CHAPTER VII.
“Now, my co-mates, and brothers in exile,
Hath not old custom made this life more sweet
Than that of painted pomp? are not these woods
More free from peril than the envious court?”
REDEEMED FROM STARVATION.—THE FIRST HABITATION ON THE AROOSTOOK.—MR. BOTTING’S HOUSE.—THE TOUROGRAPH ASTONISHES THE NATIVES.—PURCHASING SUPPLIES AT MASARDIS.—HOMEWARD BOUND.—AU REVOIR!
When I turned out the next morning the first thing I heard was an exclamation from the Colonel.
“What a jolly place for trout!”
“Trout!” we echoed. “You don’t mean it?”
A WAITING BREAKFAST.
“I do, every time, my hearties,” responded the Colonel, as he cast his line far out on the surface of a dark foam-flecked pool at the junction of the two rivers. The next instant we saw his rod bend like a whip-lash, and as the speckled prize which weighed above two pounds shot up out of the stream five hungry men fastened their eyes on it with ravenous fascination, and smacked their jaws in anticipation of a breakfast.
“Bravo, Colonel! Do it again!” we cried, as the trout was landed; and verily he did it again and again, while we did them all to a brown in the frying-pan.
During a few days rest here we secured a number of views, hunted partridges, and captured four fine beaver. Aside from the value of the pelts of the latter animals, they placed us once more beyond the chance of starvation; and having lived for a month almost entirely on their flesh, we had learned by experience that it was better than nothing.
We still retained the “shoes” on our canoes, for although each day the Aroostook River grew deeper and wider, we were obliged to repeat the experiences of Mansungun Stream.
On we paddled, day after day. Soon we passed the junction of the Mooseleuk and Aroostook Rivers, and great was our joy when at last we caught sight of the first house since leaving Chamberlin Lake.
From an architectural point of view it would hardly have interested the humblest carpenter, but to our longing eyes it was the assurance of perils over and the hardest part of the tour accomplished.
A rough log cabin, with barn adjoining, and a few acres of cleared land constituted the farm of one Philip Painter. Here, as I was focussing the camera for a picture, a mother and three children gazed on me from the window, and viewed my operations with astonishment.
THE FIRST HOUSE ON THE AROOSTOOK RIVER.
But being still over one hundred miles from the end of our voyage, the tarry was of short duration.
The Colonel, however, in prowling about the farm, found time to fill his pockets with a quantity of small apples, no larger than nutmegs, and about as digestible. He distributed them among the party as we were returning to the boats, imagining that he had made a glorious capture.
“Splendid, aren’t they?” he said, as we began to munch them.
“Anything for a change from beaver stews,” I replied. “I feel that I could take to boot-leg cheerfully.”
A mile further on another farm appeared, perched upon a high bluff.
“We must take this place by storm!” cried the Colonel. “We must find a straight North American meal if we perish in the attempt,” and he led a gallant advance toward the farm house.
Mr. Botting, the proprietor of the place, appeared in answer to our hail and greeted us with a stare of open-eyed wonder. The first words he spoke were in company with a jerking action of his thumb toward the Tourograph.
“What kind of a machine do ye call that?” he asked, eyeing the instrument with a profound glance.
“This,” said the Colonel, hastening to explain, “is the improved Gatling gun.”
“An’ ye’ve come all the way to this God-forsaken hole to sell it?” said the man. “What’s it fur, anyhow?”
“Cats,” replied the Colonel, with the gravest expression in the world.
“Wal, we ain’t got no cats round here,” said the man. “Haint seen the ghost o’ one in years.”
“Don’t believe him,” I said, interposing, “It’s not a Gatling gun; it is a camera—an instrument for taking pictures—likenesses.”
“Oh!” drawled the man, “I see! He-he! Queer lookin’ affair, ain’t it? Looks like one o’ these patent coffee-grinders I seed down at ’Guster (Augusta) when I was there last.”
“Sir, you insinuate,” said the Colonel. “We have had neither sight nor taste of coffee in weeks, and we don’t sport a coffee-grinder for bare admiration’s sake, we can tell you.”
“Which brings us to our business,” said I. “We have just come from Moosehead Lake. Can you get up a dinner for the crowd?”
“Wal, yes, I guess so,” said the man in a half-dubious tone, as he took in the calibre of the party.
Then, beckoning us to follow, he hobbled back into the house, where after an hour’s tarry we were served with a dinner that hardly paid for the time lost in eating it. It consisted of bread, potatoes, and tea sweetened with molasses; but, like the apples, even this was “a change” from beaver stews.
“CAN YOU GET UP A DINNER FOR THE CROWD?”
“Must a-had a dry time, gen’lmen,” he said, as he busied himself attending to us. “Didn’t find much water, I guess. Never did see the ’Roostook run down so low in all my life, an’ I’ve lived on this ’ere river now nigh on thirty-seven year. I’m seventy odd year old, but only for a lame hip I’ve got I could tramp through the woods with the best o’ ye.”
“You must have some trouble in working your farm,” remarked the Colonel, surveying the fields in front of the door.
“Oh, no; not much. I raise sons to do it. I’ve got eleven as likely boys as you ever did see; but I lost one in the war—poor feller!” as in a husky tone of voice he pointed to a framed certificate of his son’s war services.
Sixteen miles more of vigorous paddling brought us to the town of Masardis, the post-office of the county, and landing on the shore among a number of dug-outs and batteaux, we entered the village.
“Where is the store?” inquired the Colonel, as he crossed the street and rapped at the door of one of the houses.
