 passed the roasting-ear stage; I had learned to guard 
 myself from the carnivorous dentition of Lupus, but one 
 day Warren called out: "The cattle are in the corn!" and 
 surely they were. 
 
 I was a farmer. Ten acres had been put in sod corn 
 and there was a crop. The crop may have been due to 
 the richness of the soil or to my excellent farming, if 
 you will. But the fence was down, and half a dozen 
 steers and some cows were doing to that corn what Lu- 
 pus did to the chickens. Perhaps they were right, but 
 it was no time for argument. I rushed out, and the near- 
 est way was past the kennel of Lupus. He was lying 
 quietly within until I passed, when he suddenly decided 
 to see if my leg might not have a better flavor than my 
 hand, and he acted on the impulse of the moment, and 
 took a piece of it, just above the boot leg, where I kept 
 a favorite muscle well trained for running and another 
 for kicking. He tackled the wrong muscle, and the 
 kicking one came to the relief of its neighbor and pro- 
 jected a boot under his chin with such force that he was 
 a-weary. Other leg muscles took up the argument, and 
 somehow the same boot that lifted him one under the 
 jaw cracked his skull, and his hide was drying on the 
 fence an hour afterward. 
 
 I was sorry, very sorry; so was my leg. It was too 
 bad to kill the poor c , and it was too bad to kill 
 
WILLIAM WARREN. 335 
 
 the poor little chickens. I was a brutal fellow, and I 
 knew it. 
 
 Warren said : "You stood it longer'n I would. Them 
 durned kiotys 's got two kinds o' teeth one for chickens 
 and wild animals, and another for human flesh. Betcher 
 never try to tame another one. Say, them devils runs 
 down a wounded deer or buffler when they find one, and 
 they get him. S'pose we go down on a buffler hunt some 
 time. What d'ye say?" 
 
AMOS DECKER. 
 
 SKITTERING FOR PIKE LEGERDEMAIN MY ONLY BUF- 
 FALO HUNT. 
 
 AMOS was a raw-boned six-footer, about fifty years 
 old when I met him, bronzed with exposure, 
 and tough as a pine knot. He had drifted 
 ahead of civilization for over a quarter of a century, clear- 
 ing timber in Michigan, breaking prairie in Illinois, tak- 
 ing up claims and selling out when the neighborhood 
 became too thickly settled ; one of those restless men that 
 were always found on the best quarter-section within a 
 township awaiting a customer for his betterments. Un- 
 like his class, he was a man of fair education, whose mem- 
 ory retained much of what had evidently been an exten- 
 sive course of reading in his youth; but his associations 
 had sadly impaired any grammatical rules he might once 
 have known. 
 
 Amos may or may not have been a bachelor. He 
 lived alone in a well-built log house on a bank of the 
 Neosho, near where Burlington now stands; and it was 
 <not good form in Kansas in those days to be curious 
 ( about the past of such men as you chanced to meet. 
 [What little I knew of his early life I gathered from 
 stories that he related in the intimacy of camp life. War- 
 ren and I had been down the Verdigris River as far as 
 Independence, and then struck off northeast to the Neo- 
 sho and up that stream. We were looking for land for 
 several Eastern men who wanted to settle together if 
 certain conditions of wood, water, etc., could be found 
 on Government land, for they would not buy claims. 
 
AMOS DECKER. 337 
 
 When we got up as far as the cabin of Amos my pony 
 was lame, and we stopped and asked if we could rest and 
 see to our critters. We spoke enough of the Missouri 
 language, which largely prevailed in that part although 
 occasionally mixed with and diluted by the vocabulary 
 of Posey county, Ind. to know that a horse was a "crit- 
 ter," and a cow was a "creetur." 
 
 After the usual question, "Whar ye from?" and the 
 answer being satisfactory, he looked at my pony's foot 
 and pulled out a cactus thorn that had somehow got in 
 it, although no Indian pony would go near a bed of that 
 plant. He said: "I wouldn't ride him any more to-day; 
 stop over with me to-night, and the pony '11 be better in 
 the mawnin'." In the last sketch I referred to the 
 troubles that disturbed the Territory of Kansas, and 
 strangers were cautious, judging one to be "free State" 
 or "pro-slavery" by his nativity. Amos probably sized 
 us up long before we had him figured down, but it did 
 not take long to decide that he was to be trusted, be- 
 cause he could pronounce his r's, that shibboleth of the 
 man reared south of Mason and Dixon's line in those 
 days at least. 
 
 Warren and I had been camping and living on small 
 game tempered with salt pork and the occasional pur- 
 chase of corn bread, and when Amos suggested that if 
 the water was not so muddy after the rain he would shoot 
 a pike for dinner, Warren suggested catching one. Amos 
 had no fish hooks, but we had a few and some lines. I 
 watched him rig for skittering, and remarked that he 
 had fished before. 
 
 "Yes," said he, "we used to ketch pike in the Wabash 
 an' Massaseep by puttin' on a killy an' slingin' 'em out." 
 
 I caught the word "killy," and said: "I s'pose it's a 
 long time since you left New York." 
 
338 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 "Never lived in New York," and he gave me a look 
 of inquiry. "What made ye think that?" 
 
 "I meant New Jersey. They're close together, and I 
 made a mistake. I can always tell a man that comes 
 from New Jersey, no matter how long he's been away 
 from it." 
 
 "See here, stranger! I was a boy in New Jersey 
 once, but you don't know it ; you only guessed at it. You 
 may be good at guessin' ; guess ag'in." 
 
 "Well, you lived down along the salt water, about 
 Raritan Bay or Staten Island Sound. I only want to 
 look into a man's eye to tell where he comes from, and 
 didn't have to ask where you came from." 
 
 Then I mystified him with some old sleight-of-hand 
 tricks; passed a half dollar through his hat, let him draw 
 a card from the pack, and then after putting it back with 
 the rest told him to feel in his coat pocket and find it, 
 and several such simple tricks, which puzzled him. 
 
 Said he: "Look a-here, stranger, that's the best I 
 ever seed. Oncet, on the old Massaseep, I seed a feller 
 do sich tricks, but he had a show on a boat an' a stage, 
 an* we wus so fur off we c'u'dn't see how he dun 'em; 
 but I'll be durned ef you don't do 'em right here with my 
 own keerds. Say, do 'em over agin', will ye? I want to 
 see how ye do 'em. Say, stranger, ef you'll stay here 
 with me I'll keep ye six months an' show ye the bes' 
 claims about yere." 
 
 I declined to repeat the tricks ; all great magicians re- 
 sist such entreaties. I had puzzled this shrewd frontiers- 
 man by some simple things, and didn't care to lose my 
 prestige, just as you never wish to make a second rifle or 
 pistol shot after a very lucky first one. 
 
 When we were alone Warren said : "Them tricks was 
 all right; I don't know just how you do 'em, but that 
 
AMOS DECKER. 339 
 
 business of locating the old man in New Jersey is what 
 bothers me, and it bothers him. How did you do it?'* 
 
 "If I tell you will you keep it?" 
 
 "Betcher! Wouldn't tell him, but it's workin' on the 
 old man an' it's workin' on me." 
 
 "Well, it's all based on a word. He called a little bait 
 fish a 'killy,' and that name is one left by the Dutch set- 
 tlers along the salt waters of New York and New Jersey, 
 and is used in no other part of the country. You noticed 
 that I guessed New York first, but corrected it on the 
 second guessing." 
 
 Amos had turned his back to put some wood on the 
 fire, and I carelessly opened a book on a shelf and saw his 
 name in it. Quickly closing it, I resumed conversation, 
 and afterward laboriously spelled out his name from 
 the lines in his hand. 
 
