We were all ready to start Friday morning. Our route lay over the mountains a distance of about 20 miles from the head waters of the Allegheny to the head water of the west branch of the Susquehana waters, known as the East Fork of the Sinnamahoning. We pitched our tent just at the point where the Buffalo and Susquehana Railroad begins to cross the divide, known as the Hogback, by means of several switch backs. It is a splendid sight to see two or three trains working their way up the mountain's side on a clear, frosty morning, when the steam and smoke show so plain.
We did not get the tent in good shape for the first night, nor did we get our bunk up, owing to its being so late when we got to our camping ground. The first night in camp we had a sharp frost and in the morning Smoky Jim's fever for camping had dropped fully one-half. He complained that any one that would go into such a country to camp should be reported for trespassing on the rights of the porcupine.
It took until the third day to get our camp in good shape. We built a skeleton frame of small poles all over the tent, leaving a space of about 18 inches between tent and frame, and thatched it good with hemlock boughs. While we were working at the camp we had our bee bait out, and the second day after we put out the bait no bees came to it. Smoky laughed at me and said that a honey bee was too intelligent to stop in a place like that, but Smoky was wrong. The next morning after the sun had got well above the top of the hills, so as to warm up things down in the valley, I heated a large stone quite hot and burned some honey comb on it. It was not long before Smoky called out to me and said that there was one fool of a bee. It was not long before we had bees a-plenty. We paid no attention to them farther than to keep plenty of bait out for them. Every bee hunter knows how much steadier a bee flies after they have the bait well located.
After the camp was well completed and a good pile of wood cut we gave our attention to the bees. We soon located two lines, one going nearly east while the other went nearly south. I told Smoky to take his hatchet and go across the creek some 50 rods and make an opening or a stand about half way between the two lines, or about southeast from the stand, and when he had it ready, to call to me and I would bring the bees over and we could get a cross line and locate nearly the tree that the bees were in.
We soon got the direction in which the bees flew. I then told Smoky to take the line that now flew in a westerly course from the stand and in the direction of two or three large maple trees. The other line now flew nearly north from the stand and back toward the creek where there was considerable large timber still standing.
Leaving the bait on the stand, I took the course of the bees that were now flying north and went to a large birch tree that was standing on the bank of the creek. I was still several rods from the tree when the bees began coming to me and I knew that the tree was close by. I was looking the different trees over to see which tree the bees were in when Smoky began to halloo as though something terrible had happened him.
Guessing at the cause of Smoky's shouting, I continued on in the direction in which the line led and soon saw the bees going into the large birch tree. I took my knife and cut the letters B T on the tree and then went to Smoky, who was still making the woods ring with his shouts.
Smoky began guying me, saying that I was an old bee hunter but it took Smoky to find the first bee tree. I did not tell him that I had found the tree that the other line of bees went to, but agreed with him. I told him to mark the tree that he had located and then he could go and locate the other tree if he wished while I would go to camp and be getting grub ready.
In about three-quarters of an hour Smoky came to camp and began washing for dinner and said not a word. When I saw that Smoky would not talk, I said, "Well, Smoky, did you find the other bee tree?" He said, "Oh! you keep right on baking flapjacks." Well, after Smoky regained his speech and told how blamed bright I was, he was going to go right to work and take out the honey from one of the trees at once. I told him that as we had no screen to put over his face, the bees would sting him to death, and that he had better wait until early the next morning when it was frosty.
Smoky said that he would not go without honey for the flapjacks when we had two bee trees so close to the camp. So he took an old burlap and removed every other thread in a space of about ten inches square, making a sort of an open-work to cover his face, then pulling the sack over his head and buttoning his coat close up about his throat Smoky was ready for the fray.
He cut the birch tree, the one that I had located, that tree being a little closer to camp. There was over a hundred pounds of honey in the tree and we had only one large pail in the camp, and that we had to have to use as a water pail. The tree did not break in falling so as to break up the honey and waste it. While we cut a large beech tree and took a block of about four feet long and split it in half and dug out two large troughs to hold the honey, which was very nice, being nearly all white honey, and Smoky said, "Old Golden, won't we live high now, rabbit, partridge, baked potatoes, buckwheat flapjacks and honey to swim in."
It was now the 20th of October. I told Smoky that we would go up the creek a mile above camp and put out the bee bait, burn more honey comb, and leave the bee box on the stand and await results. In the meantime we would take a couple of bear traps and go on to a ridge and set them. It might be possible that we would get a bear, although we had not seen any bear signs on what ground we had been over. We took the traps, Smoky carrying them, while I carried the bait. The hill was high and rough and I found it about all that I was able to do to climb although I went very slow and rested often. I did not complain, for Smoky was doing all the complaining necessary for both of us. He said that we would not catch a darn thing unless it was a cold, and he didn't think that we would get that much. It proved later that Smoky was wrong in his reckonings.
We set the two bear traps in as likely places as we could find for bear to travel, and put in the balance of the day traveling through the woods in search of bear signs. Not a track or sign could we find, and when we reached camp at night I was seemingly more dead than alive.
