DAYS IN THE OPEN

That the boy should use the homely “Ma,” rather than “Mamma,” makes it clear that he is not of our generation, although his generous crop of freckles looks familiar, and his blue jumper, coming down to the knees, and that battered straw hat, are sometimes duplicated in our own day. It is fifty years across which we look, even if he does stand out so clearly. The question is one that he asks daily, if not oftener, from the time when the pussy-willows begin to swell in the spring-time, to the season for comforters and woollen mittens in the late fall.

Hark! Do you hear the voice that is calling the boy? It comes distinctly across the long stretch of years, and is as sweet and compelling now as when it pulled at the heart of the lad on that long-ago summer day. It is the voice of the brook. It gurgles and laughs and pleads. It says, “Ha! ha! ha! Isn’t this a beautiful world, and this the finest day ever? Come on, little boy, and play in my ripples. I’ve some nice peppermint growing on my banks, and all sorts of pretty pebbles that I have washed for you. Look sharp, now! Do you see that trout lying at the head of the riffle? Do you know that I counted thirty-seven as big as he is between the bridge and the Deer Pond? Come and catch ‘em!”

That brook was a part, and a large one, of the first permanent impressions made upon the boy’s mind. It had its rise in a little pond, concerning which there was the usual dark legend that it had no bottom. Just what held up the water was a mystery, but the boy never doubted the legend. It was fed by numerous springs. Vigorous and noisy from the moment when it broke forth from its source, the brook was ten miles of silvery laughter.

“If you’ll not go out of sight of the house you may go for an hour,” says the mother, for she too has ears to hear the call of the brook and can understand its charm for her lad. “Just up in the pasture-lot above the bridge,” calls back the boy, and starts off with his pole and a supply of angleworms wrapped up in paper. Take special notice of that pole, for it is the joy of the boy’s heart.

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He had thought that a cedar sapling, peeled and thoroughly dried, made an ideal outfit, until a friend gave him a straight cane-pole painted a brilliant blue. In after years he owned not a few jointed rods, made by hand of split bamboo; but the tide of joy and pride has never risen higher in his heart than on the day when he became the possessor of the blue cane-pole.

There is a place in the pasture-lot where the brook stretches itself out in a long reach of still water. Above and below are rippling shallows. Wary as is his approach, the boy sees the shy trout darting from the riffles into the darker water. Patiently he dangles his baited hook by the side of a sunken log, and trails it temptingly back and forth before the coverts where the cunning fish lie hidden, but all in vain. They have learned by experience that the presence of a blue jumper and a blue pole spells out danger for them, and refuse to take any risks. Is this, like so many other fishing trips, to end in failure? Watch the boy! Laying the blue pole carefully on the ground, he rolls his sleeves to his shoulders and, lying on his stomach on the bank of the brook, thrusts one hand very gently into the water. With the utmost caution he feels here and there under the overhanging sods until at last his fingers touch something that sends an electric thrill tingling through the length of his little body. He feels a trout, and strangely enough it does not stir. The little fingers gently tickle the belly of the trout as they work their way towards its head, and when they have encircled the body at the gills they suddenly contract and the fish is thrown far back upon the grass. This performance is repeated three or four times, and then the trophies are gathered up in the jumper and with blue pole over his shoulder the boy goes proudly homeward.

Many years after the boy had grown to manhood he was riding with a friend on their way to a famous trout preserve. Naturally, the conversation turned to fishing experiences, and he told the story of the brook and of catching trout with his hands. The friend looked a whole volume of incredulity and exclaimed, “Well, of all the fish-lies I ever heard that takes the cake.” When the clubhouse was reached the keeper, a canny Scotchman, was interviewed. “Andrew, did you ever hear of catching trout with the hands?”

“Is it guddlin’ you mean? Mony a time. I’ve caught plenty of ‘em in the burns when a boy.” The skeptic was silenced if not convinced. Since that time a heated discussion of this mooted question has appeared in a prominent sporting journal, and able arguments have been adduced to prove the impossibility of any such feat as that ascribed to the boy. But he knows, and the brook knows, and the blue pole knows; and those may doubt who will.

“May I go fishin’ down in the woods?” The question came from an anxious heart, and the boy proceeded to support his request with reasons. “The biggest trout are down there. Edwin Crumb caught one that weighed ‘most a pound down there last week. There are no big ones in the pasture-lot. I’ll be careful, and I’m ‘most seven now, you know.” It was a momentous question. For two miles after leaving the bridge the brook ran through the woods, and the mother fancied all manner of possible and impossible dangers to her boy lurking among those trees. But then, the lad must be allowed to go out of her sight some time, and the day was full of sunshine.

“If you’ll be very careful, and not go far, and be back early, you may go.”

“Whoop!” and a small boy has disappeared from view before the permission is fairly spoken. No blue pole this time. The brush and alders are too thick and the pole too long. It is only a small birch limb, six feet long, possibly, that he pulls out from under the barn as he hurries to get out of hearing before the mother repents her rashness.

What a day that was! He has not gone far before, alongside the alders in the swift water, almost at his feet, he captures a larger trout than any ever granted him by the pasture-lot. He cuts a stringer from the over-hanging alders, and with fish in one hand and pole in the other proceeds on his adventurous way. For some time he steals along the gravelly bed of the brook, eagerly expectant but without getting even a bite. Certainly this is not very exciting, and his gaze begins to wander to the woods. Is that crinkle-root? Investigation yields a plentiful supply of the peppery plant and also three or four ground-nuts. Then the brook pulls him back to itself and a few rods farther on he comes to a log across the stream and partly under water. His heart gives a thump, for this must be the place where Edwin Crumb caught his big trout. It exactly fits the oft-repeated description. He leaves the bed of the brook, fetches a circuit through the brush and comes out just where he can drop his hook by the upper side of the log in the still water. The answer to his invitation is prompt, but the captive is not as large as was anticipated. Again and yet again he returns his lure only to meet a cordial reception, until five fair-sized trout have been added to the alder stringer; then activities cease.

We cannot follow him all through his eventful pilgrimage, but there is one experience that must not go unrecorded. In a tangle of brush formed by a tree-top which has fallen into a deep place in the stream he spies an open space, possibly eighteen inches in diameter, where the water is covered with scum and foam. Just the place for a big trout, but there is no way of getting even his short pole through the brush. The line is untied, and he goes crawling out on a limb that hangs over the brook, and sits, at last, astride it and directly above the enticing spot. A fresh and exceedingly fat angleworm is looped upon the hook and the wriggling mass is cautiously dropped into the middle of the scum. It has no sooner touched the water than there is a sharp tug and a mighty swirl, but only the hook and the remainders of the worm come back in answer to his pull. Another bait, and again the hook is lowered into the pool. No, the old fellow was not pricked the first time, for here he is again and this time firmly hooked. To balance the body on the limb when both hands are employed in tugging on the line, is no easy task, but at last the trout is in his hands and hugged to his breast. With the fingers of one hand through his gills and the thumb among the sharp teeth of the fish’s mouth, the slow journey is made back to the shore. Glory enough for one day! The prize measures about twelve inches and is thick through. Edwin Crumb’s trout is beaten with room to spare.

