Court for selling liquor without a license. He had bought a gallon at a
still,--as to the locality of which he professed profound
ignorance,--carried it thirty miles, and peddled it out to his
long-suffering and thirsty neighbors. Every native being a natural
informer, the story was soon told: arrest followed, a march of fifty
miles over the mountains, and a lengthy imprisonment before trial.
Following the advice of his assigned counsel, he pleaded guilty. Being
too poor to pay a fine, and having an unlimited family dependent upon
their own exertions,--which comprises the sum of parental responsibility
among the natives,--the judge released him on his own bail-bond, and
told him to go home. He deliberately put on his hat, walked up to his
honor, and said, "I say, jedge, I reckon you fellers 'ill give me 'nough
money to ride hum an' pay fer my grub, 'cause 'tain't fair, noway. You
fetched me clar down yere, footin' it the hull way, an' now you're
lettin' me off an' tellin' me to foot it back. 'Tain't fair, noway.
You-uns oughter pay me fer it." And he went off highly indignant at
having his modest request refused.
There is much of the primitive not outgrown as yet by Charleston: it has
put on a long-tailed coat over its round-about. The gossipy telephone
is ahead of the street-cars; gas-works supply private consumers, while
the citizens wade the unlighted streets by the glimmer of their own
lanterns; innumerable cows contest the right of pedestrians to the board
footways and what of pavement separates the mud-holes; an
ice-manufactory supplies coolness to water peddled about in barrels; the
officials outnumber the capacity of the jail; the ferry-facilities vary
from an unstable leaky bateau to a dirty, open-decked dynamite
steamboat, whose night-service is subject to the lung-capacity of the
traveller hallooing for it, and the fares to necessities and
circumstances; the fine brick improvements are flanked by frame
tinder-boxes; the offal of the city has not a single relieving sewer:
yet it is a beautiful, healthy place, and the chief city of the greatest
mineral-district in the world.
Our travellers breakfasted on delicious mountain mutton and vegetables
fresh from surrounding farms. Their host secured three men and a canoe
to carry them up Elk River to Colonel Bangem's camp, at the cost of one
dollar a day and "grub," or one dollar and a quarter a day if they found
themselves, with the moderate charge of fifty cents a day for the canoe.
When the time arrived for starting, the Professor was missing. Bells
were rung, servants were despatched to search the hotel for him, but he
was not to be found. The Doctor grew impatient, but restrained himself
until an uncoated countryman, who had just walked into town and was
ready for a talk, told him that he "seed a feller, thet wuz a stranger
in these parts, with a three-legged picter-gallery, chasin' a water-cart
a right smart ways back in the town, ez I come in."
"That's he," said the Doctor. "He is crazy after pictures. I'll give you
a dollar if you bring him to the hotel alive."
"Is he wicked?" asked the man.
"Generally," answered the Doctor, whose eyes began to twinkle; "but you
get hold of his picture-gallery and run for the hotel: he will follow
you. I often have to manage him that way."
"I'm minded to try coaxin' him in thet a-way fer a dollar. You jist take
keer uv my shoes, an' I'll hev him yer ez quick ez Tim Price kin foot
it, if he follers well an' hain't contrairy-like, holdin' back."
Tim Price relieved his feet of their encumbrances, and started. When his
tall, gaunt figure had disappeared around the corner, the Doctor grew
red in the face from an internal convulsion, and then exploded past all
concealment of his joke.
"If you gentlemen," he said to the by-standers, "want to see some fun,
just follow that man. I will stay here as judge whether the man brings
in the Professor or the Professor brings in the man."
A good joke would stop a funeral in Charleston. The hotel was cleared of
men in an instant to follow Tim and enjoy the hunt. Tim sighted the
Professor about a quarter of a mile back in the town, A darky driving a
water-cart was standing up on the shafts, thrashing his mule with the
ends of his driving-lines, and urging it, by voice and gesture, to the
highest mule-speed: "Git up! git up! you lazy old no-go! Git up! Don't
you see dat picter-feller tryin' to took you an' me an' de bar'l? Git
up! Wag yer ears an' switch yer tail. You're not gwine ter stan' still
an' keep yer eyes on de instrement fer no gallery-man to took, 'less
you's fix' up fer Sunday. Git up, you ole long-eared corn-eater!"
The Professor was keeping well up with the flying water-works. His hat
was stuck on the back of his head, he carried his camera with its tripod
spread ready for sudden action, and every step of his run was guided by
thoughts of proper distance, fixed focus, and determination to have the
water-works in his collection of instantaneous photographs. A turn in
the street gave the Professor his opportunity: he darted ahead, set his
camera, and took the whole show as it went galloping by, when he
reclined against a fence while making the street ring with his laugh.