The next morning after we had left the bee bait on the old road bed and then climbed the hill to set the two bear traps, Smoky said that we would go down to Hull's, a distance of about three miles, and see if he could get cans to put the extracted honey in. We had made a sack from two towels and had begun to strain or extract the honey from the comb and had the water pail nearly full of strained honey, and were sorely in need of the pail to carry water in.
When I got to where we had left the bee bait, on the old road bed, I found plenty of bees at work. I soon got the line which went up the stream and a little to the left of the road and directly toward two large soft maple trees, the only trees of any size in that direction for a long distance. I said to myself, a quick job for you must be in one or the other of those maples. I left the bait and went to look for the bees in one of the two trees.
When I came to the trees, bees came to me in great numbers, but I could not see a bee going in or out in either. I was satisfied that the bees were in one of the trees, but after looking for a long time I thought that I must be mistaken, that the bees were farther on and up on the side of the hill. I gave it up and moved the bait up the road to a point about opposite where the line would strike the hillside and where several trees were left standing, making a good opening by cutting away the brush. I then released the bees from the box. After they had done much circling I was quite sure I saw two or three of them swing back in the direction of the soft maple trees.
I left the box and went along the creek in search of mink or coon signs, so as to give the bees time to get the bait well located, as they will then fly so much steadier and without doing so much circling. When I returned to the bait, the bees were flying steadily in the direction of the two soft maples and there could be no mistake this time. I took the bait down and placed it in the road opposite the two soft maples and began the second time to search the trees. After looking a long time without seeing bees going to or from the trees, I was again compelled to give it up. I began searching among the old timber, old stumps and stubs, as it was in the midst of an old bark slashing. I would search among the old down trees a while and then look over the two soft maples.
I had kept up this search from 9 o'clock in the morning until 2 o'clock in the afternoon. When I was approaching the two maple trees from the southwest side I readily discovered bees going into the tree close to and just above a large branch or prong of the tree which made it impossible to see them until the sun was just in the right position to shine square on the place where the bees entered the tree.
In my younger days I always carried a pair of climbers and a rope, so that when I found it difficult to locate the particular tree that the bees were in, when they were in thick timber, I could climb any tree no difference how large and locate the bees. This would often save much time in finding a bee tree. I would often climb a tree that stood in a favorable place on the bee line and cut off the top of the tree and make the bee stand up 30 or 40 feet from the ground. This I found a great advantage in lining bees in a thick, bushy section. That day is past with me for I am too clumsy to climb any more.
When I got to camp, I found Smoky at work putting the honey that was strained into cans and he said that he had concluded to change his name from Smoky Jim to Sticky Jim. We concluded to let bee hunting go for a day or two and set two more bear traps south of camp, although we had seen no signs of bear. Hear I will mention one of Smoky's dry remarks.
We took two bear traps and bait for them following up a hollow south from camp to the top of a ridge where there was quite a large clump of green timber still standing. When we came to the head of the hollow and near the top of the ridge where we thought would be a good place to set a bear trap, I pointed to a small scraggly beech sapling and told Smoky to cut it. Then to cut off a piece six or eight feet long for a clog. Also to measure the size of the ring in the trap chain and cut the clog off so that when the ring was put down over the end of the clog, sixteen or eighteen inches to a prong, it would fit the ring fairly close. This would make the ring or chain secure to the clog, as it would give the ring no chance to work about, while I would make a bed to set the trap in and have the trap set by the time that he got the clog ready.
It was now that I found that Smoky had brought a small hatchet weighing less than one-half pound instead of the larger belt axe, but there was nothing to do only to cut the clog with the little hatchet. So Smoky went to work cutting the clog while I went to setting the traps. After a while Smoky came with the clog and he had cut it off where it was considerably too large for the ring in the chain. I said, "Smoky, I guess you did not size that ring or the clog very much for you have got it much too large." Smoky replied readily, "Yes I did too, the tree has grown that much since I began to chop it."
After a time we managed to get the two traps set and got back to camp. That night about 10 o'clock, Smoky woke me with a punch in the ribs and at the same time saying, "Get your gun, the whole Siwash tribe of Indians are on us." On the impulse of the moment I though Smoky was right for I could hear many voices and the barking and snarling of dogs. In a moment all that had ever happened to me and many things that never did, nor can happen, passed through my mind but it was only for a moment when some one called out at the tent door saying, "Get up, you have visitors."
We asked who was there and the reply was, "Oh get up, two sleeps is better than one any time." I got up and put on my pants and unbuckled the tent door and there stood a half dozen men and as many more dogs. Two of the men had a large demijohn strung on a pole and they were carrying it on their shoulders, two more of the men had coons slung over their shoulders. The boys said that they were out coon hunting and by chance ran into our camp and thought that they would call on us and learn what we were doing. The demijohn contained cider, and the barking of the dogs was caused by getting into trouble over scraps that had been thrown about camp.