But now it dawns upon the boy that he has been gone a long time, and if he hopes to be permitted to repeat this trip he must hurry home. He also becomes acutely conscious of an awful vacuum in the region of his stomach which even crinkle-root and ground-nuts will not fill. He reasons with himself that he can reach home more quickly by striking through the woods to the road than by retracing his way along the brook. He is very sure that he knows the way, but his certitude evaporates steadily as he plunges his way through the woods. Just when he admits to himself that he has no idea in which direction the road lies, he emerges into a clearing and sees before him a group of farm buildings. They are certainly unfamiliar; but some one must live here and he can get directions as to his shortest way home. Who is that in the doorway? It cannot be Mrs. Woodman whose home is only a short half-mile from his own? But it is, and, to make his joy complete, this is baking-day and the good woman hands him out an apple turnover. All turnovers are good, but that one was far and away the best ever baked. A hungry boy and an apple turnover form a great combination.

It would not do to say that the boy and the brook were inseparable companions, for there were long months when the Frost King had everything his own way and the merry stream found it hard work to maintain its appearance even on the shallow riffles. Then there were swift flights down the hillsides for the boy, and long journeys up again dragging his sled. Often in the long winter nights he heard the half-smothered gurgle of the near-by brook, and wondered where the trout lived when the thermometer was below zero.

Even in the summer days the two friends could not be together all the time. A mile or so over the hill was the brown school-house to which the boy must make his pilgrimages five days each week for three months at a time, and where he learned, helped by the pictures, that three cherries and two cherries make five cherries, and wrestled more or less successfully with the multiplication table. The old meadow just above the orchard was a famous place for strawberries, and many hours the boy spent in gathering the luscious fruit while the bobolinks, perched on swaying mullein stalks or the old rail-fence, engaged in a vocal contest of riotous and maudlin song. Then a robin had built its nest on one of the big beams under the meetinghouse shed on the top of the hill, and the eggs must needs be watched and the young birds looked after. Sometimes the children strayed into the burial ground adjoining the church and pushed aside the myrtle to read on the little head-stone the name of a child that had died long, long ago.

If anything could make the boy forget the brook it was his dog. Very likely the dog had a pedigree, but it had not been recorded, and he was as dear to the heart of the child as if his ancestors had all been decorated with blue ribbons. Pedro and the lad knew where the woodchucks lived on the side of the hill above the pond, and it was a red-letter day when one of them was cut off from his hole by the two hunters and Pedro vanquished him in a pitched battle.

The brook has run through the years and its laughter sounds now in the ears of the writer. Somehow he hopes that the River of Life will be like the brook, larger grown. And ever as its murmur is heard a vision of the mother is seen.

The two grew into the boy’s heart together. In the last days when that mother had grown weary and was waiting for rest, the son sat by her bedside and they talked together of the long past days, of the home under the hill, of friends gone on into the silence, and of the brook with its sun-painted trout. She has been sleeping for many years on the banks of the Susquehanna, lulled by the ceaseless flow of the noble river with whose waters the waters of the brook are mingled.

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Here is a story of something that was shown me when I was a little boy. Every time I think of this story it seems to me more and more charming. For it is with some stories as it is with many people—they become better as they grow older.... And that something which was told me when I was a child, you shall hear too, and learn that whatever an old man does, is generally right.—Hans Christian Andersen, The Wife Perfect.

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II. THE TWO BOYS

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E may safely interpret a lowery day in haying time as a providential hint to go fishing. It did not require a strong hint of this kind to move grandfather, especially when the boy was around; for he not only loved to fish but he loved the boy who loved to fish, and was always planning something for his pleasure.

Why not stop for a moment just here to consider what sort of a grandfather a boy should have? Of course he must have white hair and a kindly face, but these are comparatively unimportant parts of his outfit. It is the disposition that counts. He must not have nerves. The peppery, irascible, impatient man, who growls and sputters on the least provocation, should never set up in business as a grandfather. In order to highest excellence he should keep the boy-spirit through all the experiences of life. The man who has entirely ceased to be a boy is disqualified.

This particular grandsire filled the bill completely. He never scolded, and never even grew tired of answering questions. When the little lad had reached the sled age, the cunning hands of his grandfather built him one that could easily distance all competitors. When skates had become an obsession, it was the same benefactor who invested his hard-earned money in the most wonderful pair that the boy had ever seen, and surreptitiously taught him to use them before the anxious mother knew anything about it. But the crowning day among all the many that these two spent together was that upon which the older boy taught the younger how to use a gun. The gun was a family heirloom, and tradition said that it had done duty in the Revolutionary War. The old flint lock had been removed and a percussion lock substituted; but the hammer refused to stay cocked. When it was fired, whatever might be the result to the object fired at, no uncertainty could be felt about the consequences to the firer; he was kicked certainly, promptly, and vigorously.

On an historic morning in the winter, when the grandfather was going into the woods to chop, he took the boy’s breath away by saying, “If you want to go with me to-day and take along the old shotgun, you may, possibly, shoot a squirrel.”

Will he go? If any boy reads these lines, let him answer. Gun over shoulder, and heart filled with infinite happiness, the boy trudges along the road, through the fields, and into the woods on the hillside, pouring forth a steady flow of talk. When the big beech, which the grandfather is turning into fire-wood, is reached, a council of war is held. Directions are given as to the proper way of handling a gun, and especially this one. “You’ll have to hold the hammer back with your thumb, and when you have taken good aim, let go.” Over and over again it is impressed upon the boy that under no circumstances is he to point the muzzle of the gun toward him.

While instructions are going on, a harsh call sounds from among the distant trees. The boy does not need to be told that it is the cry of the grey-squirrel, and with all the speed that caution will permit he hurries in the direction of the hidden challenger. Every now and then he stops to await a renewal of the cry, and then on again. Now the call is very near, almost directly overhead. Evidently it comes from somewhere high up in that great maple. For moments that seem hours he peers here and there among the leafless branches. At last the flirt of a grey tail catches his eye, and there, stretched along a limb near the top of the trees, lies the quarry. Up goes the long-barrelled gun, but the muzzle refuses to hold still. It describes circles and rectangles and zigzags, but persistently avoids the squirrel. Possibly it is too heavy for the slight muscles. Certainly the boy’s heart is beating a tattoo, and a severe attack of “squirrel fever” has him in its grip. Just as despair is completely overwhelming the lad, he sees a big log near by, and loses no time in getting behind it, with the gun resting upon it and pointing toward the tree-top. With this rest it is possible to keep the contraptious old gun still for a minute. Carefully he pulls back the hammer, takes a long sight over the barrel, and lets go. Have the heavens fallen and has the world come to an end? The gun bellows, and the boy turns a back-somersault in the snow, vaguely fancying that the entire universe has struck him. The squirrel is forgotten for a moment in the surprise caused by the back-action of the gun. But it is only for a moment, and then digging the snow out of his eyes, the boy peers anxiously up at the limb just occupied by the squirrel. It is empty. Has he missed him? Just when humiliation begins to creep into his heart he sees a grey heap on the snow, and sorrow turns to joy.

With gun over his shoulder and the squirrel hidden behind him, he takes the back trail, and soon rejoins the chopper. “I heard the gun go off,” says the old boy. “What did you shoot at?”