Tim Price, who was watching his chance, saw that it had come. He grabbed
the camera, gave a yell of triumph, and faced for the home-run. He had
not an instant to lose. The Professor sprang for his precious
instrument. Tim's long legs carried him across the street, over a fence
into a cross-cut lot, and away for the hotel at a mountaineer's speed.
The Professor was small, but active as a cat. Where Tim jumped fences,
the Professor squirmed through them; where Tim took one long stride, the
Professor scored three short ones. Tim lost his hat, and the Professor
threw off his coat as he ran. The main street was reached without
perceptible decrease of distance between them; but there the pavements
were something Tim's bare feet were not used to catching on, and the
people something he was not used to dodging: he upset several, but
dashed on, with his pursuer gaining on his heels. Men, women, dogs, and
darkies turned out to witness the race or follow it. "Stop thief!" "Go
it, Tim!" "You're catching him, stranger!" "Foot it, little one!" were
cries that speeded the running. The Doctor stood waiting at the hotel
door, laughing, shaking, and red as a veritable Bacchus. Tim Price
banged the camera into him, whirled round suddenly, caught the Professor
as he dashed at him, and held him in his powerful arms, squirming like
an eel.
"Yere's your crazy man, stranger," said Tim, in slow, drawling tone. "I
tell you he kin jest p'intedly foot it. Thar hain't been such a run in
Kanoy County sence they stopped 'lectin' country fellers fer sheriff. I
reckon I've arned thet dollar. What shall I do with the leetle feller?"
The Professor was powerless, but lay in Tim's arms biting, kicking, and
curled up like a yellow-jacket interested with an enemy.
"Let him go," said the laughing Doctor. "He will stay with me now. He is
not dangerous when I am about. Set him on his feet."
No sooner was the Professor deposited on the pavement than he dealt Tim
a stinging blow which staggered him, and stood ready with trained
muscles set for defence.
"Look yere, leetle un," said Tim, coolly and with great self-restraint,
"'tain't fer the likes uv me to hit you, bein's you're a bit out in your
top, but I'll gin you another hug ef you do that ag'in; I will,
p'intedly."
In the good humor of the crowd, the mirth of the Doctor, and the
latter's possession of the camera the Professor scented a joke, and at
once saw his friend's hand in it. He joined in the laugh at his expense,
and lengthened his friend's face by saying, "The Doctor having had his
fun, he will now pay the bill at the bar for all of you: he pays all my
expenses: so walk in, gentlemen."
The laws of hospitality west of the Alleghanies do not permit any one to
decline an invitation, so the Doctor settled for the whole procession
and paid Tim Price his well-earned dollar.
"Captain," said Tim to the hotel-proprietor, who had joined the crowd,
"ef two fellers comes here from the East, one uv 'em ez round ez a
punkin an' red ez a flannel shirt an' bald ez a land-tortle, an' t'other
ez brown ez a mud-catty an' poor ez a razor-back hog, tell 'em I'm yere
to pilot 'em up Elk to Colonel Bangem's caliker tents. He said they were
ez green ez frogs, an' didn't know nothin' noway, an' fer me to take
keer uv 'em. He don't reckon they'll come tell to-morrow. One uv 'em's a
hoss-doctor, an' t'other's a perfessor uv religion, Colonel Bangem
telled me. I dunno whether the feller's a circuit-rider er a rale
preacher."
"That's the highly-illuminated pumpkin, my good man," said the
Professor, pointing to the Doctor, "and I am Colonel Bangem's spiritual
adviser. We got here a day sooner than we expected to."
"You don't say? May I never! An' the colonel never telled me nothin'
nohow 'bout any one uv you bein' crazy. Howdee? How do you like these
parts? Right smart town we've got yere, hain't it? I'll take keer uv
you. There hain't no man on Elk River kin take keer uv you better nor
Tim Price, ary time. I hain't much up to moon men, though. Thar's one
feller up my way thet gits kinder skeery at the full uv the moon; but I
hain't never tended him. I reckon I kin l'arn the job,--ez the ole boy
said when his marm set him to mindin' fleas off the cat."
Tim Price was the hunter, boatman, fisherman, yarn-spinner, and
character of his region, and Colonel Bangem's faithful ally in all his
sports: the latter had therefore sent him to meet his friends on their
arrival at Charleston, and he at once proceeded to take command of the
whole party as a matter of course.