We invited the boy in and asked them to tell what luck they had had hunting coon. They said that they had only got the two coons on their way up, but thought that they would do better on their way back down the creek. The boys lived about six miles down the stream. The creek ran close along the wagon road nearly all the way so the boys would follow along the road allowing the dogs to hunt along the creek for coon. The boys concluded to stay and eat their lunch before starting back. We made them a cup of hot coffee and set out a plate of honey and the boys ate their lunch, drank cider, and told stories until nearly 1 o'clock.
They said that they had had a dandy time hunting coon along the last of September while coon were working on the corn and they said that they had killed about 30 and one wildcat. I asked if they did not think September rather early in the season to kill coon? They said that they thought that there was as much sport in it in September as at any other time of the year. I asked if there was any more sport in coon hunting in September than there was later in the season? They said that they did not know that there was. I replied that then they were out at least one-half or more on the price of the skins. They replied that it would be a queer jay that would put off a coon hunt a month for the difference that there might be in the price of a coon skin. I saw that I was up against it and that my argument had no weight in the matter, so I dropped it.
When told that we were putting in our time mostly hunting bees, the boys said that we were losing the best time of our lives by not having some good coon dogs along with us, and Smoky quite agreed with them. However, I could not see it in that light. After the boys left, Smoky and I had to laugh over the boys' jolly time until near daybreak before we could get to sleep again and we quite agreed with the boys that the second sleep was better than the first.
It was now the first of November and we had not put out any small traps, as the weather was still very warm and dry for the season of the year. Each day we could see away off to the southwest by the black heavy smoke that the forest fires that had been burning in that direction were coming nearer and nearer to us. Smoky said that he thought that a coon skin in October was worth as much as in November. He said by the time that we could get our traps out the forest fires would have the whole country burned over and all the game driven out. Smoky was not far from the mark in his prophesying.
We now began to put out the small traps at as good a "jag" as I was able to stand the travel. We had, while bee hunting at odd times, selected and prepared many of the sets so that we were now able to set out many more traps in a day than we could have done had we not fixed and selected many places for sets. The fourth day of November was a very warm day in Potter County, and as we had not tried to get any bees west of camp, I told Smoky that we had better let the balance of the traps go for a day and try the bees in that direction as it was not likely that we would have many more days that bees would fly during the season.
We went about one-half mile west of camp and put out the bee bait and burned more comb. It was not long before a bee came to the bait and then another and another, until we had several at work. As soon as the first bee that came was loaded up and began to make preparations to go, I told Smoky to keep a good eye on him to see which way he went, as the quicker we got a line the quicker we could move on.
When the bee first started from the bait, he jagged off east, then he circled so that neither Smoky nor I could tell which way he went. I told Smoky that I was afraid that the bee went back up the creek toward a tree we had already found. Smoky said that he did not know what made me think so, for no one could tell which direction that bee went. I told Smoky that I had always noticed that the way that the bee first started when leaving the bait was pretty sure to be in the direction of the tree and to get in position so that he could see well if the bee should fly back up the creek as we had no time to spare on bees flying in that direction.
It was not long before we had bees a-plenty and they came from a tree that we had already found. I told Smoky that we would leave some bait there so that those bees would not follow us, and we would move down the creek some distance before we would try for more. We moved nearly a mile, and while I was fixing a stand--there was no stump or good place to set the box--so I cut a stick about four feet long, an inch in diameter and split the top end into four parts, or in other words quartered the stick, then with two small sticks the size of a lead pencil, pressed down in between these quarters. It spread them so as to form plenty of space to set the box on. The other end of the stick is sharpened to drive firmly into the ground. As I was about to say, while I was fixing the stand, Smoky discovered a bee working on a witch-hazel bush close by the stand. Smoky said that he thought that the bee must have the rheumatism and was gathering Pond's Extract to bathe his joints in (it is with this shrub that Pond's Extract is made) and this was the cause of Smoky making the remark, I suppose.
It was necessary to burn comb here as we soon had three or four bees at work on the bait and in a short time we had bees a-plenty. They flew just to the right of the wagon road in a westerly direction and on to the side of a very steep hill where there was considerable standing timber. We soon got the course of the bees' flight, but there seemed to be two lines, as some of the bees would fly to the left of a large tree that stood Just on the bank of the road, while others would fly to the right of the tree. This caused Smoky to remark that we had another sticky job on our hands, saying that there was two different lines. I told Smoky that I thought not. It was all the same bees and that the bees would soon all be flying to the left or lower side of the tree.
Smoky wished to know how I made that out. I explained that I thought the bees were around the point of the hill and up a side draft that came into the main hollow some sixty rods below where we were and that the bees that were flying to the right of the tree flew in a direct line to the tree by flying up over the point of the hill then down into the hollow; those that flew to the left of the tree flew around the point of the hill and up the hollow to their tree. Smoky laughed at my idea and said that bees always flew in a straight line--does not everybody say as straight as a bee-line?
I told Smoky that was all very well in a level and open country. That a bee knew that it was no farther around the rim of a kettle than up over the bail; that a bee was far too wise to carry a load up over a hill when he could get there in the same distance on a level; that bees in their flight would often vary their course and fly along the side of a hill to keep out of a strong wind until they were nearly opposite the tree, when they would make nearly a square turn to the tree. That they would also vary their flight from a straight line to follow an opening as a road cut out through the thick woods.