 "Stranger," said he, slowly, "you ar' suttenly a gifted 
 man. To look at yer no one would ever mistrust it, but 
 I've read about how these things could be done, but 
 never put no faith in it; but now I'm convinced. 
 Stranger, put it thar!" 
 
 "Amos," said I, "I'm a greenhorn from the East, but 
 I object to being called 'stranger' by every stranger that 
 I meet. I'm no more a stranger to a man I never saw 
 before than he is to me, and I won't stand it. If you'll 
 drop that word we'll be friends and go a-fishing. What 
 d'ye say?" 
 
 Warren had caught some minnows in a little stream, 
 and we went down to the edge of the river to fish with 
 some heavy pecan poles, which our host pronounced 
 "pecawn;" this is a species of hickory which bears the 
 nut of commerce and is very strong and elastic, but 
 heavy. The water appeared to be so muddy that there 
 seemed but little chance of a fish seeing our bait, but we 
 
34:0 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 kept casting and skittering until I got a rise that took 
 the bait off the hook. This was encouraging. Then 
 Amos got a strike that was a savage one; it pulled the 
 line through the ring on the tip of his hickory switch, 
 and scorched his hand in checking the rush. We had 
 no reels ; I had probably seen them in Eastern stores, but 
 had no knowledge of them in practical fishing. It was 
 evident that Amos knew as much about fishing as I did, 
 and that was considerable, I thought. He soon checked 
 the fish and landed it, a pike of some kind that may have 
 weighed five pounds. Warren struck something, wet his 
 foot and lost his line, because it was short and was not 
 fastened to the butt. 
 
 "Betcher," said he, "that fish would weigh fifty 
 pounds. It was the biggest one I ever hooked. No 
 man c'd V stopped him. Did you see how he took that 
 line out? Why, lightnin* 'ud a' been left away behind in 
 that race." 
 
 Amos suggested that the pike would make our din- 
 ner, and we let the minnows go and went up to his 
 cabin. While he prepared dinner I looked after the 
 ponies, which were staked out on the prairie; led them 
 down to water, and gave them some salt. I wonder if 
 an Indian ever wasted salt on a pony? It's doubtful. 
 About the only thing that I ever saw them give a pony 
 freely was a club. My tough little fellow, which I had 
 named "Jimsey," a sort of pet form of "Jim," had become 
 greatly attached to me through the agency of salt and 
 sugar. Warren came out and put a hobble on his pony, 
 and I turned mine loose. I urged him to do likewise, 
 but he said : 
 
 "That's all right; Jimsey will stay here with Pete be- 
 cause he's hobbled, but, betcher, you let 'em both loose 
 an' you'll never see 'em ag'in." 
 
AMOS DECKER. 341 
 
 "Let Pete loose, an' if he goes away I'll give you my 
 claim. The ponies will get better feed if they can range, 
 and a stranger can't catch 'em. We're goin' to stop here 
 all night, and if our ponies go off you can have my claim 
 and its betterments." 
 
 "It's a go; Pete wouldn't fetch more'n $30, an' your 
 claim, with house, well and ten acres of broken prairie 
 all fenced is wuth more'n ten times that." 
 
 His pony was relieved from the hobble, and we went 
 in to dinner. The pike had been boiled, and had a dress- 
 ing of drawn butter, a most unusual thing in that region 
 of plain living and high thinking. But Amos had cows, 
 which are well enough in their way, but have a habit of 
 giving milk as a raw material and leaving its manufac- 
 ture into cheese and butter to other hands. The ques- 
 tion was: Whose hands? If I had puzzled Amos with 
 a few simple tricks of legerdemain, such as are published 
 in many books on the subject, he presented the problem: 
 "Who milked the cows and made the butter?" Of course 
 he could do it, but he was often gone for weeks, and cows 
 must be milked twice each day. He had butter, and that 
 is all we knew. 
 
 After dinner and pipes Warren went out, and reported 
 that our ponies were not in sight. "Gone down in 
 the timber to browse on the mulberry bark," said Amos. 
 "I'll tell you what it is, you fellers make a mistake in 
 thinking them animiles 'ud druther have corn shelled or 
 on the cob than to browse. They'd druther git down 
 in that bottom timber, an' eat hazel brush an' young mul- 
 berry an inch thick 'an to have all the corn 'at you c'd 
 set afore 'em. Let 'em go; they'll look out fer you ef 
 you give 'em salt an' sugar, es Fred says he's done. 
 Don't you worry." 
 
 Morning came, and after breakfast we went to the 
 
342 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 edge of the woods; I gave the shrill whistle with the 
 fingers, and called my pony's name. Soon he answered, 
 and both animals followed us back to the cabin. Here 
 I will say that I am not a horseman, and have no liking 
 for horses. Few men like horses. They will tell you 
 that they "like a good horse." That means that they 
 like him while he is young and stylish, but when all that 
 is past he may be sold to pull an ash cart. Out on such 
 love! Compare it with the love that the sportsman has 
 for his dog, that has worked the fields with him in heat and 
 cold, his skin torn by briers in summer and his feet frozen 
 in the winter's snows. Is the old dog sold into drudgery 
 in his old days? "Not on your life!" as the phrase of the 
 day goes. Therefore I do not believe that the average 
 man loves the horse for more than he can get out of him. 
 I have a regard for the horse as a most useful animal, just 
 as I have a regard for a locomotive as a bit of useful ma- 
 chinery ; but I think, with Charles Dickens, that the head 
 of a horse, at its best, is not a handsome thing, admitting 
 that some horses may have comparatively handsome 
 heads by some modification of that long nose. I am 
 wondering what Dickens would have thought of the head 
 of a moose ! There is no doubt but Mr. Moose sees most 
 delicate lines of beauty in the facial contour of Mrs. 
 Moose, but we are not educated up to their standard 
 that's the trouble, and a moose is the homeliest animal 
 that my eyes ever gazed upon, take head, body or legs, 
 or in "the altogether." 
 
 Before we left the breakfast table Amos had arranged 
 a buffalo hunt for the next week, and we agreed to go 
 with him. His idea and that of his neighbors was to take 
 ox teams, and bring back loads of beef for present use 
 and for salting for winter, as well as to get the skins for 
 robes to use or to sell. 
 
AMOS DECKER. 343 
 
 The week rolled around, and our arms were cleaned 
 and oiled, knives sharpened, the covered wagon packed 
 with camping necessities and all ready to hitch the cattle 
 to long before the train of ten wagons hove in sight. By 
 the time they reached my cabin we had the ponies haltered 
 and tied behind, and the two yoke of oxen hitched and 
 ready to fall in the rear of the procession when it passed. 
 We went off to the southwest, and in a few miles struck a 
 well-broken trail near the head of the Verdigris, which 
 they had left some distance back to go out of the way to 
 pick us up. We were out four nights before we reached 
 the Arkansas River, some eighty miles from our place. 
 The country was rolling prairie, with timber along the 
 frequent streams, and on the third day out I saw the first 
 live buffalo, a herd of several hundred, which pungled off 
 like porpoises when we came in sight. I wondered why 
 the men did not chase them, but learned that they were 
 not going to kill a buffalo until there was a chance to 
 camp and go at it with some sort of system. Warren 
 counted heads, and said that the other ten wagons con- 
 tained twenty-five men, and with ours there were thirty 
 ponies in the party. 
 
 Amos seemed to be the leader and directed the 
 movements. We camped near the mouth of a small 
 stream on the north bank of the river; the wagons 
 were arranged so as to form a corral to keep the live 
 stock in at night to prevent a stampede by wolves or buf- 
 falo, but we had to enlarge the circle with logs. The 
 oxen and ponies had been feeding while we were doing 
 this, and then we gathered them in for the night; three 
 guards were appointed to keep watch, one at a time, for 
 fear of accident that might stampede our stock in spite of 
 the corral, and leave us in bad shape. There was danger 
 that some prowling band of O sages, Kaws or other In- 
 
344 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 dians might do this, so an armed man patroled outside 
 the corral while we slept. 
 