"I footed it over the mountains, and sent my boat the river way. Hit
oughter be yere now: so we'll pack you men's tricks to the boats an'
p'int 'em up-stream. It 'ill be sundown afore we git thar."
The party started from the hotel, the procession followed to see them
off, and they were soon down the Kanawha and into the mouth of Elk at
the point of the town. Log rafts, huge barges, miles of railroad-ties,
laid-up steamers, peddling-boats, with their highly-colored storehouses,
fishermen's scows, floating homely cabins alive with bare-legged
children and idlers of the water-side, push-boats loaded to the edge of
the narrow gunwales with merchandise for delivery to stores and dwellers
far up the river, boats loaded with hoop-poles, grist, chickens, and the
"home-plunder" of some mover to civilization, coming down the river from
the mountain-clearing, and samples of every conceivable kind of the
river's outpour, were tied to the banks or lazily floating on the
currentless back-water from the Kanawha.
An old steamboat-captain once said of Elk that "it was the all-firedest
river God ever made,--fer it rises at both ends and runs both ways to
wunst." This is true, and is caused by the Kanawha, when rising, pouring
its water into the mouth of Elk and reversing its current for many
miles, while at the same time rain falls in the mountains, increasing
the latter river's depth and velocity. Flour-mills, iron-foundries,
saw-mills, woollen-mills, and barrel-factories extend their long wooden
slides down to the river's edge, to gather material for their
consumption. A railroad spans it with an iron trussed bridge, and the
demands of wagon and foot-travel are met by an airy one suspended by
cables from tower-like abutments on either side, both bridges swung high
in the air, out of reach of flood and of the smoke-stacks of passing
steam-craft.
A mile from the river's mouth, and just beyond the limits of Charleston,
is one of the finest sandstone-quarries in the world. The United States
government monopolizes most of its product in the construction of the
magnificent lock and shifting dams in course of erection on the Kanawha
to facilitate the transportation of coal from the immense deposits now
being mined to the great markets of the Ohio River. A little farther on,
the brown front of a timber dam and cribbed lock looks down upon a wild
swirl and rush of water; for through a cut gap in its centre Elk flows
unobstructed,--a penniless mob having made the opening one night that
their canoes might pass free and capitalists be encouraged to remove
such worthless stuff as money from the growing industries of the river.
Prior to this act of vandalism the water was backed by the dam for a
distance of fourteen miles, to Jarrett's Ford, making a halting-place
for rafts and logs, barges and floats, coming down from the vast forests
above when rains and snow-thaws raised the river and its tributaries;
but now a long stretch of boom catches what it can of Elk's commerce and
is a chartered parasite upon it.
Here at the old dam the mountains close in tightly upon the narrow
valley. Log cabins and a few simple frame houses nestle upon diminutive
farms; the wild beauty of shoal and eddy, bouldered channel and
lake-like stretches of pool, rocky walls and timber-clad peaks, begins
to charm the stranger and draw him on and on through scenery as
attractive as grand toss of mountains and delve of river can make it.
By dint of poling, pushing, rowing, and pulling, the boats were worked
over rapids and pools for almost a score of miles, to where the last
rays of the sun slid over a mountain-point and hit Colonel Bangem's hat
as it spun in the air by way of welcome, while the prows clove the water
of a lovely eddy lying in front of his camp. The meeting was that of old
friends, with the addition of a blush from Bess Bangem and its bright
reflection from the Professor's face.
Tim Price took the colonel to one side mysteriously, and whispered, "I
took keer uv the Perfessor my own self: he guv me a power uv trouble,
though. Shell I hitch him now, er let him run loose?"
"We'll turn him loose now, Tim; but if he takes to turning somersets,
catch him, loosen his collar, take off his boots, and throw him into the
river," was the colonel's sober reply.
Scientists nowadays set up Energy as the ancestor of everything, measure
the value of its descendants by the quantity they possess of the family
trait, and spend their time in showing how to utilize it for the good of
mankind in general. Professor Yarren was an apostle of Energy: it
absorbed him, filled him. From the weight of the sun to boiled potatoes,
from the spring of a tiger to the jump of a flea, from the might of
chemical disembodiment to opening an oyster, he calculated, advised, and
dilated upon it. He himself, was the epitome of Energy: in his size he
economized space, in his diet he ate for power, not quantity. To him
eating and sleeping were Energy's warehousemen; idleness was dry-rot,
moth, and mildew; laughing, talking, whistling, singing, somersets, and
fishing, never-to-be-neglected and in-constant-use safety-valves. He
regarded himself as an assimilator of everything that went into him, be
it food, sight, sound, or scent, and his perfection as such in exact
ratio to the product he derived from them. So when next morning he said
"Come on" to the Doctor, and Colonel Bangem, Mrs. Colonel Bangem, Bess
Bangem, and Martha, the mountain-maid, who were all standing in front of
the camp rigged for a day's fishing, he meant that one of Energy's
safety-valves was ready to blow off, and that further delay might be
dangerous to him.
