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FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END* + + + + +This etext was prepared by Donald Lainson, charlie@idirect.com. + + + + + +LITTLE RIVERS + +A BOOK OF ESSAYS IN PROFITABLE IDLENESS + +by HENRY VAN DYKE + + + + +"And suppose he takes nothing, yet he enjoyeth a delightful walk by +pleasant Rivers, in sweet Pastures, amongst odoriferous Flowers, +which gratifie his Senses, and delight his Mind; which Contentments +induce many (who affect not Angling) to choose those places of +pleasure for their summer Recreation and Health." + +COL. ROBERT VENABLES, The Experienc'd Angler, 1662. + + + +DEDICATION + + +To one who wanders by my side +As cheerfully as waters glide; +Whose eyes are brown as woodland streams, +And very fair and full of dreams; +Whose heart is like a mountain spring, +Whose thoughts like merry rivers sing: +To her--my little daughter Brooke-- +I dedicate this little book. + + + + +CONTENTS + + + I. Prelude + + II. Little Rivers + + III. A Leaf of Spearmint + + IV. Ampersand + + V. A Handful of Heather + + VI. The Ristigouche from a Horse-Yacht + + VII. Alpenrosen and Goat's-Milk + +VIII. Au Large + + IX. Trout-Fishing in the Traun + + X. At the sign of the Balsam Bough + + XI. A Song after Sundown + + + + +PRELUDE + + +AN ANGLER'S WISH IN TOWN + + +When tulips bloom in Union Square, +And timid breaths of vernal air + Are wandering down the dusty town, +Like children lost in Vanity Fair; + +When every long, unlovely row +Of westward houses stands aglow + And leads the eyes toward sunset skies, +Beyond the hills where green trees grow; + +Then weary is the street parade, +And weary books, and weary trade: + I'm only wishing to go a-fishing; +For this the month of May was made. + + +I guess the pussy-willows now +Are creeping out on every bough + Along the brook; and robins look +For early worms behind the plough. + +The thistle-birds have changed their dun +For yellow coats to match the sun; + And in the same array of flame +The Dandelion Show's begun. + +The flocks of young anemones +Are dancing round the budding trees: + Who can help wishing to go a-fishing +In days as full of joy as these? + + +I think the meadow-lark's clear sound +Leaks upward slowly from the ground, + While on the wing the bluebirds ring +Their wedding-bells to woods around: + +The flirting chewink calls his dear +Behind the bush; and very near, + Where water flows, where green grass grows, +Song-sparrows gently sing, "Good cheer:" + +And, best of all, through twilight's calm +The hermit-thrush repeats his psalm: + How much I'm wishing to go a-fishing +In days so sweet with music's balm! + + +'Tis not a proud desire of mine; +I ask for nothing superfine; + No heavy weight, no salmon great, +To break the record, or my line: + +Only an idle little stream, +Whose amber waters softly gleam, + Where I may wade, through woodland shade, +And cast the fly, and loaf, and dream: + +Only a trout or two, to dart +From foaming pools, and try my art: + No more I'm wishing--old-fashioned fishing, +And just a day on Nature's heart. + +1894. + + + + +LITTLE RIVERS + + +A river is the most human and companionable of all inanimate +things. It has a life, a character, a voice of its own, and is as +full of good fellowship as a sugar-maple is of sap. It can talk in +various tones, loud or low, and of many subjects, grave and gay. +Under favourable circumstances it will even make a shift to sing, +not in a fashion that can be reduced to notes and set down in black +and white on a sheet of paper, but in a vague, refreshing manner, +and to a wandering air that goes + + + "Over the hills and far away." + + +For real company and friendship, there is nothing outside of the +animal kingdom that is comparable to a river. + +I will admit that a very good case can be made out in favour of +some other objects of natural affection. For example, a fair +apology has been offered by those ambitious persons who have fallen +in love with the sea. But, after all, that is a formless and +disquieting passion. It lacks solid comfort and mutual confidence. +The sea is too big for loving, and too uncertain. It will not fit +into our thoughts. It has no personality because it has so many. +It is a salt abstraction. You might as well think of loving a +glittering generality like "the American woman." One would be more +to the purpose. + +Mountains are more satisfying because they are more individual. It +is possible to feel a very strong attachment for a certain range +whose outline has grown familiar to our eyes, or a clear peak that +has looked down, day after day, upon our joys and sorrows, +moderating our passions with its calm aspect. We come back from +our travels, and the sight of such a well-known mountain is like +meeting an old friend unchanged. But it is a one-sided affection. +The mountain is voiceless and imperturbable; and its very loftiness +and serenity sometimes make us the more lonely. + +Trees seem to come closer to our life. They are often rooted in +our richest feelings, and our sweetest memories, like birds, build +nests in their branches. I remember, the last time that I saw +James Russell Lowell, (only a few weeks before his musical voice +was hushed,) he walked out with me into the quiet garden at Elmwood +to say good-bye. There was a great horse-chestnut tree beside the +house, towering above the gable, and covered with blossoms from +base to summit,--a pyramid of green supporting a thousand smaller +pyramids of white. The poet looked up at it with his gray, pain- +furrowed face, and laid his trembling hand upon the trunk. "I +planted the nut," said he, "from which this tree grew. And my +father was with me and showed me how to plant it." + +Yes, there is a good deal to be said in behalf of tree-worship; and +when I recline with my friend Tityrus beneath the shade of his +favourite oak, I consent in his devotions. But when I invite him +with me to share my orisons, or wander alone to indulge the luxury +of grateful, unlaborious thought, my feet turn not to a tree, but +to the bank of a river, for there the musings of solitude find a +friendly accompaniment, and human intercourse is purified and +sweetened by the flowing, murmuring water. It is by a river that I +would choose to make love, and to revive old friendships, and to +play with the children, and to confess my faults, and to escape +from vain, selfish desires, and to cleanse my mind from all the +false and foolish things that mar the joy and peace of living. +Like David's hart, I pant for the water-brooks. There is wisdom in +the advice of Seneca, who says, "Where a spring rises, or a river +flows, there should we build altars and offer sacrifices." + +The personality of a river is not to be found in its water, nor in +its bed, nor in its shore. Either of these elements, by itself, +would be nothing. Confine the fluid contents of the noblest stream +in a walled channel of stone, and it ceases to be a stream; it +becomes what Charles Lamb calls "a mockery of a river--a liquid +artifice--a wretched conduit." But take away the water from the +most beautiful river-banks, and what is left? An ugly road with +none to travel it; a long, ghastly scar on the bosom of the earth. + +The life of a river, like that of a human being, consists in the +union of soul and body, the water and the banks. They belong +together. They act and react upon each other. The stream moulds +and makes the shore; hollowing out a bay here, and building a long +point there; alluring the little bushes close to its side, and +bending the tall slim trees over its current; sweeping a rocky +ledge clean of everything but moss, and sending a still lagoon full +of white arrow-heads and rosy knot-weed far back into the meadow. +The shore guides and controls the stream; now detaining and now +advancing it; now bending it in a hundred sinuous curves, and now +speeding it straight as a wild-bee on its homeward flight; here +hiding the water in a deep cleft overhung with green branches, and +there spreading it out, like a mirror framed in daisies, to reflect +the sky and the clouds; sometimes breaking it with sudden turns and +unexpected falls into a foam of musical laughter, sometimes +soothing it into a sleepy motion like the flow of a dream. + +Is it otherwise with the men and women whom we know and like? Does +not the spirit influence the form, and the form affect the spirit? +Can we divide and separate them in our affections? + +I am no friend to purely psychological attachments. In some +unknown future they may be satisfying, but in the present I want +your words and your voice with your thoughts, your looks and your +gestures to interpret your feelings. The warm, strong grasp of +Greatheart's hand is as dear to me as the steadfast fashion of his +friendships; the lively, sparkling eyes of the master of Rudder +Grange charm me as much as the nimbleness of his fancy; and the +firm poise of the Hoosier Schoolmaster's shaggy head gives me new +confidence in the solidity of his views of life. I like the pure +tranquillity of Isabel's brow as well as her + + + "most silver flow + Of subtle-paced counsel in distress." + + +The soft cadences and turns in my lady Katrina's speech draw me +into the humour of her gentle judgments of men and things. The +touches of quaintness in Angelica's dress, her folded kerchief and +smooth-parted hair, seem to partake of herself, and enhance my +admiration for the sweet order of her thoughts and her old- +fashioned ideals of love and duty. Even so the stream and its +channel are one life, and I cannot think of the swift, brown flood +of the Batiscan without its shadowing primeval forests, or the +crystalline current of the Boquet without its beds of pebbles and +golden sand and grassy banks embroidered with flowers. + +Every country--or at least every country that is fit for +habitation--has its own rivers; and every river has its own +quality; and it is the part of wisdom to know and love as many as +you can, seeing each in the fairest possible light, and receiving +from each the best that it has to give. The torrents of Norway +leap down from their mountain home with plentiful cataracts, and +run brief but glorious races to the sea. The streams of England +move smoothly through green fields and beside ancient, sleepy +towns. The Scotch rivers brawl through the open moorland and flash +along steep Highland glens. The rivers of the Alps are born in icy +caves, from which they issue forth with furious, turbid waters; but +when their anger has been forgotten in the slumber of some blue +lake, they flow down more softly to see the vineyards of France and +Italy, the gray castles of Germany, the verdant meadows of Holland. +The mighty rivers of the West roll their yellow floods through +broad valleys, or plunge down dark canyons. The rivers of the +South creep under dim arboreal archways hung with banners of waving +moss. The Delaware and the Hudson and the Connecticut are the +children of the Catskills and the Adirondacks and the White +Mountains, cradled among the forests of spruce and hemlock, playing +through a wild woodland youth, gathering strength from numberless +tributaries to bear their great burdens of lumber and turn the +wheels of many mills, issuing from the hills to water a thousand +farms, and descending at last, beside new cities, to the ancient +sea. + +Every river that flows is good, and has something worthy to be +loved. But those that we love most are always the ones that we +have known best,--the stream that ran before our father's door, the +current on which we ventured our first boat or cast our first fly, +the brook on whose banks we first picked the twinflower of young +love. However far we may travel, we come back to Naaman's state of +mind: "Are not Abana and Pharpar, rivers of Damascus, better than +all the waters of Israel?" + +It is with rivers as it is with people: the greatest are not always +the most agreeable, nor the best to live with. Diogenes must have +been an uncomfortable bedfellow: Antinous was bored to death in the +society of the Emperor Hadrian: and you can imagine much better +company for a walking trip than Napoleon Bonaparte. Semiramis was +a lofty queen, but I fancy that Ninus had more than one bad +quarter-of-an-hour with her: and in "the spacious times of great +Elizabeth" there was many a milkmaid whom the wise man would have +chosen for his friend, before the royal red-haired virgin. "I +confess," says the poet Cowley, "I love littleness almost in all +things. A little convenient Estate, a little chearful House, a +little Company, and a very little Feast, and if I were ever to fall +in Love again, (which is a great Passion, and therefore, I hope, I +have done with it,) it would be, I think, with Prettiness, rather +than with Majestical Beauty. I would neither wish that my +Mistress, nor my Fortune, should be a Bona Roba, as Homer uses to +describe his Beauties, like a daughter of great Jupiter for the +stateliness and largeness of her Person, but as Lucretius says: + + + 'Parvula, pumilio, [Greek text omitted], tota merum sal.'" + + +Now in talking about women it is prudent to disguise a prejudice +like this, in the security of a dead language, and to intrench it +behind a fortress of reputable authority. But in lowlier and less +dangerous matters, such as we are now concerned with, one may dare +to speak in plain English. I am all for the little rivers. Let +those who will, chant in heroic verse the renown of Amazon and +Mississippi and Niagara, but my prose shall flow--or straggle along +at such a pace as the prosaic muse may grant me to attain--in +praise of Beaverkill and Neversink and Swiftwater, of Saranac and +Raquette and Ausable, of Allegash and Aroostook and Moose River. +"Whene'er I take my walks abroad," it shall be to trace the clear +Rauma from its rise on the fjeld to its rest in the fjord; or to +follow the Ericht and the Halladale through the heather. The +Ziller and the Salzach shall be my guides through the Tyrol; the +Rotha and the Dove shall lead me into the heart of England. My +sacrificial flames shall be kindled with birch-bark along the +wooded stillwaters of the Penobscot and the Peribonca, and my +libations drawn from the pure current of the Ristigouche and the +Ampersand, and my altar of remembrance shall rise upon the rocks +beside the falls of Seboomok. + +I will set my affections upon rivers that are not too great for +intimacy. And if by chance any of these little ones have also +become famous, like the Tweed and the Thames and the Arno, I at +least will praise them, because they are still at heart little +rivers. + +If an open fire is, as Charles Dudley Warner says, the eye of a +room; then surely a little river may be called the mouth, the most +expressive feature, of a landscape. It animates and enlivens the +whole scene. Even a railway journey becomes tolerable when the +track follows the course of a running stream. + +What charming glimpses you catch from the window as the train winds +along the valley of the French Broad from Asheville, or climbs the +southern Catskills beside the Aesopus, or slides down the +Pusterthal with the Rienz, or follows the Glommen and the Gula from +Christiania to Throndhjem. Here is a mill with its dripping, lazy +wheel, the type of somnolent industry; and there is a white +cascade, foaming in silent pantomime as the train clatters by; and +here is a long, still pool with the cows standing knee-deep in the +water and swinging their tails in calm indifference to the passing +world; and there is a lone fisherman sitting upon a rock, rapt in +contemplation of the point of his rod. For a moment you become a +partner of his tranquil enterprise. You turn around, you crane +your neck to get the last sight of his motionless angle. You do +not know what kind of fish he expects to catch, nor what species of +bait he is using, but at least you pray that he may have a bite +before the train swings around the next curve. And if perchance +your wish is granted, and you see him gravely draw some unknown, +reluctant, shining reward of patience from the water, you feel like +swinging your hat from the window and crying out "Good luck!" + +Little rivers seem to have the indefinable quality that belongs to +certain people in the world,--the power of drawing attention +without courting it, the faculty of exciting interest by their very +presence and way of doing things. + +The most fascinating part of a city or town is that through which +the water flows. Idlers always choose a bridge for their place of +meditation when they can get it; and, failing that, you will find +them sitting on the edge of a quay or embankment, with their feet +hanging over the water. What a piquant mingling of indolence and +vivacity you can enjoy by the river-side! The best point of view +in Rome, to my taste, is the Ponte San Angelo; and in Florence or +Pisa I never tire of loafing along the Lung' Arno. You do not know +London until you have seen it from the Thames. And you will miss +the charm of Cambridge unless you take a little boat and go +drifting on the placid Cam, beneath the bending trees, along the +backs of the colleges. + +But the real way to know a little river is not to glance at it here +or there in the course of a hasty journey, nor to become acquainted +with it after it has been partly civilised and spoiled by too close +contact with the works of man. You must go to its native haunts; +you must see it in youth and freedom; you must accommodate yourself +to its pace, and give yourself to its influence, and follow its +meanderings whithersoever they may lead you. + +Now, of this pleasant pastime there are three principal forms. You +may go as a walker, taking the river-side path, or making a way for +yourself through the tangled thickets or across the open meadows. +You may go as a sailor, launching your light canoe on the swift +current and committing yourself for a day, or a week, or a month, +to the delightful uncertainties of a voyage through the forest. +You may go as a wader, stepping into the stream and going down with +it, through rapids and shallows and deeper pools, until you come to +the end of your courage and the daylight. Of these three ways I +know not which is best. But in all of them the essential thing is +that you must be willing and glad to be led; you must take the +little river for your guide, philosopher, and friend. + +And what a good guidance it gives you. How cheerfully it lures you +on into the secrets of field and wood, and brings you acquainted +with the birds and the flowers. The stream can show you, better +than any other teacher, how nature works her enchantments with +colour and music. + +Go out to the Beaver-kill + + + "In the tassel-time of spring," + + +and follow its brimming waters through the budding forests, to that +corner which we call the Painter's Camp. See how the banks are all +enamelled with the pale hepatica, the painted trillium, and the +delicate pink-veined spring beauty. A little later in the year, +when the ferns are uncurling their long fronds, the troops of blue +and white violets will come dancing down to the edge of the stream, +and creep venturously out to the very end of that long, moss- +covered log in the water. Before these have vanished, the yellow +crow-foot and the cinquefoil will appear, followed by the star- +grass and the loose-strife and the golden St. John's-wort. Then +the unseen painter begins to mix the royal colour on his palette, +and the red of the bee-balm catches your eye. If you are lucky, +you may find, in midsummer, a slender fragrant spike of the purple- +fringed orchis, and you cannot help finding the universal self- +heal. Yellow returns in the drooping flowers of the jewel-weed, +and blue repeats itself in the trembling hare-bells, and scarlet is +glorified in the flaming robe of the cardinal-flower. Later still, +the summer closes in a splendour of bloom, with gentians and asters +and goldenrod. + +You never get so close to the birds as when you are wading quietly +down a little river, casting your fly deftly under the branches for +the wary trout, but ever on the lookout for all the various +pleasant things that nature has to bestow upon you. Here you shall +come upon the cat-bird at her morning bath, and hear her sing, in a +clump of pussy-willows, that low, tender, confidential song which +she keeps for the hours of domestic intimacy. The spotted +sandpiper will run along the stones before you, crying, "wet-feet, +wet-feet!" and bowing and teetering in the friendliest manner, as +if to show you the way to the best pools. In the thick branches of +the hemlocks that stretch across the stream, the tiny warblers, +dressed in a hundred colours, chirp and twitter confidingly above +your head; and the Maryland yellow-throat, flitting through the +bushes like a little gleam of sunlight, calls "witchery, witchery, +witchery!" That plaintive, forsaken, persistent note, never +ceasing, even in the noonday silence, comes from the wood-pewee, +drooping upon the bough of some high tree, and complaining, like +Mariana in the moated grange, "weary, weary, weary!" + +When the stream runs out into the old clearing, or down through the +pasture, you find other and livelier birds,--the robins, with his +sharp, saucy call and breathless, merry warble; the bluebird, with +his notes of pure gladness, and the oriole, with his wild, flexible +whistle; the chewink, bustling about in the thicket, talking to his +sweetheart in French, "cherie, cherie!" and the song-sparrow, +perched on his favourite limb of a young maple, dose beside the +water, and singing happily, through sunshine and through rain. +This is the true bird of the brook, after all: the winged spirit of +cheerfulness and contentment, the patron saint of little rivers, +the fisherman's friend. He seems to enter into your sport with his +good wishes, and for an hour at a time, while you are trying every +fly in your book, from a black gnat to a white miller, to entice +the crafty old trout at the foot of the meadow-pool, the song- +sparrow, close above you, will be chanting patience and +encouragement. And when at last success crowns your endeavour, and +the parti-coloured prize is glittering in your net, the bird on the +bough breaks out in an ecstasy of congratulation: "catch 'im, catch +'im, catch 'im; oh, what a pretty fellow! sweet!" + +There are other birds that seem to have a very different temper. +The blue-jay sits high up in the withered-pine tree, bobbing up and +down, and calling to his mate in a tone of affected sweetness. +"salute-her, salute-her," but when you come in sight he flies away +with a harsh cry of "thief, thief, thief!" The kingfisher, +ruffling his crest in solitary pride on the end of a dead branch, +darts down the stream at your approach, winding up his red angrily +as if he despised you for interrupting his fishing. And the cat- +bird, that sang so charmingly while she thought herself unobserved, +now tries to scare you away by screaming "snake, snake!" + +As evening draws near, and the light beneath the trees grows +yellower, and the air is full of filmy insects out for their last +dance, the voice of the little river becomes louder and more +distinct. The true poets have often noticed this apparent increase +in the sound of flowing waters at nightfall. Gray, in one of his +letters, speaks of "hearing the murmur of many waters not audible +in the daytime." Wordsworth repeats the same thought almost in the +same words: + + + "A soft and lulling sound is heard + Of streams inaudible by day." + + +And Tennyson, in the valley of Cauteretz, tells of the river + + + "Deepening his voice with deepening of the night." + + +It is in this mystical hour that you will hear the most celestial +and entrancing of all bird-notes, the songs of the thrushes,--the +hermit, and the wood-thrush, and the veery. Sometimes, but not +often, you will see the singers. I remember once, at the close of +a beautiful day's fishing on the Swiftwater, I came out, just after +sunset, into a little open space in an elbow of the stream. It was +still early spring, and the leaves were tiny. On the top of a +small sumac, not thirty feet away from me, sat a veery. I could +see the pointed spots upon his breast, the swelling of his white +throat, and the sparkle of his eyes, as he poured his whole heart +into a long liquid chant, the clear notes rising and falling, +echoing and interlacing in endless curves of sound, + + + "Orb within orb, intricate, wonderful." + + +Other bird-songs can be translated into words, but not this. There +is no interpretation. It is music,--as Sidney Lanier defines it,-- + + + "Love in search of a word." + + +But it is not only to the real life of birds and flowers that the +little rivers introduce you. They lead you often into familiarity +with human nature in undress, rejoicing in the liberty of old +clothes, or of none at all. People do not mince along the banks of +streams in patent-leather shoes or crepitating silks. Corduroy and +home-spun and flannel are the stuffs that suit this region; and the +frequenters of these paths go their natural gaits, in calf-skin or +rubber boots, or bare-footed. The girdle of conventionality is +laid aside, and the skirts rise with the spirits. + +A stream that flows through a country of upland farms will show you +many a pretty bit of genre painting. Here is the laundry-pool at +the foot of the kitchen garden, and the tubs are set upon a few +planks close to the water, and the farmer's daughters, with bare +arms and gowns tucked up, are wringing out the clothes. Do you +remember what happened to Ralph Peden in The Lilac Sunbonnet when +he came on a scene like this? He tumbled at once into love with +Winsome Charteris,--and far over his head. + +And what a pleasant thing it is to see a little country lad riding +one of the plough-horses to water, thumping his naked heels against +the ribs of his stolid steed, and pulling hard on the halter as if +it were the bridle of Bucephalus! Or perhaps it is a riotous +company of boys that have come down to the old swimming-hole, and +are now splashing and gambolling through the water like a drove of +white seals very much sun-burned. You had hoped to catch a goodly +trout in that hole, but what of that? The sight of a harmless hour +of mirth is better than a fish, any day. + +Possibly you will overtake another fisherman on the stream. It may +be one of those fabulous countrymen, with long cedar poles and bed- +cord lines, who are commonly reported to catch such enormous +strings of fish, but who rarely, so far as my observation goes, do +anything more than fill their pockets with fingerlings. The +trained angler, who uses the finest tackle, and drops his fly on +the water as accurately as Henry James places a word in a story, is +the man who takes the most and the largest fish in the long run. +Perhaps the fisherman ahead of you is such an one,--a man whom you +have known in town as a lawyer or a doctor, a merchant or a +preacher, going about his business in the hideous respectability of +a high silk hat and a long black coat. How good it is to see him +now in the freedom of a flannel shirt and a broad-brimmed gray felt +with flies stuck around the band. + +In Professor John Wilson's Essays Critical and Imaginative, there +is a brilliant description of a bishop fishing, which I am sure is +drawn from the life: "Thus a bishop, sans wig and petticoat, in a +hairy cap, black jacket, corduroy breeches and leathern leggins, +creel on back and rod in hand, sallying from his palace, impatient +to reach a famous salmon-cast ere the sun leave his cloud, . . . +appears not only a pillar of his church, but of his kind, and in +such a costume is manifestly on the high road to Canterbury and the +Kingdom-Come." I have had the good luck to see quite a number of +bishops, parochial and diocesan, in that style, and the vision has +always dissolved my doubts in regard to the validity of their claim +to the true apostolic succession. + +Men's "little ways" are usually more interesting, and often more +instructive than their grand manners. When they are off guard, +they frequently show to better advantage than when they are on +parade. I get more pleasure out of Boswell's Johnson than I do out +of Rasselas or The Rambler. The Little Flowers of St. Francis +appear to me far more precious than the most learned German and +French analyses of his character. There is a passage in Jonathan +Edwards' Personal Narrative, about a certain walk that he took in +the fields near his father's house, and the blossoming of the +flowers in the spring, which I would not exchange for the whole of +his dissertation On the Freedom of the Will. And the very best +thing of Charles Darwin's that I know is a bit from a letter to his +wife: "At last I fell asleep," says he, "on the grass, and awoke +with a chorus of birds singing around me, and squirrels running up +the tree, and some woodpeckers laughing; and it was as pleasant and +rural a scene as ever I saw; and I did not care one penny how any +of the birds or beasts had been formed." + +Little rivers have small responsibilities. They are not expected +to bear huge navies on their breast or supply a hundred-thousand +horse-power to the factories of a monstrous town. Neither do you +come to them hoping to draw out Leviathan with a hook. It is +enough if they run a harmless, amiable course, and keep the groves +and fields green and fresh along their banks, and offer a happy +alternation of nimble rapids and quiet pools, + + + "With here and there a lusty trout, + And here and there a grayling." + + +When you set out to explore one of these minor streams in your +canoe, you have no intention of epoch-making discoveries, or +thrilling and world-famous adventures. You float placidly down the +long stillwaters, and make your way patiently through the tangle of +fallen trees that block the stream, and run the smaller falls, and +carry your boat around the larger ones, with no loftier ambition +than to reach a good camp-ground before dark and to pass the +intervening hours pleasantly, "without offence to God or man." It +is an agreeable and advantageous frame of mind for one who has done +his fair share of work in the world, and is not inclined to grumble +at his wages. There are few moods in which we are more susceptible +of gentle instruction; and I suspect there are many tempers and +attitudes, often called virtuous, in which the human spirit appears +to less advantage in the sight of Heaven. + +It is not required of every man and woman to be, or to do, +something great; most of us must content ourselves with taking +small parts in the chorus. Shall we have no little lyrics because +Homer and Dante have written epics? And because we have heard the +great organ at Freiburg, shall the sound of Kathi's zither in the +alpine hut please us no more? Even those who have greatness thrust +upon them will do well to lay the burden down now and then, and +congratulate themselves that they are not altogether answerable for +the conduct of the universe, or at least not all the time. "I +reckon," said a cowboy to me one day, as we were riding through the +Bad Lands of Dakota, "there's some one bigger than me, running this +outfit. He can 'tend to it well enough, while I smoke my pipe +after the round-up." + +There is such a thing as taking ourselves and the world too +seriously, or at any rate too anxiously. Half of the secular +unrest and dismal, profane sadness of modern society comes from the +vain idea that every man is bound to be a critic of life, and to +let no day pass without finding some fault with the general order +of things, or projecting some plan for its improvement. And the +other half comes from the greedy notion that a man's life does +consist, after all, in the abundance of the things that he +possesses, and that it is somehow or other more respectable and +pious to be always at work making a larger living, than it is to +lie on your back in the green pastures and beside the still waters, +and thank God that you are alive. + +Come, then, my gentle reader, (for by this time you have discovered +that this chapter is only a preface in disguise,--a declaration of +principles or the want of them, an apology or a defence, as you +choose to take it,) and if we are agreed, let us walk together; but +if not, let us part here with out ill-will. + +You shall not be deceived in this book. It is nothing but a +handful of rustic variations on the old tune of "Rest and be +thankful," a record of unconventional travel, a pilgrim's scrip +with a few bits of blue-sky philosophy in it. There is, so far as +I know, very little useful information and absolutely no criticism +of the universe to be found in this volume. So if you are what +Izaak Walton calls "a severe, sour-complexioned man," you would +better carry it back to the bookseller, and get your money again, +if he will give it to you, and go your way rejoicing after your own +melancholy fashion. + +But if you care for plain pleasures, and informal company, and +friendly observations on men and things, (and a few true fish- +stories,) then perhaps you may find something here not unworthy +your perusal. And so I wish that your winter fire may burn clear +and bright while you read these pages; and that the summer days may +be fair, and the fish may rise merrily to your fly, whenever you +follow one of these little rivers. + +1895. + + + +A LEAF OF SPEARMINT + +RECOLLECTIONS OF A BOY AND A ROD. + + +"It puzzles me now, that I remember all these young impressions so, +because I took no heed of them at the time whatever; and yet they +come upon me bright, when nothing else is evident in the gray fog +of experience."--B. D. BLACKMORE: Lorna Doone. + + +Of all the faculties of the human mind, memory is the one that is +most easily "led by the nose." There is a secret power in the +sense of smell which draws the mind backward into the pleasant land +of old times. + +If you could paint a picture of Memory, in the symbolical manner of +Quarles's Emblems, it should represent a man travelling the highway +with a dusty pack upon his shoulders, and stooping to draw in a +long, sweet breath from the small, deep-red, golden-hearted flowers +of an old-fashioned rose-tree straggling through the fence of a +neglected garden. Or perhaps, for a choice of emblems, you would +better take a yet more homely and familiar scent: the cool +fragrance of lilacs drifting through the June morning from the old +bush that stands between the kitchen door and the well; the warm +layer of pungent, aromatic air that floats over the tansy-bed in a +still July noon; the drowsy dew of odour that falls from the big +balm-of-Gilead tree by the roadside as you are driving homeward +through the twilight of August; or, best of all, the clean, spicy, +unexpected, unmistakable smell of a bed of spearmint--that is the +bed whereon Memory loves to lie and dream! + +Why not choose mint as the symbol of remembrance? It is the true +spice-tree of our Northern clime, the myrrh and frankincense of the +land of lingering snow. When its perfume rises, the shrines of the +past are unveiled, and the magical rites of reminiscence begin. + + +I. + + +You are fishing down the Swiftwater in the early Spring. In a +shallow pool, which the drought of summer will soon change into dry +land, you see the pale-green shoots of a little plant thrusting +themselves up between the pebbles, and just beginning to overtop +the falling water. You pluck a leaf of it as you turn out of the +stream to find a comfortable place for lunch, and, rolling it +between your fingers to see whether it smells like a good salad for +your bread and cheese, you discover suddenly that it is new mint. +For the rest of that day you are bewitched; you follow a stream +that runs through the country of Auld Lang Syne, and fill your +creel with the recollections of a boy and a rod. + +And yet, strangely enough, you cannot recall the boy himself at all +distinctly. There is only the faintest image of him on the endless +roll of films that has been wound through your mental camera: and +in the very spots where his small figure should appear, it seems as +if the pictures were always light-struck. Just a blur, and the dim +outline of a new cap, or a well-beloved jacket with extra pockets, +or a much-hated pair of copper-toed shoes--that is all you can see. + +But the people that the boy saw, the companions who helped or +hindered him in his adventures, the sublime and marvellous scenes +among the Catskills and the Adirondacks and the Green Mountains, in +the midst of which he lived and moved and had his summer holidays-- +all these stand out sharp and clear, as the "Bab Ballads" say, + + + "Photographically lined + On the tablets of your mind." + + +And most vivid do these scenes and people become when the vague and +irrecoverable boy who walks among them carries a rod over his +shoulder, and you detect the soft bulginess of wet fish about his +clothing, and perhaps the tail of a big one emerging from his +pocket. Then it seems almost as if these were things that had +really happened, and of which you yourself were a great part. + +The rod was a reward, yet not exactly of merit. It was an +instrument of education in the hand of a father less indiscriminate +than Solomon, who chose to interpret the text in a new way, and +preferred to educate his child by encouraging him in pursuits which +were harmless and wholesome, rather than by chastising him for +practices which would likely enough never have been thought of, if +they had not been forbidden. The boy enjoyed this kind of father +at the time, and later he came to understand, with a grateful +heart, that there is no richer inheritance in all the treasury of +unearned blessings. For, after all, the love, the patience, the +kindly wisdom of a grown man who can enter into the perplexities +and turbulent impulses of a boy's heart, and give him cheerful +companionship, and lead him on by free and joyful ways to know and +choose the things that are pure and lovely and of good report, make +as fair an image as we can find of that loving, patient Wisdom +which must be above us all if any good is to come out of our +childish race. + +Now this was the way in which the boy came into possession of his +undreaded rod. He was by nature and heredity one of those +predestined anglers whom Izaak Walton tersely describes as "born +so." His earliest passion was fishing. His favourite passage in +Holy Writ was that place where Simon Peter throws a line into the +sea and pulls out a great fish at the first cast. + +But hitherto his passion had been indulged under difficulties--with +improvised apparatus of cut poles, and flabby pieces of string, and +bent pins, which always failed to hold the biggest fish; or perhaps +with borrowed tackle, dangling a fat worm in vain before the noses +of the staring, supercilious sunfish that poised themselves in the +clear water around the Lake house dock at Lake George; or, at best, +on picnic parties across the lake, marred by the humiliating +presence of nurses, and disturbed by the obstinate refusal of old +Horace, the boatman, to believe that the boy could bait his own +hook, but sometimes crowned with the delight of bringing home a +whole basketful of yellow perch and goggle-eyes. Of nobler sport +with game fish, like the vaulting salmon and the merry, pugnacious +trout, as yet the boy had only dreamed. But he had heard that +there were such fish in the streams that flowed down from the +mountains around Lake George, and he was at the happy age when he +could believe anything--if it was sufficiently interesting. + +There was one little river, and only one, within his knowledge and +the reach of his short legs. It was a tiny, lively rivulet that +came out of the woods about half a mile away from the hotel, and +ran down cater-cornered through a sloping meadow, crossing the road +under a flat bridge of boards, just beyond the root-beer shop at +the lower end of the village. It seemed large enough to the boy, +and he had long had his eye upon it as a fitting theatre for the +beginning of a real angler's life. Those rapids, those falls, +those deep, whirling pools with beautiful foam on them like soft, +white custard, were they not such places as the trout loved to hide +in? + +You can see the long hotel piazza, with the gossipy groups of +wooden chairs standing vacant in the early afternoon; for the +grown-up people are dallying with the ultimate nuts and raisins of +their mid-day dinner. A villainous clatter of innumerable little +vegetable-dishes comes from the open windows of the pantry as the +boy steals