 It rained in the night, but the morning was fair, and 
 leaving ten men to see that the stock did not wander and 
 to keep camp, we saddled our ponies, and started to look 
 for the game. To a question Amos replied: "No, we had 
 our guard all picked afore we started, and we don't ex- 
 pect you boys to do any of it. Them ten men will take 
 care o' things night an' day. I ast ye to come an' hunt, 
 didn't I? Then what ye talkin' 'bout? There ain't even 
 an ole bull in sight, but you can see where the herd went 
 north toward the Smoky Hill Fork, an' mebbe gone on 
 to the Saline or way up to Solomon Fork. But there's 
 more a heap more an' if we don't strike 'em to-day, 
 why, to-morrer's comin'. If it was dry ground we might 
 see where there was a herd by the dust; there's an old 
 bull now off by hisself, but we don't want him. There's 
 nothin' good about him but his overcoat, an' that's on'y 
 good for buckskin. Them old bulls get druv out by the 
 young ones, an' just herd by theirselves." 
 
 We went north to the divide that separates the waters 
 flowing into the Arkansas from those of the Smoky Hill 
 Fork of Kaw River, which feeds the Missouri as far north 
 as Kansas City. The Kaw River is spelled "Kansas" on 
 the maps, but nobody called it anything but Kaw, after 
 the tribe of degraded Indians who lived along its waters. 
 Why this was so may be classed in Lord Dundreary's 
 catalogue of "things no fellow can find out." It was 
 near noon when our ponies were hobbled, and given a 
 couple of hours to graze and drink, while we ate, smoked 
 and talked. There had been no introductions; such 
 things were superfluous in those days among such men, 
 and we had scraped acquaintance, and knew a few Johns, 
 Jims, Bills and Joes. They were rough, ignorant men, 
 
AMOS DECKER. 345 
 
 frontier farmers, and, as I was in that class, we got along; 
 but it was evident that Amos had exploited me as a ma- 
 gician, for they were curious about me after we made 
 camp at night. They were satisfied that I was a Free 
 State man, for that was the first thing that a man wished 
 to satisfy himself on in those days are you friend or foe? 
 
 This curiosity became too strong to be controlled, 
 and Joe broke out with : "Amos says you can see through 
 a pack of cards and tell how they will deal; is that so?" 
 
 "No; Amos says many things besides his prayers. 
 Sometimes I make a guess at what cards a man holds, 
 and if I guess anywhere near right he thinks it wonder- 
 ful. Hand me that pack, and I'll make a guess on the 
 hand you have after you have cut the cards." 
 
 This was a rash statement, for the pack was well worn 
 and dirty; but my fame was at stake. Running them 
 over in shuffling, I got the four aces and a king at the 
 bottom of the pack, and then laid it on the blanket. "Now 
 you cut the cards anywhere you like," said I, and he cut 
 near the middle. Catching the eyes of the crowd, I put 
 the "cut" back on top, and played the old trick of dealing 
 from the end of the pack, giving him a card from the 
 bottom and myself one from the top. When the deal 
 was finished I said : "It's hard to see through these cards, 
 they're so dirty; but your hand beats mine. Keep 'em 
 all together; don't spread 'em out; I can guess better 
 when they're bunched. Let's see! I guess you've got 
 four aces and a queen; no, it's a king, the king of spades, 
 I think ; it's a black one ; no, it's the king of clubs." 
 
 He showed down the hand as I called it, and those 
 simple men were astounded. Both Warren and Amos 
 told me that the hand was dealt from the bottom, but they 
 had seen more of such things than the others. The com- 
 pany of these men was no pleasure; they were men 
 
346 MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 shrewd enough at a bargain, but children in everything 
 else; they had read nothing, could talk of nothing but 
 their own uneventful lives. Yet it was necessary that 
 something should be done to relieve the monotony of sit- 
 ting around a camp-fire and listening to the talk of men 
 who could not talk. Therefore, to relieve myself from 
 the dreadful situation, ten times more lonsome than if no 
 human being had been within one hundred miles, I 
 "opened my box of tricks," learned in the idle moments 
 of schoolboy life, and amused myself and companions 
 with the few simple bits of legerdemain which I could call 
 to mind. Later in life many such situations have oc- 
 curred, when if you wanted any fun you must make it 
 yourself, and it is my mature opinion that such a crowd 
 have so little humor that they don't appreciate anything 
 except practical jokes or the wonders of the magician. 
 The humorous story or the witty repartee is wasted on 
 them as much as it would be on a Digger Indian. Yet 
 that is the state of mind of over half of the people of the 
 United States, taking them "by and large.''' It is safe to 
 say that outside what may be called the educated classes 
 few appreciate a joke unless it is in its roughest costume. 
 Refine it, put it in evening dress, and it "is caviare to the 
 general;" but the few who can and do enjoy it are those 
 for whom it was intended. Jests are of so many kinds 
 that some are offensive. Bacon, in his "Essays," says: 
 "As for jest, there be certain things which ought to be 
 privileged from it namely, religion, matters of state, 
 great persons, any man's present business of importance, 
 any case that deserveth pity." This definition is "funny" 
 to this generation. 
 
 It is funny because "matters of state" are the subject 
 of political cartoons in almost every illustrated paper of 
 to-day, and as for "great persons" they are the fellows 
 
AMOS DECKER. 347 
 
 who get it! A young friend at my elbow, who is fully 
 abreast of the current idioms of the day, says: "Yes, an' 
 they git it frequent, right where Alice wears her pearls." 
 
 "Johnny," I asked, "what do you mean? What has 
 Alice and her pearls " 
 
 "Why, they get it in the neck! See? Oh, I forget, 
 you wasn't alive last week. Say, that was a big scald on 
 
 Senator in last week's Scalder. Did you see 
 
 it?" 
 
 This is the sort of interruption that comes to a man 
 who writes of old times when his surroundings are not 
 congenial. . After removing Johnny I tried to get back 
 by a jump of forty years from the present to the day when 
 the buffalo grazed from Oregon to Texas. 
 
 On our way back to camp we saw a few solitary bulls, 
 and some time in the night there was an alarm that 
 turned us all out with our rifles ready for action. One 
 of the herders had gone off to the eastward, and struck 
 a small bunch of buffalo and had killed a calf. He had 
 brought the dressed carcass and the skin back, and had 
 stretched the latter between two trees just outside the 
 camp, and some wolves had torn it down and were fight- 
 ing over it. A few fire brands settled the dispute, and 
 the torn skin was brought in the corral in the interest of 
 harmony. 
 
 The next morning was rainy, but the ponies had their 
 corn and we our buffalo veal, and off we went. In less 
 than an hour we saw the whole prairie covered with buf- 
 falo, grazing and going south. From a knoll the entire 
 earth seemed covered with them as far as we could see. 
 There might have been a million, or a hundred million, 
 or as many figures as you please to add to the guess. I 
 tell you in sober truth, and I ask you to believe me, I 
 don't know how many buffalo were in that herd. War- 
 
348 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 ren said: "Betcher there's more'n ten hundred millions!" 
 You may take Warren's estimate or mine, as you prefer, 
 or you may go there and try to count the tracks of that 
 great herd, I don't care; but I will assert that that 
 there was a big lot of buffalo out there in the open air of 
 that Kansas prairie one day in the fall of 1858. That 
 herd was too big for a few men on ponies to stampede, 
 and we put in the spurs and got alongside. Those on 
 the outside took the alarm, and pressed on without other 
 effect than to cause the others next them to think they 
 were pressing for better forage. Amos had told me to 
 pick a barren cow if I could find one, a fat young cow 
 that had no calf near her, and to keep a sharp eye in the 
 rear, and not get mixed in the herd, or there would be 
 a dead man and a dead pony. 
 
