A great if not famous inventor once lived in Ponkapoag. James Basin came from one of the Channel Islands, a French Huguenot, with his family, and settled in the little village; it would be hard to tell why. He invented the "Basin trumpet," a curious kind of cornet with which one gets change of pitch by turning a crank with one hand while holding the instrument to the mouth with the other. This was played in the choir in the Congregational church of those early days. He invented many other musical instruments, one the forerunner of the cabinet organ which made a fortune for certain New Englanders. He invented a braiding machine which has since his day made millions for Rhode Island factories. It may be that he invented the strangest form of double-runner that I have heard of, and which was used on Ponkapoag Hill, but I fancy not. That I guess was an inspiration worked out on the spat by some hardy Yankee. It consisted of a great wood-sled on which half the village could be accommodated. This was hauled by horses to the top of the hill, a boy of more than ordinary courage, strength, and-it seems to me-skill, sitting on that diminutive sled in front of the great on-rushing mass and guiding it in safety to the bottom of the hill, time after time.
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That a boy should have been found that would turn this trick after he had once successfully done it is not so difficult to believe as that one should have the hardihood to undertake it for the first time to find out whether he could do it or not. This Yankee Casabianca, or whatever he ought to be called, I myself knew after he had reached years of middle life and I dare say discretion. I remember well his breadth of back and depth of chest, and I think it quite true that he once lifted a barrel of flour in his teeth, but whether he got his start in physical strength steering that Ponkapoag-invented double-runner down the long hill, or whether he had to have the strength inborn in the first place to be able to do it, I cannot say.
They have a wonderful curve over at St. Moritz known as the "Cresta Run," 1320 yards long and abounding in hair-raising thrills from start to finish. Hardly has the rider, lying prone on his steel-skeleton flyer, got under good headway before he comes to the "church leap." Here a swinging descent shoots him into a double compound curve where he must flash to the left and again to the right in letter S fashion, helped to be sure, by raised banks on either side as he needs them. The banks help, but it takes lightning combinations of wisdom, skill and strength to make the turns in safety for all that, nor does he have a chance for a long breath before he shoots at ever increasing speed into the "battledore" where the course turns almost at a right angle and shoots him on into the "shuttlecock" where he must negotiate another right angle. Then he must immediately take "stream corner" and be ready for his plunge into "the straight." From this again he has to take "Bulpett's corner." By this time he may be going seventy miles an hour, but "cresta leap" is before him, after which he has only to go up the steep hill which is supposed to arrest his speed at the finish. Yet even here his skill must be in full play, as riders have been known to go forty feet in air over the crest of the hill and take a fine plunge into the soft snow beyond. Indeed, the soft snow waits the venturesome rider at every turn of the famous St. Moritz course, and many there be who go to it before "church leap" is fairly negotiated, thus early in the game. The whole course, nearly a mile, is frequently made in a little over a minute and a quarter.
All this is fine to see, without doubt, and finer still to do, but do you know, if I could have my choice and could see but one, I would choose to see that leviathan double-runner of a half-century ago swinging the curve at Captain Bill Tucker's corner, followed by that big wood-sled with the half of Ponkapoag's population on it, and hear the joyous Yankee shouts as they resounded all the way from the crest of the hill to George B.'s blacksmith shop.
CHAPTER XXV
PICKEREL FISHING
I rarely know where the pickerel fishermen come from. They seem to be a race apart and their talk is not of towns or politics, of business or religion. Neither love nor war is their theme, but ice and fishing through it, and what happens to a man while so doing. If I suggest Randolph, or Framingham, Wellesley or Weymouth, they know them, perchance, as places where such and such ponds have a depth that is known to them and ice on which they have had adventures which they can detail. Those things for which the towns stand characterized in the minds of most men are nothing to them, but rather what bait may be found in their streams or what fish may be drawn through the ice in their territory. On days when I talk with them Boston centres about the Quincy Market, where bait is sold and pickerel are displayed, and the sporting goods stores, the merits of whose tackle are known to a nicety. Thus are worlds multiplied to infinity, each one of us having his own. But to step into that of the pickerel fishermen of a midwinter day adds zest to the excursion.
They are quite like the juncos, to me, these genial men of the frozen day. They suddenly appear from I know not where, share the joys of the day and place for a brief time, then walk off the ice again with their traps, going I know not whither. The next day in all probability, if it be a good one for fishing, others will come to fish in the same places and in the same way, but not usually the same men. Thus the winter wandering birds appear, take their toll of the day and the earth on which it shines, give the joy of their presence to all who seek it understandingly, then vanish. It would seem as if the pickerel fishermen were a distinct species, like the tree sparrows and the pine grosbeaks, winter visitors not to be looked for in warm weather, folk who pass from pond to pond, taking toll of all and thus learning their characteristics so definitely, though this seems hardly probable. Probably my pickerel fishermen of yesterday are artisans today, bookkeepers perhaps or salesmen, so differently dressed and occupied, their talk of such different things that I would not know them, for of all animals man alone is able to put on or take off an individuality at will, changing his countenance with his garment and his mind with his occupation. The Natty Bumpo of today may be the natty dry goods clerk of tomorrow, assuming the Bumpo with his fishing togs and making his talk of many ponds fit the clothes.