“A grey squirrel,” is the answer. “Missed him, eh?” This is the moment of supreme happiness, as the concealed game is brought to the front and the boy cries, “Missed him, did I? What do you think of that?” What amazement, simulated or real, appears on the older face! His surprise even surpasses the boy’s expectation. “Well! Well! If that isn’t a big one, and you killed him all by yourself! I’ll take his hide off when we get home and you shall have him for supper.”

It is more than probable that some dear people, if they have the patience to read thus far, will lay down the book in disgust, saying, “Cruel! Cruel! Boys should be taught never to take life unnecessarily.” The writer accepts their censure with all meekness, and assures them of his hearty sympathy. But he is writing of the boy in the open, the out-of-doors boy, the real boy, not of a becurled and anæmic male child, coddled and restrained and tutored until he is no more than a little manikin. And writing of the real boy as he has been, is, and evermore will be, it must be set down in all honesty that he loves the hunt.

But we have wandered a long way from that lowery day when grandfather said, “Boy, I can’t work in the hay-field today; what do you say to going over to the river fishing?” Now the boy had spent innumerable hours on the creek that flowed past the old farm-house, and had sought acquaintance with the bull-heads and horndace and eels for a mile in either direction, but the river he had fished only in his dreams. He had seen huge pickerel and giant perch which neighbours had exhibited as spoils from this wonderful stream, and in night visions he had walked along its banks and pulled out fish of enormous size and brilliant colouring. Now his dreams were to come true.

In the same valley with the river, and before it was reached, was the canal. Just below a lock, where the water looked to be infinitely deep to the boy, the grandfather stopped and said, “We will try it here for a while.” Nothing happened except that after feeling a tug at his line the boy pulled it in minus a hook. “Probably a turtle,” explains the elder: “Let’s go on to the river.” A quarter of a mile farther on and the shining river is reached, just where a dam had been many years before. Some of the logs remained, reaching out over the water, and upon these the two boys seated themselves and began to fish. Memory has failed to record all the incidents of that eventful day, but it has engraved the picture of the long string of fish which they carried home that night. The record is probably not any more accurate than some of which we read now-a-days, for it declares that this string was something over six feet long, and weighed at least a thousand pounds!

One experience of that day will not allow itself to be forgotten. The boy hooked a fish that put up an exceptionally vigorous fight, but was finally brought in. After it had been unhooked and was being exultantly inspected by the younger and exhibited for the admiration of the older boy, it gave a sudden wriggle, slipped through the hands of its captor, and fell back into the river. Woe of woes! For the time, life was not worth living. The biggest fish he had ever caught had gotten away! In spite of the most heroic efforts his chin began to quiver and then came a burst of tears. “Never mind,” said the older boy, “you’ll catch another just as good.”

That day and that particular event came back with startling distinctness more than thirty years later, and on the banks of the far-famed Nepigon. The boy had long since come to be a man, and was camped with two congenial friends at the lower end of “Pine Portage.” There had been long days of ideal trout-fishing and nights filled with refreshing sleep. One day an old man—apparently near to the Psalmist’s limit of years—with his son in the prime of life, came up the river with their Indian guides and stopped for a few hours to try the Pine Portage pool. While the younger man fished from the canoe, the father stood upon a rock that jutted out into the river and began casting. It was not long before he hooked a fish which gave every indication of being a big one. The old man fought him well. The son stopped in his casting to look on, and the campers came down to the shore to watch the battle. Out of the depths the gallant fish flung himself clear of the water, and then all saw that he was of unusual size. The son hastened to the shore and offered to take the rod and finish the contest, but the old man refused. A half-hour passed, and then the tired fish began to show signs of yielding and the fisherman already saw himself the proud captor of a six-pound trout, when—it was all over. Was there a flaw in the line? Had the aged sportsman inadvertently dropped the tip of his rod until the fish had a straight-away pull upon the reel? No matter what the cause, the line had parted under the last surge of the fish, and he was lost. For a moment the old face worked strangely, and then down went the white head, face in his hands, and we saw the shaking body as he sobbed out his disappointment Then the son laid his hand upon the senior’s shoulder and we heard him say, “Never mind, father, you’ll catch another just as good.” Ten and eighty are not far apart when we go fishing.

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As for my chosen pursuit of angling, (which I follow with diligence when not interrupted by less important concerns), I rejoice with every true fisherman that it has a greeting of its own, and of a most honourable antiquity. There is no record of its origin. But it is quite certain that since the days of the Flood... two honest and good-natured anglers have never met each other by the way, without crying out, “What luck?”—Henry Van Dyke, Fisherman’s Luck.

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III. THE TOWN-MEETING AT BLUE ROCK POOL

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IDN’T know that fish held town-meetings? That shows how your education has been neglected. A town-meeting is an assembly; fish assemble; therefore, fish hold town-meetings. Isn’t that conclusive? But the fact is one of experience as well as of logical deduction. It can be “mediated” by the faith of every disciple of the immortal Izaak.

This is the unadorned and veracious account of one of these piscatorial gatherings, held on an August day in Caine River, New Brunswick, seventeen miles from the nearest house. They had been gathering for days. Prominent citizens were there from Big Rock, five miles down the river, and almost every inhabitant of the Forks, three miles up stream, had answered to roll-call. A large number of youngsters who had lately taken up their abode in Blue Rock Brook seemed to think that this was some sort of circus, and had to be nipped into order by their more sedate seniors.

The main business on hand was to provide for the “summer schools” which had won a deserved reputation for excellence long before the University of Chicago opened its doors. It was customary, also, to elect a path-master at this time, that the highways might be looked after and kept free from grass. The Hon. S. Maximus Fontaine, political boss of Troutopolis, had things well in hand, and it was generally admitted that his slate would go through without a hitch.

No wonder that the beauty-loving trout came from far and from near to this place of assembly. If the truth must be told a majority cared less about the election than they did for the climate. Search the country over and you could not find a more charming spot. Just where a great clump of white birches made a whispering place for the wind, Blue Rock Brook came gurgling down into the river. Its source was a great spring back among the hills, and all along its course other springs gave of their best to keep its waters cool and sweet. From start to finish it was uncontaminated. When, at last, it found the river, it rested for a little in a big, clear pool, before giving of its freshness to the warmer waters of the larger stream. Just here, with clean gravel underneath and the nodding birches casting their shadows overhead, enswathed in a delicious coolness that defied the heat of the August sun, were gathered the clans on the day of which we write. It was here that they were deceived, betrayed, undone by a stony-hearted Preacher who had journeyed far to be present at this meeting. But that suggests backing up and starting over again in order to get the Preacher to this lonely spot.

How did he find the town-meeting? That is a long story and must be compressed if told at all. It would take more time than we have at our command to describe the mighty struggle through which the Preacher passed in wrenching himself away from the seductive stockyards’ odours of Chicago. He succeeded, however, and went meandering through New York State and Massachusetts, finally taking passage on a venerable tub that crawls—in fair weather—between Boston and Yarmouth. There was a vague idea haunting the ministerial mind that he wanted to see the Evangeline country; but that infant persuasion died suddenly in Digby. If any American tourist wants to see Nova Scotia let him keep away from Digby or put it last on his list. For fascination it discounts the Lorelei. All right-minded people (that means those who love to sail and fish) are charmed with this little town.