past the kitchen end of the house, with Horace's +lightest bamboo pole over his shoulder, and a little brother in +skirts and short white stockings tagging along behind him. + +When they come to the five-rail fence where the brook runs out of +the field, the question is, Over or under? The lowlier method +seems safer for the little brother, as well as less conspicuous for +persons who desire to avoid publicity until their enterprise has +achieved success. So they crawl beneath a bend in the lowest +rail,--only tearing one tiny three-cornered hole in a jacket, and +making some juicy green stains on the white stockings,--and emerge +with suppressed excitement in the field of the cloth of buttercups +and daisies. + +What an afternoon--how endless and yet how swift! What perilous +efforts to leap across the foaming stream at its narrowest points; +what escapes from quagmires and possible quicksands; what stealthy +creeping through the grass to the edge of a likely pool, and +cautious dropping of the line into an unseen depth, and patient +waiting for a bite, until the restless little brother, prowling +about below, discovers that the hook is not in the water at all, +but lying on top of a dry stone,--thereby proving that patience is +not the only virtue--or, at least, that it does a better business +when it has a small vice of impatience in partnership with it! + +How tired the adventurers grow as the day wears away; and as yet +they have taken nothing! But their strength and courage return as +if by magic when there comes a surprising twitch at the line in a +shallow, unpromising rapid, and with a jerk of the pole a small, +wiggling fish is whirled through the air and landed thirty feet +back in the meadow. + +"For pity's sake, don't lose him! There he is among the roots of +the blue flag." + +"I've got him! How cold he is--how slippery--how pretty! Just +like a piece of rainbow!" + +"Do you see the red spots? Did you notice how gamy he was, little +brother; how he played? It is a trout, for sure; a real trout, +almost as long as your hand." + +So the two lads tramp along up the stream, chattering as if there +were no rubric of silence in the angler's code. Presently another +simple-minded troutling falls a victim to their unpremeditated art; +and they begin already, being human, to wish for something larger. +In the very last pool that they dare attempt--a dark hole under a +steep bank, where the brook issues from the woods--the boy drags +out the hoped-for prize, a splendid trout, longer than a new lead- +pencil. But he feels sure that there must be another, even larger, +in the same place. He swings his line out carefully over the +water, and just as he is about to drop it in, the little brother, +perched on the sloping brink, slips on the smooth pine-needles, and +goes sliddering down into the pool up to his waist. How he weeps +with dismay, and how funnily his dress sticks to him as he crawls +out! But his grief is soon assuaged by the privilege of carrying +the trout strung on an alder twig; and it is a happy, muddy, proud +pair of urchins that climb over the fence out of the field of +triumph at the close of the day. + +What does the father say, as he meets them in the road? Is he +frowning or smiling under that big brown beard? You cannot be +quite sure. But one thing is clear: he is as much elated over the +capture of the real trout as any one. He is ready to deal mildly +with a little irregularity for the sake of encouraging pluck and +perseverance. Before the three comrades have reached the hotel, +the boy has promised faithfully never to take his little brother +off again without asking leave; and the father has promised that +the boy shall have a real jointed fishing-rod of his own, so that +he will not need to borrow old Horace's pole any more. + +At breakfast the next morning the family are to have a private +dish; not an every-day affair of vulgar, bony fish that nurses can +catch, but trout--three of them! But the boy looks up from the +table and sees the adored of his soul, Annie V----, sitting at the +other end of the room, and faring on the common food of mortals. +Shall she eat the ordinary breakfast while he feasts on dainties? +Do not other sportsmen send their spoils to the ladies whom they +admire? The waiter must bring a hot plate, and take this largest +trout to Miss V---- (Miss Annie, not her sister--make no mistake +about it). + +The face of Augustus is as solemn as an ebony idol while he plays +his part of Cupid's messenger. The fair Annie affects surprise; +she accepts the offering rather indifferently; her curls drop down +over her cheeks to cover some small confusion. But for an instant +the corner of her eye catches the boy's sidelong glance, and she +nods perceptibly, whereupon his mother very inconsiderately calls +attention to the fact that yesterday's escapade has sun-burned his +face dreadfully. + +Beautiful Annie V----, who, among all the unripened nymphs that +played at hide-and-seek among the maples on the hotel lawn, or +waded with white feet along the yellow beach beyond the point of +pines, flying with merry shrieks into the woods when a boat-load of +boys appeared suddenly around the corner, or danced the lancers in +the big, bare parlours before the grown-up ball began--who in all +that joyous, innocent bevy could be compared with you for charm or +daring? How your dark eyes sparkled, and how the long brown +ringlets tossed around your small head, when you stood up that +evening, slim and straight, and taller by half a head than your +companions, in the lamp-lit room where the children were playing +forfeits, and said, "There is not one boy here that DARES to kiss +ME!" Then you ran out on the dark porch, where the honeysuckle +vines grew up the tall, inane Corinthian pillars. + +Did you blame the boy for following? And were you very angry, +indeed, about what happened,--until you broke out laughing at his +cravat, which had slipped around behind his ear? That was the +first time he ever noticed how much sweeter the honeysuckle smells +at night than in the day. It was his entrance examination in the +school of nature--human and otherwise. He felt that there was a +whole continent of newly discovered poetry within him, and +worshipped his Columbus disguised in curls. Your boy is your true +idealist, after all, although (or perhaps because) he is still +uncivilised. + + +II. + + +The arrival of the rod, in four joints, with an extra tip, a brass +reel, and the other luxuries for which a true angler would +willingly exchange the necessaries of life, marked a new epoch in +the boy's career. At the uplifting of that wand, as if it had been +in the hand of another Moses, the waters of infancy rolled back, +and the way was opened into the promised land, whither the tyrant +nurses, with all their proud array of baby-chariots, could not +follow. The way was open, but not by any means dry. One of the +first events in the dispensation of the rod was the purchase of a +pair of high rubber boots. Inserted in this armour of modern +infantry, and transfigured with delight, the boy clumped through +all the little rivers within a circuit of ten miles from Caldwell, +and began to learn by parental example the yet unmastered art of +complete angling. + +But because some of the streams were deep and strong, and his legs +were short and slender, and his ambition was even taller than his +boots, the father would sometimes take him up pickaback, and wade +along carefully through the perilous places--which are often, in +this world, the very places one longs to fish in. So, in your +remembrance, you can see the little rubber boots sticking out under +the father's arms, and the rod projecting over his head, and the +bait dangling down unsteadily into the deep holes, and the +delighted boy hooking and playing and basketing his trout high in +the air. How many of our best catches in life are made from some +one else's shoulders! + +From this summer the whole earth became to the boy, as Tennyson +describes the lotus country, "a land of streams." In school-days +and in town he acknowledged the sway of those mysterious and +irresistible forces which produce tops at one season, and marbles +at another, and kites at another, and bind all boyish hearts to +play mumble-the-peg at the due time more certainly than the stars +are bound to their orbits. But when vacation came, with its annual +exodus from the city, there was only one sign in the zodiac, and +that was Pisces. + +No country seemed to him tolerable without trout, and no landscape +beautiful unless enlivened by a young river. Among what delectable +mountains did those watery guides lead his vagrant steps, and with +what curious, mixed, and sometimes profitable company did they make +him familiar! + +There was one exquisite stream among the Alleghanies, called +Lycoming Creek, beside which the family spent a summer in a +decadent inn, kept by a tremulous landlord who was always sitting +on the steps of the porch, and whose most memorable remark was that +he had "a misery in his stomach." This form of speech amused the +boy, but he did not in the least comprehend it. It was the +description of an unimaginable experience in a region which was as +yet known to him only as the seat of pleasure. He did not +understand how any one could be miserable when he could catch trout +from his own dooryard. + +The big creek, with its sharp turns from side to side of the +valley, its hemlock-shaded falls in the gorge, and its long, still +reaches in the "sugar-bottom," where the maple-trees grew as if in +an orchard, and the superfluity of grasshoppers made the trout fat +and dainty, was too wide to fit the boy. But nature keeps all +sizes in her stock, and a smaller stream, called Rocky Run, came +tumbling down opposite the inn, as if made to order for juvenile +use. + +How well you can follow it, through the old pasture overgrown with +alders, and up past the broken-down mill-dam and the crumbling +sluice, into the mountain-cleft from which it leaps laughing! The +water, except just after a rain-storm, is as transparent as glass-- +old-fashioned window-glass, I mean, in small panes, with just a +tinge of green in it, like the air in a grove of young birches. +Twelve feet down in the narrow chasm below the falls, where the +water is full of tiny bubbles, like Apollinaris, you can see the +trout poised, with their heads up-stream, motionless, but quivering +a little, as if they were strung on wires. + +The bed of the stream has been scooped out of the solid rock. Here +and there banks of sand have been deposited, and accumulations of +loose stone disguise the real nature of the channel. Great +boulders have been rolled down the alleyway and left where they +chanced to stick; the stream must get around them or under them as +best it can. But there are other places where everything has been +swept clean; nothing remains but the primitive strata, and the +flowing water merrily tickles the bare ribs of mother earth. +Whirling stones, in the spring floods, have cut well-holes in the +rock, as round and even as if they had been made with a drill, and +sometimes you can see the very stone that sunk the well lying at +the bottom. There are long, straight, sloping troughs through +which the water runs like a mill-race. There are huge basins into +which the water rumbles over a ledge, as if some one were pouring +it very steadily out of a pitcher, and from which it glides away +without a ripple, flowing over a smooth pavement of rock which +shelves down from the shallow foot to the deep head of the pool. + +The boy wonders how far he dare wade out along that slippery floor. +The water is within an inch of his boot-tops now. But the slope +seems very even, and just beyond his reach a good fish is rising. +Only one step more, and then, like the wicked man in the psalm, his +feet begin to slide. Slowly, and standing bolt upright, with the +rod held high above his head, as if it must on no account get wet, +he glides forward up to his neck in the ice-cold bath, gasping with +amazement. There have been other and more serious situations in +life into which, unless I am mistaken, you have made an equally +unwilling and embarrassed entrance, and in which you have been +surprised to find yourself not only up to your neck, but over,--and +you are a lucky man if you have had the presence of mind to stand +still for a moment, before wading out, and make sure at least of +the fish that tempted you into your predicament. + +But Rocky Run, they say, exists no longer. It has been blasted by +miners out of all resemblance to itself, and bewitched into a dingy +water-power to turn wheels for the ugly giant, Trade. It is only +in the valley of remembrance that its current still flows like +liquid air; and only in that country that you can still see the +famous men who came and went along the banks of the Lyocoming when +the boy was there. + +There was Collins, who was a wondrous adept at "daping, dapping, or +dibbling" with a grasshopper, and who once brought in a string of +trout which he laid out head to tail on the grass before the house +in a line of beauty forty-seven feet long. A mighty bass voice had +this Collins also, and could sing, "Larboard Watch, Ahoy!" "Down in +a Coal-Mine," and other profound ditties in a way to make all the +glasses on the table jingle; but withal, as you now suspect, rather +a fishy character, and undeserving of the unqualified respect which +the boy had for him. And there was Dr. Romsen, lean, satirical, +kindly, a skilful though reluctant physician, who regarded it as a +personal injury if any one in the party fell sick in summer time; +and a passionately unsuccessful hunter, who would sit all night in +the crotch of a tree beside an alleged deer-lick, and come home +perfectly satisfied if he had heard a hedgehog grunt. It was he +who called attention to the discrepancy between the boy's appetite +and his size by saying loudly at a picnic, "I wouldn't grudge you +what you eat, my boy, if I could only see that it did you any +good,"--which remark was not forgiven until the doctor redeemed his +reputation by pronouncing a serious medical opinion, before a +council of mothers, to the effect that it did not really hurt a boy +to get his feet wet. That was worthy of Galen in his most inspired +moment. And there was hearty, genial Paul Merit, whose mere +company was an education in good manners, and who could eat eight +hard-boiled eggs for supper without ruffling his equanimity; and +the tall, thin, grinning Major, whom an angry Irishwoman once +described as "like a comb, all back and teeth;" and many more were +the comrades of the boy's father, all of whom he admired, (and +followed when they would let him,) but none so much as the father +himself, because he was the wisest, kindest, and merriest of all +that merry crew, now dispersed to the uttermost parts of the earth +and beyond. + +Other streams played a part in the education of that happy boy: the +Kaaterskill, where there had been nothing but the ghosts of trout +for the last thirty years, but where the absence of fish was almost +forgotten in the joy of a first introduction to Dickens, one very +showery day, when dear old Ned Mason built a smoky fire in a cave +below Haines's Falls, and, pulling The Old Curiosity Shop out of +his pocket, read aloud about Little Nell until the tears ran down +the cheeks of reader and listener--the smoke was so thick, you +know: and the Neversink, which flows through John Burroughs's +country, and past one house in particular, perched on a high bluff, +where a very dreadful old woman come out and throws stones at "city +fellers fishin' through her land" (as if any one wanted to touch +her land! It was the water that ran over it, you see, that carried +the fish with it, and they were not hers at all): and the stream at +Healing Springs, in the Virginia mountains, where the medicinal +waters flow down into a lovely wild brook without injuring the +health of the trout in the least, and where the only drawback to +the angler's happiness is the abundance of rattlesnakes--but a boy +does not mind such things as that; he feels as if he were immortal. +Over all these streams memory skips lightly, and strikes a trail +through the woods to the Adirondacks, where the boy made his first +acquaintance with navigable rivers,--that is to say, rivers which +are traversed by canoes and hunting-skiffs, but not yet defiled by +steamboats,--and slept, or rather lay awake, for the first time on +a bed of balsam-boughs in a tent. + + +III. + + +The promotion from all-day picnics to a two weeks' camping-trip is +like going from school to college. By this time a natural process +of evolution has raised the first rod to something lighter and more +flexible,--a fly-rod, so to speak, but not a bigoted one,--just a +serviceable, unprejudiced article, not above using any kind of bait +that may be necessary to catch the fish. The father has received +the new title of "governor," indicating not less, but more +authority, and has called in new instructors to carry on the boy's +education: real Adirondack guides--old Sam Dunning and one-eyed +Enos, the last and laziest of the Saranac Indians. Better men will +be discovered for later trips, but none more amusing, and none +whose woodcraft seems more wonderful than that of this queerly +matched team, as they make the first camp in a pelting rain-storm +on the shore of Big Clear Pond. The pitching of the tents is a +lesson in architecture, the building of the camp-fire a victory +over damp nature, and the supper of potatoes and bacon and fried +trout a veritable triumph of culinary art. + +At midnight the rain is pattering persistently on the canvas; the +fronts flaps are closed and tied together; the lingering fire +shines through them, and sends vague shadows wavering up and down: +the governor is rolled up in his blankets, sound asleep. It is a +very long night for the boy. + +What is that rustling noise outside the tent? Probably some small +creature, a squirrel or a rabbit. Rabbit stew would be good for +breakfast. But it sounds louder now, almost loud enough to be a +fox,--there are no wolves left in the Adirondacks, or at least only +a very few. That is certainly quite a heavy footstep prowling +around the provision-box. Could it be a panther,--they step very +softly for their size,--or a bear perhaps? Sam Dunning told about +catching one in a trap just below here. (Ah, my boy, you will soon +learn that there is no spot in all the forests created by a +bountiful Providence so poor as to be without its bear story.) +Where was the rifle put? There it is, at the foot of the tent- +pole. Wonder if it is loaded? + +"Waugh-ho! Waugh-ho-o-o-o!" + +The boy springs from his blankets like a cat, and peeps out between +the tent-flaps. There sits Enos, in the shelter of a leaning tree +by the fire, with his head thrown back and a bottle poised at his +mouth. His lonely eye is cocked up at a great horned owl on the +branch above him. Again the sudden voice breaks out: + +"Whoo! whoo! whoo cooks for you all?" + +Enos puts the bottle down, with a grunt, and creeps off to his +tent. + +"De debbil in dat owl," he mutters. "How he know I cook for dis +camp? How he know 'bout dat bottle? Ugh!" + +There are hundreds of pictures that flash into light as the boy +goes on his course, year after year, through the woods. There is +the luxurious camp on Tupper's Lake, with its log cabins in the +spruce-grove, and its regiment of hungry men who ate almost a deer +a day; and there is the little bark shelter on the side of Mount +Marcy, where the governor and the boy, with baskets full of trout +from the Opalescent River, are spending the night, with nothing but +a fire to keep them warm. There is the North Bay at Moosehead, +with Joe La Croix (one more Frenchman who thinks he looks like +Napoleon) posing on the rocks beside his canoe, and only reconciled +by his vanity to the wasteful pastime of taking photographs while +the big fish are rising gloriously out at the end of the point. +There is the small spring-hole beside the Saranac River, where +Pliny Robbins and the boy caught twenty-three noble trout, weighing +from one to three pounds apiece, in the middle of a hot August +afternoon, and hid themselves in the bushes when ever they heard a +party coming down the river, because they did not care to attract +company; and there are the Middle Falls, where the governor stood +on a long spruce log, taking two-pound fish with the fly, and +stepping out at every cast a little nearer to the end of the log, +until it slowly tipped with him, and he settled down into the +river. + +Among such scenes as these the boy pursued his education, learning +many things that are not taught in colleges; learning to take the +weather as it comes, wet or dry, and fortune as it falls, good or +bad; learning that a meal which is scanty fare for one becomes a +banquet for two--provided the other is the right person; learning +that there is some skill in everything, even in digging bait, and +that what is called luck consists chiefly in having your tackle in +good order; learning that a man can be just as happy in a log +shanty as in a brownstone mansion, and that the very best pleasures +are those that do not leave a bad taste in the mouth. And in all +this the governor was his best teacher and his closest comrade. + +Dear governor, you have gone out of the wilderness now, and your +steps will be no more beside these remembered little rivers--no +more, forever and forever. You will not come in sight around any +bend of this clear Swiftwater stream where you made your last cast; +your cheery voice will never again ring out through the deepening +twilight where you are lingering for your disciple to catch up with +you; he will never again hear you call: "Hallo, my boy! What luck? +Time to go home!" But there is a river in the country where you +have gone, is there not?--a river with trees growing all along it-- +evergreen trees; and somewhere by those shady banks, within sound +of clear running waters, I think you will be dreaming and waiting +for your boy, if he follows the trail that you have shown him even +to the end. + +1895. + + + +AMPERSAND + + +It is not the walking merely, it is keeping yourself in tune for a +walk, in the spiritual and bodily condition in which you can find +entertainment and exhilaration in so simple and natural a pastime. +You are eligible to any good fortune when you are in a condition to +enjoy a walk. When the air and water taste sweet to you, how much +else will taste sweet! When the exercise of your limbs affords you +pleasure, and the play of your senses upon the various objects and +shows of Nature quickens and stimulates your spirit, your relation +to the world and to yourself is what it should be,--simple, and +direct, and wholesome."--JOHN BURROUGHS: Pepacton. + + +The right to the name of Ampersand, like the territory of Gaul in +those Commentaries which Julius Caesar wrote for the punishment of +schoolboys, is divided into three parts. It belongs to a mountain, +and a lake, and a little river. + +The mountain stands in the heart of the Adirondack country, just +near enough to the thoroughfare of travel for thousands of people +to see it every year, and just far enough from the beaten track to +be unvisited except by a very few of the wise ones, who love to +turn aside. Behind the mountain is the lake, which no lazy man has +ever seen. Out of the lake flows the stream, winding down a long, +untrodden forest valley, to join the Stony Creek waters and empty +into the Raquette River. + +Which of the three Ampersands has the prior claim to the name, I +cannot tell. Philosophically speaking, the mountain ought to be +regarded as the head of the family, because it was undoubtedly +there before the others. And the lake was probably the next on the +ground, because the stream is its child. But man is not strictly +just in his nomenclature; and I conjecture that the little river, +the last-born of the three, was the first to be christened +Ampersand, and then gave its name to its parent and grand-parent. +It is such a crooked stream, so bent and curved and twisted upon +itself, so fond of turning around unexpected corners and sweeping +away in great circles from its direct course, that its first +explorers christened it after the eccentric supernumerary of the +alphabet which appears in the old spelling-books as &--and per se, +and. + +But in spite of this apparent subordination to the stream in the +matter of a name, the mountain clearly asserts its natural +authority. It stands up boldly; and not only its own lake, but at +least three others, the Lower Saranac, Round Lake, and Lonesome +Pond, lie at its foot and acknowledge its lordship. When the cloud +is on its brow, they are dark. When the sunlight strikes it, they +smile. +Wherever you may go over the waters of these lakes you shall see +Mount Ampersand looking down at you, and saying quietly, "This is +my domain." + +I never look at a mountain which asserts itself in this fashion +without desiring to stand on the top of it. If one can reach the +summit, one becomes a sharer in the dominion. The difficulties in +the way only add to the zest of the victory. Every mountain is, +rightly considered, an invitation to climb. And as I was resting +for a month one summer at Bartlett's, Ampersand challenged me +daily. + +Did you know Bartlett's in its palmy time? It was the homeliest, +quaintest, coziest place in the Adirondacks. Away back in the +ante-bellum days Virgil Bartlett had come into the woods, and built +his house on the bank of the Saranac River, between the Upper +Saranac and Round Lake. It was then the only dwelling within a +circle of many miles. The deer and bear were in the majority. At +night one could sometimes hear the scream of the panther or the +howling of wolves. But soon the wilderness began to wear the +traces of a conventional smile. The desert blossomed a little--if +not as the rose, at least as the gilly-flower. Fields were +cleared, gardens planted; half a dozen log cabins were scattered +along the river; and the old house, having grown slowly and +somewhat irregularly for twenty years, came out, just before the +time of which I write, in a modest coat of paint and a broad- +brimmed piazza. But Virgil himself, the creator of the oasis--well +known of hunters and fishermen, dreaded of lazy guides and +quarrelsome lumbermen,--"Virge," the irascible, kind-hearted, +indefatigable, was there no longer. He had made his last clearing, +and fought his last fight; done his last favour to a friend, and +thrown his last adversary out of the tavern door. His last log had +gone down the river. His camp-fire had burned out. Peace to his +ashes. His wife, who had often played the part of Abigail toward +travellers who had unconsciously incurred the old man's mistrust, +now reigned in his stead; and there was great abundance of maple- +syrup on every man's flapjack. + +The charm of Bartlett's for the angler was the stretch of rapid +water in front of the house. The Saranac River, breaking from its +first resting-place in the Upper Lake, plunged down through a great +bed of rocks, making a chain of short falls and pools and rapids, +about half a mile in length. Here, in the spring and early summer, +the speckled trout--brightest and daintiest of all fish that swim-- +used to be found in great numbers. As the season advanced, they +moved away into the deep water of the lakes. But there were always +a few stragglers left, and I have taken them in the rapids at the +very end of August. What could be more delightful than to spend an +hour or two, in the early morning or evening of a hot day, in +wading this rushing stream, and casting the fly on its clear +waters? The wind blows softly down the narrow valley, and the +trees nod from the rocks above you. The noise of the falls makes +constant music in your ears. The river hurries past you, and yet +it is never gone. + +The same foam-flakes seem to be always gliding downward, the same +spray dashing over the stones, the same eddy coiling at the edge of +the pool. Send your fly in under those cedar branches, where the +water swirls around by that old log. Now draw it up toward the +foam. There is a sudden gleam of dull gold in the white water. +You strike too soon. Your line comes back to you. In a current +like this, a fish will almost always hook himself. Try it again. +This time he takes the fly fairly, and you have him. It is a good +fish, and he makes the slender rod bend to the strain. He sulks +for a moment as if uncertain what to do, and then with a rush darts +into the swiftest part of the current. You can never stop him +there. Let him go. Keep just enough pressure on him to hold the +hook firm, and follow his troutship down the stream as if he were a +salmon. He slides over a little fall, gleaming through the foam, +and swings around in the next pool. Here you can manage him more +easily; and after a few minutes' brilliant play, a few mad dashes +for the current, he comes to the net, and your skilful guide lands +him with a quick, steady sweep of the arm. The scales credit him +with an even pound, and a better fish than this you will hardly +take here in midsummer. + +"On my word, master," says the appreciative Venator, in Walton's +Angler, "this is a gallant trout; what shall we do with him?" And +honest Piscator, replies: "Marry! e'en eat him to supper; we'll go +to my hostess from whence we came; she told me, as I was going out +of door, that my brother Peter, [and who is this but Romeyn of +Keeseville?] a good angler and a cheerful companion, had sent word +he would lodge there tonight, and bring a friend with him. My +hostess has two beds, and I know you and I have the best; we'll +rejoice with my brother Peter and his friend, tell tales, or sing +ballads, or make a catch, or find some harmless sport to content +us, and pass away a little time without offence to God or man." + +Ampersand waited immovable while I passed many days in such +innocent and healthful pleasures as these, until the right day came +for the ascent. Cool, clean, and bright, the crystal morning +promised a glorious noon, and the mountain almost seemed to beckon +us to come up higher. The photographic camera and a trustworthy +lunch were stowed away in the pack-basket. The backboard was +adjusted at a comfortable angle in the stern seat of our little +boat. The guide held the little craft steady while I stepped into +my place; then he pushed out into the stream, and we went swiftly +down toward Round Lake. + +A Saranac boat is one of the finest things that the skill of man +has ever produced under the inspiration of the wilderness. It is a +frail shell, so light that a guide can carry it on his shoulders +with ease, but so dexterously fashioned that it rides the heaviest +waves like a duck, and slips through the water as if by magic. You +can travel in it along the shallowest rivers and across the +broadest lakes, and make forty or fifty miles a day, if you have a +good guide. + +Everything depends, in the Adirondacks, as in so many other regions +of life, upon your guide. If he is selfish, or surly, or stupid, +you will have a bad time. But if he is an Adirondacker of the best +old-fashioned type,--now unhappily growing more rare from year to +year,--you will find him an inimitable companion, honest, faithful, +skilful and cheerful. He is as independent as a prince, and the +gilded youths and finicking fine ladies who attempt to patronise +him are apt to make but a sorry show before his solid and +undisguised contempt. But deal with him man to man, and he will +give you a friendly, loyal service which money cannot buy, and +teach you secrets of woodcraft and lessons in plain, self-reliant +manhood more valuable than all the learning of the schools. Such a +guide was mine, rejoicing in the Scriptural name of Hosea, but +commonly called, in brevity and friendliness, "Hose." + +As we entered Round Lake on this fair morning, its surface was as +smooth and shining as a mirror. It was too early yet for the tide +of travel which sends a score of boats up and down this +thoroughfare every day; and from shore to shore the water was +unruffled, except by a flock of sheldrakes which had been feeding +near Plymouth Rock, and now went skittering off into Weller Bay +with a motion between flying and swimming, leaving a long wake of +foam behind them. + +At such a time as this you can see the real colour of these +Adirondack lakes. It is not blue, as romantic writers so often +describe it, nor green, like some of those wonderful Swiss lakes; +although of course it reflects the colour of the trees along the +shore; and when the wind stirs it, it gives back the hue of the +sky, blue when it is clear, gray when the clouds are gathering, and +sometimes as black as ink under the shadow of storm. But when it +is still, the water itself is like that river which one of the +poets has described as + + + "Flowing with a smooth brown current." + + +And in this sheet of burnished bronze the mountains and islands +were reflected perfectly, and the sun shone back from it, not in +broken gleams or a wide lane of light, but like a single ball of +fire, moving before us as we moved. + +But stop! What is that dark speck on the water, away down toward +Turtle Point? It has just the shape and size of a deer's head. It +seems to move steadily out into the lake. There is a little +ripple, like a wake, behind it. Hose turns to look at it, and then +sends the boat darting in that direction with long, swift strokes. +It is a moment of pleasant excitement, and we begin to conjecture +whether the deer is a buck or a doe, and whose hounds have driven +it in. But when Hose turns to look again, he slackens his stroke, +and says: "I guess we needn't to hurry; he won't get away. It's +astonishin' what a lot of fun a man can get in the course of a +natural life a-chasm' chumps of wood." + +We landed on a sand beach at the mouth of a little stream, where a +blazed tree marked the beginning of the Ampersand trail. This line +through the forest was made years ago by that ardent sportsman and +lover of the Adirondacks, Dr. W. W. Ely, of Rochester. Since that +time it has been shortened and improved a little by other +travellers, and also not a little blocked and confused by the +lumbermen and the course of Nature. For when the lumbermen go into +the woods, they cut roads in every direction, leading nowhither, +and the unwary wanderer is thereby led aside from the right way, +and entangled in the undergrowth. And as for Nature, she is +entirely opposed to continuance of paths through her forest. She +covers them with fallen leaves, and hides them with thick bushes. +She drops great trees across them, and blots then out with +windfalls. But the blazed line--a succession of broad axe-marks on +the trunks of the trees, just high enough to catch the eye on a +level--cannot be so easily obliterated, and this, after all, is the +safest guide through the woods. + +Our trail led us at first through a natural meadow, overgrown with +waist-high grass, and very spongy to the tread. Hornet-haunted +also was this meadow, and therefore no place for idle dalliance or +unwary digression, for the sting of the hornet is one of the +saddest and most humiliating surprises of this mortal life. + +Then through a tangle of old wood-roads my guide led me safely, and +we struck one of the long ridges which slope gently from the lake +to the base of the mountain. Here walking was comparatively easy, +for in the hard-wood timber there is little underbrush. The +massive trunks seemed like pillars set to uphold the level roof of +green. Great yellow birches, shaggy with age, stretched their +knotted arms high above us; sugar-maples stood up straight and +proud under their leafy crowns; and smooth beeches--the most +polished and parklike of all the forest trees--offered +opportunities for the carving of lovers' names in a place where few +lovers ever come. + +The woods were quiet. It seemed as if all living creatures had +deserted them. Indeed, if you have spent much time in our Northern +forests, you must have often wondered at the sparseness of life, +and felt a sense of pity for the apparent loneliness of the +squirrel that chatters at you as you pass, or the little bird that +hops noiselessly about in the thickets. The midsummer noontide is +an especially silent time. The deer are asleep in some wild +meadow. The partridge has gathered her brood for their midday nap. +The squirrels are perhaps counting over their store of nuts in a +hollow tree, and the hermit-thrush spares his voice until evening. +The woods are close--not cool and fragrant as the foolish romances +describe them--but warm and still; for the breeze which sweeps +across the hilltop and ruffles the lake does not penetrate into +these shady recesses, and therefore all the inhabitants take the +noontide as their hour of rest. Only the big woodpecker--he of the +scarlet head and mighty bill--is indefatigable, and somewhere +unseen is "tapping the hollow beech-tree," while a wakeful little +bird,--I guess it is the black-throated green warbler,--prolongs +his dreamy, listless ditty,--'te-de-terit-sca,--'te-de-us--wait. + +After about an hour of easy walking, our trail began to ascend more +sharply. We passed over the shoulder of a ridge and around the +edge of a fire-slash, and then we had the mountain fairly before +us. Not that we could see anything of it, for the woods still shut +us in, but the path became very steep, and we knew that it was a +straight climb; not up and down and round about did this most +uncompromising trail proceed, but right up, in a direct line for +the summit. + +Now this side of Ampersand is steeper than any Gothic roof I have +ever seen, and withal very much encumbered with rocks and ledges +and fallen trees. There were places where we had to haul ourselves +up by roots and branches, and places where we had to go down on our +hands and knees to crawl under logs. It was breathless work, but +not at all dangerous or difficult. Every step forward was also a +step upward; and as we stopped to rest for a moment, we could see +already glimpses of the lake below us. But at these I did not much +care to look, for I think it is a pity to spoil the surprise of a +grand view by taking little snatches of it beforehand. It is +better to keep one's face set to the mountain, and then, coming out +from the dark forest upon the very summit, feel the splendour of +the outlook flash upon one like a revelation. + +The character of the woods through which we were now passing was +entirely different from those of the lower levels. On these steep +places the birch and maple will not grow, or at least they occur +but sparsely. The higher slopes and sharp ridges of the mountains +are always covered with soft-wood timber. Spruce and hemlock and +balsam strike their roots among the rocks, and find a hidden +nourishment. They stand close together; thickets of small trees +spring up among the large ones; from year to year the great trunks +are falling one across another, and the undergrowth is thickening +around them, until a spruce forest seems to be almost impassable. +The constant rain of needles and the crumbling of the fallen trees +form a rich, brown mould, into which the foot sinks noiselessly. +Wonderful beds of moss, many feet in thickness, and softer than +feathers, cover the rocks and roots. There are shadows never +broken by the sun, and dark, cool springs of icy water hidden away +in the crevices. You feel a sense of antiquity here which you can +never feel among the maples and birches. Longfellow was right when +he filled his forest primeval with "murmuring pines and hemlocks." + +The higher one climbs, the darker and gloomier and more rugged the +vegetation becomes. The pine-trees soon cease to follow you; the +hemlocks disappear, and the balsams can go no farther. Only the +hardy spruce keeps on bravely, rough and stunted, with branches +matted together and pressed down flat by the weight of the winter's +snow, until finally, somewhere about the level of four thousand +feet above the sea, even this bold climber gives out, and the +weather-beaten rocks of the summit are clad only with mosses and +Alpine plants. + +Thus it is with mountains, as perhaps with men, a mark of superior +dignity to be naturally bald. + +Ampersand, falling short by a thousand feet of the needful height, +cannot claim this distinction. But what Nature has denied, human +labour has supplied. Under the direction of the Adirondack Survey, +some years ago, several acres of trees were cut from the summit; +and