 There was then the spice of danger in this hunt! It 
 began to be more interesting. I had thought it would be 
 sufficient to make the trip and study the types of men, 
 see a herd of buffalo with its flankers and rear-guard of 
 wolves ready to capture a weak straggler, or a calf that 
 strayed too far; but now that there was danger there was 
 a promise of sport. Hotspur truly says: 
 
 "The blood more stirs 
 To rouse a lion than to start a hare." 
 
 Our party had stretched out over two miles on the 
 flank of the herd, which was moving slowly in the mass, 
 but more swiftly near the hunters, and an occasional shot 
 was heard. My pony would not take me too near; he 
 had evidently seen a herd of buffalo before, and I only 
 feared danger in the rear. It was getting to be interest- 
 ing, and after I had singled out my game and tried to get 
 alongside it, with no other buffalo intervening, it was 
 exciting. 
 
AMOS DECKER. 349 
 
 Unconsciously I gave a whoop as the picked animal 
 came in plain view, and the pony didn't need spur nor 
 whip to quicken his pace to get alongside; he understood 
 it all. Once alongside the galloping beast, a new diffi- 
 culty appeared ; she was at my right hand, and I feared to 
 twist in the saddle, not knowing how the pony would act, 
 and I had never shot from my left shoulder. I did, how- 
 ever, shift the rifle to my left arm and fired. The pony 
 never swerved, and the huge beast dropped. The shot 
 caused the animals near me to crowd away, and I circled 
 about and shot again as the animal was about to rise; a 
 few struggles and I had killed a buffalo. 
 
 "Come on! Kill some more!" yelled Warren as he 
 passed, seeking a fresh victim; but I had cooled down, 
 and was content to watch the herd as it turned off to the 
 right up the river, looking more like a sea covered with 
 rolling porpoises than anything I can liken it to. I sat 
 on my pony gazing on the wonderful sight while my 
 companions followed the herd and thought only of kill- 
 ing. To-day it seems like a dream. Where we rode be- 
 side that great herd the locomotive shrieks, and a genera- 
 tion of men has been born who may occasionally plow up 
 a bone or a horn that tells of an extinct race of great 
 animals. 
 
 It was well along in the afternoon before all had gath- 
 ered at the camp, and the rain still fell. The guards fed 
 the ponies, and we made a big fire to dry ourselves by, 
 and by the time supper was over there was a rainbow in 
 the east. Amos came over to our wagon, and wanted to 
 know how I liked buffalo hunting. 
 
 "Well, Amos," I replied, "it's a good deal like goin' 
 into a barnyard an' shooting cattle; just galloping along- 
 side of a steer, an' pluggin' him with lead until he drops. 
 I'd a heap sight rather shoot woodcock." 
 
350 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 "Woodcock! What's them? Them air big wood- 
 pickers 'at drums on trees fur grub? Why, they ain't 
 good to eat, an' it takes as much powder an' lead to kill 
 one on 'em as it does to kill a buffler that weighs over a 
 quarter of a ton. Wai, that's all right; you can shoot 
 woodpickers ef you like, but when I shoot I want to see 
 something worth shooting at." 
 
 I hadn't the courage to explain what a woodcock was ; 
 it wouldn't have helped the matter in the least, nor the 
 disposition to argue the case of sport versus meat; that 
 would have been equally hopeless. So I said: "Won't 
 the wolves spoil the skins and the meat to-night before 
 we can save both in the morning?" 
 
 "Yes, some on 'em," said he; "but it's the best we 
 could do, an' if we're short we'll kill some more. We 
 allers kill enough for ourselves an' the wolves, too; 
 there's plenty of 'em." 
 
 After Amos left us Warren said: "Betcher didn't kill 
 any more buffler 'an I did. Honest, now, how many?" 
 
 "One." 
 
 "Is that all? Why, what joo do all day? Betcher I 
 killed half a dozen, and put my mark on a lot more; I 
 come out here for fun, I did, an' now the gang's goin' 
 back as soon as they skin an' load up the meat." 
 
 There was no use in talking to this man. I began to 
 feel myself out of touch with the rest, holding opinions 
 which I did not care to expose to ridicule by expressing 
 them, so I turned the talk in another direction. We 
 could hear the wolves howl and fight as long as we heard 
 anything, and when silence came morning came with it. 
 
 Camp was broken, and the oxen were hitched up and 
 the wagons scattered to do their work. Guards and all 
 hands went to the labor of skinning, and from inquiry 
 afterward I learned that nearly one hundred buffaloes 
 
AMOS DECKER. 351 
 
 had been killed by seventeen men! But they were not 
 all choice beeves, and then only the forequarters with the 
 hump rib were to be taken back, for those and the 
 tongues were the choice parts. If time permitted, they 
 would all be skinned, and the wolves would put a polish 
 on the bones. 
 
 I had been greatly impressed by that pigeon slaughter 
 which Cooper relates in one of the "Leather Stocking" 
 tales, where the people loaded a cannon and brought 
 down hundreds at a shot, while Natty protested, killed 
 one pigeon for his own use and went his way. That's a 
 good thing for a boy to read; it had its effect on me all 
 through life. It's the fashion to sneer at Cooper, and 
 say that there never were any such Indians as his. That 
 may be so, but it's the fault of the Indians. I like Coop- 
 er's Indians, but the real thing, with the dirt and vermin- 
 laden blanket, "Faugh! an ounce of civet, good apothe- 
 cary, to sweeten my imagination." 
 
 We will pass over the disgusting detail of skinning 
 and loading up. Six skins fell to Warren and me, and 
 several forequarters and tongues. That's all there is of 
 our hunt. The party was a most uninteresting one, de- 
 void of intelligence and consequently of humor. Amos 
 and Warren were the only two whose company was en- 
 durable on this, my first and only buffalo hunt. If my 
 friend of later years, old Nessmuk, had been there he 
 would have agreed with me, and in his fondness for par- 
 ody might have said : 
 
 "Better fifty shots at woodcock 
 Than ten tons of buffalo." 
 
 I learned that the hide of a buffalo bull was not worth 
 taking, because the hair was thin or absent on the hind- 
 
352 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 quarters, and that their beef was worthless; but that the 
 fine robes came from the cows, and that the hump rib of 
 a two-year-old heifer was a fine bit of beef. 
 
 On the wall of my den hangs a pair of buffalo horns 
 saved from the slaughter of that day. Below them are a 
 pair of snowshoes, and the sword of an officer of the line. 
 Sometimes an old man rests his eyes upon these relics 
 until the present is forgotten; the rushing bison with 
 their thundering tramp and grunting snort go by in 
 countless herds, which somehow change into battalions 
 of armed men with glistening bayonets and ragged col- 
 ors, which afterward fade into the brown of the forest 
 and the stillness only broken by the fall of the snow- 
 shoe, until he is aroused by a soft hand on his shoulder, 
 and a soft voice by his side says : "Hadn't you better get 
 ready for dinner? You've been asleep." 
 
FRED MATHER. 
 
A CHRISTMAS WITH "OLD PORT." 
 
 RETURN OF THE WANDERER AND THE FEAST PORT TYLER 
 MADE IN HONOR OF THE "jAYHAWKER" STORIES 
 TOLD BY PORT, BILLY BISHOP, MAT MILLER AND 
 OTHERS UNTIL DAYLIGHT CAME THROUGH THE 
 WINDOWS. 
 