If we had not set out to tell how the Preacher broke up that Blue Rock town-meeting, we should stop right here and relate one or two mild stories about the fishing at Digby. Did you ever catch pollock that were run by ninety-horse-power steam engines? Pollock that would strike so hard that they dislocated the fisherman’s shoulders when he tried to check them up a bit? Did you ever catch a codfish weighing two hundred and seventy pounds? Now this is not about pollock or codfish, and it is just possible that one figure ought to be taken off the weight of that cod. Do not ask that we tell about the day’s fishing on the Bay of Fundy, for we must not do it. We “could a tale unfold,” but it shall not be unfolded here lest we never get to that town-meeting.

It was at the supper table in a Fredericton hotel that the existence of Blue Rock Pool first became known to the Preacher. He had opened his heart to the whole company and begged of them information concerning the trout fishing in that locality. One guest said that by driving out to the northeast four miles trout could be gotten in limited numbers and of small proportions. Another suggested going up the St. John’s River some ten miles. There was much talk of what had been done in time past, and much regret expressed that the Preacher had not come in June or waited until later. The time was very unfavourable—it always is. Under such consolation the mercury in the ministerial thermometer sank out of sight. When supper was over and the Preacher was leaving the table, a small man who had not said a word during the entire meal took the discouraged dominie to one side and said:

“If you are willing to make a trip of some sixty or seventy miles and camp out one night, I can tell you of a place where you can get some trout.”

“But,” said the Preacher, “I have no tent or blankets or duffle of any kind.”

“I’ll see to all that,” replied the little man; “I have everything that you will need, and it is yours to use.”

What a lot of good fellows there are in the world, and the majority of them love to fish. Here was a man putting his precious outfit at the disposal of an utter stranger, with no thought of reward or desire for it, simply to show a kindness to a brother devotee of the gentle art. And the little man proved to be a tailor. Now it has been said that it takes nine tailors to make a man; but you could have made nine average men out of that tailor and there would have been material left to patch the rest of the race. He gave the Preacher the name of a man who could be secured as a guide, helped him make out a list of eatables, brought over his caribou blanket, tent, dishes, etc., and bright and early the next morning the train going north carried a passenger bound for Blue Rock Pool.

Did you ever notice with what reluctance the average vehicle of transportation moves when it has a fisherman on board? If you use a horse, he’ll go to sleep; an auto is sure to throw a fit, and a railway train almost invariably stops and goes backward for a good share of the time. It looks as if there existed some sort of a “combine” to prevent the fisherman from making connections with the place where he knows bliss is waiting for him. It took the train six hours to go fifty miles! They called it an “accommodation”; but by the way that fisherman growled you could see that he did not realize that he was being accommodated. He did finally get to Doaktown, where his guide lived, and found the aforesaid gentleman waiting for him at the station in response to a telegram sent the night before. His name was George—at least it ought to have been—and he was a clean-looking, husky fellow about thirty-five years of age. Close at hand was Bucephalus adjusted to a buckboard. (Bucephalus was the prancing steed which had consented to haul us to Caine River.) He was not handsome except in behaviour; in that he was a beauty. Habakkuk had evidently not seen Bucephalus when he wrote: “Their horses are swifter than the leopard.” The duffle was piled on behind the seat, a bag of oats was given the place of honour on top of the duffie, and Bucephalus, gently and with infinite caution, began to move. A sense of security took possession of the Preacher’s soul with the first step that that horse took. There was something dignified and assuring about his movements that left the mind absolutely free to reflect upon the beauties of nature, untroubled by any fear of personal injury. About a mile out of Doaktown on the road to Caine River was a little hill. Bravely Bucephalus tackled it, stopping not more than twice each rod to give his passengers time to drink in the beauties of the scenery. It was during this period of hill-climbing, with its attendant spaces of quiet, that George began his wary approach towards getting acquainted with the Preacher.

George: “Where do you live?”

Preacher: “Chicago.”

George: “What might your business be?”

Preacher: “I’m a Preacher.”

Thereupon George’s lower jaw dropped until it almost seemed to rest upon the dashboard, while he rolled a skeptical eye towards his seat-mate. Being convinced after prolonged scrutiny that the truth had been told, he relapsed into silence, broken at last by the remark, “I’ll bet you ain’t a Baptist Preacher.”

When his bet was promptly taken, he brought the interview to a close by saying, “You must git a mighty sight more pay than our preacher or you’d never got so far from home.”

For some time as Bucephalus jogged along through the woods George was evidently depressed. He may have been reflecting upon certain emphatic remarks addressed to Bucephalus earlier in the journey, or, possibly, he was wondering how he could sneak out of his job. It was evident that he had not reckoned on piloting a body of divinity on a fishing trip and was somewhat dubious as to the prospect.

The road ended in Caine River, and for the five miles farther to Blue Rock Pool there was nothing for it but to take to the bed of the stream. It reminded one of driving over the cobble-stone pavements of Albany, New York, only not quite so much so. The Swedish movement which undertakes to joggle you all over is not in it for efficiency with such a ride. If there is any part of the anatomy that is unmoved by this wiggle and joggle it must be in the domain of the “subliminal self.” When within sight of the destination it was found that the Preacher’s suit-case, in which he had a change of underclothing, reel, flies, etc., had become discouraged and dropped off. It was found a mile down stream, resting against a rock, with not a thing wet. “I’ll set up the tent and git supper while you go after ‘em,” said George, an arrangement to which the Preacher promptly agreed. The bamboo rod was put together, leader and flies selected, and, just as the sun was touching the tree-tops on the west bank of the river, the Preacher intruded upon the town-meeting. Hon. S. Maximus Fontaine had just concluded a deal by which everything was to go his way, when a strange and gaudy insect alighted upon the surface of the pool and went wiggling toward the shore. There was a wild and unseemly scramble, but the honourable wire-puller had his own notions of precedence and, cuffing some of the smaller fry out of his way and frightening off others by the glare of his eye, he proceeded to make that tid-bit his own. No sooner had he closed his jaws upon the coveted dainty than he was sorry, for there was evidently “a string to it” and that string kept steadily tugging at his mouth. Much as he believed in “pulls” he did not enjoy this one, and tried to part with it. He cavorted about among his astonished fellow-townsmen, flung himself out of the water, darted towards a well-known root that had succoured him once before in a like experience, but still that firm persuasion at work upon his mouth would not let up and, at last, he gave ground and was guided out into the river.

Out in the stream, thirty or forty feet from the pool, stood the Preacher engineering this performance. To say that he was nervous is a mild statement. He was scared. It had occurred to him just after that battle had begun that his landing net was at the camp, and here was a big, big trout to be taken care of. A six-ounce bamboo rod does not lend itself to the derrick act by which you lift the fish out of the water by main force and throw him over your head, landing him some eighty rods away. It would not do to try tiring out the old warrior in the pool, for by the time that was accomplished all of his comrades would be in a state of mind that would effectually prevent any further levy upon them. So out in the river that fish must come while the fisherman takes his chances. It was a long, hard fight, carried on a good part of the time in swift water where the chances for the fish’s escape were excellent; but at last, tired out and helpless, he was led into the still and shallow water near the shore. There, just as the fisherman was reaching down for him, the old politician gave a last lunge that snapped the snood, and he was free; but before he could gather strength to swim away the Preacher lay down on him, and the days of Hon. S. Maximus Fontaine were numbered.