when we emerged, after the last sharp scramble, upon the very +crest of the mountain, we were not shut in by a dense thicket, but +stood upon a bare ridge of granite in the centre of a ragged +clearing. + +I shut my eyes for a moment, drew a few long breaths of the +glorious breeze, and then looked out upon a wonder and a delight +beyond description. + +A soft, dazzling splendour filled the air. Snowy banks and drifts +of cloud were floating slowly over a wide and wondrous land. Vast +sweeps of forest, shining waters, mountains near and far, the +deepest green and the palest blue, changing colours and glancing +lights, and all so silent, so strange, so far away, that it seemed +like the landscape of a dream. One almost feared to speak, lest it +should vanish. + +Right below us the Lower Saranac and Lonesome Pond, Round Lake and +the Weller Ponds, were spread out like a map. Every point and +island was clearly marked. We could follow the course of the +Saranac River in all its curves and windings, and see the white +tents of the hay-makers on the wild meadows. Far away to the +northeast stretched the level fields of Bloomingdale. But westward +all was unbroken wilderness, a great sea of woods as far as the eye +could reach. And how far it can reach from a height like this! +What a revelation of the power of sight! That faint blue outline +far in the north was Lyon Mountain, nearly thirty miles away as the +crow flies. Those silver gleams a little nearer were the waters of +St. Regis. The Upper Saranac was displayed in all its length and +breadth, and beyond it the innumerable waters of Fish Creek were +tangled among the dark woods. The long ranges of the hills about +the Jordan bounded the western horizon, and on the southwest Big +Tupper Lake was sleeping at the base of Mount Morris. Looking past +the peak of Stony Creek Mountain, which rose sharp and distinct in +a line with Ampersand, we could trace the path of the Raquette +River from the distant waters of Long Lake down through its far- +stretched valley, and catch here and there a silvery link of its +current. + +But when we turned to the south and east, how wonderful and how +different was the view! Here was no widespread and smiling +landscape with gleams of silver scattered through it, and soft blue +haze resting upon its fading verge, but a wild land of mountains, +stern, rugged, tumultuous, rising one beyond another like the waves +of a stormy ocean,--Ossa piled upin Pelion,--Mcintyre's sharp peak, +and the ragged crest of the Gothics, and, above all, Marcy's dome- +like head, raised just far enough above the others to assert his +royal right as monarch of the Adirondacks. + +But grandest of all, as seen from this height, was Mount Seward,--a +solemn giant of a mountain, standing apart from the others, and +looking us full in the face. He was clothed from base to summit in +a dark, unbroken robe of forest. Ou-kor-lah, the Indians called +him--the Great Eye; and he seemed almost to frown upon us in +defiance. At his feet, so straight below us that it seemed almost +as if we could cast a stone into it, lay the wildest and most +beautiful of all the Adirondack waters--Ampersand Lake. + +On its shore, some five-and-twenty years ago, the now almost +forgotten Adirondack Club had their shanty--the successor of "the +Philosophers' Camp" on Follensbee Pond. Agassiz, Appleton, Norton, +Emerson, Lowell, Hoar, Gray, John Holmes, and Stillman, were among +the company who made their resting-place under the shadow of Mount +Seward. They had bought a tract of forest land completely +encircling the pond, cut a rough road to it through the woods, and +built a comfortable log cabin, to which they purposed to return +summer after summer. But the civil war broke out, with all its +terrible excitement and confusion of hurrying hosts: the club +existed but for two years, and the little house in the wilderness +was abandoned. In 1878, when I spent three weeks at Ampersand, the +cabin was in ruins, and surrounded by an almost impenetrable growth +of bushes. The only philosophers to be seen were a family of what +the guides quaintly call "quill pigs." The roof had fallen to the +ground; raspberry-bushes thrust themselves through the yawning +crevices between the logs; and in front of the sunken door-sill lay +a rusty, broken iron stove, like a dismantled altar on which the +fire had gone out forever. + +After we had feasted upon the view as long as we dared, counted the +lakes and streams, and found that we could see without a glass more +than thirty, and recalled the memories of "good times" which came +to us from almost every point of the compass, we unpacked the +camera, and proceeded to take some pictures. + +If you are a photographer, and have anything of the amateur's +passion for your art, you will appreciate my pleasure and my +anxiety. Never before, so far as I knew, had a camera been set up +on Ampersand. I had but eight plates with me. The views were all +very distant and all at a downward angle. The power of the light +at this elevation was an unknown quantity. And the wind was +sweeping vigorously across the open summit of the mountain. I put +in my smallest stop, and prepared for short exposures. + +My instrument was a thing called a Tourograph, which differs from +most other cameras in having the plate-holder on top of the box. +The plates are dropped into a groove below, and then moved into +focus, after which the cap is removed and the exposure made. + +I set my instrument for Ampersand Pond, sighted the picture through +the ground glass, and measured the focus. Then I waited for a +quiet moment, dropped the plate, moved it carefully forward to the +proper mark, and went around to take off the cap. I found that I +already had it in my hand, and the plate had been exposed for about +thirty seconds with a sliding focus! + +I expostulated with myself. I said: "You are excited; you are +stupid; you are unworthy of the name of photographer. Light- +writer! You ought to write with a whitewash-brush!" The reproof +was effectual, and from that moment all went well. The plates +dropped smoothly, the camera was steady, the exposure was correct. +Six good pictures were made, to recall, so far as black and white +could do it, the delights of that day. + +It has been my good luck to climb many of the peaks of the +Adirondacks--Dix, the Dial, Hurricane, the Giant of the Valley, +Marcy, and Whiteface--but I do not think the outlook from any of +them is so wonderful and lovely as that from little Ampersand: and +I reckon among my most valuable chattels the plates of glass on +which the sun has traced for me (who cannot draw) the outlines of +that loveliest landscape. + +The downward journey was swift. We halted for an hour or two +beside a trickling spring, a few rods below the summit, to eat our +lunch. Then, jumping, running, and sometimes sliding, we made the +descent, passed in safety by the dreaded lair of the hornet, and +reached Bartlett's as the fragrance of the evening pancake was +softly diffused through the twilight. Mark that day, Memory, with +a double star in your catalogue! + +1895. + + + +A HANDFUL OF HEATHER + + +"Scotland is the home of romance because it is the home of Scott, +Burns, Black, Macdonald, Stevenson, and Barrie--and of thousands of +men like that old Highlander in kilts on the tow-path, who loves +what they have written. I would wager he has a copy of Burns in +his sporran, and has quoted him half a dozen times to the grim Celt +who is walking with him. Those old boys don't read for excitement +or knowledge, but because they love their land and their people and +their religion--and their great writers simply express their +emotions for them in words they can understand. You and I come +over here, with thousands of our countrymen, to borrow their +emotions."--ROBERT BRIDGES: Overheard in Arcady. + + +My friend the Triumphant Democrat, fiercest of radicals and kindest +of men, expresses his scorn for monarchical institutions (and his +invincible love for his native Scotland) by tenanting, summer after +summer, a famous castle among the heathery Highlands. There he +proclaims the most uncompromising Americanism in a speech that +grows more broadly Scotch with every week of his emancipation from +the influence of the clipped, commercial accent of New York, and +casts contempt on feudalism by playing the part of lord of the +manor to such a perfection of high-handed beneficence that the +people of the glen are all become his clansmen, and his gentle lady +would be the patron saint of the district--if the republican +theology of Scotland could only admit saints among the elect. + +Every year he sends trophies of game to his friends across the sea-- +birds that are as toothsome and wild-flavoured as if they had not +been hatched under the tyranny of the game-laws. He has a pleasant +trick of making them grateful to the imagination as well as to the +palate by packing them in heather. I'll warrant that Aaron's rod +bore no bonnier blossoms than these stiff little bushes--and none +more magical. For every time I take up a handful of them they +transport me to the Highlands, and send me tramping once more, with +knapsack and fishing-rod, over the braes and down the burns. + + +I. + +BELL-HEATHER. + + +Some of my happiest meanderings in Scotland have been taken under +the lead of a book. Indeed, for travel in a strange country there +can be no better courier. Not a guide-book, I mean, but a real +book, and, by preference, a novel. + +Fiction, like wine, tastes best in the place where it was grown. +And the scenery of a foreign land (including architecture, which is +artificial landscape) grows less dreamlike and unreal to our +perception when we people it with familiar characters from our +favourite novels. Even on a first journey we feel ourselves among +old friends. Thus to read Romola in Florence, and Les Miserables +in Paris, and Lorna Doone on Exmoor, and The Heart of Midlothian +in Edinburgh, and David Balfour in the Pass of Glencoe, and The +Pirate in the Shetland Isles, is to get a new sense of the +possibilities of life. All these things have I done with much +inward contentment; and other things of like quality have I yet +in store; as, for example, the conjunction of The Bonnie Brier-Bush +with Drumtochty, and The Little Minister with Thrums, and The +Raiders with Galloway. But I never expect to pass pleasanter +days than those I spent with A Princess of Thule among the Hebrides. + +For then, to begin with, I was young; which is an unearned +increment of delight sure to be confiscated by the envious years +and never regained. But even youth itself was not to be compared +with the exquisite felicity of being deeply and desperately in love +with Sheila, the clear-eyed heroine of that charming book. In this +innocent passion my gray-haired comrades, Howard Crosby, the +Chancellor of the University of New York, and my father, an ex- +Moderator of the Presbyterian General Assembly, were ardent but +generous rivals. + +How great is the joy and how fascinating the pursuit of such an +ethereal affection! It enlarges the heart without embarrassing the +conscience. It is a cup of pure gladness with no bitterness in its +dregs. It spends the present moment with a free hand, and yet +leaves no undesirable mortgage upon the future. King Arthur, the +founder of the Round Table, expressed a conviction, according to +Tennyson, that the most important element in a young knight's +education is "the maiden passion for a maid." Surely the safest +form in which this course in the curriculum may be taken is by +falling in love with a girl in a book. It is the only affair of +the kind into which a young fellow can enter without +responsibility, and out of which he can always emerge, when +necessary, without discredit. And as for the old fellow who still +keeps up this education of the heart, and worships his heroine with +the ardour of a John Ridd and the fidelity of a Henry Esmond, I +maintain that he is exempt from all the penalties of declining +years. The man who can love a girl in a book may be old, but never +aged. + +So we sailed, lovers all three, among the Western Isles, and +whatever ship it was that carried us, her figurehead was always the +Princess Sheila. Along the ruffled blue waters of the sounds and +lochs that wind among the roots of unpronounceable mountains, and +past the dark hills of Skye, and through the unnumbered flocks of +craggy islets where the sea-birds nest, the spell of the sweet +Highland maid drew us, and we were pilgrims to the Ultima Thule +where she lived and reigned. + +The Lewis, with its tail-piece, the Harris, is quite a sizable +island to be appended to such a country as Scotland. It is a +number of miles long, and another number of miles wide, and it has +a number of thousand inhabitants--I should say as many as three- +quarters of an inhabitant to the square mile--and the conditions of +agriculture and the fisheries are extremely interesting and +quarrelsome. All these I duly studied at the time, and reported in +a series of intolerably dull letters to the newspaper which +supplied a financial basis for my sentimental journey. They are +full of information; but I have been amused to note, after these +many years, how wide they steer of the true motive and interest of +the excursion. There is not even a hint of Sheila in any of them. +Youth, after all, is a shamefaced and secretive season; like the +fringed polygala, it hides its real blossom underground. + +It was Sheila's dark-blue dress and sailor hat with the white +feather that we looked for as we loafed through the streets of +Stornoway, that quaint metropolis of the herring-trade, where +strings of fish alternated with boxes of flowers in the windows, +and handfuls of fish were spread upon the roofs to dry just as the +sliced apples are exposed upon the kitchen-sheds of New England in +September, and dark-haired women were carrying great creels of fish +on their shoulders, and groups of sunburned men were smoking among +the fishing-boats on the beach and talking about fish, and sea- +gulls were floating over the houses with their heads turning from +side to side and their bright eyes peering everywhere for +unconsidered trifles of fish, and the whole atmosphere of the +place, physical, mental, and moral, was pervaded with fish. It was +Sheila's soft, sing-song Highland speech that we heard through the +long, luminous twilight in the pauses of that friendly chat on the +balcony of the little inn where a good fortune brought us +acquainted with Sam Bough, the mellow Edinburgh painter. It was +Sheila's low sweet brow, and long black eyelashes, and tender blue +eyes, that we saw before us as we loitered over the open moorland, +a far-rolling sea of brown billows, reddened with patches of bell- +heather, and brightened here and there with little lakes lying wide +open to the sky. And were not these peat-cutters, with the big +baskets on their backs, walking in silhouette along the ridges, the +people that Sheila loved and tried to help; and were not these +crofters' cottages with thatched roofs, like beehives, blending +almost imperceptibly with the landscape, the dwellings into which +she planned to introduce the luxury of windows; and were not these +Standing Stones of Callernish, huge tombstones of a vanished +religion, the roofless temple from which the Druids paid their +westernmost adoration to the setting sun as he sank into the +Atlantic--was not this the place where Sheila picked the bunch of +wild flowers and gave it to her lover? There is nothing in +history, I am sure, half so real to us as some of the things in +fiction. The influence of an event upon our character is little +affected by considerations as to whether or not it ever happened. + +There were three churches in Stornoway, all Presbyterian, of +course, and therefore full of pious emulation. The idea of +securing an American preacher for an August Sabbath seemed to fall +upon them simultaneously, and to offer the prospect of novelty +without too much danger. The brethren of the U. P. congregation, +being a trifle more gleg than the others, arrived first at the inn, +and secured the promise of a morning sermon from Chancellor Howard +Crosby. The session of the Free Kirk came in a body a little +later, and to them my father pledged himself for the evening sermon. +The senior elder of the Established Kirk, a snuff-taking man and +very deliberate, was the last to appear, and to his request for an +afternoon sermon there was nothing left to offer but the services +of the young probationer in theology. I could see that it struck +him as a perilous adventure. Questions about "the fundamentals" +glinted in his watery eye. He crossed and uncrossed his legs with +solemnity, and blew his nose so frequently in a huge red silk +handkerchief that it seemed like a signal of danger. At last he +unburdened himself of his hesitations. + +"Ah'm not saying that the young man will not be orthodox--ahem! +But ye know, sir, in the Kirk, we are not using hymns, but just the +pure Psawms of Daffit, in the meetrical fairsion. And ye know, +sir, they are ferry tifficult in the reating, whatefer, for a young +man, and one that iss a stranger. And if his father will just be +coming with him in the pulpit, to see that nothing iss said amiss, +that will be ferry comforting to the congregation." + +So the dear governor swallowed his laughter gravely and went surety +for his son. They appeared together in the church, a barnlike +edifice, with great galleries half-way between the floor and the +roof. Still higher up, the pulpit stuck like a swallow's nest +against the wall. The two ministers climbed the precipitous stair +and found themselves in a box so narrow that one must stand +perforce, while the other sat upon the only seat. In this "ride +and tie" fashion they went through the service. When it was time +to preach, the young man dropped the doctrines as discreetly as +possible upon the upturned countenances beneath him. I have +forgotten now what it was all about, but there was a quotation from +the Song of Solomon, ending with "Sweet is thy voice, and thy +countenance is comely." And when it came to that, the +probationer's eyes (if the truth must be told) went searching +through that sea of faces for one that should be familiar to his +heart, and to which he might make a personal application of the +Scripture passage--even the face of Sheila. + +There are rivers in the Lewis, at least two of them, and on one of +these we had the offer of a rod for a day's fishing. Accordingly +we cast lots, and the lot fell upon the youngest, and I went forth +with a tall, red-legged gillie, to try for my first salmon. The +Whitewater came singing down out of the moorland into a rocky +valley, and there was a merry curl of air on the pools, and the +silver fish were leaping from the stream. The gillie handled the +big rod as if it had been a fairy's wand, but to me it was like a +giant's spear. It was a very different affair from fishing with +five ounces of split bamboo on a Long Island trout-pond. The +monstrous fly, like an awkward bird, went fluttering everywhere but +in the right direction. It was the mercy of Providence that +preserved the gillie's life. But he was very patient and +forbearing, leading me on from one pool to another, as I spoiled +the water and snatched the hook out of the mouth of rising fish, +until at last we found a salmon that knew even less about the +niceties of salmon-fishing than I did. He seized the fly firmly, +before I could pull it away, and then, in a moment, I found myself +attached to a creature with the strength of a whale and the agility +of a flying-fish. He led me rushing up and down the bank like a +madman. He played on the surface like a whirlwind, and sulked at +the bottom like a stone. He meditated, with ominous delay, in the +middle of the deepest pool, and then, darting across the river, +flung himself clean out of water and landed far up on the green +turf of the opposite shore. My heart melted like a snowflake in +the sea, and I thought that I had lost him forever. But he rolled +quietly back into the water with the hook still set in his nose. A +few minutes afterwards I brought him within reach of the gaff, and +my first salmon was glittering on the grass beside me. + +Then I remembered that William Black had described this very fish +in A Princess of Thule. I pulled the book from my pocket, and, +lighting a pipe, sat down to read that delightful chapter over +again. The breeze played softly down the valley. The warm +sunlight was filled with the musical hum of insects and the murmur +of falling waters. I thought how much pleasanter it would have +been to learn salmon-fishing, as Black's hero did, from the Maid of +Borva, than from a red-headed gillie. But, then, his salmon, after +leaping across the stream, got away; whereas mine was safe. A man +cannot have everything in this world. I picked a spray of rosy +bell-heather from the bank of the river, and pressed it between the +leaves of the book in memory of Sheila. + + +II. + +COMMON HEATHER. + + +It is not half as far from Albany to Aberdeen as it is from New +York to London. In fact, I venture to say that an American on foot +will find himself less a foreigner in Scotland than in any other +country in the Old World. There is something warm and hospitable-- +if he knew the language well enough he would call it couthy--in the +greeting that he gets from the shepherd on the moor, and the +conversation that he holds with the farmer's wife in the stone +cottage, where he stops to ask for a drink of milk and a bit of +oat-cake. He feels that there must be a drop of Scotch somewhere +in his mingled blood, or at least that the texture of his thought +and feelings has been partly woven on a Scottish loom--perhaps the +Shorter Catechism, or Robert Burns's poems, or the romances of Sir +Walter Scott. At all events, he is among a kindred and +comprehending people. They do not speak English in the same way +that he does--through the nose---but they think very much more in +his mental dialect than the English do. They are independent and +wide awake, curious and full of personal interest. The wayside +mind in Inverness or Perth runs more to muscle and less to fat, has +more active vanity and less passive pride, is more inquisitive and +excitable and sympathetic--in short, to use a symbolist's +description, it is more apt to be red-headed--than in Surrey or +Somerset. Scotchmen ask more questions about America, but fewer +foolish ones. You will never hear them inquiring whether there is +any good bear-hunting in the neighbourhood of Boston, or whether +Shakespeare is much read in the States. They have a healthy +respect for our institutions, and have quite forgiven (if, indeed, +they ever resented) that little affair in 1776. They are all born +Liberals. When a Scotchman says he is a Conservative, it only +means that he is a Liberal with hesitations. + +And yet in North Britain the American pedestrian will not find that +amused and somewhat condescending toleration for his peculiarities, +that placid willingness to make the best of all his vagaries of +speech and conduct, that he finds in South Britain. In an English +town you may do pretty much what you like on a Sunday, even to the +extent of wearing a billycock hat to church, and people will put up +with it from a countryman of Buffalo Bill and the Wild West Show. +But in a Scotch village, if you whistle in the street on a Lord's +Day, though it be a Moody and Sankey tune, you will be likely to +get, as I did, an admonition from some long-legged, grizzled elder: + +"Young man, do ye no ken it's the Sawbath Day?" + +I recognised the reproof of the righteous, an excellent oil which +doth not break the head, and took it gratefully at the old man's +hands. For did it not prove that he regarded me as a man and a +brother, a creature capable of being civilised and saved? + +It was in the gray town of Dingwall that I had this bit of pleasant +correction, as I was on the way to a fishing tramp through +Sutherlandshire. This northwest corner of Great Britain is the +best place in the whole island for a modest and impecunious angler. +There are, or there were a few years ago, wild lochs and streams +which are still practically free, and a man who is content with +small things can pick up some very pretty sport from the highland +inns, and make a good basket of memorable experiences every week. + +The inn at Lairg, overlooking the narrow waters of Loch Shin, was +embowered in honeysuckles, and full of creature comfort. But there +were too many other men with rods there to suit my taste. "The +feesh in this loch," said the boatman, "iss not so numerous ass the +feeshermen, but more wise. There iss not one of them that hass not +felt the hook, and they know ferry well what side of the fly has +the forkit tail." + +At Altnaharra, in the shadow of Ben Clebrig, there was a cozy +little house with good fare, and abundant trout-fishing in Loch +Naver and Loch Meadie. It was there that I fell in with a +wandering pearl-peddler who gathered his wares from the mussels in +the moorland streams. They were not of the finest quality, these +Scotch pearls, but they had pretty, changeable colours of pink and +blue upon them, like the iridescent light that plays over the +heather in the long northern evenings. I thought it must be a hard +life for the man, wading day after day in the ice-cold water, and +groping among the coggly, sliddery stones for the shellfish, and +cracking open perhaps a thousand before he could find one pearl. +"Oh, yess," said be, "and it iss not an easy life, and I am not +saying that it will be so warm and dry ass liffing in a rich house. +But it iss the life that I am fit for, and I hef my own time and my +thoughts to mysel', and that is a ferry goot thing; and then, sir, +I haf found the Pearl of Great Price, and I think upon that day and +night." + +Under the black, shattered peaks of Ben Laoghal, where I saw an +eagle poising day after day as if some invisible centripetal force +bound him forever to that small circle of air, there was a loch +with plenty of brown trout and a few salmo ferox; and down at +Tongue there was a little river where the sea-trout sometimes come +up with the tide. + +Here I found myself upon the north coast, and took the road +eastward between the mountains and the sea. It was a beautiful +region of desolation. There were rocky glens cutting across the +road, and occasionally a brawling stream ran down to the salt +water, breaking the line of cliffs with a little bay and a half- +moon of yellow sand. The heather covered all the hills. There +were no trees, and but few houses. The chief signs of human labour +were the rounded piles of peat, and the square cuttings in the moor +marking the places where the subterranean wood-choppers had +gathered their harvests. The long straths were once cultivated, +and every patch of arable land had its group of cottages full of +children. The human harvest has always been the richest and most +abundant that is raised in the Highlands; but unfortunately the +supply exceeded the demand; and so the crofters were evicted, and +great flocks of sheep were put in possession of the land; and now +the sheep-pastures have been changed into deer-forests; and far and +wide along the valleys and across the hills there is not a trace of +habitation, except the heaps of stones and the clumps of straggling +bushes which mark the sites of lost homes. But what is one +country's loss is another country's gain. Canada and the United +States are infinitely the richer for the tough, strong, fearless, +honest men that were dispersed from these lonely straths to make +new homes across the sea. + +It was after sundown when I reached the straggling village of +Melvich, and the long day's journey had left me weary. But the +inn, with its red-curtained windows, looked bright and reassuring. +Thoughts of dinner and a good bed comforted my spirit--prematurely. +For the inn was full. There were but five bedrooms and two +parlours. The gentlemen who had the neighbouring shootings +occupied three bedrooms and a parlour; the other two bedrooms had +just been taken by the English fishermen who had passed me in the +road an hour ago in the mail-coach (oh! why had I not suspected +that treacherous vehicle?); and the landlord and his wife assured +me, with equal firmness and sympathy, that there was not another +cot or pair of blankets in the house. I believed them, and was +sinking into despair when Sandy M'Kaye appeared on the scene as my +angel of deliverance. Sandy was a small, withered, wiry man, +dressed in rusty gray, with an immense white collar thrusting out +its points on either side of his chin, and a black stock climbing +over the top of it. I guessed from his speech that he had once +lived in the lowlands. He had hoped to be engaged as a gillie by +the shooting party, but had been disappointed. He had wanted to be +taken by the English fishermen, but another and younger man had +stepped in before him. Now Sandy saw in me his Predestinated +Opportunity, and had no idea of letting it post up the road that +night to the next village. He cleared his throat respectfully and +cut into the conversation. + +"Ah'm thinkin' the gentleman micht find a coomfortaible lodgin' wi' +the weedow Macphairson a wee bittie doon the road. Her dochter is +awa' in Ameriky, an' the room is a verra fine room, an' it is a +peety to hae it stannin' idle, an' ye wudna mind the few steps to +and fro tae yir meals here, sir, wud ye? An' if ye 'ill gang wi' +me efter dinner, 'a 'll be prood to shoo ye the hoose." + +So, after a good dinner with the English fishermen, Sandy piloted +me down the road through the thickening dusk. I remember a hoodie +crow flew close behind us with a choking, ghostly cough that +startled me. The Macpherson cottage was a snug little house of +stone, with fuchsias and roses growing in the front yard: and the +widow was a douce old lady, with a face like a winter apple in the +month of April, wrinkled, but still rosy. She was a little +doubtful about entertaining strangers, but when she heard I was +from America she opened the doors of her house and her heart. And +when, by a subtle cross examination that would have been a credit +to the wife of a Connecticut deacon, she discovered the fact that +her lodger was a minister, she did two things, with equal and +immediate fervour; she brought out the big Bible and asked him to +conduct evening worship, and she produced a bottle of old Glenlivet +and begged him to "guard against takkin' cauld by takkin' a glass +of speerits." + +It was a very pleasant fortnight at Melvich. Mistress Macpherson +was so motherly that "takkin' cauld" was reduced to a permanent +impossibility. The other men at the inn proved to be very +companionable fellows, quite different from the monsters of +insolence that my anger had imagined in the moment of +disappointment. The shooting party kept the table abundantly +supplied with grouse and hares and highland venison; and there was +a piper to march up and down before the window and play while we +ate dinner--a very complimentary and disquieting performance. But +there are many occasions in life when pride can be entertained only +at the expense of comfort. + +Of course Sandy was my gillie. It was a fine sight to see him +exhibiting the tiny American trout-rod, tied with silk ribbons in +its delicate case, to the other gillies and exulting over them. +Every morning he would lead me away through the heather to some +lonely loch on the shoulders of the hills, from which we could look +down upon the Northern Sea and the blue Orkney Isles far away across +the Pentland Firth. Sometimes we would find a loch with a boat on +it, and drift up and down, casting along the shores. Sometimes, +in spite of Sandy's confident predictions, no boat could be found, +and then I must put on the Mackintosh trousers and wade out over my +hips into the water, and circumambulate the pond, throwing the flies +as far as possible toward the middle, and feeling my way carefully +along the bottom with the long net-handle, while Sandy danced on +the bank in an agony of apprehension lest his Predestinated Opportunity +should step into a deep hole and be drowned. It was a curious fact +in natural history that on the lochs with boats the trout were in +the shallow water, but in the boatless lochs they were away out in +the depths. "Juist the total depraivity o' troots," said Sandy, +"an' terrible fateegin'." + +Sandy had an aversion to commit himself to definite statements on +any subject not theological. If you asked him how long the +morning's tramp would be, it was "no verra long, juist a bit ayant +the hull yonner." And if, at the end of the seventh mile, you +complained that it was much too far, he would never do more than +admit that "it micht be shorter." If you called him to rejoice +over a trout that weighed close upon two pounds, he allowed that it +was "no bad--but there's bigger anes i' the loch gin we cud but +wile them oot." And at lunch-time, when we turned out a full +basket of shining fish on the heather, the most that he would say, +while his eyes snapped with joy and pride, was, "Aweel, we canna +complain, the day." + +Then he would gather an armful of dried heather-stems for kindling, +and dig out a few roots and crooked limbs of the long-vanished +forest from the dry, brown, peaty soil, and make our campfire of +prehistoric wood--just for the pleasant, homelike look of the +blaze--and sit down beside it to eat our lunch. Heat is the least +of the benefits that man gets from fire. It is the sign of +cheerfulness and good comradeship. I would not willingly satisfy +my hunger, even in a summer nooning, without a little flame burning +on a rustic altar to consecrate and enliven the feast. When the +bread and cheese were finished and the pipes were filled with +Virginia tobacco, Sandy would begin to tell me, very solemnly and +respectfully, about the mistakes I had made in the fishing that +day, and mourn over the fact that the largest fish had not been +hooked. There was a strong strain of pessimism in Sandy, and he +enjoyed this part of the sport immensely. + +But he was at his best in the walk home through the lingering +twilight, when the murmur of the sea trembled through the air, and +the incense of burning peat floated up from the cottages, and the +stars blossomed one by one in the pale-green sky. Then Sandy +dandered on at his ease down the hills, and discoursed of things in +heaven and earth. He was an unconscious follower of the theology +of the Reverend John Jasper, of Richmond, Virginia, and rejected +the Copernican theory of the universe as inconsistent with the +history of Joshua. "Gin the sun doesna muve," said he, "what for +wad Joshua be tellin' him to stond steel? 