In the Doctor, Energy was stored in bond as it were, subject to duties,
and only to be issued on certificate that it was wanted for use and
everything ready for it: therefore at the Professor's "Come on" he
calmly sat down on a log, filled his pipe, leisurely lighted it, and
good-humoredly remarked, "I am confident that one-half of what we call
life is spent in undoing what we have done, in lamenting the lack of
what we have forgotten, or going back after it: therefore I make it a
rule when everything seems ready for a start--especially when going
fishing--to sit five minutes in calm communion with my pipe, thinking
matters over. It insures against much discomfort from treacherous
memories and neglect."
As the Doctor whiffed at his pipe, he inventoried guns, tackle, lunch,
hammocks, air-cushions, gigs, frog-spears, and all other necessaries for
a day's sport on the river. The result was as he had prophesied,--many
things had been omitted. "Now," said he, when the five minutes were up,
"we might venture down the bank, which, rest assured, each member of
this party will have to climb up again after something left behind."
A motley little fleet awaited the party at the water's
edge,--square-ended, flat-bottomed punts, sharp-bowed bateaux, long,
graceful, dug-out canoes, and a commodious push-boat, with cabin and
awning, whose motive power was poles. Elk River craft are as abundant as
the log cabins on its banks, and their pilots are as numerous as the
inhabitants. Neither sex nor size is a disqualification, for, excepting
the trifling matter of being web-toed, all are provided from birth with
water-going properties, and, be it seed-time or harvest, the river has
the first claim upon them for all its varied sports and occupations. A
shot at mallard, black-head, butter-duck, loon, wild goose, or
blue-winged teal, as they follow the river's winds northward in the
spring-time, will stop the ploughs furrowing its fertile bottoms as far
as its echoes roll around mountain-juts, and cause the hands that held
the lines to grasp old-fashioned rifles for a chance at the winged
passers. When, later, woodcock seek its margins, gray snipe, kill-deer,
mud-hens, and plovers its narrow fens, the scythe will rest in the
half-mown field while its wielder "takes a crack at 'em." And when
autumn brings thousands of gray squirrels, flocks of wild pigeon and
water-fowl, to feed on its mast, no household obligation or out-door
profit will keep the natives from shooting, morning, noon, and night.
Some day in the near future a railroad will be built "up Elk," and then,
while commerce and civilization will get a lift, the loveliest of rivers
will be scarred; her trout-streams, carp-runs, bass-pools,
salmon-swirls, deer-licks, bear-dens, partridge-nestles, and
pheasant-covers will be overrun by sports-men, her magnificent mountains
will be scratched bald-headed by lumbermen, her laughing tributaries
will be saddened with saw-dust, and her queer, quaint, original
boat-pullers and "seng-diggers" will wear shoes in summer-time and coats
in winter, weather-board their log cabins, put glass in the windows and
partitions across the one room inside. Woods-meetings will creep into
churches, square sousing in the river will degenerate to the gentle
baptismal sprinkle; no picnics or barbecues will delight the inhabitants
with flying horses and fights, open fireplaces and sparking-benches will
give way to stoves and chairs, riding double on horseback, with fair
arms not afraid to hold tight against all dangers real or fancied, will
be a joy of the past, "bean-stringin's," "apple-parin's,"
"punkin-clippin's," "sass-bilin's," "sugar-camps," "cabin-raisin's,"
"log-rollin's," "bluin's," "tar-and-feathering," and "hangin's," will be
out-civilized, and the whole country will be spoiled.
"It looks like a good biting morning for bass," said Colonel Bangem,
while he was distributing the party properly among the boats. "But, in
spite of all signs, bass bite when they please. It is a sunny morning:
so use bright spoon-trolls, medium size. If the fish rise freely,
twenty-five feet of line is enough to have out on the stern lines; and,
as the ladies will use the poles, ten feet of line is enough for them.