The flight of the bees, as I suspected, was soon all to the left of the tree standing on the bank of the road. We moved the bait down to the mouth of the side draft and soon had a line flying nearly up the hollow. I told Smoky to take the bees some forty rods up the hollow and make a stand while I would follow and inspect the trees that looked favorable. Soon Smoky halloed to me and said that the bees had nearly all left him. I told him to make the stand where he was. As he had passed the tree that was the cause of the bees dropping off all at once.
Just below where Smoky was and a little up on the bank from the hollow stood a large maple tree. I started to inspect the tree. Bees were flying all about me and as soon as I was near enough to the tree to see, I could see bees flying all about the tree, some forty feet from the ground. I called to Smoky and told him that the bees were treed in a large maple.
This was on the fourth day of November and was a very rare thing for bees to be working at that time of the year in this section of the country. This tree made the sixth bee tree that we had found while in camp.
This ended our bee hunting and we now put in the balance of the time, while in camp, with the traps. It will now be necessary to go back to the 20th of October to a time that Smoky said was the biggest day of his life.
On the 20th of October we started out to look at the bear traps with little hopes of getting anything more than a porcupine. Up to this time we had not seen any signs of bear, only what had been made during the summer, where the bear had dug out woodchucks and torn old logs to pieces in search of grubs, and where they had dug wild turnips. These signs were so old that we had but little hopes of getting a bear while in camp and Smoky was continually condemning the country.
We went up along a hollow that led to the top of a high ridge where we had a bear trap setting and where I thought was the most likely place to catch a bear, but found the trap undisturbed.
We next crossed a narrow ridge where we had another trap. The trap was set in a spring run and the banks on either side of the run were quite thickly grown up with low brush. Smoky was in advance a few steps so that when he came to the edge of the thick brush that grew on the bank of the run, parted the brush and looked through at the trap, he caught a glimpse of some black object moving in the run. He quickly stepped back and held up his hand, his eyes sparkling with excitement and he whispered to me, "By Moses, we have got him." Smoky being given to much joking, I asked, "What have we got?" for I had not heard any noise of any kind. Smoky said, "A bear, by long horn spoon-handle." I stepped past Smoky and looked through the brush and there was a large black porcupine moving about a little in the trap.
I stepped back and said to Smoky, "Well, shoot him." Smoky said, "No, I will miss him. You shoot him," at the same time handing me the gun. I now saw that Smoky was in earnest and surely thought we had a bear and I burst out with laughter. Smoky was amazed and said, "You blooming simpleton, what is the matter with you?" The look of anxiety and the manner in which Smoky spoke still caused me to laugh the harder.
When I could cease laughing long enough to tell Smoky what was in the trap, Smoky's change of looks of excitement and anxiety to one of disgust was pitiful. Smoky began to condemn the country and tell how foolish we were to come to such a forsaken place as that was to trap where there was nothing but porcupines.
After resetting the trap we went on to the third trap, which was setting about a mile farther north. It was necessary to cross two narrow ridges in order to reach the trap. Smoky was in a moody state of mind and lagged along behind, hunting partridges, killing two or three.
When we reached the top of the second ridge and the trap was in the hollow beyond, I heard some sort of a noise where the trap was setting, but I was unable to tell what it was. Smoky was behind somewhere on the line, but while I stood listening he came on in great haste. He had heard the same noise and was hurrying up to inquire what it was.
I told him that I was unable to tell just what it was, but was afraid that some dog had got caught in the trap as the sound came from the direction in which the trap was. Smoky said that it was a different noise than he had ever heard a dog make.
I told Smoky that I feared that it was some hound that was in the trap and was making the pitiful sort of a howl and that we must hurry on and get him out of the trap. When we were half way down the side of the hill, the noise ceased, but I could now see that the noise came from some distance farther down the run than where the trap had been set and I knew that no dog could move the trap and clog. We now went a little more quietly. I soon got sight of Bruin rolling and tumbling in a bunch of small birch saplings where the trap clog was fast, good and stout.
Smoky had not got his eye onto the bear yet, when I stopped and pointed in the direction of the bear and said, "Smoky, there is the gentleman that you have been so anxious to see." Smoky had not yet got his eye onto the bear and he said, "That's no darned dog that makes that noise. What is it? I don't see anything." "No, Smoky, it is no dog; neither is it a porky; it is a bear this time all right."
I pointed at the clump of yellow birches and said, "Don't you see him down in the gulch there?" When Smoky got his eye on the bear, you should have seen them sparkle. This was the first bear that Smoky had ever seen outside of captivity. When I told Smoky that we would go up close to the bear and he (Smoky) should shoot it, he again reached the gun to me and again insisted that I should shoot it, saying that he would surely miss it, the same as he declared in the case of the porcupine. I told Smoky that he had plenty of cartridges and that it would be some time before it would be too dark to see to shoot and that he must shoot the bear. It took a great deal of urging to get Smoky to shoot, he declaring all the time that he knew he would miss it.