A new fly was fastened to the leader, and the disturbed citizens were invited to interview it. A half-dozen, so small that they did not know any better, were gathered in by the Preacher in one-two-three order. Then came a tug that meant business, and the Preacher began kicking himself for forgetting that landing net. It seems that a big politician from the Miramichi had come up to see how Hon. S. Maximus managed things, and as he had seen his friend tackle that first strange insect and disappear, he concluded that this was the proper thing to do. He followed his friend to the basket of the Preacher, but not until he had indulged in some contortions that nearly gave the sportsman nervous prostration.

By this time the shadows had thickened and George was yelling: “Supper’s ready.” He was mistaken. It took about fifteen minutes to dress and fry those half-dozen small trout—not one under half a pound—and while they were cooking the Preacher weighed his prizes. Hon. S. Maximus came within two ounces, and his friend within four ounces of four pounds. Did you ever take a four-pound trout, or even a three-pounder, on a light rod? Then you know how self-satisfied that Preacher was.

The tent had been pitched on a little plateau some fifteen feet above the river. It was nine o’clock when supper was finished and the dishes washed, horse picketed and everything made ready for the night. The caribou skin was laid on the bed of boughs, the blankets made ready for cover, and George and the Preacher “retired.” The campfire shone out against the dark background of the wooded hills, the river sung a lullaby, and George told a story about a moose that he had killed the previous winter not more than forty rods from the spot where they were lying, and—when the Preacher waked he was freezing. The fire had gone out, it was nearly daybreak, and those blankets seemed made of gauze. He had no inordinate affection for George under normal conditions, but now he rolled over and clasped him to his heart. George seemed to have lost his fear of the Preacher, and for the remainder of the night each tried to use the other as a stove. Each failed of absolute success.

It is evident that the teller of this story has violated one of the fundamental rules of homiletics, and made his porch too large for the house. There remains a whole forenoon of fishing to be disposed of and no time to tell about it. But if we had unlimited space at our command, who could fittingly describe even an hour of successful dalliance with the festive trout?

There were no more of the size of the political boss and his friend; but how they came! Something over fifty trout preferred the Preacher to the town-meeting, and when noon came that meeting had adjourned sine die—especially die. Some were eaten for dinner, some were on the table at the Doaktown hotel that night, George had what he wanted, and twenty-one went back with the proud Preacher to Fredericton the next morning.

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This simple fact, so glad in itself, so obvious to one who keeps his eyes open in Nature’s world, is mentioned here by way of invitation—to assure the reader if he but enter this School of the Woods, he will see little of that which made his heart ache in his own sad world; no tragedies or footlight effects of woes or struggles but rather a wholesome, cheerful life to make one glad and send him back to his own school with deeper wisdom and renewed courage.—William J. Long, School of the Woods.

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IV. IN THE NORTH WOODS

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TOP a minute!”

It was the frightful jolt as one of the wheels of the wagon struck a high boulder and then went down to the hub in a mud-hole that called forth this plaintive request.

“I’ll get out and walk!”

The cry came from one, but we made it unanimous with great alacrity. We were making our way in a lumber wagon from the railway station to Otter Lake. The driver said it was only ten miles to our destination, and for the first hour we were comparatively hilarious; then we struck the woods and trouble began. It was growing dark, and stumps and stones and sink-holes could not be seen and so were taken as they came. The wagon rose upon some obstruction to come down with a jar that seemed to loosen every joint in the body.

A little of this was quite enough, and the party made the last part of the trip on foot, tripping and stumbling through the darkness until, after what seemed an interminable time, the lights of the cabin flashed out through the trees. We were in no condition to be curious as to our surroundings that night and, after a supper of fried trout, were glad to tumble into bed. The remark of one of the boys of the family that the “old man” was away, did not seem to possess much significance until later on when we learned that he was serving time in the county jail for shooting deer out of season.

In the sunshine of the next morning we saw our surroundings clearly for the first time. A little clearing of a couple of acres on the lake shore, a rough log cabin with a rougher barn, a beautiful little lake guarded on the east and south by high hills timbered to their summits,—what more could the seeker after rest and recreation ask? Otter Lake is too small to be entitled to a place on the average map of New York, but it lies north of the Mohawk River and east of the railway running from Utica to Clayton. It is not far enough east to be considered as in the Adirondacks, and the section is familiarly known as the “North Woods.” An alternative term is “John Brown’s Tract,” as the hero of Ossawatomie at one time owned hundreds, if not thousands of acres of land in this locality, and cherished ambitious plans for a colony.

The party was made up of the Doctor, the Hardware Man, Frank, Jim, the Boy and the Preacher. Poor Jim! He could ill afford the expense of the outing, but he “felt all played out,” as he expressed it, and the physician had ordered him from behind the counter to the woods. Every day he cheerfully assured us that he was feeling better, and every day he grew thinner and his breathing more difficult. He was in the beginning of a fight which was to go on for a couple of years longer; then he gave up the battle and lay down to rest.

We had come prepared to camp out, and immediate preparations were made for realizing this ambition. The guide proposed Independence River as a favourable point and, as we knew nothing of that or any other part of the country, we acted upon his suggestion, especially as he had told marvellous tales of the Independence River trout. It was not a long or hard tramp to the place where we struck the river and pitched the tent. The sun was shining, the air was soft and warm, and the Hardware Man was running over with enthusiasm. As we made ready for the night, with a big fire blazing in front of the open tent, he remarked, “I’ve looked forward to this hour from my boyhood.” Whereas the more experienced members of the party pulled on extra sweaters for the night, the Hardware Man proceeded to disrobe as if he were in his house in Harlem. When some one suggested that he might feel the need of this clothing before morning, he exhibited his sleeping bag made of blankets and assured us that this would be quite sufficient. Just before dawn the next morning, when the camp-fire had gone out and a penetrating chill was in the air, some of the party were awakened by the movements of the Hardware Man. He crawled out of his sleeping bag, arrayed himself in his discarded garments, and when asked what was the trouble declared, “I’m freezing. One night of this is more than enough. My ambition is satisfied.”

That day was devoted to the alleged trout of Independence River. From what the guide had told us we had supposed that two-pounders were impatiently waiting to be caught. We fished all day and averaged half a trout apiece. Six ardent fishermen managed to capture three trout, not all of which would weigh two pounds. Evidently something was wrong. Fortunately, explanations abound when fish refuse to bite. It is too early or too late in the season. We haven’t the proper bait. It is too warm or too cold. They were taking everything offered last week, or they will begin biting next week. This time the fish had left the stream and were gathered on the “spring-holes,” so the guide assures us, and we do not question his pronunciamento. The trouble was that we couldn’t find any spring-holes. One thing the Preacher did find for which he was not looking; namely, a narrow escape from being shot. He had made a short cut through the underbrush to strike the river higher up, and as he came out upon the border of the stream found himself looking into the muzzle of a gun. A party coming down the river in a boat had heard the crashing in the woods and, of course, thought of deer. All that saved the Preacher was the fact that the man with the gun did not belong to that group of invincible idiots who shoot at a noise or at an unidentified moving object. A week later, in a camp three miles away, a young man was shot and instantly killed by his camp-mate who saw something moving in the bushes and fired on the chance of its being a deer. At the close of the day the Hardware Man presented numerous and cogent reasons why we should not spend another night in camp, and just before sundown we struck the trail back to the cabin.