'A wad suner beleeve +there was a mistak' in the veesible heevens than ae fault in the +Guid Buik." Whereupon we held long discourse of astronomy and +inspiration; but Sandy concluded it with a philosophic word which +left little to be said: "Aweel, yon teelescope is a wonnerful +deescovery; but 'a dinna think the less o' the Baible." + + +III. + +WHITE HEATHER. + + +Memory is a capricious and arbitrary creature. You never can tell +what pebble she will pick up from the shore of life to keep among +her treasures, or what inconspicuous flower of the field she will +preserve as the symbol of + + + "Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears." + + +She has her own scale of values for these mementos, and knows +nothing of the market price of precious stones or the costly +splendour of rare orchids. The thing that pleases her is the thing +that she will hold fast. And yet I do not doubt that the most +important things are always the best remembered; only we must learn +that the real importance of what we see and hear in the world is to +be measured at last by its meaning, its significance, its intimacy +with the heart of our heart and the life of our life. And when we +find a little token of the past very safely and imperishably kept +among our recollections, we must believe that memory has made no +mistake. It is because that little thing has entered into our +experience most deeply, that it stays with us and we cannot lose +it. + +You have half forgotten many a famous scene that you travelled far +to look upon. You cannot clearly recall the sublime peak of Mont +Blanc, the roaring curve of Niagara, the vast dome of St. Peter's. +The music of Patti's crystalline voice has left no distinct echo in +your remembrance, and the blossoming of the century-plant is dimmer +than the shadow of a dream. But there is a nameless valley among +the hills where you can still trace every curve of the stream, and +see the foam-bells floating on the pool below the bridge, and the +long moss wavering in the current. There is a rustic song of a +girl passing through the fields at sunset, that still repeats its +far-off cadence in your listening ears. There is a small flower +trembling on its stem in some hidden nook beneath the open sky, +that never withers through all the changing years; the wind passes +over it, but it is not gone--it abides forever in your soul, an +amaranthine blossom of beauty and truth. + +White heather is not an easy flower to find. You may look for it +among the highlands for a day without success. And when it is +discovered, there is little outward charm to commend it. It lacks +the grace of the dainty bells that hang so abundantly from the +Erica Tetralix, and the pink glow of the innumerable blossoms of +the common heather. But then it is a symbol. It is the Scotch +Edelweiss. It means sincere affection, and unselfish love, and +tender wishes as pure as prayers. I shall always remember the +evening when I found the white heather on the moorland above Glen +Ericht. Or, rather, it was not I that found it (for I have little +luck in the discovery of good omens, and have never plucked a four- +leaved clover in my life), but my companion, the gentle Mistress of +the Glen, whose hair was as white as the tiny blossoms, and yet +whose eyes were far quicker than mine to see and name every flower +that bloomed in those lofty, widespread fields. + +Ericht Water is formed by the marriage of two streams, one flowing +out of Strath Ardle and the other descending from Cairn Gowar +through the long, lonely Pass of Glenshee. The Ericht begins at +the bridge of Cally, and its placid, beautiful glen, unmarred by +railway or factory, reaches almost down to Blairgowrie. On the +southern bank, but far above the water, runs the high road to +Braemar and the Linn of Dee. On the other side of the river, +nestling among the trees, is the low white manor-house, + + + "An ancient home of peace." + + +It is a place where one who had been wearied and perchance sore +wounded in the battle of life might well desire to be carried, as +Arthur to the island valley of Avilion, for rest and healing. + +I have no thought of renewing the conflicts and cares that filled +that summer with sorrow. There were fightings without and fears +within; there was the surrender of an enterprise that had been +cherished since boyhood, and the bitter sense of irremediable +weakness that follows such a reverse; there was a touch of that +wrath with those we love, which, as Coleridge says, + + + "Doth work like madness in the brain;" + + +flying across the sea from these troubles, I had found my old +comrade of merrier days sentenced to death, and caught but a brief +glimpse of his pale, brave face as he went away into exile. At +such a time the sun and the light and the moon and the stars are +darkened, and the clouds return after rain. But through those +clouds the Mistress of the Glen came to meet me--a stranger till +then, but an appointed friend, a minister of needed grace, an angel +of quiet comfort. The thick mists of rebellion, mistrust, and +despair have long since rolled away, and against the background of +the hills her figure stands out clearly, dressed in the fashion of +fifty years ago, with the snowy hair gathered close beneath her +widow's cap, and a spray of white heather in her outstretched hand. + +There were no other guests in the house by the river during those +still days in the noontide hush of midsummer. Every morning, while +the Mistress was busied with her household cares and letters, I +would be out in the fields hearing the lark sing, and watching the +rabbits as they ran to and fro, scattering the dew from the grass +in a glittering spray. Or perhaps I would be angling down the +river, with the swift pressure of the water around my knees, and an +inarticulate current of cooling thoughts flowing on and on through +my brain like the murmur of the stream. Every afternoon there were +long walks with the Mistress in the old-fashioned garden, where +wonderful roses were blooming; or through the dark, fir-shaded den +where the wild burn dropped down to join the river; or out upon the +high moor under the waning orange sunset. Every night there were +luminous and restful talks beside the open fire in the library, +when the words came clear and calm from the heart, unperturbed by +the vain desire of saying brilliant things, which turns so much of +our conversation into a combat of wits instead of an interchange of +thoughts. Talk like this is possible only between two. The +arrival of a third person sets the lists for a tournament, and +offers the prize for a verbal victory. But where there are only +two, the armour is laid aside, and there is no call to thrust and +parry. + +One of the two should be a good listener, sympathetic, but not +silent, giving confidence in order to attract it--and of this art a +woman is the best master. But its finest secrets do not come to +her until she has passed beyond the uncertain season of compliments +and conquests, and entered into the serenity of a tranquil age. + +What is this foolish thing that men say about the impossibility of +true intimacy and converse between the young and the old? +Hamerton, for example, in his book on Human Intercourse, would have +us believe that a difference in years is a barrier between hearts. +For my part, I have more often found it an open door, and a +security of generous and tolerant welcome for the young soldier, +who comes in tired and dusty from the battle-field, to tell his +story of defeat or victory in the garden of still thoughts where +old age is resting in the peace of honourable discharge. I like +what Robert Louis Stevenson says about it in his essay on Talk and +Talkers. + +"Not only is the presence of the aged in itself remedial, but their +minds are stored with antidotes, wisdom's simples, plain +considerations overlooked by youth. They have matter to +communicate, be they never so stupid. Their talk is not merely +literature, it is great literature; classic by virtue of the +speaker's detachment; studded, like a book of travel, with things +we should not otherwise have learnt. . . where youth agrees with +age, not where they differ, wisdom lies; and it is when the young +disciple finds his heart to beat in tune with his gray-haired +teacher's that a lesson may be learned." + +The conversation of the Mistress of the Glen shone like the light +and distilled like the dew, not only by virtue of what she said, +but still more by virtue of what she was. Her face was a good +counsel against discouragement; and the cheerful quietude of her +demeanour was a rebuke to all rebellious, cowardly, and +discontented thoughts. It was not the striking novelty or +profundity of her commentary on life that made it memorable, it was +simply the truth of what she said and the gentleness with which she +said it. Epigrams are worth little for guidance to the perplexed, +and less for comfort to the wounded. But the plain, homely sayings +which come from a soul that has learned the lesson of patient +courage in the school of real experience, fall upon the wound like +drops of balsam, and like a soothing lotion up on the eyes smarting +and blinded with passion. + +She spoke of those who had walked with her long ago in her garden, +and for whose sake, now that they had all gone into the world of +light, every flower was doubly dear. Would it be a true proof of +loyalty to them if she lived gloomily or despondently because they +were away? She spoke of the duty of being ready to welcome +happiness as well as to endure pain, and of the strength that +endurance wins by being grateful for small daily joys, like the +evening light, and the smell of roses, and the singing of birds. +She spoke of the faith that rests on the Unseen Wisdom and Love +like a child on its mother's breast, and of the melting away of +doubts in the warmth of an effort to do some good in the world. +And if that effort has conflict, and adventure, and confused noise, +and mistakes, and even defeats mingled with it, in the stormy years +of youth, is not that to be expected? The burn roars and leaps in +the den; the stream chafes and frets through the rapids of the +glen; the river does not grow calm and smooth until it nears the +sea. Courage is a virtue that the young cannot spare; to lose it +is to grow old before the time; it is better to make a thousand +mistakes and suffer a thousand reverses than to refuse the battle. +Resignation is the final courage of old age; it arrives in its own +season; and it is a good day when it comes to us. Then there are +no more disappointments; for we have learned that it is even better +to desire the things that we have than to have the things that we +desire. And is not the best of all our hopes--the hope of +immortality--always before us? How can we be dull or heavy while +we have that new experience to look forward to? It will be the +most joyful of all our travels and adventures. It will bring us +our best acquaintances and friendships. But there is only one way +to get ready for immortality, and that is to love this life, and +live it as bravely and cheerfully and faithfully as we can. + +So my gentle teacher with the silver hair showed me the treasures +of her ancient, simple faith; and I felt that no sermons, nor +books, nor arguments can strengthen the doubting heart so deeply as +just to come into touch with a soul which has proved the truth of +that plain religion whose highest philosophy is "Trust in the Lord +and do good." At the end of the evening the household was gathered +for prayers, and the Mistress kneeled among her servants, leading +them, in her soft Scottish accent, through the old familiar +petitions for pardon for the errors of the day, and refreshing +sleep through the night and strength for the morrow. It is good to +be in a land where the people are not ashamed to pray. I have +shared the blessing of Catholics at their table in lowly huts among +the mountains of the Tyrol, and knelt with Covenanters at their +household altar in the glens of Scotland; and all around the world, +where the spirit of prayer is, there is peace. The genius of the +Scotch has made many contributions to literature, but none I think, +more precious, and none that comes closer to the heart, than the +prayer which Robert Louis Stevenson wrote for his family in distant +Samoa, the night before he died:-- + + +"We beseech thee, Lord, to behold us with favour, folk of many +families and nations, gathered together in the peace of this roof: +weak men and women subsisting under the covert of thy patience. Be +patient still; suffer us yet a while longer--with our broken +promises of good, with our idle endeavours against evil--suffer us +a while longer to endure, and (if it may be) help us to do better. +Bless to us our extraordinary mercies; if the day come when these +must be taken, have us play the man under affliction. Be with our +friends, be with ourselves. Go with each of us to rest; if any +awake, temper to them the dark hours of watching; and when the day +returns to us--our sun and comforter--call us with morning faces, +eager to labour, eager to be happy, if happiness shall be our +portion, and, if the day be marked to sorrow, strong to endure it. +We thank thee and praise thee; and, in the words of Him to whom +this day is sacred, close our oblation." + + +The man who made that kindly human prayer knew the meaning of white +heather. And I dare to hope that I too have known something of its +meaning, since that evening when the Mistress of the Glen picked +the spray and gave it to me on the lonely moor. "And now," she +said, "you will be going home across the sea; and you have been +welcome here, but it is time that you should go, for there is the +place where your real duties and troubles and joys are waiting for +you. And if you have left any misunderstandings behind you, you +will try to clear them up; and if there have been any quarrels, you +will heal them. Carry this little flower with you. It's not the +bonniest blossom in Scotland, but it's the dearest, for the message +that it brings. And you will remember that love is not +getting, but giving; not a wild dream of pleasure, and a madness of +desire--oh no, love is not that--it is goodness, and honour, and +peace, and pure living--yes, love is that; and it is the best thing +in the world, and the thing that lives longest. And that is what I +am wishing for you and yours with this bit of white heather." + +1893. + + + +THE RISTIGOUCHE FROM A HORSE-YACHT + + +Dr. Paley was ardently attached to this amusement; so much so that +when the Bishop of Durham inquired of him when one of his most +important works would be finished, he said, with great simplicity +and good humour, 'My Lord, I shall work steadily at it when the +fly-fishing season is over.'--SIR HUMPHRY DAVY: Salmonia. + + +The boundary line between the Province of Quebec and New Brunswick, +for a considerable part of its course, resembles the name of the +poet Keats; it is "writ in water." But like his fame, it is water +that never fails,--the limpid current of the river Ristigouche. + +The railway crawls over it on a long bridge at Metapedia, and you +are dropped in the darkness somewhere between midnight and dawn. +When you open your window-shutters the next morning, you see that +the village is a disconsolate hamlet, scattered along the track as +if it had been shaken by chance from an open freight-car; it +consists of twenty houses, three shops, and a discouraged church +perched upon a little hillock like a solitary mourner on the +anxious seat. The one comfortable and prosperous feature in the +countenance of Metapedia is the house of the Ristigouche Salmon +Club--an old-fashioned mansion, with broad, white piazza, looking +over rich meadow-lands. Here it was that I found my friend +Favonius, president of solemn societies, pillar of church and +state, ingenuously arrayed in gray knickerbockers, a flannel shirt, +and a soft hat, waiting to take me on his horse-yacht for a voyage +up the river. + +Have you ever seen a horse-yacht? Sometimes it is called a scow; +but that sounds common. Sometimes it is called a house-boat; but +that is too English. What does it profit a man to have a whole +dictionary full of language at his service, unless he can invent a +new and suggestive name for his friend's pleasure-craft? The +foundation of the horse-yacht--if a thing that floats may be called +fundamental--is a flat-bottomed boat, some fifty feet long and ten +feet wide, with a draft of about eight inches. The deck is open +for fifteen feet aft of the place where the bowsprit ought to be; +behind that it is completely covered by a house, cabin, cottage, or +whatever you choose to call it, with straight sides and a peaked +roof of a very early Gothic pattern. Looking in at the door you +see, first of all, two cots, one on either side of the passage; +then an open space with a dining-table, a stove, and some chairs; +beyond that a pantry with shelves, and a great chest for +provisions. A door at the back opens into the kitchen, and from +that another door opens into a sleeping-room for the boatmen. A +huge wooden tiller curves over the stern of the boat, and the +helmsman stands upon the kitchen-roof. Two canoes are floating +behind, holding back, at the end of their long tow-ropes, as if +reluctant to follow so clumsy a leader. This is an accurate +description of the horse-yacht. If necessary it could be sworn to +before a notary public. But I am perfectly sure that you might +read this page through without skipping a word, and if you had +never seen the creature with your own eyes, you would have no idea +how absurd it looks and how comfortable it is. + +While we were stowing away our trunks and bags under the cots, and +making an equitable division of the hooks upon the walls, the +motive power of the yacht stood patiently upon the shore, stamping +a hoof, now and then, or shaking a shaggy head in mild protest +against the flies. Three more pessimistic-looking horses I never +saw. They were harnessed abreast, and fastened by a prodigious +tow-rope to a short post in the middle of the forward deck. Their +driver was a truculent, brigandish, bearded old fellow in long +boots, a blue flannel shirt, and a black sombrero. He sat upon the +middle horse, and some wild instinct of colour had made him tie a +big red handkerchief around his shoulders, so that the eye of the +beholder took delight in him. He posed like a bold, bad robber- +chief. But in point of fact I believe he was the mildest and most +inoffensive of men. We never heard him say anything except at a +distance, to his horses, and we did not inquire what that was. + +Well, as I have said, we were haggling courteously over those hooks +in the cabin, when the boat gave a lurch. The bow swung out into +the stream. There was a scrambling and clattering of iron horse- +shoes on the rough shingle of the bank; and when we looked out of +doors, our house was moving up the river with the boat under it. + +The Ristigouche is a noble stream, stately and swift and strong. +It rises among the dense forests in the northern part of New +Brunswick--a moist upland region, of never-failing springs and +innumerous lakes--and pours a flood of clear, cold water one +hundred and fifty miles northward and eastward through the hills +into the head of the Bay of Chaleurs. There are no falls in its +course, but rapids everywhere. It is steadfast but not impetuous, +quick but not turbulent, resolute and eager in its desire to get to +the sea, like the life of a man who has a purpose + + + "Too great for haste, too high for rivalry." + + +The wonder is where all the water comes from. But the river is fed +by more than six thousand square miles of territory. From both +sides the little brooks come dashing in with their supply. At +intervals a larger stream, reaching away back among the mountains +like a hand with many fingers to gather + + + "The filtered tribute of the rough woodland," + + +delivers its generous offering to the main current. + +The names of the chief tributaries of the Ristigouche are curious. +There is the headstrong Metapedia, and the crooked Upsalquitch, and +the Patapedia, and the Quatawamkedgwick. These are words at which +the tongue balks at first, but you soon grow used to them and learn +to take anything of five syllables with a rush, as a hunter takes a +five-barred gate, trusting to fortune that you will come down with +the accent in the right place. + +For six or seven miles above Metapedia the river has a breadth of +about two hundred yards, and the valley slopes back rather gently +to the mountains on either side. There is a good deal of +cultivated land, and scattered farm-houses appear. The soil is +excellent. But it is like a pearl cast before an obstinate, +unfriendly climate. Late frosts prolong the winter. Early frosts +curtail the summer. The only safe crops are grass, oats, and +potatoes. And for half the year all the cattle must be housed and +fed to keep them alive. This lends a melancholy aspect to +agriculture. Most of the farmers look as if they had never seen +better days. With few exceptions they are what a New Englander +would call "slack-twisted and shiftless." Their barns are pervious +to the weather, and their fences fail to connect. Sleds and +ploughs rust together beside the house, and chickens scratch up the +front-door yard. In truth, the people have been somewhat +demoralised by the conflicting claims of different occupations; +hunting in the fall, lumbering in the winter and spring, and +working for the American sportsmen in the brief angling season, are +so much more attractive and offer so much larger returns of ready +money, that the tedious toil of farming is neglected. But for all +that, in the bright days of midsummer, these green fields sloping +down to the water, and pastures high up among the trees on the +hillsides, look pleasant from a distance, and give an inhabited air +to the landscape. + +At the mouth of the Upsalquitch we passed the first of the fishing- +lodges. It belongs to a sage angler from Albany who saw the beauty +of the situation, years ago, and built a habitation to match it. +Since that time a number of gentlemen have bought land fronting on +good pools, and put up little cottages of a less classical style +than Charles Cotton's "Fisherman's Retreat" on the banks of the +river Dove, but better suited to this wild scenery, and more +convenient to live in. The prevailing pattern is a very simple +one; it consists of a broad piazza with a small house in the middle +of it. The house bears about the same proportion to the piazza +that the crown of a Gainsborough hat does to the brim. And the +cost of the edifice is to the cost of the land as the first price +of a share in a bankrupt railway is to the assessments which follow +the reorganisation. All the best points have been sold, and real +estate on the Ristigouche has been bid up to an absurd figure. In +fact, the river is over-populated and probably over-fished. But we +could hardly find it in our hearts to regret this, for it made the +upward trip a very sociable one. At every lodge that was open, +Favonius (who knows everybody) had a friend, and we must slip +ashore in a canoe to leave the mail and refresh the inner man. + +An angler, like an Arab, regards hospitality as a religious duty. +There seems to be something in the craft which inclines the heart +to kindness and good-fellowship. Few anglers have I seen who were +not pleasant to meet, and ready to do a good turn to a fellow- +fisherman with the gift of a killing fly or the loan of a rod. Not +their own particular and well-proved favourite, of course, for that +is a treasure which no decent man would borrow; but with that +exception the best in their store is at the service of an +accredited brother. One of the Ristigouche proprietors I remember, +whose name bespoke him a descendant of Caledonia's patron saint. +He was fishing in front of his own door when we came up, with our +splashing horses, through the pool; but nothing would do but he +must up anchor and have us away with him into the house to taste +his good cheer. And there were his daughters with their books and +needlework, and the photographs which they had taken pinned up on +the wooden walls, among Japanese fans and bits of bright-coloured +stuff in which the soul of woman delights, and, in a passive, +silent way, the soul of man also. Then, after we had discussed the +year's fishing, and the mysteries of the camera, and the deep +question of what makes some negatives too thin and others too +thick, we must go out to see the big salmon which one of the ladies +had caught a few days before, and the large trout swimming about in +their cold spring. It seemed to me, as we went on our way, that +there could hardly be a more wholesome and pleasant summer-life for +well-bred young women than this, or two amusements more innocent +and sensible than photography and fly-fishing. + +It must be confessed that the horse-yacht as a vehicle of travel is +not remarkable in point of speed. Three miles an hour is not a +very rapid rate of motion. But then, if you are not in a hurry, +why should you care to make haste? + +The wild desire to be forever racing against old Father Time is one +of the kill-joys of modern life. That ancient traveller is sure to +beat you in the long run, and as long as you are trying to rival +him, he will make your life a burden. But if you will only +acknowledge his superiority and profess that you do not approve of +racing after all, he will settle down quietly beside you and jog +along like the most companionable of creatures. That is a pleasant +pilgrimage in which the journey itself is part of the destination. + +As soon as one learns to regard the horse-yacht as a sort of moving +house, it appears admirable. There is no dust or smoke, no rumble +of wheels, or shriek of whistles. You are gliding along steadily +through an ever-green world; skirting the silent hills; passing +from one side of the river to the other when the horses have to +swim the current to find a good foothold on the bank. You are on +the water, but not at its mercy, for your craft is not disturbed by +the heaving of rude waves, and the serene inhabitants do not say "I +am sick." There is room enough to move about without falling +overboard. You may sleep, or read, or write in your cabin, or sit +upon the floating piazza in an arm-chair and smoke the pipe of +peace, while the cool breeze blows in your face and the musical +waves go singing down to the sea. + +There was one feature about the boat, which commended itself very +strongly to my mind. It was possible to stand upon the forward +deck and do a little trout-fishing in motion. By watching your +chance, when the corner of a good pool was within easy reach, you +could send out a hasty line and cajole a sea-trout from his hiding- +place. It is true that the tow-ropes and the post made the back +cast a little awkward; and the wind sometimes blew the flies up on +the roof of the cabin; but then, with patience and a short line the +thing could be done. I remember a pair of good trout that rose +together just as we were going through a boiling rapid; and it +tried the strength of my split-bamboo rod to bring those fish to +the net against the current and the motion of the boat. + +When nightfall approached we let go the anchor (to wit, a rope tied +to a large stone on the shore), ate our dinner "with gladness and +singleness of heart" like the early Christians, and slept the sleep +of the just, lulled by the murmuring of the waters, and defended +from the insidious attacks of the mosquito by the breeze blowing +down the river and the impregnable curtains over our beds. At +daybreak, long before Favonius and I had finished our dreams, we +were under way again; and when the trampling of the horses on some +rocky shore wakened us, we could see the steep hills gliding past +the windows and hear the rapids dashing against the side of the +boat, and it seemed as if we were still dreaming. + +At Cross Point, where the river makes a long loop around a narrow +mountain, thin as a saw and crowned on its jagged edge by a rude +wooden cross, we stopped for an hour to try the fishing. It was +here that I hooked two mysterious creatures, each of which took the +fly when it was below the surface, pulled for a few moments in a +sullen way and then apparently melted into nothingness. It will +always be a source of regret to me that the nature of these fish +must remain unknown. While they were on the line it was the +general opinion that they were heavy trout; but no sooner had they +departed, than I became firmly convinced, in accordance with a +psychological law which holds good all over the world, that they +were both enormous salmon. Even the Turks have a proverb which +says, "Every fish that escapes appears larger than it is." No one +can alter that conviction, because no one can logically refute it. +Our best blessings, like our largest fish, always depart before we +have time to measure them. + +The Slide Pool is in the wildest and most picturesque part of the +river, about thirty-five miles above Metapedia. The stream, +flowing swiftly down a stretch of rapids between forest-clad hills, +runs straight toward the base of an eminence so precipitous that +the trees can hardly find a foothold upon it, and seem to be +climbing up in haste on either side of the long slide which leads +to the summit. The current, barred by the wall of rock, takes a +great sweep to the right, dashing up at first in angry waves, then +falling away in oily curves and eddies, until at last it sleeps in +a black deep, apparently almost motionless, at the foot of the +hill. It was here, on the upper edge of the stream, opposite to +the slide, that we brought our floating camp to anchor for some +days. What does one do in such a watering-place? + +Let us take a "specimen day." It is early morning, or to be more +precise, about eight of the clock, and the white fog is just +beginning to curl and drift away from the surface of the river. +Sooner than this it would be idle to go out. The preternaturally +early bird in his greedy haste may catch the worm; but the salmon +never take the fly until the fog has lifted; and in this the +scientific angler sees, with gratitude, a remarkable adaptation of +the laws of nature to the tastes of man. The canoes are waiting at +the front door. We step into them and push off, Favonius going up +the stream a couple of miles to the mouth of the Patapedia, and I +down, a little shorter distance, to the famous Indian House Pool. +The slim boat glides easily on the current, with a smooth buoyant +motion, quickened by the strokes of the paddles in the bow and the +stern. We pass around two curves in the river and find ourselves +at the head of the pool. Here the man in the stern drops the +anchor, just on the edge of the bar where the rapid breaks over +into the deeper water. The long rod is lifted; the fly unhooked +from the reel; a few feet of line pulled through the rings, and the +fishing begins. + +First cast,--to the right, straight across the stream, about twenty +feet: the current carries the fly down with a semicircular sweep, +until it comes in line with the bow of the canoe. Second cast,--to +the left, straight across the stream, with the same motion: the +semicircle is completed, and the fly hangs quivering for a few +seconds at the lowest point of the arc. Three or four feet of line +are drawn from the reel. Third cast to the right; fourth cast to +the left. Then a little more line. And so, with widening half- +circles, the water is covered, gradually and very carefully, until +at length the angler has as much line out as his two-handed rod can +lift and swing. Then the first "drop" is finished; the man in the +stern quietly pulls up the anchor and lets the boat drift down a +few yards; the same process is repeated on the second drop; and so +on, until the end of the run is reached and the fly has passed over +all the good water. This seems like a very regular and somewhat +mechanical proceeding as one describes it, but in the performance +it is rendered intensely interesting by the knowledge that at any +moment it is liable to be interrupted. + +This morning the interruption comes early. At the first cast of +the second drop, before the fly has fairly lit, a great flash of +silver darts from the waves close by the boat. Usually a salmon +takes the fly rather slowly, carrying it under water before he +seizes it in his mouth. But this one is in no mood for +deliberation. He has hooked himself with a rush, and the line goes +whirring madly from the reel as he races down the pool. Keep the +point of the rod low; he must have his own way now. Up with the +anchor quickly, and send the canoe after him, bowman and sternman +paddling with swift strokes. He has reached the deepest water; he +stops to think what has happened to him; we have passed around and +below him; and now, with the current to help us, we can begin to +reel in. Lift the point of the rod, with a strong, steady pull. +Put the force of both arms into it. The tough wood will stand the +strain. The fish must be moved; he must come to the boat if he is +ever to be landed. He gives a little and yields slowly to the +pressure. Then suddenly he gives too much, and runs straight +toward us. Reel in now as swiftly as possible, or else he will get +a slack on the line and escape. Now he stops, shakes his head from +side to side, and darts away again across the pool, leaping high +out of water. Don't touch the reel! Drop the point of the rod +quickly, for if he falls on the leader he will surely break it. +Another leap, and another! Truly he is "a merry one," and it will +go hard with us to hold him. But those great leaps have exhausted +his strength, and now he follows the rod more easily. The men push +the boat back to the shallow side of the pool until it touches +lightly on the shore. The fish comes slowly in, fighting a little +and making a few short runs; he is tired and turns slightly on his +side; but even yet he is a heavy weight on the line, and it seems a +wonder that so slight a thing as the leader can guide and draw him. +Now he is close to the boat. The boatman steps out on a rock with +his gaff. Steadily now and slowly, lift the rod, bending it +backward. A quick sure stroke of the steel! a great splash! and +the salmon is lifted upon the shore. How he flounces about on the +stones. Give him the coup de grace at once, for his own sake as +well as for ours. And now look at him, as he lies there on the +green leaves. Broad back; small head tapering to a point; clean, +shining sides with a few black spots on them; it is a fish fresh- +run from the sea, in perfect condition, and that is the reason why +he has given such good sport. + +We must try for another before we go back. Again fortune favours +us, and at eleven o'clock we pole up the river to the camp with two +good salmon in the canoe. Hardly have we laid them away in the +ice-box, when Favonius comes dropping down from Patapedia with +three fish, one of them a twenty-four pounder. And so the +morning's work is done. + +In the evening, after dinner, it was our custom to sit out on the +deck, watching the moonlight as it fell softly over the black hills +and changed the river into a pale flood of rolling gold. The +fragrant wreaths of smoke floated lazily away on the faint breeze +of night. There was no sound save the rushing of the water and the +crackling of the camp-fire on the shore. We talked of many things +in the heavens above, and the earth beneath, and the waters under +the earth; touching lightly here and there as the spirit of vagrant +converse led us. Favonius has the good sense to talk about himself +occasionally and tell his own experience. The man who will not do +that must always be a dull companion. Modest egoism is the salt of +conversation: you do not want too much of it; but if it is +altogether omitted, everything tastes flat. I remember well the +evening when he told me the story of the Sheep of the Wilderness. + +"I was ill that summer," said he, "and the doctor had ordered me to +go into the woods, but on no account to go without plenty of fresh +meat, which was essential to my recovery. So we set out into the +wild country north of Georgian Bay, taking a live sheep with us in +order to be sure that the doctor's prescription might be faithfully +followed. It was a young and innocent little beast, curling itself +up at my feet in the canoe, and following me about on shore like a +dog. I gathered grass every day to feed it, and carried it in my +arms over the rough portages. It ate out of my hand and rubbed its +woolly head against my leggings. To my dismay, I found that I was +beginning to love it for its own sake and without any ulterior +motives. The thought of killing and eating it became more and more +painful to me, until at length the fatal fascination was complete, +and my trip became practically an exercise of devotion to that +sheep. I carried it everywhere and ministered fondly to its wants. +Not for the world would I have alluded to mutton in its presence. +And when we returned to civilisation I parted from the creature +with sincere regret and the consciousness that I had humoured my +affections at the expense of my digestion. The sheep did not give +me so much as a look of farewell, but fell to feeding on the grass +beside the farm-house with an air of placid triumph." + +After hearing this touching tale, I was glad that no great intimacy +had sprung up between Favonius and the chickens which we carried in +a coop on the forecastle head, for there is no telling what +restrictions his tender-heartedness might have laid upon our +larder. But perhaps a chicken would not have given such an opening +for misplaced affection as a sheep. There is a great difference in +animals in this respect. I certainly never heard of any one +falling in love with a salmon in such a way as to regard it as a +fond companion. And this may be one reason why no sensible person +who has tried fishing has ever been able to see any cruelty in it. + +Suppose the fish is not caught by an angler, what is his +alternative fate? He will either perish miserably in the struggles +of the crowded net, or die of old age and starvation like the long, +lean stragglers which are sometimes found in the shallow pools, or +be devoured by a larger fish, or torn to pieces by a seal or an +otter. Compared with any of these miserable deaths, the fate of a +salmon who is hooked in a clear stream and after a glorious fight +receives the happy despatch at the moment when he touches the +shore, is a sort of euthanasia. And, since the fish was made to be +man's food, the angler who brings him to the table of destiny in +the cleanest, quickest, kindest way is, in fact, his benefactor. + +There were some days, however, when our benevolent intentions +toward the salmon were frustrated; mornings when they refused to +rise, and evenings when they escaped even the skilful endeavours of +Favonius. In vain did he try every fly in his book, from the +smallest "Silver Doctor" to the largest "Golden Eagle." The "Black +Dose" would not move them. The "Durham Ranger" covered the pool in +vain. On days like this, if a stray fish rose, it was hard to land +him, for he was usually but slightly hooked. + +I remember one of these shy creatures which led me a pretty dance +at the mouth of Patapedia. He came to the fly just at dusk, rising +very softly and quietly, as if he did not really care for it but +only wanted to see what it was like. He went down at once into +deep water, and began the most dangerous and exasperating of all +salmon-tactics, moving around in slow circles and shaking his head +from side to side, with sullen pertinacity. This is called +"jigging," and unless it can be stopped, the result is fatal. + +I could not stop it. That salmon was determined to jig. He knew +more than I did. + +The canoe followed him down the pool. He jigged away past all +three of the inlets of the Patapedia, and at last, in the still, +deep water below, after we had laboured with him for half an hour, +and brought him near enough to see that he was immense, he calmly +opened his mouth and the fly came back to me void. That was a sad +evening, in which all the consolations of philosophy were needed. + +Sunday was a very peaceful day in our camp. In the Dominion of +Canada, the question "to fish or not to fish" on the first day of +the week is not left to the frailty of the individual conscience. +The law on the subject is quite explicit, and says that between six +o'clock on Saturday evening and six o'clock on Monday morning all +nets shall be taken up and no one shall wet a line. The +Ristigouche Salmon Club has its guardians stationed all along the +river, and they are quite as inflexible in seeing that their +employers keep this law as the famous sentinel was in refusing to +let Napoleon pass without the countersign. But I do not think that +these keen sportsmen regard it as a hardship; they are quite +willing that the fish should have "an off day" in every week, and +only grumble because some of the net-owners down at the mouth of +the river have brought political influence to bear in their favour +and obtained exemption from the rule. For our part, we were +nothing loath to hang up our rods, and make the day different from +other days. + +In the morning we had a service in the cabin of the boat, gathering +a little congregation of guardians and boatmen, and people from a +solitary farm-house by the river. They came in pirogues--long, +narrow boats hollowed from the trunk of a tree; the black-eyed, +brown-faced girls sitting back to back in the middle of the boat, +and the men standing up bending to their poles. It seemed a +picturesque way of travelling, although none too safe. + +In the afternoon we sat on deck and looked at the water. What a +charm there is in watching a swift stream! The eye never wearies +of following its curls and eddies, the shadow of the waves dancing +over the stones, the strange, crinkling lines of sunlight in the +shallows. There is a sort of fascination in it, lulling and +soothing the mind into a quietude which is even pleasanter than +sleep, and making it almost possible to do that of which we so +often speak, but which we never quite accomplish--"think about +nothing." Out on the edge of the pool, we could see five or six +huge salmon, moving slowly from side to side, or lying motionless +like gray shadows. There was nothing to break the silence except +the thin clear whistle of the white-throated sparrow far back in +the woods. This is almost the only bird-song that one hears on the +river, unless you count the metallic "chr-r-r-r" of the kingfisher +as a song. + +Every now and then one of the salmon in the pool would lazily roll +out of water, or spring high into the air and fall back with a +heavy splash. What is it that makes salmon leap? Is it pain or +pleasure? Do they do it to escape the attack of another fish, or +to shake off a parasite that clings to them, or to practise jumping +so that they can ascend the falls when they reach them, or simply +and solely out of exuberant gladness and joy of living? Any one of +these reasons would be enough to account for it on week-days. On +Sunday I am quite sure they do it for the trial of the fisherman's +faith. + +But how should I tell all the little incidents which made that lazy +voyage so delightful? Favonius was the ideal host, for on water, +as well as on land, he knows how to provide for the liberty as well +as for the wants of his guests. He understands also the fine art +of conversation, which consists of silence as well as speech. And +when it comes to angling, Izaak Walton himself could not have been +a more profitable teacher by precept or example. Indeed, it is a +curious thought, and one full of sadness to a well-constituted +mind, that on the Ristigouche "I. W." would have been at sea, for +the beloved father of all fishermen passed through this world +without ever catching a salmon. So ill does fortune match with +merit here below. + +At last the days of idleness were ended. We could not + + + "Fold our tents like the Arabs, + and as silently steal away;" + + +but we took down the long rods, put away the heavy reels, made the +canoes fast to the side of the house, embarked the three horses on +the front deck, and then dropped down with the current, swinging +along through the rapids, and drifting slowly through the still +places, now grounding on a hidden rock, and now sweeping around a +sharp curve, until at length we saw the roofs of Metapedia and the +ugly bridge of the railway spanning the river. There we left our +floating house, awkward and helpless, like some strange relic of +the flood, stranded on the shore. And as we climbed the bank we +looked back and wondered whether Noah was sorry when he said good- +bye to his ark. + +1888. + + + +ALPENROSEN AND GOAT'S MILK + + +Nay, let me tell you, there be many that have forty times our +estates, that would give the greatest part of it to be healthful +and cheerful like us; who, with the expense of a little money, have +ate, and drank, and laughed, and angled, and sung, and slept +securely; and rose next day, and cast away care, and sung, and +laughed, and angled again; which are blessings rich men cannot +purchase with all their money."