I said, "Smoky, you must not shoot at the bear but at the base of the bear's ear," which he finally did and Bruin was out of his trouble almost before the smoke from the rifle had cleared away.
The bear was a large one, measuring seven feet two inches from end to end. We were unable to get it out of the woods whole. Smoky insisted that he would carry it if it was as large as a mountain. He soon gave up that idea and we cut the carcass into pieces and took part to camp and returned the next day after the balance. That night after we got to camp with the bear we had for supper bear steak, partridge, rabbit and bacon with warm biscuits and honey, baked potatoes, butter and coffee, with the necessary trimmings, which caused Smoky to remark that the country was all right for a living, but thought that society was rather limited.
The day after we had brought in the remainder of the bear, we could see the smoke from the forest fires that were burning away to the southwest, loom up thick and black. It was plainly to be seen that the fire was steadily working in the direction of our camp and was getting in close proximity to where we had a bear trap setting. I was afraid that the fire would burn sufficiently hard to spoil the trap unless it was taken up, so Smoky said that if I would "mix the muligan" (get supper) that he would go and get the trap, which I readily consented to do, telling Smoky to bring the trap down to a small creek and put the trap in the water.
Smoky got back about the time I had supper ready. He came in and put his gun up and washed ready for supper without saying a word. I saw that Smoky was looking down-hearted but thought that he was a little tired and homesick, so I did not say much to him, but after a little I said, "Charley, did you get anything in the trap?" He answered very short, saying, "If I had you would be likely to see something of it, wouldn't you?" so I said no more.
After supper was over and the dishes washed, Smoky took a piece of paper from his pocket and handed it to me with the remark, "What do you know about that?" I unfolded the paper and found that it contained a lock of bear's hair. I said, "Smoky, what is it? Another one of your jokes?" I thought that Smoky had taken the hair from the bear that we had caught two days before. Smoky remarked that he thought that the joke was on him as much as anyone, and then explained that a bear had been in the trap and he got out.
He described the circumstances, and it was plain to be seen that the guide or stepping stick had been placed a little too close to the trap which had caused the bear to step his foot partly over on to the jaw of the trap and had only been caught by the heel, which was not sufficient to hold him, although Smoky said that the bear had put up quite a fight before it had got out. Smoky said that when he came to where the trap was set and found it gone, he thought he would have the biggest time of his life. A bear all by himself, and when he found that the bear had got away, he felt like throwing himself into the creek along with the trap. I told Charley not to take the matter to heart so, for if he followed the trap line and the trail very long that he would have many a slip just at the time that he thought he had the game bagged.
The next morning the fire was sweeping over the whole country so we hustled around and pulled all of the traps that were not setting in the water or that were not out of reach of the fire. The fire put an end to trapping for everything but a few mink along the stream.
I wish to speak of one of Smoky's dry remarks. Smoky is a strong Republican. A few days after the Presidential election we were going up a small draft to look after three or four traps that I had set for fox. The first trap that we came to was undisturbed. The second one was lying at the side of the brook all in a bunch, chain and all. Plain to be seen that it had been dropped there by human hands. As soon as I saw the trap I said, "Smoky, some one has dropped that trap there." "There has been some animal in it and it has gotten out, see, there is blood on the jaws." "Very true, Smoky, there has been some animal in the trap, but human hands took it out, for no animal leaves a trap, clog and all, lying free in that way, with the trap chain slack in that way." It only required a glance about to see that there had been a coon in the trap and had been fast. Just up on the bank there lay the club that they had used to kill the coon with. After giving my opinion of the gentleman that had taken the coon, I began to reset the trap again where it was before.
Smoky objected to again setting the trap there only for some one else to get the game again, but I told Smoky that lightning rarely struck twice in the same place so we would set the trap again. We started up the hollow and were soon discussing politics again until we came to where the next trap was setting. Just before we came to the trap, Smoky picked up an empty cartridge shell. A few yards farther on lay the second trap which had had a fox in it, as was plain to be seen by the tooth marks on the small brush and by the fur on the trap. That the fox had been shot was evident by the amount of fur that was lying on the ground where the animal had been caught.
This was more than I could stand without giving vent to my feelings. After trying for some time to find words to give the case justice, and failing, Smoky remarked with all the coolness imaginable, that there was one thing certain about it, that it was a Democrat that took the fox and coon. I was astonished at the remark and asked what he meant. "Well, if it had been a Republican that had taken them, he would have taken the traps, too."
We were now getting our trap line down to a few traps along the main creek, and we now worked those traps to the best of our skill, as we wished to get our share of the mink. We had not put out any mink traps until the first of November. The weather had been very dry and warm but as it had now turned cold and I found that I could not stand the cold as I once could, I told Smoky that we would take what mink pelts we could get in a few days and pull stakes. Smoky replied that that sort of "chin music" suited him. So after ten or twelve days of mink trapping we pulled the rest of the traps and went home, having to my idea a pleasant time.