After that we were content to make daily excursions, returning to the cabin at night. Camp life is delightful when proper provision has been made for comfort; otherwise, it is a delusion and a snare. We had not outfitted as we should, and our guide either did not know how to make good our deficiencies or was too lazy to undertake the job. There is a deal of poetry about tent-dwelling, and not infrequently that is all. It is possible to have a tent that will not leak, pitched so that a heavy rain will not turn your sleeping place into a pond; a bough-bed so constructed that the boughs do not poke you in the ribs all night; a commissary department that allows some little variety in the bill of fare and a cook who can at least boil potatoes. This, we say, is possible, and these desirable features are sometimes actualities. When they are, life is “one grand, sweet song.” But there are worse experiences than returning after a day’s tramp, tired and hungry, to find awaiting you an easy chair, a well-cooked meal and a comfortable bed under the shelter of a roof.

This outing was in the days before “jacking for deer” had become not only illegal but entirely unethical. The Preacher and Frank, with the guide, tramped one afternoon to a little lake some four miles away for the purpose of floating for deer that night. As it is useless to go on such a quest when the moon is in the sky, and that luminary had fixed upon ten o’clock as the hour for retiring that night, a fire was kindled on the hill-side, well back from the water, and the hunters waited upon the slow setting of the moon. Many questions of more or less importance were discussed and, at last, Frank said to the Preacher,

“Have you ever read ‘Robert Elsmere’?”

“Yes,” answered the Preacher. “Why do you ask?”

“Well, Pastor ———— advised me not to read it. He said he had preached on the book twice, and he had never read it.”

The Preacher chuckled and then roared, until the guide growled, “You’ll scare all the deer out of the lake and over the mountain if you make so much noise.” Possibly it was the Preacher’s vociferous hilarity that explains why we “jacked” around the shores of the lake that night for two hours without sighting anything more animated than a dead stump. The Preacher was comparatively young then and had not learned that the less we know about a matter the more unrestrained and cocksure we may be in discussing it.

Not a few experiences are more amusing when considered in retrospect than at the time when they are going forward. When the guide proposed to the Preacher that they visit a little lake a couple of miles from the cabin, try for trout at sundown and then float for deer when darkness had fallen, the proposition was greeted with applause. Although the trail was not an easy one, the guide carried a canoe on his shoulders and the Preacher trudged on behind with the guns and rods, his mind filled with alluring visions of mighty trout and at least one big buck. When the lake was reached and it came time to joint the rods, it was discovered that the reels and lines had been forgotten. The fly-book, with its gaudy contents, was in the Preacher’s pocket, but neither of the two felt competent to do any successful fishing without a line. It would be dark before the trip to camp and back could be made and, reluctantly, the fishing part of the trip was abandoned. That night there was no moon to compel them to wait upon its slow movements, and as soon as darkness had fallen the “jack” was lighted and the slow circling of the lake began. About two-thirds of the way around, the guide stopped paddling, then gave the canoe a little twist so that the bow pointed towards shore, and the Preacher felt the slight shaking of the canoe agreed upon as the signal to shoot. Shoot at what? He could see nothing.

A whisper came from the guide—“Shoot!”

“Where?” was wafted back from the half-paralyzed lips of the Preacher.

“There at the edge of the lily-pads, just a little to your left.” Did the Preacher see the dim outline of a form? He does not know to this day, but he shot as he was commanded. A mighty snort answered the shot, then splashing of water and breaking of limbs, and the guide announced, “You missed him.” The assertion was entirely gratuitous. In fact, the Preacher had not expected to hit what he could not see.

Just about that time a thunder-cloud in the west became so threatening that the guide proposed that they go on shore and get under shelter. That sounded good, but it was not just clear to the passenger where the shelter was to be found. However, the mystery was solved when the guide pulled the canoe to a dry spot on shore, turned it upside down, and both crept under it as the first big drops of rain came pelting down. Just as the Preacher was congratulating himself upon their good fortune, the dulcet note of a mosquito sounded in his ears. He promptly slapped, and then kept on slapping. The singer was the advance guard of an innumerable host. All of the tribe between Paul Smith’s and Lowville had evidently gathered to the feast. To make a bad matter the worst possible, the quarters were exceedingly cramped. One could not well roll over without rolling from under the canoe. The omnipresent root was persistently punching the Preacher’s ribs. To lift his sufferings to the nth power, that guide went to sleep and actually snored. It would have been a satisfaction to have companionship in suffering, but now this was denied him. Was it only four hours? It seemed like four eternities before the guide decided that they ought to start for the cabin. The storm had passed, but every bush showered quarts of water at the slightest touch. Just where the advantage lies in keeping dry from the storm, only to get soaked to the skin from tramping through miles of wet underbrush, is not yet quite clear. At two o’clock in the morning the cabin was reached, sans trout, sans deer, but not sans mosquito bites or a thorough drenching.

What a day that was which the Doctor and the Preacher spent on the East Fork! The lake is fed by two streams, one flowing in from the southeast and the other from the southwest. By a trail the eastern branch could be struck well up towards its source, and from this point down to the lake furnished just about the right distance for a day’s fishing. Bright and early the start was made, with plenty of bread and butter, a skillet, and a supply of fat, salt pork. The fisherman who could not be happy on such a stream, on such a day, whether the fish would bite or not, listening to the laughter of the water, watching the flickers of sunshine strained through the meshes of the trees, drinking in the sweet, pure air, in close touch with nature, is a hopeless pessimist. Fishing side by side, sometimes one and then the other going first, the friends loitered down that beautiful stream while “not a wave of trouble rolled across their peaceful breasts.” Now and then an exceptionally fine trout was taken, and then fishing was suspended while they examined and exclaimed over it. They wondered again, as they had often done before, why some of the fish should be red of fin and belly and with yellow meat, while others had the greyish-white fin and belly, with white meat. The Preacher caught two trout from under the same log, one with blood-red fins and golden flesh, the other white. They were both speckled trout, lived side by side, ate the same food, but differed as greatly as a red-headed boy and an albino.

At noon, where the waters of a cold spring bubbled out of the bank, a fire was made, the fat pork set to sizzling in the skillet and then—but what’s the use? Trout fresh from the brook, fried over a fire in the open and eaten with an appetite engendered by hours of tramping and wading, make a dish for the adequate description of which words are impotent. Of course, the smaller trout were chosen for the mid-day meal, not alone that the catch might look better when exhibited that night, but because they tasted better than the larger ones. How many did we eat? Ask the Doctor! Who should understand the proper amount of food to be taken into the stomach at a single meal, if not one of his profession?

An hour or so for luncheon and chatting, and then into the stream again and on our way towards its mouth. The creels were getting heavy, and the Doctor decided to take a short cut for the lake shore. Just before starting, the two were standing near together fishing a pool, when the Doctor, taking a forward step, slipped on a smooth stone and began falling. The process was the most slow, deliberate, and altogether comical the Preacher ever witnessed. As he began losing his balance and tipping over backwards, he made frantic efforts to regain his poise. Both hands waving in the air, one clutching his rod, eyes popping out of his head, a look of mingled surprise and disgust illuminating his manly face, the final, mighty splash as the stream yielded to the impact of his body, formed a most delightful picture for his sympathetic and sorrowing comrade. Strangely enough, the Doctor could not see the humour of the situation, and if he should ever deign to read this truthful record it is doubtful if he cracks a smile.