 IT was not a bottle of "crusty Oporto," that celebrated 
 promoter of gout, that made this particular Christ- 
 mas a day to be remembered; but the "Old Port" 
 was none other than my dear old friend, Porter Tyler, 
 who figures frequently in this book; the same old bach- 
 elor, market gunner and trapper of Greenbush, N. Y., 
 whom I had left something over five years before to seek 
 sport in the West. 
 
 It was the old story: A boy had spurned the parental 
 roof, and longed for adventure; had found it, and came 
 back under the ancestral shingles. Many weeks before 
 this I had gone the rounds of old friends, and shaken 
 hands; but I was not in physical shape to engage in our 
 usual sports of winter. The freshly-turned prairie sod 
 with its decaying vegetation had left more than what 
 some of the Kansas settlers called "a leetle tech o' ager." 
 But one day the mail at West Albany brought the fol- 
 lowing: 
 
 "GREENBUSH, December 18, 1859. 
 
 "You OLD JAYHAWKER: Old Port will serve a 'coon, with 
 all the trimmings, one week from to-night, the same being 
 
 853 
 
354: MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 Christmas. He will get up this dinner in honor of your return 
 to civilization. A few of your old-time friends will be there 
 not many, for there is only one 'coon; but what they lack in 
 numbers they will make up in quality. Tobi Teller has seen the 
 list, and pronounced it 'a small party, but intensely respectable/ 
 Jim Lansing said: Tort has killed the fatted 'coon; the calf has 
 returned.' Don't fail to be with us, for Old Port will not be 
 able to skin a muskrat in a month if you disappoint him. It 
 isn't often he gets a 'coon about here, and yesterday he brought 
 one in and said: 'This is just the thing to get up a dinner for 
 Fred.' So never mind your liver nor your ague, but come. 
 Let me know at once, but don't refuse. 
 
 MARTIN MILLER." 
 
 Dr. Jones said that if I wished to shake off the accu- 
 mulated malaria of years I must be very careful in the 
 matter of diet, and that a roast 'coon might do a lot of 
 things which I can't now recall, but to which I gave re- 
 spectful attention. There is no possible use in employing 
 a doctor unless you put yourself in his hands and obey 
 his orders. That is merely common sense. Yet I went 
 to the dinner. How true it is that "all the good things 
 have been said," and that when we read a good book it 
 seems as if the author had somehow forestalled our 
 thoughts before we got to the point of writing them. 
 Honore de Balzac said: "I can resist anything but temp- 
 tation." I had often acted on this saying, but could 
 never have formulated it. I acted on it in the case of 
 this invitation. Away with Dr. Jones and his hygienic 
 treatment of a disordered liver! Was I to become a slave 
 to a disgruntled gland? Never! "Enslave a man and 
 you destroy his ambition, his enterprise, his capacity." 
 
 Climbing the hill which is now Mechanic street, but 
 then was known as the road between the woods, the cot- 
 tage where that modern Natty Bumpo lived was entered, 
 
A CHRISTMAS WITH "OLD PORT." 355 
 
 and there was General Martin Miller. Said he: "Port 
 will want to know that you are here, and I'll go tell him; 
 I've sent down for old Billy Bishop to come up here, and 
 help serve the dinner, for we want Port to sit down and 
 keep down." 
 
 While General Miller Mat we called him, for we 
 were not too stiff in our intercourse was gone in came 
 Billy Bishop. The old fellow shook hands and said: "I 
 don'd like to get this hill up by Fred Aiken's ole spook 
 house when der nide coom, but by der day he was all 
 ride." Then in came Tobias Teller, a bachelor of some 
 fifty summers and no one knew how many hard winters, 
 who lived down on the banks of the classic stream which 
 we called the Popskinny, the spelling of which is disputed 
 by Colonel Teller and Mr. Stott. He was a delightful 
 old fellow, with a flavor of cognac and madeira about 
 him that mellowed the atmosphere in his vicinity. He 
 was called Tobi among his intimates. His worthy 
 nephew (my army comrade), Colonel David A. Teller, 
 resembles him in many respects, especially in being a 
 bachelor. Then came Low Dearstyne, pilot and captain 
 of the railroad ferry. His name was Lawrence, but the 
 Albany Dutch shortened it to Low; please rhyme this 
 with "now," and not with the negative. The Irish call 
 the name Larrence, and abbreviate to Larry, and, as the 
 old Dutch have gone, this explanation may be necessary : 
 Larry is Irish, and Low is Dutch for Lawrence. Then 
 came Jim Lansing, a man of about forty-five years, who 
 kept a hotel at Clinton Heights, but had been a hotel man 
 in several places. He also was from one of the old Dutch 
 families. 
 
 The dinner came on. There was no printed nor writ- 
 ten menu, but, as I remember it, the feed was in this 
 order : 
 
356 MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 MENU. 
 Soup de snapping turtle. 
 
 Coutlettes de snapper, braisee. 
 POISSON. 
 Brook pike au naturel. Pommes de terre. 
 
 RELEVE. 
 
 Roast coon, entire. Motto: "Whole hog or none." 
 Sweet potatoes. 
 
 ENTREES. 
 
 Grouse au Port Tyler. 
 
 ENTREMETS. 
 
 Mat Miller's cheese. 
 Punch. 
 
 As master of ceremonies, General Miller took his 
 share of the good things without flinching, and destroyed 
 a goodly portion of the succulent 'coon, and wrecked a 
 grouse so that no anatomist could have identified the 
 remnants; and when the punch came on he arose and re- 
 marked: "There doesn't seem much to be said after this 
 grand gorge that our host has got up in honor of the 
 wayward youth who went to the great West with 'Excel- 
 sior' as his motto, and has returned like the Biblical hero 
 from herding with swine to the paternal mansion, with- 
 out the motto on the linen which fluttered in the rear, 
 and looked for all the world like a letter in the post- 
 office/ As he is a Shakespearean scholar, I can say to you 
 in the words of the melancholy Jaques: 'Bid him wel- 
 come. This is the motley-minded gentleman that I have 
 so often met in the forest.' Let us pledge, standing: The 
 return of the calf I mean the return of the prodigal." 
 
 Tobi turned his off eye in my direction, and Low 
 Dearstyne nudged me to get up. Never had I spoken 
 at a dinner in a formal manner. Miller's quotation from 
 "As You Like It" suggested another saying of Jaque's, 
 
A CHRISTMAS WITH "OLD PORT." 357 
 
 beginning, "I met a fool in the forest," but it was evident 
 that it was very inappropriate; but, as I got up in a be- 
 wildered way, I somehow blundered through some 
 thanks, and finished by saying: "Somewhere between 
 the lids of the volume that Mat quotes you will find these 
 words, 'I hold your dainties cheap, sir, and your welcome 
 dear/ " 
 
 General Miller then called on Port to rise, and tell 
 how he came by the 'coon which we had eaten. The old 
 man would not get up, but said : 
 
 "Y* see, it was this way. I was off, over beyond, 
 away back of Teller's, an' a-makin' toward the hell-hole 
 to pick up a few pa'tridges, 'cause Mat and Tobi said they 
 wanted to have Fred come over here on Christmas. As 
 I watched the snow, I see what looked like a funny track. 
 The snow was soft, an' it had been a-thawin', an' the sur- 
 face was all spotted with fallin' leaves and dropping 
 snow; but there was a kind o' regularity in these marks 
 that made me look closer, an' sez I to myself, sez I, that's 
 some kind of an animile that's been a-runnin' here, an' I 
 don't know what it is. It was a long track, as near like 
 what a baby could make if it walked through the snow; 
 for there was a heel to it, and it wasn't a bit like the tracks 
 of dogs, foxes, cats, minks or other animals that can be 
 read on sight; but I was bound to know what the thing 
 was. I had no dog I never hunt with a dog if I can 
 help it and after tracking it a few miles I found the 
 thing in a tree and shot it. When it came down, I knew 
 by the bushy-ringed tail what it was. It's the only 'coon 
 that I ever heard of being killed around Greenbush, and 
 that's all there is about it. My father, who lived up in 
 Vermont, used to tell of a hunter who had no bullet for 
 
358 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 his Queen Anne musket, and rammed down a peach-pit 
 on top of the powder and shot at a deer, but thought he 
 missed. Three years later he saw a commotion in the 
 bushes, and fired into it and killed a big buck which had 
 a peach tree growing out of his back ; and the hunter not 
 only got a great lot of venison, but took home three 
 bushels of peaches." 
 