Smoky agreed that the time was all right but he thought that the society was a little slow for him, saying that if it had not been for the boys on the coon hunt we would not have seen a half dozen persons since we had been in camp. We had not made a large catch of furs but I thought that we had done fairly well, all things considered (one old played-out trapper and a kid who had never set a trap for anything greater than a muskrat or a ground hog).
We had caught while in camp one bear, ten mink, eight coon and some other furs as shown in the accompanying picture. After we left I set a few traps about home, catching three fox and a few skunk and four more mink, making fourteen mink in all. We got $4 and $4.50 for the fox, and $4 to $6 for the mink, and from 80 cents to $2.25 for skunk, and about the same for coon. We got 30 to 40 cents each for muskrats.
This will about complete the story of my trapping for the season of 1908. I am sorry that I am no artist, as I could have sent some fine pictures, consisting of the bear in trap, as well as many other animals in traps, and other pictures that would have been interesting had I been able to take them at the right time and place.
Many years ago when deer were plenty in this section of the country (North Central Pennsylvania) and dogs were allowed to run deer at their will, there being no restriction by way of law against hounding deer, I started from the house about 10 o'clock in the morning to go to some traps that I had set for mink along the creek in a swamp not far from our place. There was an old road or path that led from the wagon road down through the swamp to the creek. Along this path it was thickly grown up with laurel and other underbrush that nearly shut out the path.
I was accustomed to follow this path to the creek when going to look after my traps. On my way up to the road I heard dogs barking as though they were on the trail of something, but thought nothing of it as it was a common occurrence to hear hounds running nearly every day. I was following this path and had got within a few rods of the creek and was just about ready to climb over a fallen tree that lay across the path.
The tree lay up from the ground about a foot or so and it was perhaps three feet from the ground up to the top of the log. I was just in the act of climbing this log when a good-sized buck deer went to jump the log also and we met, head on. I had no gun and if I had would have had no time to use it. I seized the deer by the horns and forced him back from the log with a startled cry at the same time. The deer, instead of trying to get away, seemed bound to come over the log to where I was, so I held to the deer's horns, not daring to let loose.
I could keep him from raising over the log and after he tried several times to jump the log, he then tried to break loose from me, but I had the advantage of the deer owing to the log being so high that the deer could not pull me over, neither could the deer get in shape to strike me with his feet under the log. I think that I was so badly frightened at the sudden meeting with the deer, that I did not know what to do so I hung tight to the buck's horns and called as loud as I could for help, thinking that some one might possibly be passing along the road, which was not so far away, hear my call and come to my assistance, but no one came. A man by the name of Nelson lived about a fourth of a mile away, who had a large bulldog. The dog's name was Turk. This dog would follow me at every chance that he could get. As no assistance came, I had about made up my mind to release my hold on the deer as my strength was fast leaving me, when I thought to call for Turk. I began calling as loud as I could and it seemed that the dog had heard my calling before I began, for almost before I was aware of his presence the dog sprang over the log and seized the deer by the hind leg, but the dog had barely grabbed the deer when the deer kicked him away from the path into the laurel.
In an instant the dog, with an angry yelp, jumped and seized the deer by the throat and in a moment the deer ceased to struggle and began to settle to the ground. As soon as I dared to release my hold on the deer's horns I got my pocket knife out and sprang over the log and ran the knife blade into the deer's throat. The deer did not seem to notice the knife. I think that the dog had choked the life out of him. The battle was over and it was only a few minutes but it was the hardest battle that I ever had and the dog came to my assistance none too soon for I could not have held on much longer.
This did not end the fight, for I had hardly begun to dress the deer before two dogs that were in pursuit of the deer came up. I was compelled to use sticks, stones and clubs to break up a fight between the bulldog and the hounds, though I finally got the row broke up and drove the hounds off in order to keep peace.
Boys, I am not sure whether the incident just related would be called a hit or a miss. I will tell of an incident that I call a hit. A man by the name of Wells and a brother of mine were camping near the old Jersey Shore turnpike and were trapping, also hunting deer. One day they had been off on the west side of the turnpike setting marten traps and had built a number of deadfalls and had also set several steel traps for foxes. On their way home to camp they had to cross several low ridges which were good sections for deer. It was nearly sundown and just the right time for deer to be on their feet feeding so we spread out along one of the ridges in hopes that some of us might get a shot. There was a good tracking snow and deer tracks were plenty. We were on the last ridge before we dropped off into the hollow to where the camp was and it was beginning to get dark in the heavy timber. I had come out onto a short spur of the ridge and was standing looking over the ground very carefully to see if I could not see a deer feeding, when I heard a shot fired by one of the boys. In a few moments a bunch of five or six deer came in sight, making their way around the point at breakneck speed.
I opened fire on the bunch without taking aim at any particular deer, as it was too dark to get down to real business and the deer were in too much of a hurry to change their feeding grounds to give me very much of a show. I was not stingy of my ammunition and pumped lead at the bunch as long as I could guess where the deer were. As soon as I had ceased to waste ammunition I heard my brother calling for me. When I got to him he was at work taking the entrails out of a good sized buck. We dragged the deer down to where the deer were when I began shooting to see if I had chanced to hit one of the bunch. It was too dark to see much but we found a little blood on the snow in one place but concluded that I had not done much damage.