“Don’t have any,” said the lady who answered his call, surprised at her visitor.
“Well, can you sell us some flour, potatoes and coffee?” and then the Colonel unrolled his memorandum of much needed camp supplies.
At this house we purchased flour, at another potatoes, at another coffee, no two articles being had at the same place, while chickens at twenty-five cents each were sold “on the run,” the Colonel and Hiram securing them after an energetic race.
BIRD TRAPPING MADE EASY.
An old lady of seventy summers, who sold me a box of honey and was very communicative, said during a short but delightful conversation—“I suppose you have heaps more people down in Connecticut than we have in this town; but I don’t believe they are half so happy as our townsfolks. Oh, no! they can’t be near so happy—except, well—except on election days;” and a sad expression came over her wrinkled countenance, for the smaller the town, the greater is the feeling on politics in Maine.
“SEVENTY SUMMERS.”
The river now widens to a distance of over one hundred and fifty feet, and day after day shows a gradual increase in its depth and power.
The current sweeps us swiftly onward through rapids innumerable in the full excitement of canoe life, but occasionally we are forced to disembark and drag our canoes over a rocky beach, which obliges us to retain the “shoes.”
At our various camps we are visited by the inhabitants along the route, who in return for the history of our tour entertain us with news of the outside world, from which we have been separated for so many weeks. Then we begin to realize that we are homeward bound.
An invitation to one of these callers, requesting the honor of his company at breakfast was accepted (with avidity), although, as he remarked, “the old woman was waiting to serve that meal for him on yonder hill.”
A PEEP AT THE STRANGERS.
On passing the towns of Ashland and Washburn, the foamy and discolored appearance of the stream gave evidence of the potato starch manufactories in the vicinity.
The strangest peculiarity of the inhabitants was their utter ignorance of the country and its surroundings.
These people, living on the river, could not give us the faintest idea of distances to points along the shore.
“Hello, stranger!” yelled the Colonel, as rounding a bend in the stream he spied a man standing in one of the log-houses that dot the banks; “can you tell us how far it is to the next town?”
“Dunno, friend; but its nigh on ten miles by the road.”
Another gave the same answer, while a third did not know the name of the next town, although he had lived five years in the country—a parallel to the Virginian woodsman who stalked forth from his native pines one day to learn that there had been such a catastrophe in the history of his country as the war of the Rebellion.
“Wake up, boys,” yelled the Colonel, arousing the party (4 A. M.) at our last camp near Washburn, where we turned out in the dark to partake of a hasty breakfast before embarking.
PRESQUE ISLE—CIVILIZATION IN FOCUS.
“If we are going to make forty-five miles to Caribou to day, we must make hay while the sun shines,—or while it doesn’t shine,” he added, as he took notice of the darkness.
Soon we were gliding down the swift stream, avoiding the huge rocks dimly appearing through the mist, until at last the rising sun dispelled the darkness.
At Presque Isle we landed, and while the guides were preparing dinner, I climbed a neighboring hill with my Tourograph and secured a picture of the scene.
Hour after hour we labored at the paddles, until they seemed almost a part of ourselves; the “shoes” on our canoes retarded us not a little.
The sun was creeping down the western sky, and the tall pines on the bluffs above us threw their lengthening shadows across the stream, as doubling the last bend we shot the canoes along side the wharf at Caribou, and completed our tour of over four hundred miles from Moosehead Lake to the Aroostook River.
Here we took the cars.[B]
[B]Since this canoe tour was completed the railroad has been extended to the town of Presque Isle, at which point tourists can leave the Aroostook River, saving themselves a tedious paddle of about twenty-two miles to Caribou.
A delegation of the “big people” of the vicinity saw us off.
VALEDICTORY.
At the parting moment they seemed visibly affected, as our sketch shows.
As we crossed the line at Fort Fairfield the following day on our way to Woodstock, New Brunswick, the custom house officer found nothing in our kit to reward his examination, although he displayed much curiosity in the leather case containing the camera.
“You must have had a fine time,” he remarked.
“Yes,” was the reply, “save building dams and shoeing canoes.”
While the Indian ejaculated—
“Me think so, too; yes!”
In the whirl of the outside world the weeks fleet by as with the swiftness of a day, but in the solitude of the wilds it seems a longer lease of time.
It is like an age since we took leave of civilization and plunged into the heart of the forests. Now, out of the depths, with a bound we are again in the noise of the busy world.
Mighty trees, primeval rocks with draperies of vine and moss and lichen, tumbling cascades, rushing streams, and all the forest’s wealth of color, form and music disappear like magic.
Presto! what a change!
From the sigh and rustle of the grand old pines list to the rattle of rail cars, the shriek of whistles, and hum of machinery in the mills and factories.
From the croon of the night-bird, that with the distant star has often been my only company in the dark hours while my comrades slept, list to the bark of dogs and crow of cocks, as we rush past town and hamlet through the night and early morn. We are out of the wilds. Farewell, Nature! Welcome, Home!
“There is a pleasure in the pathless wood,
There is a rapture on the lonely shore,
There is society where none intrude—
To sit on rocks, to muse o’er flood and fell,
To slowly trace the forest’s shady scene,
Where things that own not man’s dominion dwell,
And mortal foot hath ne’er or rarely been;
To climb the trackless mountain all unseen,
Alone o’er steep and foaming falls to lean—
This is not solitude; ’tis but to hold
Converse with Nature’s charms and view her stores unrolled.”