 Tobi Teller said: "I rise to a question of privilege. 
 This story of the deer and the peaches appears in the 
 sagas of the Norsemen, and is coeval with the sun myths, 
 with the story of the man who cut off the dog's tail, ate 
 the meat and gave the dog the bone. It is just as good, 
 however, as the day it was told by the lamented Baron 
 Munchausen, and I would be the last man to take a shav- 
 ing off it. But, as every man must contribute his mite 
 of unwritten history, I will ask General Martin Miller to 
 tell our guest what has happened in Greenbush since he 
 left us to seek fame and fortune in the wild West half a 
 dozen years ago." 
 
 MAT MILLER'S STORY. 
 
 The General looked the party over as he arose and 
 said: "In this quiet village there is little change from 
 year to year, and the only thing which I can recall that 
 might interest you is the stealing of Mrs. Parsons' geese. 
 You all know that this old lady, who lived down on 
 Columbia street, raised great numbers of geese, and de- 
 rived quite a revenue from the sale of feathers and 
 dressed birds. A neighbor, on a back street, used to help 
 dress these fowls; his name was Gordonier; you all knew 
 him, and he stuttered awfully. When he was drunk he 
 didn't stutter, and so we knew just what his spiritual 
 condition was. When there was a revival in the church 
 
A CHRISTMAS WITH "OLD PORT." 359 
 
 there was no penitent louder than old Gordonier, nor one 
 so ready to backslide when the revival was over. 
 
 "One morning, when the early birds of Greenbush 
 had gathered about the two bar-rooms which guarded 
 the approach to the Albany ferry, for their morning bit- 
 ters, old Gordonier entered. Said he : 'D-d-d ye hear the 
 n-n-news?' 
 
 " 'No/ said John Pulver; 'what is it?' 
 
 " 'S-s-s-som'b'dy s-s-stole all Mrs. P-p-parsons'es 
 g-g-geese. It co-co-couldn't ha' been me, for I was in 
 S-s-s-schenectady.' 
 
 "Then he crossed to the other bar-room, and the 
 crowd followed him, and he told the same story, winding 
 up with: 'It c-c-c-couldn't 'a' b-b-been me, for I was in 
 S-s-s-schenectady.' Afterward he went down to Ike 
 Fryer's bar, and the story was retold. John Pearl had 
 heard the yarn three times, and went off and told Pop 
 Huyler. Pop thought a minute and said: 'Let's go 
 'round to old Gordonier's house, and see if he's got the 
 geese.' So they went and knocked on the door, and 
 when the ole woman opened it Pop said: 'Good morn- 
 ing, Mrs. Gordonier; we just bought a couple o' geese of 
 the ole man, an' he sent us around here for 'em.' The 
 ole woman hesitated a moment and then said: 'All right; 
 just wait here a second, and I'll bring 'em to you; we 
 didn't raise but a few this year, an' I didn't think he'd sell 
 any.' She was very deaf, and didn't hear the men follow 
 her into the house, but just as she pulled a couple of 
 geese from under the bed John Pearl raised the curtain, 
 and he and Pop Huyler saw a great pile of geese, and 
 John remarked that she had a great many. 'Land 
 sakes,' said she, 'you don't call half a dozen many, do 
 ye? Why, they're jest thrown in there on top of a pile o' 
 'taters, an' that makes 'em loom up.' 
 
360 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 "They took the two geese up to Mrs. Parsons, who 
 had just discovered her loss, and told her where she 
 would find the rest of the stolen geese, and then found 
 Gordonier, who by this time had absorbed so many ante- 
 breakfast nips that he stuttered very little. 
 
 "The old man, long and lank, was leaning against 
 the bar as they entered, and said: 'It's too bad, but I 
 dunno who done it.' 
 
 ' 'You're sure you didn't get any of 'em?" asked Pop. 
 
 " 'Sure? How c'u'd I when I was in S-s-s-schenec- 
 tady all night? Just came in on the train.' 
 
 " 'All right, but we found the geese under your bed, 
 and you've got to go down with us to Squire Hoge- 
 boom's until Mrs. Parsons makes a complaint; come 
 along!' 
 
 "He begged and protested, said that some of the boys 
 had put the geese under his bed, if there were any geese 
 there, and the excitement loosened his stuttering valve, 
 which the nips had cemented down, and away they went 
 to the Squire's; but on reaching the corner he broke 
 away, and ran to the dock and jumped off, with a crowd 
 at his heels. John Stranahan jumped into a boat and 
 fished him out. Mrs. Parsons refused to make a charge, 
 but the old fellow picked and returned to her thirty-nine 
 geese. When Pop Huyler met him and asked: 'When 
 have you been over to S-s-s-schenectady?' the old man 
 replied: 'I on'y w-w-wish I'd a d-d-died the day I 
 j-j -jumped the d-d-dock off.' 
 
 "There was a time, not over a dozen years ago, when 
 if Bate Hayden's troughs for feeding horses were all 
 found on top the little schoolhouse there was a suspicion 
 that our guest had a hand in it, but, as he has been absent 
 a number of years, he can prove an alibi, like old Gor- 
 donier, and say he was in S-s-s-schenectady." 
 
A CHRISTMAS WITH "OLD PORT." 361 
 
 Billy Bishop, who had been waiting on the table dur- 
 ing the dinner, and was now serving the punch with fre- 
 quent regularity, remarked: "Der old Gordonier was a 
 ole hicocric, so he was." 
 
 "Now, Billy," said Tobi, "you are a little jealous be- 
 cause he got several jobs of hog-killing that you wanted. 
 There are worse men than old Gordonier." 
 
 "Yes," replied Billy; "dere's meny wus as ole Gor- 
 donier; dey keep 'em chained, but " 
 
 The master of ceremonies looked at Mr. Teller. 
 
 TOBIAS TELLER'S STORY. 
 
 "You all knew Bill Fairchild, big-hearted, generous 
 Bill, who'd give the shirt off his back to any one who 
 needed it. Well, one Sunday morning in May a poor 
 clam peddler's horse drew his wagon to the ferry with its 
 owner lying flat on the load. It was early, and people 
 looked and remarked that the man was drunk, and passed 
 on. Colonel Mike Bryan wanted some clams, and came 
 out and selected what he wished and tried to rouse the 
 man, and found that he was dead. Some one happened 
 to know him, and also knew where he lived, and sent for 
 his wife. In about an hour she came over from Albany, 
 and about that time Bill dropped down that way. She 
 was bemoaning her fate, and the fact that no clams had 
 been sold. The fact was, the man had intended to reach 
 some of the river towns before Monday morning, and 
 peddle his stock on the homestretch, but had died from 
 some cause; and the old horse, finding no controlling 
 hand on the lines, had turned around somewhere, and 
 started for home with his load and his dead master on its 
 top. The crowd stood around idly looking at the dead 
 man and the sorrowing woman, who really hadn't money 
 
362 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 enough to pay ferriage for the horse and wagon, when 
 Bill pushed through and learned the situation. 
 