Don't forget, Mrs. Bangem, to keep your troll spinning just outside the
swirl of the oar, and as near the surface of the water as possible. You
know you _will_ talk and forget all about it. Now we will start. If we
get separated and it grows cloudy, change your trolls for three-inch
'fairy minnows;' and if the wind ripples the water, let out from sixty
to eighty feet of line. Take the centre of the river, and you will haul
in salmon; for bass will not rise to a troll in the eddies when the
water is rough. Salmon will. Tim, take the lead with the Professor, that
the other men may see your stroke and course. In trolling, the oarsman
has as much to do with the success as the fisherman."
Off they went, three to a boat, the fishers seated in bow and stern, the
ladies in front with their fishing-poles, and the oarsman in his proper
place, rowing a slow, steady stroke, dipping true and silently just
fifty feet from bank, or sedge, or shelf of rock, steering outside of
snags and drift and where overhanging trees buried their shadows in the
water.
The boats had hardly reached their positions--two on each side of the
stream--when a shout from the Professor announced a catch, as hand over
hand he cautiously drew in the swerving line or held it taut, as the
diving fish sought the rocky bottom or the friendly refuge of a log
drift. With unvarying stroke Tim kept his boat in deep water, away from
entangling dangers. There was a flash in the air and a jingle of the
troll, as a fine bass shot out of the water to shake the barbs from his
open mouth; but the hooks held firm, and the taut line foiled the effort
to dislodge them. Down came the fish with a splash, to dart for the
boat at lightning speed and leap again for life; but this time no jingle
of troll announced his game. He leaped ahead to fall upon the line and
thus tear the hooks from their hold. Successful fishing depends upon two
things,--the presence of fish and knowing more than fish do. At the
instant of the fish's leap the Professor slackened his line: down came
the bass on a limber loop, defeated in his strategy and wearied by his
effort, to be hauled quickly to the boat's side and landed, wriggling
and tossing, at Tim Price's feet.
"You've cotched bass afore, Perfesser. You ez up to their ways ez a
mus'rat to a mussel, er a kingfisher to a minner," exclaimed Tim
admiringly, as he loosened the troll from a two-pound bass. "Hit's
p'intedly a pity you're out uv your head 'bout picters."
"Oh, I have one! I have one!--a fish! What kind is it?" screamed Bess
Bangem, who was the Professor's companion, as her light trout-pole bent
from a sudden tug, and the reel whirred as the line ran off.
"Stop him, hold on to him, wind him in, and I will tell you," answered
the Professor, laughing.
Bess was a practised hand, and loved the sport; but, woman-like, she
always paused to wonder what she had caught before proceeding to find
out.
"It will be the subject of a lecture for you, whatever it is," replied
Bess, with a saucy shake of her head, as she wound in the line and
guided the playing fish with well-managed pole. Her fine face flushed
with the excitement of the run and leap of her prey, as it came nearer
and nearer, until Tim slipped the landing-net quietly under it and
landed a beauty in the boat.
"Poor fellow! I wonder if I hurt him?" said Bess.
"Not much, if any," remarked the Professor. "I never was a fish, and
consequently never was foolish enough to jump at a bunch of hooks; but,
as the cartilage of a fish's mouth is almost nerveless, there is but
little pain from a hook diet. Bass, salmon, pike, and other gamey fish
will often keep on biting after they have been badly hooked."
"So will men," said Bess, as she threw her troll into the water to do
fresh duty.
"You're p'intedly keerect," said Tim Price. "I got the sack four times,
an' hed right smart mittens, afore I cotched a stayin' holt on my old
woman."
Shout after shout waked the mountain-echoes, as fish were held up in
triumph, and as the boats glided over the smooth water of the eddy.
Ahead was a mass of foam and a long dash of water down a shoal.
"Yere's where me and the colonel catches 'em lively when I pull him,"
said Martha to the Doctor. "They bite yere ez lively ez a stray pig in a
tater-patch. Whoop! I've got him! He pulls like a mule at a
hitchin'-rope. Keep your boat head to the current, Alec, an' pull hard,
er we'll drift down on him an' I'll lose him. Whoop! May I never! A
five-pounder! I'll slit him down the back an' brile him fer breakfast.
Whoop! In you come!"
The boatmen pulled hard against the fierce current at the foot of the
shoal, crossed and recrossed, circled, and at it again, until a score or
more of noble bass were hooked from the swirl, and Colonel Bangem led
the way up the rapids. Then the oarsmen leaped into the water and towed
the boats through the wild current, until the eddy at the top of it
allowed them to take oars again.
"Preacher, kin you paddle?" asked Tim Price of the Professor, as he
drained the water from his legs before getting into the boat. "Ef you
air a hand at it, take an oar an' paddle a bit astern: there'll be white
peerch an' red-hoss lyin' yere at the head uv the shore."