--IZAAK WALTON: The Complete Angler. + + +A great deal of the pleasure of life lies in bringing together +things which have no connection. That is the secret of humour--at +least so we are told by the philosophers who explain the jests that +other men have made--and in regard to travel, I am quite sure that +it must be illogical in order to be entertaining. The more +contrasts it contains, the better. + +Perhaps it was some philosophical reflection of this kind that +brought me to the resolution, on a certain summer day, to make a +little journey, as straight as possible, from the sea-level streets +of Venice to the lonely, lofty summit of a Tyrolese mountain, +called, for no earthly reason that I can discover, the Gross- +Venediger. + +But apart from the philosophy of the matter, which I must confess +to passing over very superficially at the time, there were other +and more cogent reasons for wanting to go from Venice to the Big +Venetian. It was the first of July, and the city on the sea was +becoming tepid. A slumbrous haze brooded over canals and palaces +and churches. It was difficult to keep one's conscience awake to +Baedeker and a sense of moral obligation; Ruskin was impossible, +and a picture-gallery was a penance. We floated lazily from one +place to another, and decided that, after all, it was too warm to +go in. The cries of the gondoliers, at the canal corners, grew +more and more monotonous and dreamy. There was danger of our +falling fast asleep and having to pay by the hour for a day's +repose in a gondola. If it grew much warmer, we might be compelled +to stay until the following winter in order to recover energy +enough to get away. All the signs of the times pointed northward, +to the mountains, where we should see glaciers and snow-fields, and +pick Alpenrosen, and drink goat's milk fresh from the real goat. + + +I. + + +The first stage on the journey thither was by rail to Belluno-- +about four or five hours. It is a sufficient commentary on railway +travel that the most important thing about it is to tell how many +hours it takes to get from one place to another. + +We arrived in Belluno at night, and when we awoke the next morning +we found ourselves in a picturesque little city of Venetian aspect, +with a piazza and a campanile and a Palladian cathedral, surrounded +on all sides by lofty hills. We were at the end of the railway and +at the beginning of the Dolomites. + +Although I have a constitutional aversion to scientific information +given by unscientific persons, such as clergymen and men of +letters, I must go in that direction far enough to make it clear +that the word Dolomite does not describe a kind of fossil, nor a +sect of heretics, but a formation of mountains lying between the +Alps and the Adriatic. Draw a diamond on the map, with Brixen at +the northwest corner, Lienz at the northeast, Belluno at the +southeast, and Trent at the southwest, and you will have included +the region of the Dolomites, a country so picturesque, so +interesting, so full of sublime and beautiful scenery, that it is +equally a wonder and a blessing that it has not been long since +completely overrun by tourists and ruined with railways. It is +true, the glaciers and snowfields are limited; the waterfalls are +comparatively few and slender, and the rivers small; the loftiest +peaks are little more than ten thousand feet high. But, on the +other hand, the mountains are always near, and therefore always +imposing. Bold, steep, fantastic masses of naked rock, they rise +suddenly from the green and flowery valleys in amazing and endless +contrast; they mirror themselves in the tiny mountain lakes like +pictures in a dream. + +I believe the guide-book says that they are formed of carbonate of +lime and carbonate of magnesia in chemical composition; but even if +this be true, it need not prejudice any candid observer against +them. For the simple and fortunate fact is that they are built of +such stone that wind and weather, keen frost and melting snow and +rushing water have worn and cut and carved them into a thousand +shapes of wonder and beauty. It needs but little fancy to see in +them walls and towers, cathedrals and campaniles, fortresses and +cities, tinged with many hues from pale gray to deep red, and +shining in an air so soft, so pure, so cool, so fragrant, under a +sky so deep and blue and a sunshine so genial, that it seems like +the happy union of Switzerland and Italy. + +The great highway through this region from south to north is the +Ampezzo road, which was constructed in 1830, along the valleys of +the Piave, the Boite, and the Rienz--the ancient line of travel and +commerce between Venice and Innsbruck. The road is superbly built, +smooth and level. Our carriage rolled along so easily that we +forgot and forgave its venerable appearance and its lack of +accommodation for trunks. We had been persuaded to take four +horses, as our luggage seemed too formidable for a single pair. +But in effect our concession to apparent necessity turned out to be +a mere display of superfluous luxury, for the two white leaders did +little more than show their feeble paces, leaving the gray wheelers +to do the work. We had the elevating sense of traveling four-in- +hand, however--a satisfaction to which I do not believe any human +being is altogether insensible. + +At Longarone we breakfasted for the second time, and entered the +narrow gorge of the Piave. The road was cut out of the face of the +rock. Below us the long lumber-rafts went shooting down the swift +river. Above, on the right, were the jagged crests of Monte Furlon +and Premaggiore, which seemed to us very wonderful, because we had +not yet learned how jagged the Dolomites can be. At Perarolo, +where the Boite joins the Piave, there is a lump of a mountain in +the angle between the rivers, and around this we crawled in long +curves until we had risen a thousand feet, and arrived at the same +Hotel Venezia, where we were to dine. + +While dinner was preparing, the Deacon and I walked up to Pieve di +Cadore, the birthplace of Titian. The house in which the great +painter first saw the colours of the world is still standing, and +tradition points out the very room in which he began to paint. I +am not one of those who would inquire too closely into such a +legend as this. The cottage may have been rebuilt a dozen times +since Titian's day; not a scrap of the original stone or plaster +may remain; but beyond a doubt the view that we saw from the window +is the same that Titian saw. Now, for the first time, I could +understand and appreciate the landscape-backgrounds of his +pictures. The compact masses of mountains, the bold, sharp forms, +the hanging rocks of cold gray emerging from green slopes, the +intense blue aerial distances--these all had seemed to be unreal +and imaginary--compositions of the studio. But now I knew that, +whether Titian painted out-of-doors, like our modern +impressionists, or not, he certainly painted what he had seen, and +painted it as it is. + +The graceful brown-eyed boy who showed us the house seemed also to +belong to one of Titian's pictures. As we were going away, the +Deacon, for lack of copper, rewarded him with a little silver +piece, a half-lira, in value about ten cents. A celestial rapture +of surprise spread over the child's face, and I know not what +blessings he invoked upon us. He called his companions to rejoice +with him, and we left them clapping their hands and dancing. + +Driving after one has dined has always a peculiar charm. The +motion seems pleasanter, the landscape finer than in the morning +hours. The road from Cadore ran on a high level, through sloping +pastures, white villages, and bits of larch forest. In its narrow +bed, far below, the river Boite roared as gently as Bottom's lion. +The afternoon sunlight touched the snow-capped pinnacle of Antelao +and the massive pink wall of Sorapis on the right; on the left, +across the valley, Monte Pelmo's vast head and the wild crests of +La Rochetta and Formin rose dark against the glowing sky. The +peasants lifted their hats as we passed, and gave us a pleasant +evening greeting. And so, almost without knowing it, we slipped +out of Italy into Austria, and drew up before a bare, square stone +building with the double black eagle, like a strange fowl split for +broiling, staring at us from the wall, and an inscription to the +effect that this was the Royal and Imperial Austrian Custom-house. + +The officer saluted us so politely that we felt quite sorry that +his duty required him to disturb our luggage. "The law obliged him +to open one trunk; courtesy forbade him to open more." It was +quickly done; and, without having to make any contribution to the +income of His Royal and Imperial Majesty, Francis Joseph, we rolled +on our way, through the hamlets of Acqua Bona and Zuel, into the +Ampezzan metropolis of Cortina, at sundown. + +The modest inn called "The Star of Gold" stood facing the public +square, just below the church, and the landlady stood facing us in +the doorway, with an enthusiastic welcome--altogether a most +friendly and entertaining landlady, whose one desire in life seemed +to be that we should never regret having chosen her house instead +of "The White Cross," or "The Black Eagle." + +"O ja!" she had our telegram received; and would we look at the +rooms? Outlooking on the piazza, with a balcony from which we +could observe the Festa of to-morrow. She hoped they would please +us. "Only come in; accommodate yourselves." + +It was all as she promised; three little bedrooms, and a little +salon opening on a little balcony; queer old oil-paintings and +framed embroideries and tiles hanging on the walls; spotless +curtains, and board floors so white that it would have been a shame +to eat off them without spreading a cloth to keep them from being +soiled. + +"These are the rooms of the Baron Rothschild when he comes here +always in the summer--with nine horses and nine servants--the Baron +Rothschild of Vienna." + +I assured her that we did not know the Baron, but that should make +no difference. We would not ask her to reduce the price on account +of a little thing like that. + +She did not quite grasp this idea, but hoped that we would not find +the pension too dear at a dollar and fifty-seven and a half cents a +day each, with a little extra for the salon and the balcony. "The +English people all please themselves here--there comes many every +summer--English Bishops and their families." + +I inquired whether there were many Bishops in the house at that +moment. + +"No, just at present--she was very sorry--none." + +"Well, then," I said, "it is all right. We will take the rooms." + +Good Signora Barbaria, you did not speak the American language, nor +understand those curious perversions of thought which pass among +the Americans for humour; but you understood how to make a little +inn cheerful and home-like; yours was a very simple and agreeable +art of keeping a hotel. As we sat in the balcony after supper, +listening to the capital playing of the village orchestra, and the +Tyrolese songs with which they varied their music, we thought +within ourselves that we were fortunate to have fallen upon the +Star of Gold. + + +II. + + +Cortina lies in its valley like a white shell that has rolled down +into a broad vase of malachite. It has about a hundred houses and +seven hundred inhabitants, a large church and two small ones, a +fine stone campanile with excellent bells, and seven or eight +little inns. But it is more important than its size would signify, +for it is the capital of the district whose lawful title is +Magnifica Comunita di Ampezzo--a name conferred long ago by the +Republic of Venice. In the fifteenth century it was Venetian +territory; but in 1516, under Maximilian I., it was joined to +Austria; and it is now one of the richest and most prosperous +communes of the Tyrol. It embraces about thirty-five hundred +people, scattered in hamlets and clusters of houses through the +green basin with its four entrances, lying between the peaks of +Tofana, Cristallo, Sorapis, and Nuvolau. The well-cultivated grain +fields and meadows, the smooth alps filled with fine cattle, the +well-built houses with their white stone basements and balconies of +dark brown wood and broad overhanging roofs, all speak of industry +and thrift. But there is more than mere agricultural prosperity in +this valley. There is a fine race of men and women--intelligent, +vigorous, and with a strong sense of beauty. The outer walls of +the annex of the Hotel Aquila Nera are covered with frescoes of +marked power and originality, painted by the son of the innkeeper. +The art schools of Cortina are famous for their beautiful work in +gold and silver filigree, and wood-inlaying. There are nearly two +hundred pupils in these schools, all peasants' children, and they +produce results, especially in intarsia, which are admirable. The +village orchestra, of which I spoke a moment ago, is trained and +led by a peasant's son, who has never had a thorough musical +education. It must have at least twenty-five members, and as we +heard them at the Festa they seemed to play with extraordinary +accuracy and expression. + +This Festa gave us a fine chance to see the people of the Ampezzo +all together. It was the annual jubilation of the district; and +from all the outlying hamlets and remote side valleys, even from +the neighbouring vales of Agordo and Auronzo, across the mountains, +and from Cadore, the peasants, men and women and children, had come +in to the Sagro at Cortina. The piazza--which is really nothing +more than a broadening of the road behind the church--was quite +thronged. There must have been between two and three thousand +people. + +The ceremonies of the day began with general church-going. The +people here are honestly and naturally religious. I have seen so +many examples of what can only be called "sincere and unaffected +piety," that I cannot doubt it. The church, on Cortina's feast- +day, was crowded to the doors with worshippers, who gave every +evidence of taking part not only with the voice, but also with the +heart, in the worship. + +Then followed the public unveiling of a tablet, on the wall of the +little Inn of the Anchor, to the memory of Giammaria Ghedini, the +founder of the art-schools of Cortina. There was music by the +band; and an oration by a native Demosthenes (who spoke in Italian +so fluent that it ran through one's senses like water through a +sluice, leaving nothing behind), and an original Canto sung by the +village choir, with a general chorus, in which they called upon the +various mountains to "re-echo the name of the beloved master John- +Mary as a model of modesty and true merit," and wound up with-- + + + "Hurrah for John-Mary! Hurrah for his art! + Hurrah for all teachers as skilful as he! + Hurrah for us all, who have now taken part + In singing together in do . . re . . mi." + + +It was very primitive, and I do not suppose that the celebration +was even mentioned in the newspapers of the great world; but, after +all, has not the man who wins such a triumph as this in the hearts +of his own people, for whom he has made labour beautiful with the +charm of art, deserved better of fame than many a crowned monarch +or conquering warrior? We should be wiser if we gave less glory to +the men who have been successful in forcing their fellow-men to +die, and more glory to the men who have been successful in teaching +their fellow-men how to live. + +But the Festa of Cortina did not remain all day on this high moral +plane. In the afternoon came what our landlady called "allerlei +Dummheiten." There was a grand lottery for the benefit of the +Volunteer Fire Department. The high officials sat up in a green +wooden booth in the middle of the square, and called out the +numbers and distributed the prizes. Then there was a greased pole +with various articles of an attractive character tied to a large +hoop at the top--silk aprons, and a green jacket, and bottles of +wine, and half a smoked pig, and a coil of rope, and a purse. +The gallant firemen voluntarily climbed up the pole as far as +they could, one after another, and then involuntarily slid down +again exhausted, each one wiping off a little more of the grease, +until at last the lucky one came who profited by his forerunners' +labours, and struggled to the top to snatch the smoked pig. +After that it was easy. + +Such is success in this unequal world; the man who wipes off the +grease seldom gets the prize. + +Then followed various games, with tubs of water; and coins fastened +to the bottom of a huge black frying-pan, to be plucked off with +the lips; and pots of flour to be broken with sticks; so that the +young lads of the village were ducked and blackened and powdered to +an unlimited extent, amid the hilarious applause of the spectators. +In the evening there was more music, and the peasants danced in the +square, the women quietly and rather heavily, but the men with +amazing agility, slapping the soles of their shoes with their +hands, or turning cartwheels in front of their partners. At dark +the festivities closed with a display of fireworks; there were +rockets and bombs and pin-wheels; and the boys had tiny red and +blue lights which they held until their fingers were burned, just +as boys do in America; and there was a general hush of wonder as a +particularly brilliant rocket swished into the dark sky; and when +it burst into a rain of serpents, the crowd breathed out its +delight in a long-drawn "Ah-h-h-h!" just as the crowd does +everywhere. We might easily have imagined ourselves at a Fourth of +July celebration in Vermont, if it had not been for the costumes. + +The men of the Ampezzo Valley have kept but little that is peculiar +in their dress. Men are naturally more progressive than women, and +therefore less picturesque. The tide of fashion has swept them +into the international monotony of coat and vest and trousers-- +pretty much the same, and equally ugly, all over the world. Now +and then you may see a short jacket with silver buttons, or a pair +of knee-breeches; and almost all the youths wear a bunch of +feathers or a tuft of chamois' hair in their soft green hats. But +the women of the Ampezzo--strong, comely, with golden brown +complexions, and often noble faces--are not ashamed to dress as +their grandmothers did. They wear a little round black felt hat +with rolled rim and two long ribbons hanging down at the back. +Their hair is carefully braided and coiled, and stuck through and +through with great silver pins. A black bodice, fastened with +silver clasps, is covered in front with the ends of a brilliant +silk kerchief, laid in many folds around the shoulders. The white +shirt-sleeves are very full and fastened up above the elbow with +coloured ribbon. If the weather is cool, the women wear a short +black jacket, with satin yoke and high puffed sleeves. But, +whatever the weather may be, they make no change in the large, full +dark skirts, almost completely covered with immense silk aprons, by +preference light blue. It is not a remarkably brilliant dress, +compared with that which one may still see in some districts of +Norway or Sweden, but upon the whole it suits the women of the +Ampezzo wonderfully. + +For my part, I think that when a woman has found a dress that +becomes her, it is a waste of time to send to Paris for a fashion- +plate. + + +III. + + +When the excitement of the Festa had subsided, we were free to +abandon ourselves to the excursions in which the neighbourhood of +Cortina abounds, and to which the guide-book earnestly calls every +right-minded traveller. A walk through the light-green shadows of +the larch-woods to the tiny lake of Ghedina, where we could see all +the four dozen trout swimming about in the clear water and catching +flies; a drive to the Belvedere, where there are superficial +refreshments above and profound grottos below; these were trifles, +though we enjoyed them. But the great mountains encircling us on +every side, standing out in clear view with that distinctness and +completeness of vision which is one charm of the Dolomites, seemed +to summon us to more arduous enterprises. Accordingly, the Deacon +and I selected the easiest one, engaged a guide, and prepared for +the ascent. + +Monte Nuvolau is not a perilous mountain. I am quite sure that at +my present time of life I should be unwilling to ascend a perilous +mountain unless there were something extraordinarily desirable at +the top, or remarkably disagreeable at the bottom. Mere risk has +lost the attractions which it once had. As the father of a family +I felt bound to abstain from going for amusement into any place +which a Christian lady might not visit with propriety and safety. +Our preparation for Nuvolau, therefore, did not consist of ropes, +ice-irons, and axes, but simply of a lunch and two long sticks. + +Our way led us, in the early morning, through the clustering houses +of Lacedel, up the broad, green slope that faces Cortina on the +west, to the beautiful Alp Pocol. Nothing could exceed the +pleasure of such a walk in the cool of the day, while the dew still +lies on the short, rich grass, and the myriads of flowers are at +their brightest and sweetest. The infinite variety and abundance +of the blossoms is a continual wonder. They are sown more thickly +than the stars in heaven, and the rainbow itself does not show so +many tints. Here they are mingled like the threads of some strange +embroidery; and there again nature has massed her colours; so that +one spot will be all pale blue with innumerable forget-me-nots, or +dark blue with gentians; another will blush with the delicate pink +of the Santa Lucia or the deeper red of the clover; and another +will shine yellow as cloth of gold. Over all this opulence of +bloom the larks were soaring and singing. I never heard so many as +in the meadows about Cortina. There was always a sweet spray of +music sprinkling down out of the sky, where the singers poised +unseen. It was like walking through a shower of melody. + +From the Alp Pocol, which is simply a fair, lofty pasture, we had +our first full view of Nuvolau, rising bare and strong, like a huge +bastion, from the dark fir-woods. Through these our way led onward +now for seven miles, with but a slight ascent. Then turning off to +the left we began to climb sharply through the forest. There we +found abundance of the lovely Alpenrosen, which do not bloom on the +lower ground. Their colour is a deep, glowing pink, and when a +Tyrolese girl gives you one of these flowers to stick in the band +of your hat, you may know that you have found favour in her eyes. + +Through the wood the cuckoo was calling--the bird which reverses +the law of good children, and insists on being heard, but not seen. + +When the forest was at an end we found ourselves at the foot of an +alp which sloped steeply up to the Five Towers of Averau. The +effect of these enormous masses of rock, standing out in lonely +grandeur, like the ruins of some forsaken habitation of giants, was +tremendous. Seen from far below in the valley their form was +picturesque and striking; but as we sat beside the clear, cold +spring which gushes out at the foot of the largest tower, the +Titanic rocks seemed to hang in the air above us as if they would +overawe us into a sense of their majesty. We felt it to the full; +yet none the less, but rather the more, could we feel at the same +time the delicate and ethereal beauty of the fringed gentianella +and the pale Alpine lilies scattered on the short turf beside us. + +We had now been on foot about three hours and a half. The half +hour that remained was the hardest. Up over loose, broken stones +that rolled beneath our feet, up over great slopes of rough rock, +up across little fields of snow where we paused to celebrate the +Fourth of July with a brief snowball fight, up along a narrowing +ridge with a precipice on either hand, and so at last to the +summit, 8600 feet above the sea. + +It is not a great height, but it is a noble situation. For Nuvolau +is fortunately placed in the very centre of the Dolomites, and so +commands a finer view than many a higher mountain. Indeed, it is +not from the highest peaks, according to my experience, that one +gets the grandest prospects, but rather from those of middle +height, which are so isolated as to give a wide circle of vision, +and from which one can see both the valleys and the summits. Monte +Rosa itself gives a less imposing view than the Gorner Grat. + +It is possible, in this world, to climb too high for pleasure. + +But what a panorama Nuvolau gave us on that clear, radiant summer +morning--a perfect circle of splendid sight! On one side we looked +down upon the Five Towers; on the other, a thousand feet below, the +Alps, dotted with the huts of the herdsmen, sloped down into the +deep-cut vale of Agordo. Opposite to us was the enormous mass of +Tofana, a pile of gray and pink and saffron rock. When we turned +the other way, we faced a group of mountains as ragged as the +crests of a line of fir-trees, and behind them loomed the solemn +head of Pelmo. Across the broad vale of the Boite, Antelao stood +beside Sorapis, like a campanile beside a cathedral, and Cristallo +towered above the green pass of the Three Crosses. Through that +opening we could see the bristling peaks of the Sextenthal. +Sweeping around in a wider circle from that point, we saw, beyond +the Durrenstein, the snow-covered pile of the Gross-Glockner; the +crimson bastions of the Rothwand appeared to the north, behind +Tofana; then the white slopes that hang far away above the +Zillerthal; and, nearer, the Geislerspitze, like five fingers +thrust into the air; behind that, the distant Oetzthaler Mountain, +and just a single white glimpse of the highest peak of the Ortler +by the Engadine; nearer still we saw the vast fortress of the Sella +group and the red combs of the Rosengarten; Monte Marmolata, the +Queen of the Dolomites, stood before us revealed from base to peak +in a bridal dress of snow; and southward we looked into the dark +rugged face of La Civetta, rising sheer out of the vale of Agordo, +where the Lake of Alleghe slept unseen. It was a sea of mountains, +tossed around us into a myriad of motionless waves, and with a +rainbow of colours spread among their hollows and across their +crests. The cliffs of rose and orange and silver gray, the valleys +of deepest green, the distant shadows of purple and melting blue, +and the dazzling white of the scattered snow-fields seemed to shift +and vary like the hues on the inside of a shell. And over all, +from peak to peak, the light, feathery clouds went drifting lazily +and slowly, as if they could not leave a scene so fair. + +There is barely room on the top of Nuvolau for the stone shelter- +hut which a grateful Saxon baron has built there as a sort of +votive offering for the recovery of his health among the mountains. +As we sat within and ate our frugal lunch, we were glad that he had +recovered his health, and glad that he had built the hut, and glad +that we had come to it. In fact, we could almost sympathise in our +cold, matter-of-fact American way with the sentimental German +inscription which we read on the wall:-- + + + Von Nuvolau's hohen Wolkenstufen + Lass mich, Natur, durch deine Himmel rufen-- + An deiner Brust gesunde, wer da krank! + So wird zum Volkerdank mein Sachsendank. + + +We refrained, however, from shouting anything through Nature's +heaven, but went lightly down, in about three hours, to supper in +the Star of Gold. + + +IV. + + +When a stern necessity forces one to leave Cortina, there are +several ways of departure. We selected the main highway for our +trunks, but for ourselves the Pass of the Three Crosses; the Deacon +and the Deaconess in a mountain waggon, and I on foot. It should +be written as an axiom in the philosophy of travel that the easiest +way is best for your luggage, and the hardest way is best for +yourself. + +All along the rough road up to the Pass, we had a glorious outlook +backward over the Val d' Ampezzo, and when we came to the top, we +looked deep down into the narrow Val Buona behind Sorapis. I do +not know just when we passed the Austrian border, but when we came +to Lake Misurina we found ourselves in Italy again. My friends +went on down the valley to Landro, but I in my weakness, having +eaten of the trout of the lake for dinner, could not resist the +temptation of staying over-night to catch one for breakfast. + +It was a pleasant failure. The lake was beautiful, lying on top of +the mountain like a bit of blue sky, surrounded by the peaks of +Cristallo, Cadino, and the Drei Zinnen. It was a happiness to +float on such celestial waters and cast the hopeful fly. The trout +were there; they were large; I saw them; they also saw me; but, +alas! I could not raise them. Misurina is, in fact, what the +Scotch call "a dour loch," one of those places which are outwardly +beautiful, but inwardly so demoralised that the trout will not +rise. + +When we came ashore in the evening, the boatman consoled me with +the story of a French count who had spent two weeks there fishing, +and only caught one fish. I had some thoughts of staying thirteen +days longer, to rival the count, but concluded to go on the next +morning, over Monte Pian and the Cat's Ladder to Landro. + +The view from Monte Pian is far less extensive than that from +Nuvolau; but it has the advantage of being very near the wild +jumble of the Sexten Dolomites. The Three Shoemakers and a lot +more of sharp and ragged fellows are close by, on the east; on the +west, Cristallo shows its fine little glacier, and Rothwand its +crimson cliffs; and southward Misurina gives to the view a glimpse +of water, without which, indeed, no view is complete. Moreover, +the mountain has the merit of being, as its name implies, quite +gentle. I met the Deacon and the Deaconess at the top, they having +walked up from Landro. And so we crossed the boundary line +together again, seven thousand feet above the sea, from Italy into +Austria. There was no custom-house. + +The way down, by the Cat's Ladder, I travelled alone. The path was +very steep and little worn, but even on the mountain-side there was +no danger of losing it, for it had been blazed here and there, on +trees and stones, with a dash of blue paint. This is the work of +the invaluable DOAV--which is, being interpreted, the German- +Austrian Alpine Club. The more one travels in the mountains, the +more one learns to venerate this beneficent society, for the +shelter-huts and guide-posts it has erected, and the paths it has +made and marked distinctly with various colours. The Germans have +a genius for thoroughness. My little brown guide-book, for +example, not only informed me through whose back yard I must go to +get into a certain path, but it told me that in such and such a +spot I should find quite a good deal (ziemlichviel) of Edelweiss, +and in another a small echo; it advised me in one valley to take +provisions and dispense with a guide, and in another to take a +guide and dispense with provisions, adding varied information in +regard to beer, which in my case was useless, for I could not touch +it. To go astray under such auspices would be worse than +inexcusable. + +Landro we found a very different place from Cortina. Instead of +having a large church and a number of small hotels, it consists +entirely of one large hotel and a very tiny church. It does not +lie in a broad, open basin, but in a narrow valley, shut in closely +by the mountains. The hotel, in spite of its size, is excellent, +and a few steps up the valley is one of the finest views in the +Dolomites. To the east opens a deep, wild gorge, at the head of +which the pinnacles of the Drei Zinnen are seen; to the south the +Durrensee fills the valley from edge to edge, and reflects in its +pale waters the huge bulk of Monte Cristallo. It is such a +complete picture, so finished, so compact, so balanced, that one +might think a painter had composed it in a moment of inspiration. +But no painter ever laid such colours on his canvas as those which +are seen here when the cool evening shadows have settled upon the +valley, all gray and green, while the mountains shine above in rosy +Alpenglow, as if transfigured with inward fire. + +There is another lake, about three miles north of Landro, called +the Toblacher See, and there I repaired the defeat of Misurina. +The trout at the outlet, by the bridge, were very small, and while +the old fisherman was endeavouring to catch some of them in his new +net, which would not work, I pushed my boat up to the head of the +lake, where the stream came in. The green water was amazingly +clear, but the current kept the fish with their heads up stream; so +that one could come up behind them near enough for a long cast, +without being seen. As my fly lighted above them and came gently +down with the ripple, I saw the first fish turn and rise and take +it. A motion of the wrist hooked him, and he played just as gamely +as a trout in my favourite Long Island pond. How different the +colour, though, as he came out of the water. This fellow was all +silvery, with light pink spots on his sides. I took seven of his +companions, in weight some four pounds, and then stopped because +the evening light was failing. + +How pleasant it is to fish in such a place and at such an hour! +The novelty of the scene, the grandeur of the landscape, lend a +strange charm to the sport. But the sport itself is so familiar +that one feels at home--the motion of the rod, the feathery swish +of the line, the sight of the rising fish--it all brings back a +hundred woodland memories, and thoughts of good fishing comrades, +some far away across the sea, and, perhaps, even now sitting around +the forest camp-fire in Maine or Canada, and some with whom we +shall keep company no more until we cross the greater ocean into +that happy country whither they have preceded us. + + +V. + + +Instead of going straight down the valley by the high road, a drive +of an hour, to the railway in the Pusterthal, I walked up over the +mountains to the east, across the Platzwiesen, and so down through +the Pragserthal. In one arm of the deep fir-clad vale are the +Baths of Alt-Prags, famous for having cured the Countess of Gorz of +a violent rheumatism in the fifteenth century. It is an antiquated +establishment, and the guests, who were walking about in the fields +or drinking their coffee in the balcony, had a fifteenth century +look about them--venerable but slightly ruinous. But perhaps that +was merely a rheumatic result. + +All the waggons in the place were engaged. It is strange what an +aggravating effect this state of affairs has upon a pedestrian who +is bent upon riding. I did not recover my delight in the scenery +until I had walked about five miles farther, and sat down on the +grass, beside a beautiful spring, to eat my lunch. + +What is there in a little physical rest that has such magic to +restore the sense of pleasure? A few moments ago nothing pleased +you--the bloom was gone from the peach; but now it has come back +again--you wonder and admire. Thus cheerful and contented I +trudged up the right arm of the valley to the Baths of Neu-Prags, +less venerable, but apparently more popular than Alt-Prags, and on +beyond them, through the woods, to the superb Pragser-Wildsee, a +lake whose still waters, now blue as sapphire under the clear sky, +and now green as emerald under gray clouds, sleep encircled by +mighty precipices. Could anything be a greater contrast with +Venice? There the canals alive with gondolas, and the open harbour +bright with many-coloured sails; here, the hidden lake, silent and +lifeless, save when + + + "A leaping fish + Sends through the tarn a lonely cheer." + + +Tired, and a little foot-sore, after nine hours' walking, I came +into the big railway hotel at Toblach that night. There I met my +friends again, and parted from them and the Dolomites the next day, +with regret. For they were "stepping westward;" but in order to +get to the Gross-Venediger I must make a detour to the east, +through the Pusterthal, and come up through the valley of the Isel +to the great chain of mountains called the Hohe Tauern. + +At the junction of the Isel and the Drau lies the quaint little +city of Lienz, with its two castles--the square, double-towered one +in the town, now transformed into the offices of the municipality, +and the huge mediaeval one on a hill outside, now used as a damp +restaurant and dismal beer-cellar. I lingered at Lienz for a +couple of days, in the ancient hostelry of the Post. The hallways +were vaulted like a cloister, the walls were three feet thick, the +kitchen was in the middle of the house on the second floor, so that +I looked into it every time I came from my room, and ordered dinner +direct from the cook. But, so far from being displeased with these +peculiarities, I rather liked the flavour of them; and then, in +addition, the landlady's daughter, who was managing the house, was +a person of most engaging manners, and there was trout and grayling +fishing in a stream near by, and the neighbouring church of Dolsach +contained the beautiful picture of the Holy Family, which Franz +Defregger painted for his native village. + +The peasant women of Lienz have one very striking feature in their +dress--a black felt hat with a broad, stiff brim and a high crown, +smaller at the top than at the base. It looks a little like the +traditional head-gear of the Pilgrim Fathers, exaggerated. There +is a solemnity about it which is fatal to feminine beauty. + +I went by the post-waggon, with two slow horses and ten passengers, +fifteen miles up the Iselthal, to Windisch-Matrei, a village whose +early history is lost in the mist of antiquity, and whose streets +are pervaded with odours which must have originated at the same +time with the village. One wishes that they also might have shared +the fate of its early history. But it is not fair to expect too +much of a small place, and Windisch-Matrei has certainly a +beautiful situation and a good inn. There I took my guide--a wiry +and companionable little man, whose occupation in the lower world +was that of a maker and merchant of hats--and set out for the +Pragerhutte, a shelter on the side of the Gross-Venediger. + +The path led under the walls of the old Castle of Weissenstein, and +then in steep curves up the cliff which blocks the head of the +valley, and along a cut in the face of the rock, into the steep, +narrow Tauernthal, which divides the Glockner group from the +Venediger. How entirely different it was from the region of the +Dolomites! There the variety of colour was endless and the change +incessant; here it was all green grass and trees and black rocks, +with glimpses of snow. There the highest mountains were in sight +constantly; here they could only be seen from certain points in the +valley. There the streams played but a small part in the +landscape; here they were prominent, the main river raging and +foaming through the gorge below, while a score of waterfalls leaped +from the cliffs on either side and dashed down to join it. + +The peasants, men, women and children, were cutting the grass in +the perpendicular fields; the woodmen were trimming and felling the +trees in the fir-forests; the cattle-tenders were driving their +cows along the stony path, or herding them far up on the hillsides. +It was a lonely scene, and yet a busy one; and all along the road +was written the history of the perils and hardships of the life +which now seemed so peaceful and picturesque under the summer +sunlight. + +These heavy crosses, each covered with a narrow, pointed roof and +decorated with a rude picture, standing beside the path, or on the +bridge, or near the mill--what do they mean? They mark the place +where a human life has been lost, or where some poor peasant has +been delivered from a great peril, and has set up a memorial of his +gratitude. + +Stop, traveller, as you pass by, and look at the pictures. They +have little more of art than a child's drawing on a slate; but they +will teach you what it means to earn a living in these mountains. +They tell of the danger that lurks on the steep slopes of grass, +where the mowers have to go down with ropes around their waists, +and in the beds of the streams where the floods sweep through in +the spring, and in the forests where the great trees fall and crush +men like flies, and on the icy bridges where a slip is fatal, and +on the high passes where the winter snowstorm blinds the eyes and +benumbs the limbs of the traveller, and under the cliffs from which +avalanches slide and rocks roll. They show you men and women +falling from waggons, and swept away by waters, and overwhelmed in +land-slips. In the corner of the picture you may see a peasant +with the black cross above his head--that means death. Or perhaps +it is deliverance that the tablet commemorates--and then you will +see the miller kneeling beside his mill with a flood rushing down +upon it, or a peasant kneeling in his harvest-field under an +inky-black cloud, or a landlord beside his inn in flames, or a +mother praying beside her sick children; and above appears an +angel, or a saint, or the Virgin with her Child. + +Read the inscriptions, too, in their quaint German. Some of them +are as humourous as the epitaphs in New England graveyards. I +remember one which ran like this: + + + Here lies Elias Queer, + Killed in his sixtieth year; + Scarce had he seen the light of day + When a waggon-wheel crushed his life away. + + +And