 "The man had been taken into Charley Bradbury's 
 livery stable, and with only a word to the wife Bill 
 mounted the wagon and started down street singing that 
 old song, but in better voice than it was usually sung : 
 
 'Here's clams, prime clams I have to-day; 
 They're fat and fresh from Rockaway; 
 They're good for to roast, they're good for to fry, 
 And they're good for to make a clam pot-pie.' 
 
 "The church-going people looked, and some thought 
 Bill must be drunk, for everybody knew him; but if 
 people didn't come out he knocked at the doors and told 
 them all about the case, and before noon he was back, all 
 sold out. He asked the woman how much the load 
 ought to bring, and she said it had cost $6, and at retail 
 prices ought to bring $15. 
 
 " 'Well/ said Bill, 'I don't know much about selling 
 clams, and here's all I've got for 'em,' and he emptied a 
 lot of silver and bills in her lap, and went out. The pile 
 counted out nearly $40, and it was suspected that Bill had 
 put in all that was left of his month's salary from the 
 railroad. When we asked Bill about it he would curl his 
 lip and say: 
 
 " 'I'm a good clam peddler, an' can get the prices. 
 Clams, ma'am? Johnny, open the lady a nice fat one. 
 Fresh? Yes, m'm. See 'em kick. I think they spoiled 
 a good clam peddler when they made me a bookkeeper. 
 Yes, sis; they're fresh; how many?' 
 
 " 'How do you sell 'em?' 
 
 " Thirty cents a peck/ 
 
 ' 'Mother says she'll give twenty-five.' 
 
 " 'Tell your mother to go to heaven. Does she think 
 
A CHRISTMAS WITH "OLD PORT." 363 
 
 I stole 'em? Whoa! back, Jake! Here's another cus- 
 tomer. Yes'm, just up by lightning express from Rock- 
 away; caught last night. Ah, see how the juice runs out 
 of his shell, thinking how you'll enjoy him.' 
 
 "Poor Bill! When he was burned to death trying 
 to rescue the books from the office of the Boston & Al- 
 bany Railroad, when the station burned at East Albany, 
 and an appeal was made in behalf of his widow, the board 
 of directors said: 'He did no more than his duty.' 
 
 "It is true that corporations have no souls, but Bill 
 Fairchild had one, and when I think of his sacrifice for 
 the widow of an unknown clam peddler and his heroic 
 sacrifice of his life for a soulless corporation, I recognize 
 the hero. Gentlemen: To the memory of Bill Fair- 
 child!" 
 
 We had all known the reckless dare-devil, Bill, who 
 in a good cause would cry "clams!" in a quiet village on 
 a Sunday morning, and whose tragic death was fresh in 
 the memory of all present; so when the next speaker 
 began telling of him we were surprised. General Miller 
 had selected his victim, and we heard 
 
 "Talking about Bill Fairchild reminds me of a winter 
 night when my boat had been frozen up for months, and 
 the ice in the Hudson had begun to get tender in spots. 
 No teams had crossed the river for a fortnight, and where 
 the foot passengers crossed there were boards placed in 
 the most dangerous spots. Although there was a man 
 in charge of the boat, who slept on board, I kept watch 
 of the river to see that everything was safe. We usually 
 wintered the boat in the Albany basin, but this time she 
 was moored in the canal between the two big freight 
 houses of the B. & A. R. R. 
 
364: MEN 1 HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 "On this particular night there was a heavy fog in 
 which a man could easily get lost, and the ice was getting 
 weaker every hour. I had looked in at the railroad 
 office, and found Bill at work on his books, and sat down 
 by the stove. After a while he looked up, and remarked : 
 'It's a bad night on the ice. Some people crossed the 
 river just before dark, but you wouldn't get me on it. 
 No, sir! I wouldn't try to cross that river for a thousand 
 dollars/ 
 
 " 'Listen !' said I. 'What was that?' 
 
 " 'Somebody singing,' suggested he. 
 "A wail came from the river, distinctly this time, for 
 the night was still. Bill grabbed a lantern, and we 
 rushed out on the dock. The feeble light did not show 
 an object ten feet away, but we heard a splash and a 
 groan, apparently not far out in the river. 
 
 " 'Hang on!' cried Bill; Til be with you soon,' and in 
 spite of protest he dashed down the slope by Dandaraw's, 
 where people took the ice to cross. He shouted, and 
 soon I heard this dialogue: 
 
 "'Oh, Lord! Help me out! I'm a respectable col- 
 ored man, and live over in Nigger Hollow, an' my name's 
 Stephen Baker. Oh, do please send someone quick!' 
 
 "Then Bill said: 'You're respectable, are you? What 
 did you say your name was?' 
 
 " 'It's Stephen Baker, an' I'm a respectable colored 
 man. Oh, do send some one quick, for I'll drown sure!' 
 
 " 'Are you Steve Baker that stole Sim Diamond's 
 chickens?' 
 
 " 'No, Lord, no! I never took no chickens; it was 
 my brother Jim. Oh, come quick!' 
 
 " 'What you got hold of?' 
 
 "'Aboard. Oh, do come!' 
 
 "All the while Bill was looking for the edge of the 
 
A CHRISTMAS WITH "OLD PORT:' 3G5 
 
 hole and taking off his clothes. In he went, and towed 
 the board and the darkey to the sound ice ; but both were 
 too chilled to get out. I had alarmed the men in Dan- 
 daraw's bar, and they pushed out boards and rescued 
 both men. Bill had an attack of pneumonia and rheu- 
 matism, and lost a month's work. And that's the kind of 
 man Bill Fairchild was, and you all know how he died." 
 
 As I write this, thirty-seven years later, Whittier's 
 verse comes to mind: 
 
 "Dream not helm and harness 
 
 The sign of valor true; 
 Peace hath higher tests of manhood 
 
 Than battle ever knew." 
 
 When Low had finished Billy Bishop said: "Yes, Pill 
 Fairchild vos a goot fayler; we should trink punch mit 
 him." And 
 
 "They drank to one saint more." 
 
 General Mat arose, and suggested that a representa- 
 tive Jayhawker from Bleeding Kansas was anxious and 
 willing to tell something about the human fruit which 
 the trees bore in that sanguinary region, or perhaps a 
 story of Osawatomie Brown, who had been hanged to 
 a tree in Virginia some three weeks before, would be 
 acceptable. 
 
 THE LOST HAT. 
 
 I had expected to be called on, and had laid out what 
 I thought to be a good story, but Miller's remarks sent 
 the whole thing out of mind. I was nervous and self- 
 
366 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 conscious to a degree, and so with some remarks about 
 the newspapers having told the whole Kansas story, and 
 perhaps a little more, I said: 
 
 "Our host, Porter, would, I know, rather hear of my 
 hunting and trapping experiences than about jayhawk- 
 ing, as they call it, so I will tell him how I lost a hat on 
 a hunting trip. It was not a valuable hat; just one of 
 the kind that you see in rural villages a hat that under 
 no conditions could ever have been a new one. You 
 know the kind; they were never created by man, but 
 have the air of having always existed. If I cared to par- 
 aphrase Byron I would say: 
 
 'I had a hat which was not all a hat, 
 Part of the brim was gone, etc.* 
 
 "These details are necessary when you tell about a 
 hat, for its shape, texture and color are all that comprise 
 individuality in a hat. Its texture was felt, and its shape 
 was not like the shiny 'nail keg' which adorns the brow 
 of a member of Assembly when he comes to Albany; its 
 color, if it had any, is beyond my power to describe. The 
 sun had toyed with its hues until it had attained that 
 delicate shade of old-mown hay seen on the chin whiskers 
 of the member from Sqeedunk. 
 
 "That's the best description I can give of the hat. It 
 was a rare day in autumn; you know how the hills and 
 the maples looked; I won't go into that because I didn't 
 lose them; they get around every year. 
 
