Elk In Winter
Photo by F. J. Haynes
There is a large number of fly-fishermen in the east who sincerely believe that the best sport cannot be had in the streams of the Rocky Mountains, and this belief has a grain of truth when the fishing is confined solely to native trout and to streams of indifferent interest. But when the waters flow through such picturesque surroundings as are found in the Yellowstone National Park, when from among these waters one may select the stream that shall furnish the trout he loves most to take, the objection is most fully answered. The writer can attest how difficult it was to outgrow the conviction that a certain brook of the Alleghanies had no equal, but he now gladly concedes that there are streams in the west just as prolific of fish and as pleasant to look upon as the one he followed in boyhood. It is proper enough to maintain that: "The fields are greenest where our childish feet have strayed," but when we permit a mere sentiment to prevent the fullest enjoyment of the later opportunities of life, your beautiful sentiment becomes a harmful prejudice.
Having Eaten and Drunk
When the prophet required Naaman to go down and bathe in the river Jordan, Naaman was exceeding wroth, and exclaimed, "Are not Abana and Pharpar, rivers of Damascus, better than any in Israel?" The record hath it that Naaman went and bathed in the Jordan, and that his body was healed of its leprosy and his mind of its conceit. So, when my angling friend from New Brunswick inquires whether I have fished the Waskahegan or have tried the lower pools of the Assametaquaghan for salmon, I am compelled to answer no. But there comes a longing to give him a day's outing on Hell-Roaring Creek or to see him a-foul of a five-pound von Behr trout amid the steam of the Riverside Geyser. The streams of Maine and Canada are delightful and possess a charm that lingers in the mind like the minor chords of almost forgotten music, but they cannot be compared with the full-throated torrents of the Absarokas. As well liken a fugue with flute and cymbals to an oratorio with bombardon and sky-rockets!
Who hath seen the beaver busied? Who hath watched the black-tail mating?
Who hath lain alone to hear the wild-goose cry?
Who hath worked the chosen water where the ouananiche is waiting,
Or the sea-trout's jumping-crazy for the fly?
He must go—go—go—away from here!
On the other side the world he's overdue.
'Send your road is clear before you when the old Spring-fret comes o'er you
And the Red Gods call for you!
Do you know the blackened timber—do you know that racing stream
With the raw right-angled log-jam at the end:
And the bar of sun-warmed shingle where a man may bask and dream
To the click of shod canoe poles round the bend?
It is there that we are going with our rods and reels and traces,
To a silent smoky Indian that we know—
To a couch of new-pulled hemlock with the starlight on our faces,
For the Red Gods call us out and we must go!
The Feet of the Young Men—Kipling.
Who Hath Seen the Beaver Busied?
Photo by
Biological Survey