there is another famous one which says: + + + Here perished the honoured and virtuous maiden, + G.V. + + This tablet was erected by her only son. + + +But for the most part a glance at these Marterl und Taferl, which +are so frequent on all the mountain-roads of the Tyrol, will give +you a strange sense of the real pathos of human life. If you are a +Catholic, you will not refuse their request to say a prayer for the +departed; if you are a Protestant, at least it will not hurt you to +say one for those who still live and suffer and toil among such +dangers. + +After we had walked for four hours up the Tauernthal, we came to +the Matreier-Tauernhaus, an inn which is kept open all the year for +the shelter of travellers over the high pass that crosses the +mountain-range at this point, from north to south. There we dined. +It was a bare, rude place, but the dish of juicy trout was +garnished with flowers, each fish holding a big pansy in its mouth, +and as the maid set them down before me she wished me "a good +appetite," with the hearty old-fashioned Tyrolese courtesy which +still survives in these remote valleys. It is pleasant to travel +in a land where the manners are plain and good. If you meet a +peasant on the road he says, "God greet you!" if you give a child a +couple of kreuzers he folds his hands and says, "God reward you!" +and the maid who lights you to bed says, "Goodnight, I hope you +will sleep well!" + +Two hours more of walking brought us through Ausser-gschloss and +Inner-gschloss, two groups of herdsmen's huts, tenanted only in +summer, at the head of the Tauernthal. Midway between them lies a +little chapel, cut into the solid rock for shelter from the +avalanches. This lofty vale is indeed rightly named; for it is +shut off from the rest of the world. The portal is a cliff down +which the stream rushes in foam and thunder. On either hand rises +a mountain wall. Within, the pasture is fresh and green, sprinkled +with Alpine roses, and the pale river flows swiftly down between +the rows of dark wooden houses. At the head of the vale towers the +Gross-Venediger, with its glaciers and snow-fields dazzling white +against the deep blue heaven. The murmur of the stream and the +tinkle of the cow-bells and the jodelling of the herdsmen far up +the slopes, make the music for the scene. + +The path from Gschloss leads straight up to the foot of the dark +pyramid of the Kesselkopf, and then in steep endless zig-zags along +the edge of the great glacier. I saw, at first, the pinnacles of +ice far above me, breaking over the face of the rock; then, after +an hour's breathless climbing, I could look right into the blue +crevasses; and at last, after another hour over soft snow-fields +and broken rocks, I was at the Pragerhut, perched on the shoulder +of the mountain, looking down upon the huge river of ice. + +It was a magnificent view under the clear light of evening. Here +in front of us, the Venediger with all his brother-mountains +clustered about him; behind us, across the Tauern, the mighty chain +of the Glockner against the eastern sky. + +This is the frozen world. Here the Winter, driven back into his +stronghold, makes his last stand against the Summer, in perpetual +conflict, retreating by day to the mountain-peak, but creeping back +at night in frost and snow to regain a little of his lost +territory, until at last the Summer is wearied out, and the Winter +sweeps down again to claim the whole valley for his own. + + +VI. + + +In the Pragerhut I found mountain comfort. There were bunks along +the wall of the guest-room, with plenty of blankets. There was +good store of eggs, canned meats, and nourishing black bread. The +friendly goats came bleating up to the door at nightfall to be +milked. And in charge of all this luxury there was a cheerful +peasant-wife with her brown-eyed daughter, to entertain travellers. +It was a pleasant sight to see them, as they sat down to their +supper with my guide; all three bowed their heads and said their +"grace before meat," the guide repeating the longer prayer and the +mother and daughter coming in with the responses. I went to bed +with a warm and comfortable feeling about my heart. It was a good +ending for the day. In the morning, if the weather remained clear, +the alarm-clock was to wake us at three for the ascent to the +summit. + +But can it be three o'clock already. The gibbous moon still hangs +in the sky and casts a feeble light over the scene. Then up and +away for the final climb. How rough the path is among the black +rocks along the ridge! Now we strike out on the gently rising +glacier, across the crust of snow, picking our way among the +crevasses, with the rope tied about our waists for fear of a fall. +How cold it is! But now the gray light of morning dawns, and now +the beams of sunrise shoot up behind the Glockner, and now the sun +itself glitters into sight. The snow grows softer as we toil up +the steep, narrow comb between the Gross-Venediger and his +neighbour the Klein-Venediger. At last we have reached our +journey's end. See, the whole of the Tyrol is spread out before us +in wondrous splendour, as we stand on this snowy ridge; and at our +feet the Schlatten glacier, like a long, white snake, curls down +into the valley. + +There is still a little peak above us; an overhanging horn of snow +which the wind has built against the mountain-top. I would like to +stand there, just for a moment. The guide protests it would be +dangerous, for if the snow should break it would be a fall of a +thousand feet to the glacier on the northern side. But let us dare +the few steps upward. How our feet sink! Is the snow slipping? +Look at the glacier! What is happening? It is wrinkling and +curling backward on us, serpent-like. Its head rises far above us. +All its icy crests are clashing together like the ringing of a +thousand bells. We are falling! I fling out my arm to grasp the +guide--and awake to find myself clutching a pillow in the bunk. +The alarm-clock is ringing fiercely for three o'clock. A driving +snow-storm is beating against the window. The ground is white. +Peer through the clouds as I may, I cannot even catch a glimpse of +the vanished Gross-Venediger. + +1892. + + + +AU LARGE + + +Wherever we strayed, the same tranquil leisure enfolded us; day +followed day in an order unbroken and peaceful as the unfolding of +the flowers and the silent march of the stars. Time no longer ran +like the few sands in a delicate hour-glass held by a fragile human +hand, but like a majestic river fed by fathomless seas. . . . We +gave ourselves up to the sweetness of that unmeasured life, without +thought of yesterday or to-morrow; we drank the cup to-day held to +our lips, and knew that so long as we were athirst that draught +would not be denied us." --HAMILTON W. MABIE: Under the Trees. + + +There is magic in words, surely, and many a treasure besides Ali +Baba's is unlocked with a verbal key. Some charm in the mere +sound, some association with the pleasant past, touches a secret +spring. The bars are down; the gate open; you are made free of all +the fields of memory and fancy--by a word. + +Au large! Envoyez au large! is the cry of the Canadian voyageurs as +they thrust their paddles against the shore and push out on the +broad lake for a journey through the wilderness. Au large! is what +the man in the bow shouts to the man in the stern when the birch +canoe is running down the rapids, and the water grows too broken, +and the rocks too thick, along the river-bank. Then the frail bark +must be driven out into the very centre of the wild current, into +the midst of danger to find safety, dashing, like a frightened +colt, along the smooth, sloping lane bordered by white fences of +foam. + +Au large! When I hear that word, I hear also the crisp waves +breaking on pebbly beaches, and the big wind rushing through +innumerable trees, and the roar of headlong rivers leaping down the +rocks, I see long reaches of water sparkling in the sun, or +sleeping still between evergreen walls beneath a cloudy sky; and +the gleam of white tents on the shore; and the glow of firelight +dancing through the woods. I smell the delicate vanishing perfume +of forest flowers; and the incense of rolls of birch-bark, +crinkling and flaring in the camp-fire; and the soothing odour of +balsam-boughs piled deep for woodland beds--the veritable and only +genuine perfume of the land of Nod. The thin shining veil of the +Northern lights waves and fades and brightens over the night sky; +at the sound of the word, as at the ringing of a bell, the curtain +rises. Scene, the Forest of Arden; enter a party of hunters. + +It was in the Lake St. John country, two hundred miles north of +Quebec, that I first heard my rustic incantation; and it seemed to +fit the region as if it had been made for it. This is not a little +pocket wilderness like the Adirondacks, but something vast and +primitive. You do not cross it, from one railroad to another, by a +line of hotels. You go into it by one river as far as you like, or +dare; and then you turn and come back again by another river, +making haste to get out before your provisions are exhausted. The +lake itself is the cradle of the mighty Saguenay: an inland sea, +thirty miles across and nearly round, lying in the broad limestone +basin north of the Laurentian Mountains. The southern and eastern +shores have been settled for twenty or thirty years; and the rich +farm-land yields abundant crops of wheat and oats and potatoes to a +community of industrious habitants, who live in little modern +villages, named after the saints and gathered as closely as +possible around big gray stone churches, and thank the good Lord +that he has given them a climate at least four or five degrees +milder than Quebec. A railroad, built through a region of granite +hills, which will never be tamed to the plough, links this outlying +settlement to the civilised world; and at the end of the railroad +the Hotel Roberval, standing on a hill above the lake, offers to +the pampered tourist electric lights, and spring-beds, and a wide +veranda from which he can look out across the water into the face +of the wilderness. + +Northward and westward the interminable forest rolls away to the +shores of Hudson's Bay and the frozen wastes of Labrador. It is an +immense solitude. A score of rivers empty into the lake; little +ones like the Pikouabi and La Pipe, and middle-sized ones like the +Ouiatehouan and La Belle Riviere, and big ones like the Mistassini +and the Peribonca; and each of these streams is the clue to a +labyrinth of woods and waters. The canoe-man who follows it far +enough will find himself among lakes that are not named on any map; +he will camp on virgin ground, and make the acquaintance of +unsophisticated fish; perhaps even, like the maiden in the fairy- +tale, he will meet with the little bear, and the middle-sized bear, +and the great big bear. + +Damon and I set out on such an expedition shortly after the nodding +lilies in the Connecticut meadows had rung the noon-tide bell of +summer, and when the raspberry bushes along the line of the Quebec +and Lake St. John Railway had spread their afternoon collation for +birds and men. At Roberval we found our four guides waiting for +us, and the steamboat took us all across the lake to the Island +House, at the northeast corner. There we embarked our tents and +blankets, our pots and pans, and bags of flour and potatoes and +bacon and other delicacies, our rods and guns, and last, but not +least, our axes (without which man in the woods is a helpless +creature), in two birch-bark canoes, and went flying down the +Grande Decharge. + +It is a wonderful place, this outlet of Lake St. John. All the +floods of twenty rivers are gathered here, and break forth through +a net of islands in a double stream, divided by the broad Ile +d'Alma, into the Grande Decharge and the Petite Decharge. The +southern outlet is small, and flows somewhat more quietly at first. +But the northern outlet is a huge confluence and tumult of waters. +You see the set of the tide far out in the lake, sliding, driving, +crowding, hurrying in with smooth currents and swirling eddies, +toward the corner of escape. By the rocky cove where the Island +House peers out through the fir-trees, the current already has a +perceptible slope. It begins to boil over hidden stones in the +middle, and gurgles at projecting points of rock. A mile farther +down there is an islet where the stream quickens, chafes, and +breaks into a rapid. Behind the islet it drops down in three or +four foaming steps. On the outside it makes one long, straight +rush into a line of white-crested standing waves. + +As we approached, the steersman in the first canoe stood up to look +over the course. The sea was high. Was it too high? The canoes +were heavily loaded. Could they leap the waves? There was a quick +talk among the guides as we slipped along, undecided which way to +turn. Then the question seemed to settle itself, as most of these +woodland questions do, as if some silent force of Nature had the +casting-vote. "Sautez, sautez!" cried Ferdinand, "envoyez au +large!" In a moment we were sliding down the smooth back of the +rapid, directly toward the first big wave. The rocky shore went by +us like a dream; we could feel the motion of the earth whirling +around with us. The crest of the billow in front curled above the +bow of the canoe. "Arret', arret', doucement!" A swift stroke of +the paddle checked the canoe, quivering and prancing like a horse +suddenly reined in. The wave ahead, as if surprised, sank and +flattened for a second. The canoe leaped through the edge of it, +swerved to one side, and ran gayly down along the fringe of the +line of billows, into quieter water. + +Every one feels the exhilaration of such a descent. I know a lady +who almost cried with fright when she went down her first rapid, +but before the voyage was ended she was saying:-- + + + "Count that day lost whose low, descending sun + Sees no fall leaped, no foaming rapid run." + + +It takes a touch of danger to bring out the joy of life. + +Our guides began to shout, and joke each other, and praise their +canoes. + +"You grazed that villain rock at the corner," said Jean; "didn't +you know where it was?" + +"Yes, after I touched it," cried Ferdinand; "but you took in a +bucket of water, and I suppose your m'sieu' is sitting on a piece +of the river. Is it not?" + +This seemed to us all a very merry jest, and we laughed with the +same inextinguishable laughter which a practical joke, according to +Homer, always used to raise in Olympus. It is one of the charms of +life in the woods that it brings back the high spirits of boyhood +and renews the youth of the world. Plain fun, like plain food, +tastes good out-of-doors. Nectar is the sweet sap of a maple-tree. +Ambrosia is only another name for well-turned flapjacks. And all +the immortals, sitting around the table of golden cedar-slabs, make +merry when the clumsy Hephaistos, playing the part of Hebe, +stumbles over a root and upsets the plate of cakes into the fire. + +The first little rapid of the Grande Decharge was only the +beginning. Half a mile below we could see the river disappear +between two points of rock. There was a roar of conflict, and a +golden mist hanging in the air, like the smoke of battle. All +along the place where the river sank from sight, dazzling heads of +foam were flashing up and falling back, as if a horde of water- +sprites were vainly trying to fight their way up to the lake. It +was the top of the grande chute, a wild succession of falls and +pools where no boat could live for a moment. We ran down toward it +as far as the water served, and then turned off among the rocks on +the left hand, to take the portage. + +These portages are among the troublesome delights of a journey in +the wilderness. To the guides they mean hard work, for everything, +including the boats, must be carried on their backs. The march of +the canoes on dry land is a curious sight. Andrew Marvell +described it two hundred years ago when he was poetizing beside the +little river Wharfe in Yorkshire:-- + + + "And now the salmon-fishers moist + Their leathern boats begin to hoist, + And like antipodes in shoes + Have shod their heads in their canoes. + How tortoise-like, but none so slow, + These rational amphibii go!" + + +But the sportsman carries nothing, except perhaps his gun, or his +rod, or his photographic camera; and so for him the portage is only +a pleasant opportunity to stretch his legs, cramped by sitting in +the canoe, and to renew his acquaintance with the pretty things +that are in the woods. + +We sauntered along the trail, Damon and I, as if school were out +and would never keep again. How fresh and tonic the forest seemed +as we plunged into its bath of shade. There were our old friends +the cedars, with their roots twisted across the path; and the white +birches, so trim in youth and so shaggy in age; and the sociable +spruces and balsams, crowding close together, and interlacing their +arms overhead. There were the little springs, trickling through +the moss; and the slippery logs laid across the marshy places; and +the fallen trees, cut in two and pushed aside,--for this was a +much-travelled portage. + +Around the open spaces, the tall meadow-rue stood dressed in robes +of fairy white and green. The blue banners of the fleur-de-lis +were planted beside the springs. In shady corners, deeper in the +wood, the fragrant pyrola lifted its scape of clustering bells, +like a lily of the valley wandered to the forest. When we came to +the end of the portage, a perfume like that of cyclamens in +Tyrolean meadows welcomed us, and searching among the loose grasses +by the water-side we found the exquisite purple spikes of the +lesser fringed orchis, loveliest and most ethereal of all the +woodland flowers save one. And what one is that? Ah, my friend, +it is your own particular favourite, the flower, by whatever name +you call it, that you plucked long ago when you were walking in the +forest with your sweetheart,-- + + + "Im wunderschonen Monat Mai + Als alle Knospen sprangen." + + +We launched our canoes again on the great pool at the foot of the +first fall,--a broad sweep of water a mile long and half a mile +wide, full of eddies and strong currents, and covered with drifting +foam. There was the old campground on the point, where I had +tented so often with my lady Greygown, fishing for ouananiche, the +famous land-locked salmon of Lake St. John. And there were the big +fish, showing their back fins as they circled lazily around in the +eddies, as if they were waiting to play with us. But the goal of +our day's journey was miles away, and we swept along with the +stream, now through a rush of quick water, boiling and foaming, now +through a still place like a lake, now through + + + "Fairy crowds + Of islands, that together lie, + As quietly as spots of sky + Among the evening clouds." + + +The beauty of the shores was infinitely varied, and unspoiled by +any sign of the presence of man. We met no company except a few +king-fishers, and a pair of gulls who had come up from the sea to +spend the summer, and a large flock of wild ducks, which the guides +call "Betseys," as if they were all of the gentler sex. In such a +big family of girls we supposed that a few would not be missed, and +Damon bagged two of the tenderest for our supper. + +In the still water at the mouth of the Riviere Mistook, just above +the Rapide aux Cedres, we went ashore on a level wooded bank to +make our first camp and cook our dinner. Let me try to sketch our +men as they are busied about the fire. + +They are all French Canadians of unmixed blood, descendants of the +men who came to New France with Samuel de Champlain, that +incomparable old woodsman and life-long lover of the wilderness. +Ferdinand Larouche is our chef--there must be a head in every party +for the sake of harmony--and his assistant is his brother Francois. +Ferdinand is a stocky little fellow, a "sawed off" man, not more +than five feet two inches tall, but every inch of him is pure vim. +He can carry a big canoe or a hundred-weight of camp stuff over a +mile portage without stopping to take breath. He is a capital +canoe-man, with prudence enough to balance his courage, and a fair +cook, with plenty of that quality which is wanting in the ordinary +cook of commerce--good humour. Always joking, whistling, singing, +he brings the atmosphere of a perpetual holiday along with him. +His weather-worn coat covers a heart full of music. He has two +talents which make him a marked man among his comrades. He plays +the fiddle to the delight of all the balls and weddings through the +country-side; and he speaks English to the admiration and envy of +the other guides. But like all men of genius he is modest about +his accomplishments. "H'I not spik good h'English--h'only for +camp--fishin', cookin', dhe voyage--h'all dhose t'ings." The +aspirates puzzle him. He can get though a slash of fallen timber +more easily than a sentence full of "this" and "that." Sometimes +he expresses his meaning queerly. He was telling me once about his +farm, "not far off here, in dhe Riviere au Cochon, river of dhe +pig, you call 'im. H'I am a widow, got five sons, t'ree of dhem +are girls." But he usually ends by falling back into French, +which, he assures you, you speak to perfection, "much better than +the Canadians; the French of Paris in short--M'sieu' has been in +Paris?" Such courtesy is born in the blood, and is irresistible. +You cannot help returning the compliment and assuring him that his +English is remarkable, good enough for all practical purposes, +better than any of the other guides can speak. And so it is. + +Francois is a little taller, a little thinner, and considerably +quieter than Ferdinand. He laughs loyally at his brother's jokes, +and sings the response to his songs, and wields a good second +paddle in the canoe. + +Jean--commonly called Johnny--Morel is a tall, strong man of fifty, +with a bushy red beard that would do credit to a pirate. But when +you look at him more closely, you see that he has a clear, kind +blue eye and a most honest, friendly face under his slouch hat. He +has travelled these woods and waters for thirty years, so that he +knows the way through them by a thousand familiar signs, as well as +you know the streets of the city. He is our pathfinder. + +The bow paddle in his canoe is held by his son Joseph, a lad not +quite fifteen, but already as tall, and almost as strong as a man. +"He is yet of the youth," said Johnny, "and he knows not the +affairs of the camp. This trip is for him the first--it is his +school--but I hope he will content you. He is good, M'sieu', and +of the strongest for his age. I have educated already two sons in +the bow of my canoe. The oldest has gone to Pennsylvanie; he peels +the bark there for the tanning of leather. The second had the +misfortune of breaking his leg, so that he can no longer kneel to +paddle. He has descended to the making of shoes. Joseph is my +third pupil. And I have still a younger one at home waiting to +come into my school." + +A touch of family life like that is always refreshing, and doubly +so in the wilderness. For what is fatherhood at its best, +everywhere, but the training of good men to take the teacher's +place when his work is done? Some day, when Johnny's rheumatism +has made his joints a little stiffer and his eyes have lost +something of their keenness, he will be wielding the second paddle +in the boat, and going out only on the short and easy trips. It +will be young Joseph that steers the canoe through the dangerous +places, and carries the heaviest load over the portages, and leads +the way on the long journeys. + +It has taken me longer to describe our men than it took them to +prepare our frugal meal: a pot of tea, the woodsman's favourite +drink, (I never knew a good guide that would not go without whisky +rather than without tea,) a few slices of toast and juicy rashers +of bacon, a kettle of boiled potatoes, and a relish of crackers and +cheese. We were in a hurry to be off for an afternoon's fishing, +three or four miles down the river, at the Ile Maligne. + +The island is well named, for it is the most perilous place on the +river, and has a record of disaster and death. The scattered +waters of the Discharge are drawn together here into one deep, +narrow, powerful stream, flowing between gloomy shores of granite. +In mid-channel the wicked island shows its scarred and bristling +head, like a giant ready to dispute the passage. The river rushes +straight at the rocky brow, splits into two currents, and raves +away on both sides of the island in a double chain of furious falls +and rapids. + +In these wild waters we fished with immense delight and fair +success, scrambling down among the huge rocks along the shore, and +joining the excitement of an Alpine climb with the placid pleasures +of angling. At nightfall we were at home again in our camp, with +half a score of onananiche, weighing from one to four pounds each. + +Our next day's journey was long and variegated. A portage of a +mile or two across the Ile d'Alma, with a cart to haul our canoes +and stuff, brought us to the Little Discharge, down which we +floated for a little way, and then hauled through the village of +St. Joseph to the foot of the Carcajou, or Wildcat Falls. A mile +of quick water was soon passed, and we came to the junction of the +Little Discharge with the Grand Discharge at the point where the +picturesque club-house stands in a grove of birches beside the big +Vache Caille Falls. It is lively work crossing the pool here, when +the water is high and the canoes are heavy; but we went through the +labouring seas safely, and landed some distance below, at the head +of the Rapide Gervais, to eat our lunch. The water was too rough +to run down with loaded boats, so Damon and I had to walk about +three miles along the river-bank, while the men went down with the +canoes. + +On our way beside the rapids, Damon geologised, finding the marks +of ancient glaciers, and bits of iron-ore, and pockets of sand full +of infinitesimal garnets, and specks of gold washed from the +primitive granite; and I fished, picking up a pair of ouananiche in +foam-covered nooks among the rocks. The swift water was almost +passed when we embarked again and ran down the last slope into a +long deadwater. + +The shores, at first bold and rough, covered with dense thickets of +second-growth timber, now became smoother and more fertile. +Scattered farms, with square, unpainted houses, and long, thatched +barns, began to creep over the hills toward the river. There was a +hamlet, called St. Charles, with a rude little church and a +campanile of logs. The cure, robed in decent black and wearing a +tall silk hat of the vintage of 1860, sat on the veranda of his +trim presbytery, looking down upon us, like an image of propriety +smiling at Bohemianism. Other craft appeared on the river. A man +and his wife paddling an old dugout, with half a dozen children +packed in amidships a crew of lumbermen, in a sharp-nosed bateau, +picking up stray logs along the banks; a couple of boatloads of +young people returning merrily from a holiday visit; a party of +berry-pickers in a flat-bottomed skiff; all the life of the +country-side was in evidence on the river. We felt quite as if we +had been "in the swim" of society, when at length we reached the +point where the Riviere des Aunes came tumbling down a hundred-foot +ladder of broken black rocks. There we pitched our tents in a +strip of meadow by the water-side, where we could have the sound of +the falls for a slumber-song all night and the whole river for a +bath at sunrise. + +A sparkling draught of crystal weather was poured into our stirrup- +cup in the morning, as we set out for a drive of fifteen miles +across country to the Riviere a l'Ours, a tributary of the crooked, +unnavigable river of Alders. The canoes and luggage were loaded on +a couple of charrettes, or two-wheeled carts. But for us and the +guides there were two quatre-roues, the typical vehicles of the +century, as characteristic of Canada as the carriole is of Norway. +It is a two-seated buckboard, drawn by one horse, and the back seat +is covered with a hood like an old-fashioned poke bonnet. The road +is of clay and always rutty. It runs level for a while, and then +jumps up a steep ridge and down again, or into a deep gully and out +again. The habitant's idea of good driving is to let his horse +slide down the hill and gallop up. This imparts a spasmodic +quality to the motion, like Carlyle's style. + +The native houses are strung along the road. The modern pattern +has a convex angle in the roof, and dormer-windows; it is a rustic +adaptation of the Mansard. The antique pattern, which is far more +picturesque, has a concave curve in the roof, and the eaves project +like eyebrows, shading the flatness of the face. Paint is a +rarity. The prevailing colour is the soft gray of weather-beaten +wood. Sometimes, in the better class of houses, a gallery is built +across the front and around one side, and a square of garden is +fenced in, with dahlias and hollyhocks and marigolds, and perhaps a +struggling rosebush, and usually a small patch of tobacco growing +in one corner. Once in a long while you may see a balm-of-Gilead +tree, or a clump of sapling poplars, planted near the door. + +How much better it would have been if the farmer had left a few of +the noble forest-trees to shade his house. But then, when the +farmer came into the wilderness he was not a farmer, he was first +of all a wood-chopper. He regarded the forest as a stubborn enemy +in possession of his land. He attacked it with fire and axe and +exterminated it, instead of keeping a few captives to hold their +green umbrellas over his head when at last his grain fields should +be smiling around him and he should sit down on his doorstep to +smoke a pipe of home-grown tobacco. + +In the time of adversity one should prepare for prosperity. I +fancy there are a good many people unconsciously repeating the +mistake of the Canadian farmer--chopping down all the native +growths of life, clearing the ground of all the useless pretty +things that seem to cumber it, sacrificing everything to utility +and success. We fell the last green tree for the sake of raising +an extra hill of potatoes; and never stop to think what an ugly, +barren place we may have to sit in while we eat them. The ideals, +the attachments--yes, even the dreams of youth are worth saving. +For the artificial tastes with which age tries to make good their +loss grow very slowly and cast but a slender shade. + +Most of the Canadian farmhouses have their ovens out-of-doors. We +saw them everywhere; rounded edifices of clay, raised on a +foundation of logs, and usually covered with a pointed roof of +boards. They looked like little family chapels--and so they were; +shrines where the ritual of the good housewife was celebrated, and +the gift of daily bread, having been honestly earned, was +thankfully received. + +At one house we noticed a curious fragment of domestic economy. +Half a pig was suspended over the chimney, and the smoke of the +summer fire was turned to account in curing the winter's meat. I +guess the children of that family had a peculiar fondness for the +parental roof-tree. We saw them making mud-pies in the road, and +imagined that they looked lovingly up at the pendent porker, +outlined against the sky,--a sign of promise, prophetic of bacon. + +About noon the road passed beyond the region of habitation into a +barren land, where blueberries were the only crop, and partridges +took the place of chickens. Through this rolling gravelly plain, +sparsely wooded and glowing with the tall magenta bloom of the +fireweed, we drove toward the mountains, until the road went to +seed and we could follow it no longer. Then we took to the water +and began to pole our canoes up the River of the Bear. It was a +clear, amber-coloured stream, not more than ten or fifteen yards +wide, running swift and strong, over beds of sand and rounded +pebbles. The canoes went wallowing and plunging up the narrow +channel, between thick banks of alders, like clumsy sea-monsters. +All the grace with which they move under the strokes of the paddle, +in large waters, was gone. They looked uncouth and predatory, like +a pair of seals that I once saw swimming far up the river +Ristigouche in chase of fish. From the bow of each canoe the +landing-net stuck out as a symbol of destruction--after the fashion +of the Dutch admiral who nailed a broom to his masthead. But it +would have been impossible to sweep the trout out of that little +river by any fair method of angling, for there were millions of +them; not large, but lively, and brilliant, and fat; they leaped in +every bend of the stream. We trailed our flies, and made quick +casts here and there, as we went along. It was fishing on the +wing. And when we pitched our tents in a hurry at nightfall on the +low shore of Lac Sale, among the bushes where firewood was scarce +and there were no sapins for the beds, we were comforted for the +poorness of the camp-ground by the excellence of the trout supper. + +It was a bitter cold night for August. There was a skin of ice on +the water-pail at daybreak. We were glad to be up and away for an +early start. The river grew wilder and more difficult. There were +rapids, and ruined dams built by the lumbermen years ago. At these +places the trout were larger, and so plentiful that it was easy to +hook two at a cast. It came on to rain furiously while we were +eating our lunch. But we did not seem to mind it any more than the +fish did. Here and there the river was completely blocked by +fallen trees. The guides called it bouchee, "corked," and leaped +out gayly into the water with their axes to "uncork" it. We passed +through some pretty lakes, unknown to the map-makers, and arrived, +before sundown, at the Lake of the Bear, where we were to spend a +couple of days. The lake was full of floating logs, and the water, +raised by the heavy rains and the operations of the lumbermen, was +several feet above its usual level. Nature's landing-places were +all blotted out, and we had to explore halfway around the shore +before we could get out comfortably. We raised the tents on a +small shoulder of a hill, a few rods above the water; and a +glorious camp-fire of birch logs soon made us forget our misery as +though it had not been. + +The name of the Lake of the Beautiful Trout made us desire to visit +it. The portage was said to be only fifty acres long (the arpent +is the popular measure of distance here), but it passed over a +ridge of newly burned land, and was so entangled with ruined woods +and desolate of birds and flowers that it seemed to us at least +five miles. The lake was charming--a sheet of singularly clear +water, of a pale green tinge, surrounded by wooded hills. In the +translucent depths trout and pike live together, but whether in +peace or not I cannot tell. Both of them grow to an enormous size, +but the pike are larger and have more capacious jaws. One of them +broke my tackle and went off with a silver spoon in his mouth, as +if he had been born to it. Of course the guides vowed that they +saw him as he passed under the canoe, and declared that he must +weigh thirty or forty pounds. The spectacles of regret always +magnify. + +The trout were coy. We took only five of them, perfect specimens +of the true Salvelinus fontinalis, with square tails, and carmine +spots on their dark, mottled sides; the largest weighed three +pounds and three-quarters, and the others were almost as heavy. + +On our way back to the camp we found the portage beset by +innumerable and bloodthirsty foes. There are four grades of insect +malignity in the woods. The mildest is represented by the winged +idiot that John Burroughs' little boy called a "blunderhead." He +dances stupidly before your face, as if lost in admiration, and +finishes his pointless tale by getting in your eye, or down your +throat. The next grade is represented by the midges. "Bite 'em no +see 'em," is the Indian name for these invisible atoms of animated +pepper which settle upon you in the twilight and make your skin +burn like fire. But their hour is brief, and when they depart they +leave not a bump behind. One step lower in the scale we find the +mosquito, or rather he finds us, and makes his poisoned mark upon +our skin. But after all, he has his good qualities. The mosquito +is a gentlemanly pirate. He carries his weapon openly, and gives +notice of an attack. He respects the decencies of life, and does +not strike below the belt, or creep down the back of your neck. +But the black fly is at the bottom of the moral scale. He is an +unmitigated ruffian, the plug-ugly of the woods. He looks like a +tiny, immature house-fly, with white legs as if he must be +innocent. But, in fact, he crawls like a serpent and bites like a +dog. No portion of the human frame is sacred from his greed. He +takes his pound of flesh anywhere, and does not scruple to take the +blood with it. As a rule you can defend yourself, to some degree, +against him, by wearing a head-net, tying your sleeves around your +wrists and your trousers around your ankles, and anointing yourself +with grease, flavoured with pennyroyal, for which cleanly and +honest scent he has a coarse aversion. But sometimes, especially +on burned land, about the middle of a warm afternoon, when a rain +is threatening, the horde of black flies descend in force and fury +knowing that their time is short. Then there is no escape. Suits +of chain armour, Nubian ointments of far-smelling potency, would +not save you. You must do as our guides did on the portage, submit +to fate and walk along in heroic silence, like Marco Bozzaris +"bleeding at every pore,"--or do as Damon and I did, break into +ejaculations and a run, until you reach a place where you can light +a smudge and hold your head over it. + +"And yet," said my comrade, as we sat coughing and rubbing our eyes +in the painful shelter of the smoke, "there are worse trials than +this in the civilised districts: social enmities, and newspaper +scandals, and religious persecutions. The blackest fly I ever saw +is the Reverend -----" but here his voice was fortunately choked by +a fit of coughing. + +A couple of wandering Indians--descendants of the Montagnais, on +whose hunting domain we were travelling--dropped in at our camp +that night as we sat around the fire. They gave us the latest news +about the portages on our further journey; how far they had been +blocked with fallen trees, and whether the water was high or low in +the rivers--just as a visitor at home would talk about the effect +of the strikes on the stock market, and the prospects of the newest +organization of the non-voting classes for the overthrow of Tammany +Hall. Every phase of civilisation or barbarism creates its own +conversational currency. The weather, like the old Spanish dollar, +is the only coin that passes everywhere. + +But our Indians did not carry much small change about them. They +were dark, silent chaps, soon talked out; and then they sat sucking +their pipes before the fire, (as dumb as their own wooden effigies +in front of a tobacconist's shop,) until the spirit moved them, and +they vanished in their canoe down the dark lake. Our own guides +were very different. They were as full of conversation as a +spruce-tree is of gum. When all shallower themes were exhausted +they would discourse of bears and canoes and lumber and fish, +forever. After Damon and I had left the fire and rolled ourselves +in the blankets in our own tent, we could hear the men going on and +on with their simple jests and endless tales of adventure, until +sleep drowned their voices. + +It was the sound of a French chanson that woke us early on the +morning of our departure from the Lake of the Bear. A gang of +lumbermen were bringing a lot of logs through the lake. Half- +hidden in the cold gray mist that usually betokens a fine day, and +wet to the waist from splashing about after their unwieldy flock, +these rough fellows were singing at their work as cheerfully as a +party of robins in a cherry-tree at sunrise. It was like the +miller and the two girls whom Wordsworth saw dancing in their boats +on the Thames: + + + "They dance not for me, + Yet mine is their glee! + Thus pleasure is spread through the earth + In stray gifts to be claimed by whoever shall find; + Thus a rich loving-kindness, redundantly kind, + Moves