 "I had a new turkey call, a sort of small box with a 
 thin cover that said 'keouk' when you tickled it, and the 
 turkeys were wild in Kansas, wilder than deer, and an 
 old gobbler that had been shot at once or twice took no 
 chances. I found a place to lie in the leaves behind a 
 
A CHRISTMAS WITH "OLD PORT." 367 
 
 huge pine log; laid my rifle handy, and at intervals 
 worked the new call. After a while a distant gobble was 
 heard. More call and nearer gobble, and I began to feel 
 very good. Soon a fine gobbler came in sight, strutting 
 and feeling his way. I had learned not to overdo the 
 calling trick, and kept silent as he advanced. I wanted 
 to get him to come within thirty yards, and then try to 
 take him in the head or neck, and utilize him for a dinner ; 
 so I watched under a limb that I had laid on top of the 
 log. He was probably fifty yards away, and my heart 
 was pumping more than was really necessary, when I 
 dropped the call, and began to scratch leaves like a hen 
 turkey looking for beech nuts, and shoved my hat up on 
 a stick to represent a turkey's back, when ! Light- 
 ning couldn't have been quicker! Something hit that 
 hat and cut my head. Feel the scar! The fact was that 
 I had called up a turkey gobbler and a wildcat or cata- 
 mount at the same time, and fooled 'em both. I didn't 
 get the turkey, and I didn't get the hat. It can't be lost, 
 for science says that nothing is lost it only changes its 
 form. Content with that assurance, I know that my hat 
 is still somewhere in this universe; perhaps a portion of 
 it has been taken up, as it decomposed, by the roots of 
 trees and plants, and so it lives in other lives, or like 
 
 'Imperious Caesar, dead and turned to clay, 
 May stop a hole to keep the wind away.' 
 
 "But my hat was gone, taken without so much as 'by 
 your leave,' and I only regret that I have neither the hide 
 of the catamount nor the fragments of the hat to decorate 
 my den. I can only say with Pope : 
 
 'A heap of dust alone remains of thee, 
 Tis all thou art, and all the proud shall be.' 
 
S68 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 Billy Bishop by this time was beginning to feel very 
 numerous, although Port had tried to keep the punch 
 under his own eye, for Porter was a man who seldom 
 looked upon the wine when it was rosy; but Billy paid no 
 attention to the color of it; the white schnapps of Hol- 
 land was as welcome to Billy as any. He wasn't any- 
 where near being "over his head," but just felt his oats, 
 and wanted to talk. 
 
 "I'll yust tole you 'bout de hell-hole w'at Port had 
 gone by for pa'tridges. John Pulver he always tell 'bout 
 it, an' how spooks set 'round de edge in de dark of de 
 moon an' work all kinds o' harm to people who come 
 by der hole. I was a-choppin' in Glen Van Rensselaer's, 
 when I dinks I co by Mr. Teller's for my ole axe to split 
 de trees, an' it was so warm I lie down by myself to rest, 
 an' I fall asleep by a nice shady place. Wen I wake it 
 was all dark, an* I see a light down in a deep hole, an' 
 den some stumps he roll up f'um der hole an' dey all get 
 me around. Den I knowed dat was de hell-hole w'at 
 John Pulver telled aboud. Was I schared? Veil, you 
 bet you was some schared, too, ven you find yourself in 
 de mittel von some stumps, an' dey all choin hants an* 
 tance you aboud like some chilld'n w'en dey sing 'Ring 
 Arount Rosy/ 
 
 "Pooty soon dey stop, an' one big stump he say, 'Billy 
 Bishop, did you got some schnapps? If you got some, 
 yust put der pottle on my head an' go home/ I find der 
 pottle in my coat, an' I put him on dat stump, an' by 
 Chimminy, dey open der ring an' I nefer stop runnin' till 
 
A CHRISTMAS WITH "OLD PORT." 369 
 
 I reach Ike Fryer's tafern. Dey can all chop around dot 
 hell-hole, but I know when I got a blenty." 
 
 JIM LANSING'S STORY. 
 
 "Gentlemen," said Jim, "I think that if Billy's bottle 
 had not been so near empty he would not have seen so 
 many stumps all dancing in one set. Just what might 
 have happened if Billy had finished the bottle, and had 
 none to leave for the spooks, will never be known; but 
 that remarkable hole has a great many stories clustered 
 about it. Men who call themselves geologists say it is 
 only a 'sink/ but there is a foundation for the dread which 
 some people have of it. 
 
 "During the Revolutionary War a portion of the 
 American army were in barracks on what is now the 
 McCulloch farm, just opposite my place on Clinton 
 Heights. Almost every night the sentinel on the post 
 at the southeast corner of the encampment, just in the 
 edge of the woods, deserted. It was singular that all the 
 desertions were from that one post, and 'most all the men 
 were soldiers with good records. The officers were puz- 
 zled, and the men had all kinds of theories about it. My 
 grandfather was a private in one of the regiments sta- 
 tioned there, and he, like the others, was perplexed by 
 the singular state of affairs. This is what he told us boys 
 in later years. 
 
 I "It came grandfather's turn to be detailed for guard 
 duty. A sentinel had deserted from that post the night 
 before, and grandfather went to his captain and asked to 
 be put on the same post. Said he, 'Captain, I don't be- 
 lieve all these men deserted. Some of 'em were as good 
 men as can be found in the army, and wouldn't desert 
 any more than you or I would. If you'll get me as- 
 signed to that post I'd like it.' 
 
370 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
 
 " 'How's this, Jim?' said the captain, for grandfather's 
 name was Jim, same as mine; 'surely you don't want to 
 desert like the rest, do ye?' 
 
 " 'Cap'n,' said my grandfather, 'they didn't desert. 
 
 There's and / naming two of his chums; 
 
 'they've gone, and I want to know where. Put me on 
 that post on the relief that goes on past midnight, and if 
 there's anything to find out I'll find it/ 
 
 "When he went to his post after midnight he picked 
 his flint, and put fresh powder in the pan of his musket, 
 and made up his mind that no matter about the rules 
 against making an alarm, he would shoot the first thing 
 that came near him. A 'coon whickered close by, but 
 he could not see to shoot it. A hog feeding on beech 
 nuts grunted satisfaction occasionally, and soon came in 
 sight. When it came within twenty feet grandfather 
 fired at it, and an Indian rose and yelled. When the 
 corporal of the guard came there was a dead Indian and a 
 hog skin. That told the story. Searching parties were 
 sent out, and found a hole in which the bodies of ten 
 soldiers lay. Its bottom could only be reached by jump- 
 ing into a tree and descending. Six Indians were en- 
 camped in the hole, but they never got out alive. It's no 
 wonder that the place has a bad name." 
 
 "Jim," said Tobi, "I read that story in my school his- 
 tory when I was a boy." 
 
 "That proves it," said Jim; "but no matter where you 
 read it, my grandfather was the man who killed the In- 
 dian in the hog skin that had murdered all the sentinels 
 on that post by the corner of the woods." 
 
 Tobi Teller rose to a point of order and remarked: 
 "As there is a peep of daylight coming through the shut- 
 ters, I now move that we adjourn." 
 
 A feeling of sadness comes over me when I recall the 
 
A CHRISTMAS WITH "OLD PORT." 371 
 
 fact that all these old friends are dead; but, in fact, most 
 of the men I have fished with have gone over to the ma- 
 jority, and while in this train of thought up comes the 
 old verse : 
 
 And Jennie is wed and Annie is dead, 
 And Alice she fled in the auld lang syne; 
 
 And I sit here at sixty year, 
 Dipping my nose in the Gascon wine. 
 
 THE END. 
 

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