At noon, while we were all taking some repose, we were suddenly alarmed. A mink, or minx (Mustela vison), a small beast of prey, resembling the European lesser otter, had had the boldness to attack, in broad daylight, the poultry that were about the house, and was shot. Our hunters had had no success, a single pheasant being all they had procured.
In the afternoon Mr. Bodmer joined us, having been driven hither by Broadhead. We immediately went out to look in the neighbourhood of the Sand springs[40] for a bear-trap, with an iron plate fastened to a chain, which was carefully covered up and concealed. Mr. Moser, who thought he could find the place, led us astray, but we amused ourselves with the interesting vegetation.
We made but little addition to our ornithological collections, scarcely anything having been killed but the whip-poor-will (Caprimulgus Virginianus), which is very numerous in all these forests. Day had scarcely dawned on the 17th of August, when our whole company was in motion to go seven miles to the house of another Sachs (a near relation of our host), whose widow lived there. For about a mile the wood retains the same character, the firs then attain a greater height, and are closer together. The wood had been cleared around some houses, and Phytolacea, Verbascum, and Rhus typhinum, which occupy all the uncultivated spots in Pennsylvania, immediately sprang up. The small habitations were built entirely of wood, and generally painted a reddish brown. In some places we observed traces of fire: the low scrub oaks were scorched and black, and were putting forth shoots from the stumps and roots. At times we had an extensive view of the mountains, uniformly clothed with dark pine forests, everywhere high tops and ridges, and all around black woods. The Canadian and the Virginian pine were high and close together, especially in the valleys. The soil in this part is not very fertile, and requires to be well manured. All is forest and wilderness, and bears, deer, and other wild animals abound. 39 The Tonkhanna meanders picturesquely between thickets, and the Lobelia cardinalis was in blossom on its banks. Bull-frogs appeared here, as on the banks of the Lehigh at Bethlehem, and the same species of butterflies as are found there. Not far from this place we came to a second very romantic brook, the Tobihanna, over which a short, covered bridge is thrown, and about 300 paces further, reached the lonely habitation of the Widow Sachs, in a desert spot without wood, where we were to pass the night.
Mrs. Sachs gave us tolerable quarters, and I immediately sent for the most expert hunters of the neighbourhood, in order, if possible, to procure a bear or a stag. Three or four men came who were ready to go for a remuneration. One of them had but a few days before, met with two bears and their young, among the bilberry bushes, and shot two of them. I obtained from him a fine large skin of one of them, and several interesting stags' horns.
The part of the country in which we now were was so lonely, wild, and grand, that we immediately took our fowling-pieces to ramble about. The Tobihanna,[41] over which is the above-mentioned bridge, thirty or forty paces in length,[42] is a pretty considerable stream, and the surrounding scenery is extremely picturesque. It is enclosed in rather high banks, overhung with fine, dark, primeval forests of Canadian pine trees, here called spruce fir, mixed with isolated trees of various kinds, and with a very close underwood of colossal Rhododendron maximum, thicker than a man's arm,[43] whose dense masses of foliage, with their dark green, laurel-like leaves hang down over the water, and are often mixed with the beautiful Kalmia latifolia. Even now, the appearance of this dark thicket on the bank was magnificent; how much more beautiful must it be when in blossom! The black forest of gigantic firs, crowded together, rises in awful gloom, here and there relieved by the light green foliage of other trees. These majestic pine forests have hitherto been visited by only a few settlers, and have escaped the great conflagrations which have deprived the skirts of these wooded mountains of part of their lofty stems. We were charmed with this North American wilderness, where Nature is, indeed, less vigorous, and poorer than in the hot climates, but still has a striking, though very different character of solemn and sublime grandeur. Mr. Bodmer immediately chose a place to sketch the above-mentioned beautiful brook, while the rest of our party strolled through the forest. Old decayed trees, often singularly hollowed, and roots of firs covered with moss, spreading over the surface in all directions, hindered us from penetrating far into this wilderness. A dark, damp shade received us here in the heat of the day, and the three-striped viper, of which there are 40 numbers under the old, decayed trunks, frequently fled as we advanced. Rattlesnakes are said to be less common than in the parts which we had before visited. Birds were not numerous in the deep recesses of these forests; only the hammering of the woodpeckers resounded in the awful wilderness. In places where there was much underwood, very thick stems of rhododendron, often from ten to twenty feet high, formed an intricate, impenetrable thicket. It was now perfectly dark, and we found the most beautiful natural arbours. The Kalmia latifolia, too, grew to the height of eight or ten feet. This country was so wild and attractive that I resolved to stop another day. To the north-east of the solitary dwelling of the Widow Sachs, was a fine beech forest, among the underwood of which pheasants were pretty numerous. We procured some of them, but I could not yet succeed in obtaining a stag or a bear.
On the 28th of August we undertook an excursion to see the bear-trap, in which one of those animals had been caught two or three days before. The man who owned this trap lived on the road between Tonkhanna and the Tobihanna, both of which flow into the Lehigh. He had appointed his house for our rendezvous, where we saw the skin of the bear, lately taken, nailed up against the gable end to dry. The saw-mill of our bear-catcher lay in a rude valley, to the south-west of the road. We came to this saw-mill, in a solitary valley, on the Tonkhanna, which rushes, roaring and foaming over rocks covered with black moss, between old broken pines, in a true primeval wilderness. In this retreat for bears, prickly smilax, brambles, and other thorny plants, tear the strongest hunting dress, and leather alone resists these enemies. At every step we had to clamber over fallen trunks of trees, to the injury of our shins, which were almost always bleeding. We found our guide, who, though it poured of rain, took his rifle, and went before, to lead us to the bear-trap.
The trap was in a place rather bare of thick stems, between young pines, and made of large logs, in such a manner that a young bear might be taken alive in it. It consisted of two round stems lying flat on the ground, between which two others, which are supported by a prop, are made to fit, and fall down when the prop is touched.[44] a is the base on which the two logs, b, rest; c, the two suspended logs, which fall as soon as the bear touches the bait, fixed in e, at the lower end of the rack f. The pole A, A, which is set in the rack f, rests in front on the prop g, and supports in h, by means of a withe, the logs c, c, c, c. When the bear touches the bait, the rack f moves, the pole A, A, becomes free, and lets the logs c, c, c, c, fall, which catch or kill the animal. The whole is covered with green fir boughs when the trap is set, and all the parts must have their bark on. The bear caught here, some days before, was about a year old, so that there was room for him between the logs; and as he was not large, and had entered the trap in front and not from the side, his life was prolonged a little. He was shot in the trap, and his head used as a bait; we took the head away with us, and the owner of the trap substituted a piece of the animal's lungs in its stead.
Bear-trap