all nature to gladness and mirth." + + +But our later thoughts of the lumbermen were not altogether +grateful, when we arrived that day, after a mile of portage, at the +little Riviere Blanche, upon which we had counted to float us down +to Lac Tchitagama, and found that they had stolen all its water to +float their logs down the Lake of the Bear. The poor little river +was as dry as a theological novel. There was nothing left of it +except the bed and the bones; it was like a Connecticut stream in +the middle of August. All its pretty secrets were laid bare; all +its music was hushed. The pools that lingered among the rocks +seemed like big tears; and the voice of the forlorn rivulets that +trickled in here and there, seeking the parent stream, was a voice +of weeping and complaint. + +For us the loss meant a hard day's work, scrambling over slippery +stones, and splashing through puddles, and forcing a way through +the tangled thickets on the bank, instead of a pleasant two hours' +run on a swift current. We ate our dinner on a sandbank in what +was once the middle of a pretty pond; and entered, as the sun was +sinking, a narrow wooded gorge between the hills, completely filled +by a chain of small lakes, where travelling became easy and +pleasant. The steep shores, clothed with cedar and black spruce +and dark-blue fir-trees, rose sheer from the water; the passage +from lake to lake was a tiny rapid a few yards long, gurgling +through mossy rocks; at the foot of the chain there was a longer +rapid, with a portage beside it. We emerged from the dense bush +suddenly and found ourselves face to face with Lake Tchitagama. + +How the heart expands at such a view! Nine miles of shining water +lay stretched before us, opening through the mountains that guarded +it on both sides with lofty walls of green and gray, ridge over +ridge, point beyond point, until the vista ended in + + + "You orange sunset waning slow." + + +At a moment like this one feels a sense of exultation. It is a new +discovery of the joy of living. And yet, my friend and I confessed +to each other, there was a tinge of sadness, an inexplicable regret +mingled with our joy. Was it the thought of how few human eyes had +even seen that lovely vision? Was it the dim foreboding that we +might never see it again? Who can explain the secret pathos of +Nature's loveliness? It is a touch of melancholy inherited from +our mother Eve. It is an unconscious memory of the lost Paradise. +It is the sense that even if we should find another Eden, we would +not be fit to enjoy it perfectly, nor stay in it forever. + +Our first camp on Tchitagama was at the sunrise end of the lake, in +a bay paved with small round stones, laid close together and beaten +firmly down by the waves. There, and along the shores below, at +the mouth of a little river that foamed in over a ledge of granite, +and in the shadow of cliffs of limestone and feldspar, we trolled +and took many fish: pike of enormous size, fresh-water sharks, +devourers of nobler game, fit only to kill and throw away; huge old +trout of six or seven pounds, with broad tails and hooked jaws, +fine fighters and poor food; stupid, wide-mouthed chub--ouitouche, +the Indians call them--biting at hooks that were not baited for +them; and best of all, high-bred onananiche, pleasant to capture +and delicate to eat. + +Our second camp was on a sandy point at the sunset end of the lake-- +a fine place for bathing, and convenient to the wild meadows and +blueberry patches, where Damon went to hunt for bears. He did not +find any; but once he heard a great noise in the bushes, which he +thought was a bear; and he declared that he got quite as much +excitement out of it as if it had had four legs and a mouthful of +teeth. + +He brought back from one of his expeditions an Indian letter, which +he had found in a cleft stick by the river. It was a sheet of +birch-bark with a picture drawn on it in charcoal; five Indians in +a canoe paddling up the river, and one in another canoe pointing in +another direction; we read it as a message left by a hunting party, +telling their companions not to go on up the river, because it was +already occupied, but to turn off on a side stream. + +There was a sign of a different kind nailed to an old stump behind +our camp. It was the top of a soap-box, with an inscription after +this fashion: + + + A.D. MEYER & B. LEVIT + Soap Mfrs. N. Y. + CAMPED HERE JULY 18-- + 1 TROUT 17 1/2 POUNDS. II OUAN + ANISHES 18 1/2 POUNDS. ONE + PIKE 147 1/2 LBS. + + +There was a combination of piscatorial pride and mercantile +enterprise in this quaint device, that took our fancy. It +suggested also a curious question of psychology in regard to the +inhibitory influence of horses and fish upon the human nerve of +veracity. We named the place "Point Ananias." + +And yet, in fact, it was a wild and lonely spot, and not even the +Hebrew inscription could spoil the sense of solitude that +surrounded us when the night came, and the storm howled across the +take, and the darkness encircled us with a wall that only seemed +the more dense and impenetrable as the firelight blazed and leaped +within the black ring. + +"How far away is the nearest house, Johnny?" + +"I don't know; fifty miles, I suppose." + +"And what would you do if the canoes were burned, or if a tree fell +and smashed them?" + +"Well, I'd say a Pater noster, and take bread and bacon enough for +four days, and an axe, and plenty of matches, and make a straight +line through the woods. But it wouldn't be a joke, M'sieu', I can +tell you." + +The river Peribonca, into which Lake Tchitagama flows without a +break, is the noblest of all the streams that empty into Lake St. +John. It is said to be more than three hundred miles long, and at +the mouth of the lake it is perhaps a thousand feet wide, flowing +with a deep, still current through the forest. The dead-water +lasted for several miles; then the river sloped into a rapid, +spread through a net of islands, and broke over a ledge in a +cataract. Another quiet stretch was followed by another fall, and +so on, along the whole course of the river. + +We passed three of these falls in the first day's voyage (by +portages so steep and rough that an Adirondack guide would have +turned gray at the sight of them), and camped at night just below +the Chute du Diable, where we found some ouananiche in the foam. +Our tents were on an islet, and all around we saw the primeval, +savage beauty of a world unmarred by man, + +The river leaped, shouting, down its double stairway of granite, +rejoicing like a strong man to run a race. The after-glow in the +western sky deepened from saffron to violet among the tops of the +cedars, and over the cliffs rose the moonlight, paling the heavens +but glorifying the earth. There was something large and generous +and untrammelled in the scene, recalling one of Walt Whitman's +rhapsodies:-- + + +"Earth of departed sunsets! Earth of the mountains misty-topped! +Earth of the vitreous pour of the full moon just tinged with blue! +Earth of shine and dark, mottling the tide of the river!" + + +All the next day we went down with the current. Regiments of black +spruce stood in endless files like grenadiers, each tree capped +with a thick tuft of matted cones and branches. Tall white birches +leaned out over the stream, Narcissus-like, as if to see their own +beauty in the moving mirror. There were touches of colour on the +banks, the ragged pink flowers of the Joe-Pye-weed (which always +reminds me of a happy, good-natured tramp), and the yellow ear- +drops of the jewel-weed, and the intense blue of the closed +gentian, that strange flower which, like a reticent heart, never +opens to the light. Sometimes the river spread out like a lake, +between high bluffs of sand fully a mile apart; and again it +divided into many channels, winding cunningly down among the +islands as if it were resolved to slip around the next barrier of +rock without a fall. There were eight of these huge natural dams +in the course of that day's journey. Sometimes we followed one of +the side canals, and made the portage at a distance from the main +cataract; and sometimes we ran with the central current to the very +brink of the chute, darting aside just in time to escape going +over. At the foot of the last fall we made our camp on a curving +beach of sand, and spent the rest of the afternoon in fishing. + +It was interesting to see how closely the guides could guess at the +weight of the fish by looking at them. The ouananiche are much +longer in proportion to their weight than trout, and a novice +almost always overestimates them. But the guides were not +deceived. "This one will weigh four pounds and three-quarters, and +this one four pounds, but that one not more than three pounds; he +is meagre, M'sieu', BUT he is meagre." When we went ashore and +tried the spring balance (which every angler ought to carry with +him, as an aid to his conscience), the guides guess usually proved +to be within an ounce or two of the fact. Any one of the senses +can be educated to do the work of the others. The eyes of these +experienced fishermen were as sensitive to weight as if they had +been made to use as scales. + +Below the last fall the Peribonca flows for a score of miles with +an unbroken, ever-widening stream, through low shores of forest and +bush and meadow. Near its mouth the Little Peribonca joins it, and +the immense flood, nearly two miles wide, pours into Lake St. John. +Here we saw the first outpost of civilisation--a huge unpainted +storehouse, where supplies are kept for the lumbermen and the new +settlers. Here also we found the tiny, lame steam launch that was +to carry us back to the Hotel Roberval. Our canoes were stowed +upon the roof of the cabin, and we embarked for the last stage of +our long journey. + +As we came out of the river-mouth, the opposite shore of the lake +was invisible, and a stiff "Nor'wester" was rolling big waves +across the bar. It was like putting out into the open sea. The +launch laboured and puffed along for four or five miles, growing +more and more asthmatic with every breath. Then there was an +explosion in the engine-room. Some necessary part of the +intestinal machinery had blown out. There was a moment of +confusion. The captain hurried to drop the anchor, and the narrow +craft lay rolling in the billows. + +What to do? The captain shrugged his shoulders like a Frenchman. +"Wait here, I suppose." But how long? "Who knows? Perhaps till +to-morrow; perhaps the day after. They will send another boat to +look for us in the course of time." + +But the quarters were cramped; the weather looked ugly; if the wind +should rise, the cranky launch would not be a safe cradle for the +night. Damon and I preferred the canoes, for they at least would +float if they were capsized. So we stepped into the frail, buoyant +shells of bark once more, and danced over the big waves toward the +shore. We made a camp on a wind-swept point of sand, and felt like +shipwrecked mariners. But it was a gilt-edged shipwreck. For our +larder was still full, and as if to provide us with the luxuries as +well as the necessities of life, Nature had spread an inexhaustible +dessert of the largest and most luscious blueberries around our +tents. + +After supper, strolling along the beach, we debated the best way of +escape; whether to send one of our canoes around the eastern shore +of the lake that night, to meet the steamer at the Island House and +bring it to our rescue; or to set out the next morning, and paddle +both canoes around the western end of the lake, thirty miles, to +the Hotel Roberval. While we were talking, we came to a dry old +birch-tree, with ragged, curling bark. "Here is a torch," cried +Damon, "to throw light upon the situation." He touched a match to +it, and the flames flashed up the tall trunk until it was +transformed into a pillar of fire. But the sudden illumination +burned out, and our counsels were wrapt again in darkness and +uncertainty, when there came a great uproar of steam-whistles from +the lake. They must be signalling for us. What could it mean? + +We fired our guns, leaped into a canoe, leaving two of the guides +to break camp, and paddled out swiftly into the night. It seemed +an endless distance before we found the feeble light where the +crippled launch was tossing at anchor. The captain shouted +something about a larger steamboat and a raft of logs, out in the +lake, a mile or two beyond. Presently we saw the lights, and the +orange glow of the cabin windows. Was she coming, or going, or +standing still? We paddled on as fast as we could, shouting and +firing off a revolver until we had no more cartridges. We were +resolved not to let that mysterious vessel escape us, and threw +ourselves with energy into the novel excitement of chasing a +steamboat in the dark. + +Then the lights began to swing around; the throbbing of paddle- +wheels grew louder and louder; she was evidently coming straight +toward us. At that moment it flashed upon us that, while she had +plenty of lights, we had none! We were lying, invisible, right +across her track. The character of the steamboat chase was +reversed. We turned and fled, as the guides say, a quatre pattes, +into illimitable space, trying to get out of the way of our too +powerful friend. It makes considerable difference, in the voyage +of life, whether you chase the steamboat, or the steamboat chases +you. + +Meantime our other canoe had approached unseen. The steamer passed +safely between the two boats, slackening speed as the pilot caught +our loud halloo! She loomed up above us like a man-of-war, and as +we climbed the ladder to the main-deck we felt that we had indeed +gotten out of the wilderness. My old friend, Captain Savard, made +us welcome. He had been sent out, much to his disgust, to catch a +runaway boom of logs and tow it back to Roberval; it would be an +all night affair; but we must take possession of his stateroom and +make ourselves comfortable; he would certainly bring us to the +hotel in time for breakfast. So he went off on the upper deck, and +we heard him stamping about and yelling to his crew as they +struggled to get their unwieldy drove of six thousand logs in +motion. + +All night long we assisted at the lumbermen's difficult enterprise. +We heard the steamer snorting and straining at her clumsy, stubborn +convoy. The hoarse shouts of the crew, disguised in a mongrel +dialect which made them (perhaps fortunately) less intelligible and +more forcible, mingled with our broken dreams. + +But it was, in fact, a fitting close of our voyage. For what were +we doing? It was the last stage of the woodman's labour. It was +the gathering of a wild herd of the houses and churches and ships +and bridges that grow in the forests, and bringing them into the +fold of human service. I wonder how often the inhabitant of the +snug Queen Anne cottage in the suburbs remembers the picturesque +toil and varied hardship that it has cost to hew and drag his walls +and floors and pretty peaked roofs out of the backwoods. It might +enlarge his home, and make his musings by the winter fireside less +commonplace, to give a kindly thought now and then to the long +chain of human workers through whose hands the timber of his house +has passed, since it first felt the stroke of the axe in the snow- +bound winter woods, and floated, through the spring and summer, on +far-off lakes and little rivers, au large. + +1894. + + + +TROUT-FISHING IN THE TRAUN + + +"Those who wish to forget painful thoughts do well to absent +themselves for a time from the ties and objects that recall them; +but we can be said only to fulfil our destiny in the place that +gave us birth. I should on this account like well enough to spend +the whole of my life in travelling abroad if I could anywhere +borrow another life to spend afterwards at home."--WILLIAM HAZLITT: +On Going a Journey. + + +The peculiarity of trout-fishing in the Traun is that one catches +principally grayling. But in this it resembles some other pursuits +which are not without their charm for minds open to the pleasures +of the unexpected--for example, reading George Borrow's The Bible +in Spain with a view to theological information, or going to the +opening night at the Academy of Design with the intention of +looking at pictures. + +Moreover, there are really trout in the Traun, rari nantes in +gurgite; and in some places more than in others; and all of high +spirit, though few of great size. Thus the angler has his +favourite problem: Given an unknown stream and two kinds of fish, +the one better than the other; to find the better kind, and +determine the hour at which they will rise. This is sport. + +As for the little river itself, it has so many beauties that one +does not think of asking whether it has any faults. Constant +fulness, and crystal clearness, and refreshing coolness of living +water, pale green like the jewel that is called aqua marina, +flowing over beds of clean sand and bars of polished gravel, and +dropping in momentary foam from rocky ledges, between banks that +are shaded by groves of fir and ash and poplar, or through dense +thickets of alder and willow, or across meadows of smooth verdure +sloping up to quaint old-world villages--all these are features of +the ideal little river. + +I have spoken of these personal qualities first, because a truly +moral writer ought to make more of character than of position. A +good river in a bad country would be more worthy of affection than +a bad river in a good country. But the Traun has also the +advantages of an excellent worldly position. For it rises all over +the Salzkammergut, the summer hunting-ground of the Austrian +Emperor, and flows through that most picturesque corner of his +domain from end to end. Under the desolate cliffs of the +Todtengebirge on the east, and below the shining ice-fields of the +Dachstein on the south, and from the green alps around St. Wolfgang +on the west, the translucent waters are gathered in little tarns, +and shot through roaring brooks, and spread into lakes of wondrous +beauty, and poured through growing streams, until at last they are +all united just below the summer villa of his Kaiserly and Kingly +Majesty, Francis Joseph, and flow away northward, through the rest +of his game-preserve, into the Traunsee. It is an imperial +playground, and such as I would consent to hunt the chamois in, if +an inscrutable Providence had made me a kingly kaiser, or even a +plain king or an unvarnished kaiser. But, failing this, I was +perfectly content to spend a few idle days in fishing for trout and +catching grayling, at such times and places as the law of the +Austrian Empire allowed. + +For it must be remembered that every stream in these over-civilised +European countries belongs to somebody, by purchase or rent. And +all the fish in the stream are supposed to belong to the person who +owns or rents it. They do not know their master's voice, neither +will they follow when he calls. But they are theoretically his. +To this legal fiction the untutored American must conform. He must +learn to clothe his natural desires in the raiment of lawful +sanction, and take out some kind of a license before he follows his +impulse to fish. + +It was in the town of Aussee, at the junction of the two highest +branches of the Traun, that this impulse came upon me, mildly +irresistible. The full bloom of mid-July gayety in that ancient +watering-place was dampened, but not extinguished, by two days of +persistent and surprising showers. I had exhausted the +possibilities of interest in the old Gothic church, and felt all +that a man should feel in deciphering the mural tombstones of the +families who were exiled for their faith in the days of the +Reformation. The throngs of merry Hebrews from Vienna and Buda- +Pesth, amazingly arrayed as mountaineers and milk-maids, walking up +and down the narrow streets under umbrellas, had Cleopatra's charm +of an infinite variety; but custom staled it. The woodland paths, +winding everywhere through the plantations of fir-trees and +provided with appropriate names on wooden labels, and benches for +rest and conversation at discreet intervals, were too moist for +even the nymphs to take delight in them. The only creatures that +suffered nothing by the rain were the two swift, limpid Trauns, +racing through the woods, like eager and unabashed lovers, to meet +in the middle of the village. They were as clear, as joyous, as +musical as if the sun were shining. The very sight of their +opalescent rapids and eddying pools was an invitation to that +gentle sport which is said to have the merit of growing better as +the weather grows worse. + +I laid this fact before the landlord of the hotel of the Erzherzog +Johann, as poetically as I could, but he assured me that it was of +no consequence without an invitation from the gentleman to whom the +streams belonged; and he had gone away for a week. The landlord +was such a good-natured person, and such an excellent sleeper, that +it was impossible to believe that he could have even the smallest +inaccuracy upon his conscience. So I bade him farewell, and took +my way, four miles through the woods, to the lake from which one of +the streams flowed. + +It was called the Grundlsee. As I do not know the origin of the +name, I cannot consistently make any moral or historical +reflections upon it. But if it has never become famous, it ought +to be, for the sake of a cozy and busy little Inn, perched on a +green hill beside the lake and overlooking the whole length of it, +from the groups of toy villas at the foot to the heaps of real +mountains at the head. This Inn kept a thin but happy landlord, +who provided me with a blue license to angle, for the +inconsiderable sum of fifteen cents a day. This conferred the +right of fishing not only in the Grundlsee, but also in the smaller +tarn of Toplitz, a mile above it, and in the swift stream which +unites them. It all coincided with my desire as if by magic. A +row of a couple of miles to the head of the lake, and a walk +through the forest, brought me to the smaller pond; and as the +afternoon sun was ploughing pale furrows through the showers, I +waded out on a point of reeds and cast the artful fly in the shadow +of the great cliffs of the Dead Mountains. + +It was a fit scene for a lone fisherman. But four sociable +tourists promptly appeared to act as spectators and critics. Fly- +fishing usually strikes the German mind as an eccentricity which +calls for remonstrance. After one of the tourists had suggestively +narrated the tale of seven trout which he had caught in another +lake, WITH WORMS, on the previous Sunday, they went away for a row, +(with salutations in which politeness but thinly veiled their +pity,) and left me still whipping the water in vain. Nor was the +fortune of the day much better in the stream below. It was a long +and wet wade for three fish too small to keep. I came out on the +shore of the lake, where I had left the row-boat, with empty bag +and a feeling of damp discouragement. + +There was still an hour or so of daylight, and a beautiful place to +fish where the stream poured swirling out into the lake. A rise, +and a large one, though rather slow, awakened my hopes. Another +rise, evidently made by a heavy fish, made me certain that virtue +was about to be rewarded. The third time the hook went home. I +felt the solid weight of the fish against the spring of the rod, +and that curious thrill which runs up the line and down the arm, +changing, somehow or other, into a pleasurable sensation of +excitement as it reaches the brain. But it was only for a moment; +and then came that foolish, feeble shaking of the line from side to +side which tells the angler that he has hooked a great, big, +leather-mouthed chub--a fish which Izaak Walton says "the French +esteem so mean as to call him Un Vilain." Was it for this that I +had come to the country of Francis Joseph? + +I took off the flies and put on one of those phantom minnows which +have immortalised the name of a certain Mr. Brown. The minnow +swung on a long line as the boat passed back and forth across the +current, once, twice, three times-- and on the fourth circle there +was a sharp strike. The rod bent almost double, and the reel sang +shrilly to the first rush of the fish. He ran; he doubled; he went +to the bottom and sulked; he tried to go under the boat; he did all +that a game fish can do, except leaping. After twenty minutes he +was tired enough to be lifted gently into the boat by a hand +slipped around his gills, and there he was, a lachsforelle of three +pounds' weight: small pointed head; silver sides mottled with dark +spots; square, powerful tail and large fins--a fish not unlike the +land-locked salmon of the Saguenay, but more delicate. + +Half an hour later he was lying on the grass in front of the Inn. +The waiters paused, with their hands full of dishes, to look at +him; and the landlord called his guests, including my didactic +tourists, to observe the superiority of the trout of the Grundlsee. +The maids also came to look; and the buxom cook, with her spotless +apron and bare arms akimbo, was drawn from her kitchen, and pledged +her culinary honour that such a pracht-kerl should be served up in +her very best style. The angler who is insensible to this sort of +indirect flattery through his fish does not exist. Even the most +indifferent of men thinks more favourably of people who know a good +trout when they see it, and sits down to his supper with kindly +feelings. Possibly he reflects, also, upon the incident as a hint +of the usual size of the fish in that neighbourhood. He remembers +that he may have been favoured in this case beyond his deserts by +good-fortune, and resolving not to put too heavy a strain upon it, +considers the next place where it would be well for him to angle. + +Hallstatt is about ten miles below Aussee. The Traun here expands +into a lake, very dark and deep, shut in by steep and lofty +mountains. The railway runs along the eastern shore. On the other +side, a mile away, you see the old town, its white houses clinging +to the cliff like lichens to the face of a rock. The guide-book +calls it "a highly original situation." But this is one of the +cases where a little less originality and a little more +reasonableness might be desired, at least by the permanent +inhabitants. A ledge under the shadow of a precipice makes a +trying winter residence. The people of Hallstatt are not a +blooming race: one sees many dwarfs and cripples among them. But +to the summer traveller the place seems wonderfully picturesque. +Most of the streets are flights of steps. The high-road has barely +room to edge itself through among the old houses, between the +window-gardens of bright flowers. On the hottest July day the +afternoon is cool and shady. The gay, little skiffs and long, open +gondolas are flitting continually along the lake, which is the main +street of Hallstatt. + +The incongruous, but comfortable, modern hotel has a huge glass +veranda, where you can eat your dinner and observe human nature in +its transparent holiday disguises. I was much pleased and +entertained by a family, or confederacy, of people attired as +peasants--the men with feathered hats, green stockings, and bare +knees--the women with bright skirts, bodices, and silk +neckerchiefs--who were always in evidence, rowing gondolas with +clumsy oars, meeting the steamboat at the wharf several times a +day, and filling the miniature garden of the hotel with rustic +greetings and early Salzkammergut attitudes. After much +conjecture, I learned that they were the family and friends of a +newspaper editor from Vienna. They had the literary instinct for +local colour. + +The fishing at Hallstatt is at Obertraun. There is a level stretch +of land above the lake, where the river flows peaceably, and the +fish have leisure to feed and grow. It is leased to a peasant, who +makes a business of supplying the hotels with fish. He was quite +willing to give permission to an angler; and I engaged one of his +sons, a capital young fellow, whose natural capacities for good +fellowship were only hampered by a most extraordinary German +dialect, to row me across the lake, and carry the net and a small +green barrel full of water to keep the fish alive, according to the +custom of the country. The first day we had only four trout large +enough to put into the barrel; the next day I think there were six; +the third day, I remember very well, there were ten. They were +pretty creatures, weighing from half a pound to a pound each, and +coloured as daintily as bits of French silk, in silver gray with +faint pink spots. + +There was plenty to do at Hallstatt in the mornings. An hour's +walk from the town there was a fine waterfall, three hundred feet +high. On the side of the mountain above the lake was one of the +salt-mines for which the region is celebrated. It has been worked +for ages by many successive races, from the Celt downward. Perhaps +even the men of the Stone Age knew of it, and came hither for +seasoning to make the flesh of the cave-bear and the mammoth more +palatable. Modern pilgrims are permitted to explore the long, wet, +glittering galleries with a guide, and slide down the smooth wooden +rollers which join the different levels of the mines. This pastime +has the same fascination as sliding down the balusters; and it is +said that even queens and princesses have been delighted with it. +This is a touching proof of the fundamental simplicity and unity of +our human nature. + +But by far the best excursion from Hallstatt was an all-day trip to +the Zwieselalp--a mountain which seems to have been especially +created as a point of view. From the bare summit you look right +into the face of the huge, snowy Dachstein, with the wild lake of +Gosau gleaming at its foot; and far away on the other side your +vision ranges over a confusion of mountains, with all the white +peaks of the Tyrol stretched along the horizon. Such a wide +outlook as this helps the fisherman to enjoy the narrow beauties of +his little rivers. No sport is at its best without interruption +and contrast. To appreciate wading, one ought to climb a little on +odd days. + +Isehl is about ten or twelve miles below Hallstatt, in the valley +of the Traun. It is the fashionable summer-resort of Austria. I +found it in the high tide of amusement. The shady esplanade along +the river was crowded with brave women and fair men, in gorgeous +raiment; the hotels were overflowing; and there were various kinds +of music and entertainments at all hours of day and night. But all +this did not seem to affect the fishing. + +The landlord of the Konigin Elizabeth, who is also the Burgomaster +and a gentleman of varied accomplishments and no leisure, kindly +furnished me with a fishing license in the shape of a large pink +card. There were many rules printed upon it: "All fishes under +nine inches must be gently restored to the water. No instrument of +capture must be used except the angle in the hand. The card of +legitimation must be produced and exhibited at the polite request +of any of the keepers of the river." Thus duly authorised and +instructed, I sallied forth to seek my pastime according to the +law. + +The easiest way, in theory, was to take the afternoon train up the +river to one of the villages, and fish down a mile or two in the +evening, returning by the eight o'clock train. But in practice the +habits of the fish interfered seriously with the latter part of +this plan. + +On my first day I had spent several hours in the vain effort to +catch something better than small grayling. The best time for the +trout was just approaching, as the broad light faded from the +stream; already they were beginning to feed, when I looked up from +the edge of a pool and saw the train rattling down the valley below +me. Under the circumstances the only thing to do was to go on +fishing. It was an even pool with steep banks, and the water ran +through it very straight and swift, some four feet deep and thirty +yards across. As the tail-fly reached the middle of the water, a +fine trout literally turned a somersault over it, but without +touching it. At the next cast he was ready, taking it with a rush +that carried him into the air with the fly in his mouth. He +weighed three-quarters of a pound. The next one was equally eager +in rising and sharp in playing, and the third might have been his +twin sister or brother. So, after casting for hours and taking +nothing in the most beautiful pools, I landed three trout from one +unlikely place in fifteen minutes. That was because the trout's +supper-time had arrived. So had mine. I walked over to the +rambling old inn at Goisern, sought the cook in the kitchen and +persuaded her, in spite of the lateness of the hour, to boil the +largest of the fish for my supper, after which I rode peacefully +back to Ischl by the eleven o'clock train. + +For the future I resolved to give up the illusory idea of coming +home by rail, and ordered a little one-horse carriage to meet me at +some point on the high-road every evening at nine o'clock. In this +way I managed to cover the whole stream, taking a lower part each +day, from the lake of Hallstatt down to Ischl. + +There was one part of the river, near Laufen, where the current was +very strong and waterfally, broken by ledges of rock. Below these +it rested in long, smooth reaches, much beloved by the grayling. +There was no difficulty in getting two or three of them out of each +run. + +The grayling has a quaint beauty. His appearance is aesthetic, +like a fish in a pre-raphaelite picture. His colour, in midsummer, +is a golden gray, darker on the back, and with a few black spots +just behind his gills, like patches put on to bring out the pallor +of his complexion. He smells of wild thyme when he first comes out +of the water, wherefore St. Ambrose of Milan complimented him in +courtly fashion "Quid specie tua gratius? Quid odore fragrantius? +Quod mella fragrant, hoc tuo corpore spiras." But the chief glory +of the grayling is the large iridescent fin on his back. You see +it cutting the water as he swims near the surface; and when you +have him on the bank it arches over him like a rainbow. His mouth +is under his chin, and he takes the fly gently, by suction. He is, +in fact, and to speak plainly, something of a sucker; but then he +is a sucker idealised and refined, the flower of the family. +Charles Cotton, the ingenious young friend of Walton, was all wrong +in calling the grayling "one of the deadest-hearted fishes in the +world." He fights and leaps and whirls, and brings his big fin to +bear across the force of the current with a variety of tactics that +would put his more aristocratic fellow-citizen, the trout, to the +blush. Twelve of these pretty fellows, with a brace of good trout +for the top, filled my big creel to the brim. And yet, such is the +inborn hypocrisy of the human heart that I always pretended to +myself to be disappointed because there were not more trout, and +made light of the grayling as a thing of naught. + +The pink fishing license did not seem to be of much use. Its +exhibition was demanded only twice. Once a river guardian, who was +walking down the stream with a Belgian Baron and encouraging him to +continue fishing, climbed out to me on the end of a long +embankment, and with proper apologies begged to be favoured with a +view of my document. It turned out that his request was a favour +to me, for it discovered the fact that I had left my fly-book, with +the pink card in it, beside an old mill, a quarter of a mile up the +stream. + +Another time I was sitting beside the road, trying to get out of a +very long, wet, awkward pair of wading-stockings, an occupation +which is unfavourable to tranquillity of mind, when a man came up +to me in the dusk and accosted me with an absence of politeness +which in German amounted to an insult. + +"Have you been fishing?" + +"Why do you want to know?" + +"Have you any right to fish?" + +"What right have you to ask?" + +"I am a keeper of the river. Where is your card?" + +"It is in my pocket. But pardon my curiosity, where is YOUR card?" + +This question appeared to paralyse him. He had probably never been +asked for his card before. He went lumbering off in the darkness, +muttering "My card? Unheard of! MY card!" + +The routine of angling at Ischl was varied by an excursion to the +Lake of St. Wolfgang and the Schafberg, an isolated mountain on +whose rocky horn an inn has been built. It stands up almost like a +bird-house on a pole, and commands a superb prospect; northward, +across the rolling plain and the Bavarian forest; southward, over a +tumultuous land of peaks and precipices. There are many lovely +lakes in sight; but the loveliest of all is that which takes its +name from the old saint who wandered hither from the country of the +"furious Franks" and built his peaceful hermitage on the +Falkenstein. What good taste some of those old saints had! + +There is a venerable church in the village, with pictures +attributed to Michael Wohlgemuth, and a chapel which is said to +mark the spot where St. Wolfgang, who had lost his axe far up the +mountain, found it, like Longfellow's arrow, in an oak, and "still +unbroke." The tree is gone, so it was impossible to verify the +story. But the saint's well is there, in a pavilion, with a bronze +image over it, and a profitable inscription to the effect that the +poorer pilgrims, "who have come unprovided with either money or +wine, should be jolly well contented to find the water so fine." +There is also a famous echo farther up the lake, which repeats six +syllables with accuracy. It is a strange coincidence that there +are just six syllables in the name of "der heilige Wolfgang." But +when you translate it into English, the inspiration of the echo +seems to be less exact. The sweetest thing about St. Wolfgang was +the abundance of purple cyclamens, clothing the mountain meadows, +and filling the air with delicate fragrance like the smell of +lilacs around a New England farmhouse in early June. + +There was still one stretch of the river above Ischl left for the +last evening's sport. I remember it so well: the long, deep place +where the water ran beside an embankment of stone, and the big +grayling poised on the edge of the shadow, rising and falling on +the current as a kite rises and falls on the wind and balances back +to the same position; the murmur of the stream and the hissing of +the pebbles underfoot in the rapids as the swift water rolled them +over and over; the odour of the fir-trees, and the streaks of warm +air in quiet places, and the faint whiffs of wood-smoke wafted from +the houses, and the brown flies dancing heavily up and down in the +twilight; the last good pool, where the river was divided, the main +part making a deep, narrow curve to the right, and the lesser part +bubbling into it over a bed of stones with half-a-dozen tiny +waterfalls, with a fine trout lying at the foot of each of them and +rising merrily as the white fly passed over him--surely it was all +very good, and a memory to be grateful for. And when the basket +was full, it was pleasant to put off the heavy wading-shoes and the +long rubber-stockings, and ride homeward in an open carriage +through the fresh night air. That is as near to sybaritic luxury +as a man should care to come. + +The lights in the cottages are twinkling like fire-flies, and there +are small groups of people singing and laughing down the road. The +honest fisherman reflects that this world is only a place of +pilgrimage, but after all there is a good deal of cheer on the +journey, if it is made with a contented heart. He wonders who the +dwellers in the scattered houses may be, and weaves romances out of +the shadows on the curtained windows. The lamps burning in the +wayside shrines tell him stories of human love and patience and +hope, and of divine forgiveness. Dream-pictures of life float +before him, tender and luminous, filled with a vague, soft +atmosphere in which the simplest outlines gain a strange +significance. They are like some of Millet's paintings--"The +Sower," or "The Sheepfold,"--there is very little detail in them +but sometimes a little means so much. + +Then the moon slips up into the sky from behind the hills, and the +fisherman begins to think of home, and of the foolish, fond old +rhymes about those whom the moon sees far away, and the stars that +have the power to fulfil wishes--as if the celestial bodies knew or +cared anything about our small nerve-thrills which we