We dragged the buck that my brother had killed to camp, got our supper and made plans for the next day's work. It was agreed that I should look after the bunch of deer and see what effect my shots had on the deer that we had found that had bled some. I was to work this bunch of deer while the other boys went to look after the marten traps, being quite sure that there would be a marten or two in the traps, for we had built some deadfalls where we saw fresh marten signs quite plenty.
The next morning I was up early and had breakfast before daylight and ready to start out and carry out the work as already planned. It was about one-fourth of a mile from camp to the turnpike and as the deer which I was going to look for were making their course, the last I had seen them, in the direction of the road, I was going to go to the road and then go north along the road to see if they had crossed. The boys would take the same path to the road that I did when they would go south of camp to look after the marten traps.
I had my gun and stood in the cabin door waiting for my brother and Wells to get ready as I would accompany them as far as the road. The boys were having some trouble belting their leggins and creepers on to their satisfaction. I became tired of waiting and made the remark that I could go and kill a deer before they could get their feet dressed. My brother said that I had better be going then, so I started on up the path to the road. It was thawing a little, just enough to make the snow pack. I had gone about a hundred yards from camp when I saw a track of a deer where it had stepped into the path, then had turned back about forty yards to the left of the path. A large birch tree had blown down, knocking one or two smaller trees down so that it made a little jam. Seeing that the tracks were so fresh I knew that the deer was close by and as the woods were open I was quite positive that the deer must be about the jam of trees, when a large doe stepped out in sight and it was only the work of a moment to let her down in her tracks. When the gun cracked out jumped a yearling buck that was lying down just in the edge of the jam and bounded over the trunk of a large birch and stopped broadside to me and I let him down. Thinking of what I had said on leaving the cabin and what my brother had said to me I ran back to camp as quick as I could go without even stopping to cut the deer's throat. As I came around the corner of the cabin I heard my brother say to Wells, "I bet a gander that he has killed a deer all right, for he would not shoot twice so quick at anything else."
Well, the boys had not got their feet dressed yet, but chance had allowed me to make my word good only I had killed two deer instead of one. The boys helped me to hang up the deer and then went to the marten traps while I went in search of the deer I had started after. Soon I struck the trail of the deer and shortly saw that one of them had a broken leg and I did not follow the trail far when the wounded deer dropped out and left the others. I began doing the creeping act and soon found the deer lying on his trail. I hung the deer up and went back to camp thinking that I had enough sport for one day and would let well enough alone.
When the boys came in at night they brought in two marten skins.
One writer contends that the pocket compass is but very little use to a man in a dense forest. This, I think, depends largely upon circumstances. While the writer has spent a good portion of fifty years almost continuously in the woods, he has seldom found it necessary to use a compass to guide him out. Now this is due partly to the natural faculty of locating any particular place. This faculty of locating any certain place or point by giving or knowing the proper direction to take after one has traveled all day or for several days in the woods, I am inclined to credit to a sort of natural instinct.
I have often thought of the story of the Indian who was met by a man in the woods who asked the Indian if he was lost. The reply was, "No, me ain't lost, wigwam lost, me here." Now I can say without boasting that it is seldom that the camp or a given point gets lost with me, while it is not an uncommon occurrence for the writer to get lost or rather bothered himself in a strange locality. But after a moment's thought, I say the camp or the point I wish to reach is in that direction, and it is not often that I miss my calculation.
As I have had several occasions to search for parties lost in the woods, I wish to relate a particular instance of one man who was lost. It was an uncle of mine by the name of Nelson, and the writer went in search of him. To illustrate that those who are lost lose their heads as soon as they find that they do not know where they are.
Now I wish to say that if you lost your course or get bothered in your bearings, do not lose your head, for if you do you are lost, but keep cool and keep your head. Sit down and fill your pipe, and while you smoke draw a map of the country carefully in your mind, and almost invariably you will locate yourself and in so doing will locate the camp.
To get back to the lost man in question whose name was Amos Fish, and at the time, was the proprietor of the Cherry Springs Hotel, in this county. This hotel was located in the heart of the largest forest in Pennsylvania, and originally was a great resort for hunters from all over the state as well as southern and western New York. (The time of which I write was somewhere in the 60's--have forgotten exact date.) There were several men boarding at this hotel and my uncle and myself were among the number boarding with Mr. Fish, hunting, as were other boarders. This hotel stood in the center of a field containing perhaps eighty acres of cleared land, and there was not another clearing or a building within a distance of seven miles.
One morning after there had been a fall of four or five inches of snow, which made fine tracking, Mr. Fish thought that he would go out that morning and try and kill a deer. He left the house going through the field in nearly a due east course. After going about one mile he crossed a stream which ran in a north and south direction. Mr. Fish had fished this stream for trout many a time. After crossing this stream Mr. Fish crossed a broad ridge and went on to a small stream known as the Sunken Branch, and a tributary of the stream Mr. Fish had previously crossed. Now Mr. Fish was fairly well acquainted with the location which he was in, but in his search for deer he had got a little mixed in his whereabout and at once lost his head.