Thoroughly drenched, the Doctor’s previous determination to take a short-cut home was much strengthened. He struck off into the woods and the Preacher was left alone to follow the stream. When he had reached the cabin the Doctor had not arrived. When it was almost sundown and no Doctor, the guide started out in search of him. According to later reports the Doctor was found in a depressed state of mind playing hide-and-go-seek with the trees in a tamarack swamp. The guide declared that he knew where they were all of the time—a most credible statement. They were in a tamarack swamp. It was well towards nine o’clock when they arrived at camp, and it took a hot supper to restore their normal good spirits.

The guide had frequently descanted upon the excellence of the fishing on “Lost Creek”; but as that stream was seven miles away, and no trail led to it, members of the party had not shown great eagerness to make the trip. But when the lake and near-by streams had become familiar through frequent visits, the Doctor, the Boy and the Preacher decided upon an excursion to “Lost Creek.” After crossing the lake, the guide plunged into what seemed an impenetrable jungle, and steadily led the way up and over the hill, through dense thickets showing no sign of ever having been traversed before. He never seemed to hesitate which way to go, and his confidence was inexplicable to those who followed until he pointed to a tree that had been “blazed,” then to another in the distance. He was not guessing or travelling by compass, but following a “blazed trail.”

The first sight of the stream was disappointing not to say disheartening. Here was no dashing brook dancing its way along, but seemingly dead water in a great stretch of marsh land. The guide called it a “beaver-meadow,” although we saw no signs of the animal or of its architectural activities. But there were trout, as we soon proved. Pushing along through the marsh grass, frequent catches of good-sized fish were made, until at last the Preacher had a notable experience, not only for that day, but for any he ever spent in fishing. The Doctor was fishing ahead, and as he vacated a dry hummock, having taken two trout from that point of vantage, his friend stepped into the same spot. The first cast brought a trout, as did the second and the third and so on until he had taken sixty fine fish without stirring from his tracks. And they all came from the same point in the stream. The lure fell in vain three feet away from this particular spot. They were not fingerlings, but ten-inch and twelve-inch fellows. The Preacher’s creel and his pockets were full when the guide and the Doctor, returning along the creek, came upon him. The guide’s explanation was that the fortunate Preacher happened in his first cast to strike a “pot-hole,” a depression in the bed of the creek, where the water was cool and in which the trout gathered in great numbers. The explanation mattered little to the Preacher; it was the fact that counted. Even now he would gladly give two old sermons to be permitted to stand again on the banks of “Lost Creek” if he were sure of locating that “pot-hole.”

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Alps on Alps in clusters swelling,

Mighty and pure, and fit to make

The ramparts of a Godhead’s

dwelling.

—Tom Moore, On the Road.

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V. OVER THE SIMPLON PASS

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E agreed, my wife and I, that the couple whom we saw for the first time in the post-office at Domo d’Ossoli and a little later met in the gathering room at the hotel, would be well worth knowing. They were, evidently, not only husband and wife, but good chums, thoroughly congenial, and rejoicing in each other’s companionship. That they were intelligent no one could doubt, and they radiated kindliness and courtesy. They were dressed for roughing it, and we were prepared for the remark of the gentleman, made to a by-stander, that they had been spending a week in mountain climbing in the neighbourhood. When he added that they would cross into the Rhone Valley by diligence on the morrow, we were conscious of a distinctly pleasant sensation at the thought that, for one day at least, they were to be our fellow-travellers.

The table d’hôte that evening gave us the desired opportunity to cultivate the acquaintance of the attractive strangers, for they were seated directly across the table from us.

“Going over the Simplon tomorrow?” I venture to ask the gentleman. “Yes.”—Dead pause! “I am sure that you enjoy Italy,” is our next effort to make conversation. “Yes,” a pause even more absolutely dead than the preceding one. What’s the matter? Do they take us for pickpockets? We furtively examine our attire to see if we are looking especially dowdy, but can discover nothing very reprehensible. Possibly they are diffident, so here goes for another attempt:

“Do you know at what time we start in the morning?” Of course we know, have known for weeks; but it is a question whose answer offers good-sized opportunities for something more than a monosyllable.

“Six-thirty.” We wait anxiously, but that is all. Even the most obtuse individual must come to the conclusion that the questioner is being snubbed; quite courteously, but also very unmistakably snubbed. Our American blood begins to boil gently, and a solemn vow is registered then and there to let these attractive but unfriendly people severely alone. Meanwhile, they have been chatting with each other in some unfamiliar language which is not Italian or French or German.

When we leave the hotel the next morning for the all-day ride over the Alps our unresponsive fellow-travellers are in the banquette at the extreme rear end of the diligence, while we occupy the coupé directly under the driver’s seat. We could not speak to them if we would, and would not if we could. Indeed, they are soon forgotten in the joy of the hour. The deep blue of the Italian sky unflecked by a cloud, the broad, smooth highway, the cottages with their tiny patches of cultivated land, the exhilarating morning air and the rattling pace at which we bowl along for the first mile or more, would help us to ignore even a greater unhappiness than that caused by the snubbing of the previous evening.

Now we have left the level road and begin the long and tortuous climb towards the summit of the Simplon Pass. Again and again we cross the brawling stream with which the road disputes the right of way. The bridges are all of solid stone. Yonder, to the left, the mountains rise in great ridges and piles of raw rock, while on the right a more gentle slope is covered with grass and shrubs. We begin to count the waterfalls, threads of spun silver hung against the dark background of the rocks, but soon lose track of the count. On the heights the snow is lying, and by the roadside the wild flowers blossom in profusion. What a glory of flowers we find on these Alpine heights! In every meadow and pasture lot red and yellow and blue and purple, with many indescribable shades, delight the eye and the heart of the traveller. The rhododendron, with its brilliant colouring, is everywhere, and the little forget-me-not nods to every passerby. Up and still up we climb, and every turn of the road brings new exclamations of delight as the wonderful panorama of mountain and valley unfolds before us.

But now we have reached the summit, and the tired horses are brought to a halt in front of the little hotel where we are to have our mid-day meal. The village is a tiny one, of a dozen houses or so. The hotel does not look especially attractive, and the meal is even less appetizing than the appearance of the building has led us to expect. For once in our life we refuse chicken—at least we are content with one mouthful. Without attempting to file a bill of particulars, it is enough to say that the interval between the death of that bird and its appearance on the table as food has been unduly prolonged. With absolute unanimity the guests abjure chicken, for that meal at least. The food is so sublimely bad that every one laughs, and even our foreign friends who refused to respond to our advances of the previous evening join in the merriment. Somehow, during the course of the meal, we are led to speak of our nationality, and then comes the revelation.

“Americans?” cries the hitherto unfriendly foreigner. “Americans?” echoes his wife, who up to this time had not been supposed to understand a word of English. The mystery is solved. This gentleman and his wife are Hollanders and have taken us for English. It is at the time when the English-Boer war is at its height, and the Hollander has no dealings with the Englishman if he can help it. The gentleman is an Amsterdam physician, and a man of culture and wide reading. His evident effort to be friendly reaches a climax when he tells us of his hotel at Brieg, where we are to spend the night, and assures us that there we will be certain to have trout for dinner.