call +affection and desires! But if there were Some One above the moon +and stars who did know and care, Some One who could see the places +and the people that you and I would give so much to see, Some One +who could do for them all of kindness that you and I fain would do, +Some One able to keep our beloved in perfect peace and watch over +the little children sleeping in their beds beyond the sea--what +then? Why, then, in the evening hour, one might have thoughts of +home that would go across the ocean by way of heaven, and be better +than dreams, almost as good as prayers. + + + +AT THE SIGN OF THE BALSAM BOUGH + + +"Come live with me, and be my love, +And we will all the pleasures prove +That valleys, groves, or hills, or field, +Or woods and steepy mountains yield. + +"There we will rest our sleepy heads, +And happy hearts, on balsam beds; +And every day go forth to fish +In foamy streams for ouananiche." + +Old Song with a new Ending. + + +It has been asserted, on high philosophical authority, that woman +is a problem. She is more; she is a cause of problems to others. +This is not a theoretical statement. It is a fact of experience. + +Every year, when the sun passes the summer solstice, the + + "Two souls with but a single thought," + +of whom I am so fortunate as to be one, are summoned by that +portion of our united mind which has at once the right of putting +the question and of casting the deciding vote, to answer this +conundrum: How can we go abroad without crossing the ocean, and +abandon an interesting family of children without getting +completely beyond their reach, and escape from the frying-pan of +housekeeping without falling into the fire of the summer hotel? +This apparently insoluble problem we usually solve by going to camp +in Canada. + +It is indeed a foreign air that breathes around us as we make the +harmless, friendly voyage from Point Levis to Quebec. The boy on +the ferry-boat, who cajoles us into buying a copy of Le Moniteur +containing last month's news, has the address of a true though +diminutive Frenchman. The landlord of the quiet little inn on the +outskirts of the town welcomes us with Gallic effusion as well- +known guests, and rubs his hands genially before us, while he +escorts us to our apartments, groping secretly in his memory to +recall our names. When we walk down the steep, quaint streets to +revel in the purchase of moccasins and water-proof coats and +camping supplies, we read on a wall the familiar but transformed +legend, L'enfant pleurs, il veut son Camphoria, and remember with +joy that no infant who weeps in French can impose any +responsibility upon us in these days of our renewed honeymoon. + +But the true delight of the expedition begins when the tents have +been set up, in the forest back of Lake St. John, and the green +branches have been broken for the woodland bed, and the fire has +been lit under the open sky, and, the livery of fashion being all +discarded, I sit down at a log table to eat supper with my lady +Greygown. Then life seems simple and amiable and well worth +living. Then the uproar and confusion of the world die away from +us, and we hear only the steady murmur of the river and the low +voice of the wind in the tree-tops. Then time is long, and the +only art that is needful for its enjoyment is short and easy. Then +we taste true comfort, while we lodge with Mother Green at the Sign +of the Balsam Bough. + + +I. + +UNDER THE WHITE BIRCHES. + + +Men may say what they will in praise of their houses, and grow +eloquent upon the merits of various styles of architecture, but, +for our part, we are agreed that there is nothing to be compared +with a tent. It is the most venerable and aristocratic form of +human habitation. Abraham and Sarah lived in it, and shared its +hospitality with angels. It is exempt from the base tyranny of the +plumber, the paper-hanger, and the gas-man. It is not immovably +bound to one dull spot of earth by the chains of a cellar and a +system of water-pipes. It has a noble freedom of locomotion. It +follows the wishes of its inhabitants, and goes with them, a +travelling home, as the spirit moves them to explore the +wilderness. At their pleasure, new beds of wild flowers surround +it, new plantations of trees overshadow it, and new avenues of +shining water lead to its ever-open door. What the tent lacks in +luxury it makes up in liberty: or rather let us say that liberty +itself is the greatest luxury. + +Another thing is worth remembering--a family which lives in a tent +never can have a skeleton in the closet. + +But it must not be supposed that every spot in the woods is +suitable for a camp, or that a good tenting-ground can be chosen +without knowledge and forethought. One of the requisites, indeed, +is to be found everywhere in the St. John region; for all the lakes +and rivers are full of clear, cool water, and the traveller does +not need to search for a spring. But it is always necessary to +look carefully for a bit of smooth ground on the shore, far enough +above the water to be dry, and slightly sloping, so that the head +of the bed may be higher than the foot. Above all, it must be free +from big stones and serpentine roots of trees. A root that looks +no bigger that an inch-worm in the daytime assumes the proportions +of a boa-constrictor at midnight--when you find it under your hip- +bone. There should also be plenty of evergreens near at hand for +the beds. Spruce will answer at a pinch; it has an aromatic smell; +but it is too stiff and humpy. Hemlock is smoother and more +flexible; but the spring soon wears out of it. The balsam-fir, +with its elastic branches and thick flat needles, is the best of +all. A bed of these boughs a foot deep is softer than a mattress +and as fragrant as a thousand Christmas-trees. Two things more are +needed for the ideal camp-ground--an open situation, where the +breeze will drive away the flies and mosquitoes, and an abundance +of dry firewood within easy reach. Yes, and a third thing must not +be forgotten; for, says my lady Greygown: + +"I shouldn't feel at home in camp unless I could sit in the door of +the tent and look out across flowing water." + +All these conditions are met in our favourite camping place below +the first fall in the Grande Decharge. A rocky point juts out into +the rivet and makes a fine landing for the canoes. There is a +dismantled fishing-cabin a few rods back in the woods, from which +we can borrow boards for a table and chairs. A group of cedars on +the lower edge of the point opens just wide enough to receive and +shelter our tent. At a good distance beyond ours, the guides' tent +is pitched; and the big camp-fire burns between the two dwellings. +A pair of white-birches lift their leafy crowns far above us, and +after them we name the place Le Camp aux Bouleaux. + +"Why not call trees people?--since, if you come to live among them +year after year, you will learn to know many of them personally, +and an attachment will grow up between you and them individually." +So writes that Doctor Amabilis of woodcraft, W. C. Prime, in his +book, Among the Northern Hills, and straightway launches forth into +eulogy on the white-birch. And truly it is an admirable, lovable, +and comfortable tree, beautiful to look upon and full of various +uses. Its wood is strong to make paddles and axe handles, and +glorious to burn, blazing up at first with a flashing flame, and +then holding the fire in its glowing heart all through the night. +Its bark is the most serviceable of all the products of the +wilderness. In Russia, they say, it is used in tanning, and gives +its subtle, sacerdotal fragrance to Russia leather. But here, in +the woods, it serves more primitive ends. It can be peeled off in +a huge roll from some giant tree and fashioned into a swift canoe +to carry man over the waters. It can be cut into square sheets to +roof his shanty in the forest. It is the paper on which he writes +his woodland despatches, and the flexible material which he bends +into drinking-cups of silver lined with gold. A thin strip of it +wrapped around the end of a candle and fastened in a cleft stick +makes a practicable chandelier. A basket for berries, a horn to +call the lovelorn moose through the autumnal woods, a canvas on +which to draw the outline of great and memorable fish--all these +and many other indispensable luxuries are stored up for the skilful +woodsman in the birch bark. + +Only do not rob or mar the tree, unless you really need what it has +to give you. Let it stand and grow in virgin majesty, ungirdled +and unscarred, while the trunk becomes a firm pillar of the forest +temple, and the branches spread abroad a refuge of bright green +leaves for the birds of the air. Nature never made a more +excellent piece of handiwork. "And if," said my lady Greygown, "I +should ever become a dryad, I would choose to be transformed into a +white-birch. And then, when the days of my life were numbered, and +the sap had ceased to flow, and the last leaf had fallen, and the +dry bark hung around me in ragged curls and streamers, some +wandering hunter would come in the wintry night and touch a lighted +coal to my body, and my spirit would flash up in a fiery chariot +into the sky." + +The chief occupation of our idle days on the Grande Decharge was +fishing. Above the camp spread a noble pool, more than two miles +in circumference, and diversified with smooth bays and whirling +eddies, sand beaches and rocky islands. The river poured into it +at the head, foaming and raging down a long chute, and swept out of +it just in front of our camp in a merry, musical rapid. It was +full of fish of various kinds--long-nosed pickerel, wall-eyed pike, +and stupid chub. But the prince of the pool was the fighting +ouananiche, the little salmon of St. John. + +Here let me chant thy praise, thou noblest and most high-minded +fish, the cleanest feeder, the merriest liver, the loftiest leaper, +and the bravest warrior of all creatures that swim! Thy cousin, +the trout, in his purple and gold with crimson spots, wears a more +splendid armour than thy russet and silver mottled with black, but +thine is the kinglier nature. His courage and skill compared with +thine + + + "Are as moonlight unto sunlight, and as water unto wine." + + +The old salmon of the sea who begot thee, long ago, in these inland +waters, became a backslider, descending again to the ocean, and +grew gross and heavy with coarse feeding. But thou, unsalted +salmon of the foaming floods, not landlocked, as men call thee, but +choosing of thine own free-will to dwell on a loftier level, in the +pure, swift current of a living stream, hast grown in grace and +risen to a higher life. Thou art not to be measured by quantity, +but by quality, and thy five pounds of pure vigour will outweigh a +score of pounds of flesh less vitalised by spirit. Thou feedest on +the flies of the air, and thy food is transformed into an aerial +passion for flight, as thou springest across the pool, vaulting +toward the sky. Thine eyes have grown large and keen by peering +through the foam, and the feathered hook that can deceive thee must +be deftly tied and delicately cast. Thy tail and fins, by +ceaseless conflict with the rapids, have broadened and +strengthened, so that they can flash thy slender body like a living +arrow up the fall. As Lancelot among the knights, so art thou +among the fish, the plain-armoured hero, the sunburnt champion of +all the water-folk. + +Every morning and evening, Greygown and I would go out for +ouananiche, and sometimes we caught plenty and sometimes few, but +we never came back without a good catch of happiness. There were +certain places where the fish liked to stay. For example, we +always looked for one at the lower corner of a big rock, very close +to it, where he could poise himself easily on the edge of the +strong downward stream. Another likely place was a straight run of +water, swift, but not too swift, with a sunken stone in the middle. +The ouananiche does not like crooked, twisting water. An even +current is far more comfortable, for then he discovers just how +much effort is needed to balance against it, and keeps up the +movement mechanically, as if he were half asleep. But his +favourite place is under one of the floating islands of thick foam +that gather in the corners below the falls. The matted flakes give +a grateful shelter from the sun, I fancy, and almost all game-fish +love to lie in the shade; but the chief reason why the onananiche +haunt the drifting white mass is because it is full of flies and +gnats, beaten down by the spray of the cataract, and sprinkled all +through the foam like plums in a cake. To this natural confection +the little salmon, lurking in his corner, plays the part of Jack +Horner all day long, and never wearies. + +"See that belle brou down below there!" said Ferdinand, as we +scrambled over the huge rocks at the foot of the falls; "there +ought to be salmon there en masse." Yes, there were the sharp +noses picking out the unfortunate insects, and the broad tails +waving lazily through the foam as the fish turned in the water. At +this season of the year, when summer is nearly ended, and every +ouananiche in the Grande Decharge has tasted feathers and seen a +hook, it is useless to attempt to delude them with the large gaudy +flies which the fishing-tackle-maker recommends. There are only +two successful methods of angling now. The first of these I tried, +and by casting delicately with a tiny brown trout-fly tied on a +gossamer strand of gut, captured a pair of fish weighing about +three pounds each. They fought against the spring of the four- +ounce rod for nearly half an hour before Ferdinand could slip the +net around them. But there was another and a broader tail still +waving disdainfully on the outer edge of the foam. "And now," said +the gallant Ferdinand, "the turn is to madame, that she should +prove her fortune--attend but a moment, madame, while I seek the +sauterelle." + +This was the second method: the grasshopper was attached to the +hook, and casting the line well out across the pool, Ferdinand put +the rod into Greygown's hands. She stood poised upon a pinnacle of +rock, like patience on a monument, waiting for a bite. It came. +There was a slow, gentle pull at the line, answered by a quick jerk +of the rod, and a noble fish flashed into the air. Four pounds and +a half at least! He leaped again and again, shaking the drops from +his silvery sides. He rushed up the rapids as if he had determined +to return to the lake, and down again as if he had changed his +plans and determined to go to the Saguenay. He sulked in the deep +water and rubbed his nose against the rocks. He did his best to +treat that treacherous grasshopper as the whale served Jonah. But +Greygown, through all her little screams and shouts of excitement, +was steady and sage. She never gave the fish an inch of slack +line; and at last he lay glittering on the rocks, with the black +St. Andrew's crosses clearly marked on his plump sides, and the +iridescent spots gleaming on his small, shapely head. "Une belle!" +cried Ferdinand, as he held up the fish in triumph, "and it is +madame who has the good fortune. She understands well to take the +large fish--is it not?" Greygown stepped demurely down from her +pinnacle, and as we drifted down the pool in the canoe, under the +mellow evening sky, her conversation betrayed not a trace of the +pride that a victorious fisherman would have shown. On the +contrary, she insisted that angling was an affair of chance--which +was consoling, though I knew it was not altogether true--and that +the smaller fish were just as pleasant to catch and better to eat, +after all. For a generous rival, commend me to a woman. And if I +must compete, let it be with one who has the grace to dissolve the +bitter of defeat in the honey of a mutual self-congratulation. + +We had a garden, and our favourite path through it was the portage +leading around the falls. We travelled it very frequently, making +an excuse of idle errands to the steamboat-landing on the lake, and +sauntering along the trail as if school were out and would never +keep again. It was the season of fruits rather than of flowers. +Nature was reducing the decorations of her table to make room for +the banquet. She offered us berries instead of blossoms. + +There were the light coral clusters of the dwarf cornel set in +whorls of pointed leaves; and the deep blue bells of the Clintonia +borealis (which the White Mountain people call the bear-berry, and +I hope the name will stick, for it smacks of the woods, and it is a +shame to leave so free and wild a plant under the burden of a Latin +name); and the gray, crimson-veined berries for which the Canada +Mayflower had exchanged its feathery white bloom; and the ruby +drops of the twisted stalk hanging like jewels along its bending +stem. On the three-leaved table which once carried the gay flower +of the wake-robin, there was a scarlet lump like a red pepper +escaped to the forest and run wild. The partridge-vine was full of +rosy provision for the birds. The dark tiny leaves of the creeping +snow-berry were all sprinkled over with delicate drops of spicy +foam. There were few belated raspberries, and, if we chose to go +out into the burnt ground, we could find blueberries in plenty. + +But there was still bloom enough to give that festal air without +which the most abundant feast seems coarse and vulgar. The pale +gold of the loosestrife had faded, but the deeper yellow of the +goldenrod had begun to take its place. The blue banners of the +fleur-de-lis had vanished from beside the springs, but the purple +of the asters was appearing. Closed gentians kept their secret +inviolate, and bluebells trembled above the rocks. The quaint +pinkish-white flowers of the turtle-head showed in wet places, and +instead of the lilac racemes of the purple-fringed orchis, which +had disappeared with midsummer, we found now the slender braided +spikes of the lady's-tresses, latest and lowliest of the orchids, +pale and pure as nuns of the forest, and exhaling a celestial +fragrance. There is a secret pleasure in finding these delicate +flowers in the rough heart of the wilderness. It is like +discovering the veins of poetry in the character of a guide or a +lumberman. And to be able to call the plants by name makes them a +hundredfold more sweet and intimate. Naming things is one of the +oldest and simplest of human pastimes. Children play at it with +their dolls and toy animals. In fact, it was the first game ever +played on earth, for the Creator who planted the garden eastward in +Eden knew well what would please the childish heart of man, when He +brought all the new-made creatures to Adam, "to see what he would +call them." + +Our rustic bouquet graced the table under the white-birches, while +we sat by the fire and watched our four men at the work of the +camp--Joseph and Raoul chopping wood in the distance; Francois +slicing juicy rashers from the flitch of bacon; and Ferdinand, the +chef, heating the frying-pan in preparation for supper. + +"Have you ever thought," said Greygown, in a contented tone of +voice, "that this is the only period of our existence when we +attain to the luxury of a French cook?" + +"And one with the grand manner, too," I replied, "for he never +fails to ask what it is that madame desires to eat to-day, as if +the larder of Lucullus were at his disposal, though he knows well +enough that the only choice lies between broiled fish and fried +fish, or bacon with eggs and a rice omelet. But I like the fiction +of a lordly ordering of the repast. How much better it is than +having to eat what is flung before you at a summer boarding-house +by a scornful waitress!" + +"Another thing that pleases me," continued my lady, "is the +unbreakableness of the dishes. There are no nicks in the edges of +the best plates here; and, oh! it is a happy thing to have a home +without bric-a-brac. There is nothing here that needs to be +dusted." + +"And no engagements for to-morrow," I ejaculated. "Dishes that +can't be broken, and plans that can--that's the ideal of +housekeeping." + +"And then," added my philosopher in skirts, "it is certainly +refreshing to get away from all one's relations for a little +while." + +"But how do you make that out?" I asked, in mild surprise. "What +are you going to do with me?" + +"Oh," said she, with a fine air of independence, "I don't count +you. You are not a relation, only a connection by marriage." + +"Well, my dear," I answered, between the meditative puffs of my +pipe, "it is good to consider the advantages of our present +situation. We shall soon come into the frame of mind of the Sultan +of Morocco when he camped in the Vale of Rabat. The place pleased +him so well that he staid until the very pegs of his tent took root +and grew up into a grove of trees around his pavilion." + + +II. + +KENOGAMI. + + +The guides were a little restless under the idle regime of our lazy +camp, and urged us to set out upon some adventure. Ferdinand was +like the uncouth swain in Lycidas. Sitting upon the bundles of +camp equipage on the shore, and crying,-- + + + "To-morrow to fresh woods and pastures new," + + +he led us forth to seek the famous fishing grounds on Lake +Kenogami. + +We skirted the eastern end of Lake St. John in our two canoes, and +pushed up La Belle Riviere to Hebertville, where all the children +turned out to follow our procession through the village. It was +like the train that tagged after the Pied Piper of Hamelin. We +embarked again, surrounded by an admiring throng, at the bridge +where the main street crossed a little stream, and paddled up it, +through a score of back yards and a stretch of reedy meadows, where +the wild and tame ducks fed together, tempting the sportsman to +sins of ignorance. We crossed the placid Lac Vert, and after a +carry of a mile along the high-road toward Chicoutimi, turned down +a steep hill and pitched our tents on a crescent of silver sand, +with the long, fair water of Kenogami before us. + +It is amazing to see how quickly these woodsmen can make a camp. +Each one knew precisely his share of the enterprise. One sprang to +chop a dry spruce log into fuel for a quick fire, and fell a harder +tree to keep us warm through the night. Another stripped a pile of +boughs from a balsam for the beds. Another cut the tent-poles from +a neighbouring thicket. Another unrolled the bundles and made +ready the cooking utensils. As if by magic, the miracle of the +camp was accomplished.-- + + + "The bed was made, the room was fit, + By punctual eve the stars were lit"-- + + +but Greygown always insists upon completing that quotation from +Stevenson in her own voice; for this is the way it ends,-- + + + "When we put up, my ass and I, + At God's green caravanserai." + + +Our permanent camp was another day's voyage down the lake, on a +beach opposite the Point Ausable. There the water was contracted +to a narrow strait, and in the swift current, close to the point, +the great trout had fixed their spawning-bed from time immemorial. +It was the first week in September, and the magnates of the lake +were already assembling--the Common Councilmen and the Mayor and +the whole Committee of Seventy. There were giants in that place, +rolling lazily about, and chasing each other on the surface of the +water. "Look, M'sieu'!" cried Francois, in excitement, as we lay +at anchor in the gray morning twilight; "one like a horse has just +leaped behind us; I assure you, big like a horse!" + +But the fish were shy and dour. Old Castonnier, the guardian of +the lake, lived in his hut on the shore, and flogged the water, +early and late, every day with his home-made flies. He was +anchored in his dugout close beside us, and grinned with delight as +he saw his over-educated trout refuse my best casts. "They are +here, M'sieu', for you can see them," he said, by way of +discouragement, "but it is difficult to take them. Do you not find +it so?" + +In the back of my fly-book I discovered a tiny phantom minnow--a +dainty affair of varnished silk, as light as a feather--and quietly +attached it to the leader in place of the tail-fly. Then the fun +began. + +One after another the big fish dashed at that deception, and we +played and netted them, until our score was thirteen, weighing +altogether thirty-five pounds, and the largest five pounds and a +half. The guardian was mystified and disgusted. He looked on for +a while in silence, and then pulled up anchor and clattered ashore. +He must have made some inquiries and reflections during the day, +for that night he paid a visit to our camp. After telling bear +stories and fish stories for an hour or two by the fire, he rose to +depart, and tapping his forefinger solemnly upon my shoulder, +delivered himself as follows:-- + +"You can say a proud thing when you go home, M'sieu'--that you have +beaten the old Castonnier. There are not many fishermen who can +say that. "But," he added, with confidential emphasis, "c'etait +votre sacre p'tit poisson qui a fait cela." + +That was a touch of human nature, my rusty old guardian, more +welcome to me than all the morning's catch. Is there not always a +"confounded little minnow" responsible for our failures? Did you +ever see a school-boy tumble on the ice without stooping +immediately to re-buckle the strap of his skates? And would not +Ignotus have painted a masterpiece if he could have found good +brushes and a proper canvas? Life's shortcomings would be bitter +indeed if we could not find excuses for them outside of ourselves. +And as for life's successes--well, it is certainly wholesome to +remember how many of them are due to a fortunate position and the +proper tools. + +Our tent was on the border of a coppice of young trees. It was +pleasant to be awakened by a convocation of birds at sunrise, and +to watch the shadows of the leaves dance out upon our translucent +roof of canvas. + +All the birds in the bush are early, but there are so many of them +that it is difficult to believe that every one can be rewarded with +a worm. Here in Canada those little people of the air who appear +as transient guests of spring and autumn in the Middle States, are +in their summer home and breeding-place. Warblers, named for the +magnolia and the myrtle, chestnut-sided, bay-breasted, blue-backed, +and black-throated, flutter and creep along the branches with +simple lisping music. Kinglets, ruby-crowned and golden-crowned, +tiny, brilliant sparks of life, twitter among the trees, breaking +occasionally into clearer, sweeter songs. Companies of redpolls +and crossbills pass chirping through the thickets, busily seeking +their food. The fearless, familiar chickadee repeats his name +merrily, while he leads his family to explore every nook and cranny +of the wood. Cedar wax-wings, sociable wanderers, arrive in +numerous flocks. The Canadians call them "recollets," because they +wear a brown crest of the same colour as the hoods of the monks who +came with the first settlers to New France. They are a songless +tribe, although their quick, reiterated call as they take to flight +has given them the name of chatterers. The beautiful tree-sparrows +and the pine-siskins are more melodious, and the slate-coloured +juncos, flitting about the camp, are as garrulous as chippy-birds. +All these varied notes come and go through the tangle of morning +dreams. And now the noisy blue-jay is calling "Thief--thief-- +thief!" in the distance, and a pair of great pileated woodpeckers +with crimson crests are laughing loudly in the swamp over some +family joke. But listen! what is that harsh creaking note? It is +the cry of the Northern shrike, of whom tradition says that he +catches little birds and impales them on sharp thorns. At the +sound of his voice the concert closes suddenly and the singers +vanish into thin air. The hour of music is over; the commonplace +of day has begun. And there is my lady Greygown, already up and +dressed, standing by the breakfast-table and laughing at my belated +appearance. + +But the birds were not our only musicians at Kenogami. French +Canada is one of the ancestral homes of song. Here you can still +listen to those quaint ballads which were sung centuries ago in +Normandie and Provence. "A la Claire Fontaine," "Dans Paris y a-t- +une Brune plus Belle que le Jour," "Sur le Pont d'Avignon," "En +Roulant ma Boule," "La Poulette Grise," and a hundred other folk- +songs linger among the peasants and voyageurs of these northern +woods. You may hear + + + "Malbrouck s'en va-t-en guerre-- + Mironton, mironton, mirontaine," + + +and + + + "Isabeau s'y promene + Le long de son jardin," + + +chanted in the farmhouse or the lumber shanty, to the tunes which +have come down from an unknown source, and never lost their echo in +the hearts of the people. + +Our Ferdinand was a perfect fountain of music. He had a clear +tenor voice, and solaced every task and shortened every voyage with +melody. "A song, Ferdinand, a jolly song," the other men would +say, as the canoes went sweeping down the quiet lake. And then the +leader would strike up a well-known air, and his companions would +come in on the refrain, keeping time with the stroke of their +paddles. Sometimes it would be a merry ditty: + + + "My father had no girl but me, + And yet he sent me off to sea; + Leap, my little Cecilia." + + +Or perhaps it was: + + + "I've danced so much the livelong day,-- + Dance, my sweetheart, let's be gay,-- + I've fairly danced my shoes away,-- + Till evening. + Dance, my pretty, dance once more; + Dance, until we break the floor." + + +But more frequently the song was touched with a plaintive pleasant +melancholy. The minstrel told how he had gone into the woods and +heard the nightingale, and she had confided to him that lovers are +often unhappy. The story of La Belle Francoise was repeated in +minor cadences--how her sweetheart sailed away to the wars, and +when he came back the village church bells were ringing, and he +said to himself that Francoise had been faithless, and the chimes +were for her marriage; but when he entered the church it was her +funeral that he saw, for she had died of love. It is strange how +sorrow charms us when it is distant and visionary. Even when we +are happiest we enjoy making music + + + "Of old, unhappy, far-off things." + + +"What is that song which you are singing, Ferdinand?" asks the +lady, as she hears him humming behind her in the canoe. + +"Ah, madame, it is the chanson of a young man who demands of his +blonde why she will not marry him. He says that he has waited long +time, and the flowers are falling from the rose-tree, and he is +very sad." + +"And does she give a reason?" + +"Yes, madame--that is to say, a reason of a certain sort; she +declares that she is not quite ready; he must wait until the rose- +tree adorns itself again." + +"And what is the end--do they get married at last?" + +"But I do not know, madame. The chanson does not go so far. It +ceases with the complaint of the young man. And it is a very +uncertain affair--this affair of the heart--is it not?" + +Then, as if he turned from such perplexing mysteries to something +plain and sure and easy to understand, he breaks out into the +jolliest of all Canadian songs: + + + "My bark canoe that flies, that flies, + Hola! my bark canoe!" + + +III. + +THE ISLAND POOL. + + +Among the mountains there is a gorge. And in the gorge there is a +river. And in the river there is a pool. And in the pool there is +an island. And on the island, for four happy days, there was a +camp. + +It was by no means an easy matter to establish ourselves in that +lonely place. The river, though not remote from civilisation, is +practically inaccessible for nine miles of its course by reason of +the steepness of its banks, which are long, shaggy precipices, and +the fury of its current, in which no boat can live. We heard its +voice as we approached through the forest, and could hardly tell +whether it was far away or near. + +There is a perspective of sound as well as of sight, and one must +have some idea of the size of a noise before one can judge of its +distance. A mosquito's horn in a dark room may seem like a trumpet +on the battlements; and the tumult of a mighty stream heard through +an unknown stretch of woods may appear like the babble of a +mountain brook close at hand. + +But when we came out upon the bald forehead of a burnt cliff and +looked down, we realised the grandeur and beauty of the unseen +voice that we had been following. A river of splendid strength +went leaping through the chasm five hundred feet below us, and at +the foot of two snow-white falls, in an oval of dark topaz water, +traced with curves of floating foam, lay the solitary island. + +The broken path was like a ladder. "How shall we ever get down?" +sighed Greygown, as we dropped from rock to rock; and at the bottom +she looked up sighing, "I know we never can get back again." There +was not a foot of ground on the shores level enough for a tent. +Our canoe ferried us over, two at a time, to the island. It was +about a hundred paces long, composed of round, coggly stones, with +just one patch of smooth sand at the lower end. There was not a +tree left upon it larger than an alder-bush. The tent-poles must +be cut far up on the mountain-sides, and every bough for our beds +must be carried down the ladder of rocks. But the men were gay at +their work, singing like mocking-birds. After all, the glow of +life comes from friction with its difficulties. If we cannot find +them at home, we sally abroad and create them, just to warm up our +mettle. + +The ouananiche in the island pool were superb, astonishing, +incredible. We stood on the cobble-stones at the upper end, and +cast our little flies across the sweeping stream, and for three +days the fish came crowding in to fill the barrel of pickled salmon +for our guides' winter use; and the score rose,--twelve, twenty- +one, thirty-two; and the size of the "biggest fish" steadily +mounted--four pounds, four and a half, five, five and three- +quarters. "Precisely almost six pounds," said Ferdinand, holding +the scales; "but we may call him six, M'sieu', for if it had been +to-morrow that we had caught him, he would certainly have gained +the other ounce." And yet, why should I repeat the fisherman's +folly of writing down the record of that marvellous catch? We +always do it, but we know that it is a vain thing. Few listen to +the tale, and none accept it. Does not Christopher North, +reviewing the Salmonia of Sir Humphry Davy, mock and jeer +unfeignedly at the fish stories of that most reputable writer? +But, on the very next page, old Christopher himself meanders +on into a perilous narrative of the day when he caught a whole +cart-load of trout in a Highland loch. Incorrigible, happy +inconsistency! Slow to believe others, and full of sceptical +inquiry, fond man never doubts one thing--that somewhere in the +world a tribe of gentle readers will be discovered to whom his fish +stories will appear credible. + +One of our days on the island was Sunday--a day of rest in a week +of idleness. We had a few books; for there are some in existence +which will stand the test of being brought into close contact with +nature. Are not John Burroughs' cheerful, kindly essays full of +woodland truth and companionship? Can you not carry a whole +library of musical philosophy in your pocket in Matthew Arnold's +volume of selections from Wordsworth? And could there be a better +sermon for a Sabbath in the wilderness than Mrs. Slosson's immortal +story of Fishin' Jimmy? + +But to be very frank about the matter, the camp is not stimulating +to the studious side of my mind. Charles Lamb, as usual, has said +what I feel: "I am not much a friend to out-of-doors reading. I +cannot settle my spirits to it." + +There are blueberries growing abundantly among the rocks--huge +clusters of them, bloomy and luscious as the grapes of Eshcol. The +blueberry is nature's compensation for the ruin of forest fires. +It grows best where the woods have been burned away and the soil is +too poor to raise another crop of trees. Surely it is an innocent +and harmless pleasure to wander along the hillsides gathering these +wild fruits, as the Master and His disciples once walked through +the fields and plucked the ears of corn, never caring what the +Pharisees thought of that new way of keeping the Sabbath. + +And here is a bed of moss beside a dashing rivulet, inviting us to +rest and be thankful. Hark! There is a white-throated sparrow, on +a little tree across the river, whistling his afternoon song + + + "In linked sweetness long drawn out." + + +Down in Maine they call him the Peabody-bird, because his notes +sound to them like Old man--Peabody, peabody, peabody. In New +Brunswick the Scotch settlers say that he sings Lost--lost-- +Kennedy, kennedy, kennedy. But here in his northern home I think +we can understand him better. He is singing again and again, with +a cadence that never wearies, "Sweet--sweet--Canada, canada, +canada!" The Canadians, when they came across the sea, remembering +the nightingale of southern France, baptised this little gray +minstrel their rossignol, and the country ballads are full of his +praise. Every land has its nightingale, if we only have the heart +to hear him. How distinct his voice is--how personal, how +confidential, as if he had a message for us! + +There is a breath of fragrance on the cool shady air beside our +little stream, that seems familiar. It is the first week of +September. Can it be that the twin-flower of June, the delicate +Linnaea borealis, is blooming again? Yes, here is the threadlike +stem lifting its two frail pink bells above the bed of shining +leaves. How dear an early flower seems when it comes back again +and unfolds its beauty in a St. Martin's summer! How delicate and +suggestive is the faint, magical odour! It is like a renewal of +the dreams of youth. + +"And need we ever grow old?" asked my lady Greygown, as she sat +that evening with the twin-flower on her breast, watching the stars +come out along the edge of the cliffs, and tremble on the hurrying +tide of the river. "Must we grow old as well as gray? Is the time +coming when all life will be commonplace and practical, and +governed by a dull 'of course'? Shall we not always find +adventures and romances, and a few blossoms returning, even when +the season grows late?" + +"At least," I answered, "let us believe in the possibility, for to +doubt it is to destroy it. If we can only come back to nature +together every year, and consider the flowers and the birds, and +confess our faults and mistakes and our unbelief under these silent +stars, and hear the river murmuring our absolution, we shall die +young, even though we live long: we shall have a treasure of +memories which will be like the twin-flower, always a double +blossom on a single stem, and carry with us into the unseen world +something which will make it worth while to be immortal." + + +1894. + + + +A SONG AFTER SUNDOWN + + +"There's no music like a little river's. It plays the same tune +(and that's the favourite) over and over again, and yet does not +weary of it like men fiddlers. It takes the mind out of doors; and +though we should be grateful for good houses, there is, after all, +no house like god's out-of-doors. And lastly, sir, it quiets a man +down like saying his prayers."--ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON: Prince +Otto. + + + +THE WOOD-NOTES OF THE VEERY + + +The moonbeams over Arno's vale in silver flood were pouring, +When first I heard the nightingale a long-lost love deploring: +So passionate, so full of pain, it sounded strange and eerie, +I longed to hear a simpler strain, the wood-notes of the veery. + +The laverock sings a bonny lay, above the Scottish heather, +It sprinkles from the dome of day like light and love together; +He drops the golden notes to greet his brooding mate, his dearie; +I only know one song more sweet, the vespers of the veery. + +In English gardens green and bright, and rich in fruity treasure, +I've heard the blackbird with delight repeat his merry measure; +The ballad was a lively one, the tune was loud and cheery, +And yet with every setting sun I listened for the veery. + +O far away, and far away, the tawny thrush is singing, +New England woods at close of day with that clear chant are ringing; +And when my light of life is low, and heart and flesh are weary, +I fain would hear, before I go, the wood-notes of the veery. + +1895. + + + + + +End of this Project Gutenberg etext of Little Rivers by Henry van Dyke + |