My uncle when coming in from hunting that evening crossed Mr. Fish's track on the ridge near the head of the Sunken Branch, and had heard him shoot several times but supposed that he was shooting at deer. When the hunters all got in that night and Mr. Fish failed to appear, the matter was discussed by the hunters from all points of view. It was generally thought that Mr. Fish had had good luck killing deer and had been detained in dressing and hanging them up, or that he had wounded a deer and had been led a long way from home in getting it.
When it got well along in the evening and Mr. Fish failed to come then it was feared that he had met with some misfortune. No one would believe that he was lost, as it was known that he was pretty well acquainted with the woods in the direction that he had been known to take. But as the time went on and still Mr. Fish did not come, we all began to fear for his safety, as the night was very cold, so every few minutes some one would go out and fire a gun. This was continued all night, though there was no answer.
My uncle and myself had an early breakfast and started some time before daybreak for the locality in which uncle had seen Mr. Fish's tracks and heard gun shots which were thought to have been fired by him. Shortly after daybreak we found the track of a man which we could readily see had been made during the night. After following the track some distance we were convinced that we were following the track of Mr. Fish and he was lost, for his tracks would go in a zigzag sort of a circle and crossing his tracks previously made.
After we had followed Mr. Fish's track for an hour or longer we saw him coming nearly towards us with his hat in his hand. We stood still and he came close to us before he seemed to notice us. He had no gun, and when he stopped he stared at us and did not seem to know us. Uncle then spoke to him and said, "Amos, what is the matter, are you lost?" Mr. Fish replied that he wanted to go to the Cherry Springs Hotel. In a few minutes after eating a good lunch which we had carried with us for that purpose, he seemed to know us.
When questioned as to what he had done with his gun, he apparently had forgotten that he ever had a gun. But after a time seemed to remember the gun in a vague sort of way, and said that he must have left it by a tree but could not tell in what direction the tree was. After a search of a half hour we found the gun standing by a tree where apparently Mr. Fish had traveled around for some time.
When we came to the creek on our way to the house and at the place where Mr. Fish had crossed it in the morning before, he asked what stream it was. When told that it was the place where he had crossed the creek the morning before and asked if he did not remember the creek as he had fished there many a time, he said that he had no recollection of ever seeing the stream before. Shortly we came out into the field and Mr. Fish did not know his own house. Asked who lived there and did not seem to recognize his own home until he had been inside the house for several minutes with his family.
I have related this instance of Mr. Fish to show how necessary it is for one who has got slightly mixed in his course to keep cool and not allow himself to become excited. If he does he immediately loses his head and is at once lost, as in the case of Mr. Fish. He was at no time more than four miles from his house, and was quite familiar with the ground he was on during the whole time. He was lost while following the deer that he was in pursuit of. They led him into a windfall perhaps containing one hundred acres, and it was while in this that he became bothered as to the right course to go to his house. He at once lost his head, or more proper, his reasoning faculties, and at once became lost.
Mr. Fish was east of the ridge and road and as he had a compass, all there was for him to do was to consult the compass and go west to the road, but Mr. Fish declared that his compass would not work, and it might have been possible that he held the compass so close to the gun barred that the compass did not work properly.
In my more than fifty years' life in the woods as a trapper and hunter, it has been my lot to search for several persons lost in the woods. Once in these same woods I searched for three weeks for a little child four years old. At first the search for days was carried on by more than a hundred men, then another man and myself continued, then my companion gave it up. I continued alone for days, but there has never been a trace of the child seen or heard of, since its grandmother last saw the little fellow sitting on the door step eating a piece of bread and butter on the morning of its disappearance, along in the early 80's.
To speak of the use of the pocket compass, I would say to the trapper or hunter that where he can it is best to locate his camp when in a section of a country where the woods are very large, and the trapper or hunter is not well acquainted with the locality, on a stream or in a valley of considerable size, or near a public highway or some landmark that is readily recognized by the trapper. Even thought it may be after nightfall, for the thrifty trapper or hunter will oftener find himself on the trail after the stars are shining than he will in camp before dark. Now it is quite necessary that the camper should first acquaint himself with these land marks for some distance either side of his camp (when I say some distance I mean miles) and especially get the general course or direction that the stream runs or other landmarks, for this is where the real use of the pocket compass comes in play.
Now when you start out place out a line of traps or on the trail of a deer or other animal, all that there is to be done is to know whether you are on the south, north or other direction, as the case may be, from this valley or other landmarks. Now the trapper or hunter soon becomes so accustomed to traveling in the woods that when he makes up his mind to strike for camp, he can tell about how long it will take him to reach this valley that the camp is located in. When the time comes to go to camp consult the compass, and as it is known what direction to take to hit the camp, or at least the stream or other landmark on which the camp is located.
Yes, boys, if any one is in the habit of getting lost the pocket compass is a very useful instrument in finding the way, providing it is properly used. Let me say, however, that no matter how often "the shanty gets lost," don't lose your head, for if you do, the compass or the landmarks will do you no good.