Now for the last half of the trip! We have only just left the hotel when the diligence is stopped and the passengers are asked to get out and walk for a mile across the debris of an avalanche which came thundering down from the terminal moraines of the Ross Boden glacier the previous spring. The diligence sways and lurches and thumps along, while we pick our way over stones and ice and around giant rocks. Halfway across we meet a young man who has spent nearly all of his waking hours for months past in search for the body of his sister who met her death under the sudden sweep of the avalanche.

Here, in this little monastery—so they tell us—is where Napoleon made his headquarters for a time when he led his troops over the mighty mountains to the sunny plains of Italy. We stop long enough to admire the St. Bernard dogs, and then on down the mountains. When we begin the descent some of the party assert that this ride will be less interesting than that of the morning when we were all the time climbing upward. Possibly it is; but it is far more exciting. Five horses going at full speed towards a precipice which drops away for a full thousand feet, the leaders seemingly pawing into space before they turn the corner, the outer wheels of the diligence constantly flirting with the edge of the precipice—these are things that lead to nervous prostration. As I look back at that trip I am satisfied that it was only by leaning hard toward the inside of the road that I saved the passengers and the whole outfit from untimely destruction.

When the Amsterdam doctor descanted upon the deliciousness of the trout served in the Brieg hostelry, he awakened memories of the Nepigon and the Adirondacks, of northern Wisconsin and the Miramichi! I formed a resolution, then and there, to catch as well as to eat some of the trout for which Brieg was said to be famous. Arriving at Brieg at 5.30 p.m. after our drive of forty miles, I at once interviewed the concierge of the hotel, who assured me that it would be no trick at all to catch a mess of trout before dinner-time. Away to a tackle store, where line and leader and hooks were bought and a cane-pole rented, an interview with the hotel “boy,” who dug a can of worms fat enough to have come from Holland, and then for the Rhone, which was rushing along the valley about half a mile distant. The first sight of the river somewhat dampened my ardour. It was of a dirty milk colour, and no respectable American trout would live in it for a moment. But then, I reasoned, Swiss trout may not know any better—so here goes. I fished in the rapids and in swirling pools, under low bending alders and by the side of huge rocks. I skittered those fat worms on the surface, and dropped them down to the bottom. Every trick of the angler learned by experience or gathered from conversation and reading, was tried in vain. Tell it not in Skegemog and publish it not on Prairie River!—but I never had a bite. And yet I was not cast down. The setting sun was turning the mountain tops into glory, the laughter of reapers in a neighbouring field, the tinkle of goats’ bells far up the mountain side, the gurgle and singing of the Rhone, the beauty of that matchless valley—I had gained all these by my efforts, even though of fish I had none.

Let no hard-hearted reader giggle over my poor luck, for when I sat down that night to dinner, and the far-famed Brieg trout were placed before me, behold! they were not trout at all, but some sort of a sucker, full of pronged bones and with soft white meat. I never had any ambition to catch suckers.

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The sea is a jovial comrade;

He laughs wherever he goes;

His merriment shines in the dim-

pling lines

That wrinkle his hale repose.

He lays him down at the feet of the

sun

And shaking all over with glee,

And the broad-backed billows fall

faint on the shore

In the mirth of the mighty sea!

—Bayard Taylor, Wind and Sea.

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VI. ON SEA AND SHORE

[Original]

R. W. D. HOWELLS made a most pathetic confession some years ago in an article contributed to a well-known journal when he said concerning vacations, “Whatever choice you make, you are pretty sure to regret it.” Either Mr. Howells was “out of tune with the universe” or he never tried Edgartown.

Lest some of our readers should assume some selfish motive as prompting this bold proclamation of Edgartown as an attractive spot in which to spend the summer days, let it be said that the writer does not stand in with any hotel proprietor or real estate dealer in this village by the sea—or elsewhere.

Just how Martha’s Vineyard came by its name is not certain. One tradition has it that when, in 1605, Bartholomew Gosnold sailed from England for “Northern Virginia” and chanced upon No Man’s Land, he gave it the name of Martha’s Vineyard, and that, for some unknown reason, this name was transferred to the neighbouring island.

Still another tradition alleges that the first settler on the island had a loved daughter to whom he gave a tract of land where vines grew luxuriantly; and so not only her tract, but the whole island came to be known as Martha’s Vineyard. Neither theory costs anything; they are probably about equally true—you can take your choice.

At the extreme eastern end of Martha’s Vineyard is the quaint, restful village of Edgartown. Turn your face towards the sun-rise and you look across a narrow bay to Chappaquiddick Island, lying like a giant earthwork to protect the village from the assaults of the ocean. Wouldn’t you like to ramble about a bit? We’ll start in at this ravine south of the town, for it was here that the first settler made his home. Considering that he built his log cabin in 1630, only ten years after the landing of the Pilgrims, it is not strange that nothing remains to mark the place of his abode but this grass-grown depression in the hill-side.

Going south along the main street we come to the old Mayhew house, built in 1698, and looking as if it proposed to stand for a few centuries longer. Tradition has it that during the Revolutionary War a cannon-ball passed through its walls, going in at the rear and coming out at the front. We stop just long enough to make an unsuccessful hunt for the hole, and then on to the Collins place. What is there especially interesting about this fairly modern house? Just this: that it was our home through many summer days, and we can never think of it or of its hospitable mistress without a thrill of delight. Out there in the front yard gleam the white grave-stones which mark the resting places of members of the family who died a hundred and fifty years ago. From the wide porch at the back of the house you look out over the bay to Chappaquiddick, and may even catch glimpses of the sea, looking either to the north or to the south.

We’ve rested long enough, and will resume our journey up the street to the Fisher house. Some day we will make a long stop here, for it is a pre-revolutionary mansion and full of relics of the olden days. Here are quaint old deeds, some of them in the Indian language, and no end of curios gathered by members of the family during a prolonged stay in Spain.

If you’ve leisure, let’s visit the piers. Time was when all was bustle here, but it is depressingly quiet now. Forty vessels in a single year sailed from this port in search of whales. An old record bearing date of November 11, 1652, tells us that “Thos. Daggett and Wm. Weeks are appointed whale cutters for this year; voted the day above written.” In those days whales were frequently cast upon the beach by severe storms, and whale cutters were appointed to insure a fair division of the spoil. Now the whaling industry is a thing of the past. One of the pathetic sights of the village is an old whaling vessel tied to the pier and slowly rotting away. It is many a year since the last of these vessels sailed from port, but if we are fortunate enough to meet one of the retired captains and can induce him to tell us something of his experiences, we shall come quite near enough to the hardships and privations of those heroic days. Do you see that man going along Water Street? He sailed a whaling vessel for forty years, and one of his voyages lasted six years lacking ten days.

DAYS IN THE OPEN

By Lathan A. Crandall

Illustrated by Louis Rhead

Fleming H. Revell Company1914

THE BOY AND THE BROOK

I. THE BOY AND THE BROOK

II. THE TWO BOYS

III. THE TOWN-MEETING AT BLUE ROCK POOL

IV. IN THE NORTH WOODS

V. OVER THE SIMPLON PASS

VI. ON SEA AND SHORE

Fleming H. Revell Company
1914