Whip-poor-wills whistled their shrillest that June night, and the air
was ablaze with millions of fire-flies. A grand scene was revealed when
the round, yellow moon came creeping up from behind the ragged ridge
that walls the eastern bank of Cataluche. The pines along the summit of
the ridge, stood out like black skeletons. A light, almost as bright as
day, flooded the shut-in valley, casting dark shadows on the stony
ground under the giant forest trees, silvering their tall tops, and
whitening the bare, mast-like pines, standing girdled in the fields of
sprouting corn. The valley was resonant with the roar of the river. A
refreshing evening breeze swept the porch of the old farm-house,
carrying with it a sleepy influence which knocked the props out from
under the drowsy eye-lids of our party, and caused one after another to
steal away to bed.
The more enterprising and enthusiastic anglers were out and fishing
before breakfast; but after that meal we all went. We pursued every bend
of the romantic stream, catching trout at every cast of our flies. One
day in particular is to be remembered. A soft, warm shower had fallen,
and then cleared brightly by 9 o’clock. The best of breezes, one from
the south, was blowing through the hemlocks. The current of the stream
was slightly riled; thus everything being propitious for the sport.
From one pool alone, ten gold and pink-spotted trout were taken that
morning. It was a spot where a steep cliff, festooned with vines, lifted
itself from the water on one side. On the other, was a wide curve of the
bank, and along it grew azaleas and rhododendrons under the pines. The
Rhine-wine colored waters lay dark in this picturesque basin; and from
them were lifted trout after trout, beguiled by the treacherous fly.
Between four and five hundred fish were brought in that evening.
There are many other streams in the Great Smoky mountains about equal in
excellence to Cataluche. Among these are the Ocona Lufta, Forney, Hazel
and Eagle creeks in Swain county. Soco is a natural trout stream; but,
flowing as it does through the Cherokee reservation, its waters have
been so whipped by the aboriginal fishermen that it can not be
recommended to the angler. On its banks the angler, starting from
Waynesville, will travel to reach the Ocona Lufta. The waters of the
Ocona Lufta, even at its mouth in Tuckasege river, are of singular
purity, and through some portions of its course, from racing over a
moss-lined bed, appear clear emerald green. Above the Indian town the
valley grows narrow, and prosperous farmers live along its banks. The
forests are rich in cherry and walnut trees, and all necessary water
power is afforded by the river. Joel Conner’s is a pleasant place to
stop.
Forney creek empties into the Tuckasege at some distance below
Charleston. The ride to its mouth will interest even the most practical
of travelers. At times, the waters create a tumultuous uproar over a
broken channel; then with startling silence they run smooth and swift
for a hundred yards, and, making a bold sweep around a craggy mountain,
disappear as though the earth had swallowed them. There are several
islands in the stream; and at one place there is a twin pair lying close
together in a channel wider than usual. Wild ducks will often be seen
keeping their unwavering flight around the bends; and frequently from
the water edge of a clump of alders, spice-wood and thunderberry bushes,
a blue heron, with lank neck outstretched, will sail lazily out over the
river. The mail man, mounted on a cadaverous horse, with leather
mailbags upon his saddle, is apt to meet the tourist; but, differing
from the general run of the natives, he travels on time and is loath to
stop and talk. Not so with the man who, with a bushel of meal over his
shoulders, is coming on foot from the nearest “corn-cracker.” At your
halt for a few points in regard to your route, he will answer to the
best of his ability; and then, if you feel so inclined, he will continue
planted in the road and talk for an hour without once thinking of
setting down his load. The fishing in Forney creek is excellent. It is
in a rugged section, and at its mouth the scenery is wild enough to hold
forth fine inducements. Hazel and Eagle creeks empty into the Little
Tennessee in a still more lonely and less inhabited section, a number of
miles below the mouth of the Tuckasege.
The Nantihala river is prolific in trout near its pure sources; and,
along its lower reaches, is alive with other fish, among which the gamey
black-bass is enough to allure the angler. A man may be an expert bass
fisher, but a veritable failure at trouting. When one discovers this
fact, with a sound pole, long line and reel, try the minnow and
trolling-hook at the mouth of the Nantihala. In the Tuckasege his
efforts may be rewarded with a salmon. A number of these royal fish were
placed in this stream a few years since, and are now frequently landed.
Nearly every creek that empties into the Tuckasege teems with trout.
Among these are the north fork of Scott’s creek, Dark Ridge creek, and
Caney Fork, all in Jackson county. A gentleman of undoubted veracity,
who has whipped nearly every stream in the mountains, pronounces the
Dark Ridge creek to be the best of any he ever cast a fly in. Its
head-waters can be struck by turning from the State road about seven
miles from Waynesville, and pursuing a left-hand, unfrequented road,
into the wilderness. There are no farms along its banks. Great, silent
forests, in which the locust and hickory attain enormous size, embosom
it. Its edges are wild with tangled rhododendron and kalmia; its waters,
small in volume, but cold and crystal.
Fourteen miles south of Webster, the county-seat of Jackson, is the most
stupendous waterfall of the mountains. It is said that on certain
evenings, when that dead quiet, prophetic of a storm, dwells in the
valley, the dull roar of the falls can be heard eight miles down the
river. It is on the Tuckasege, about 20 miles below its sources. There
are three ways to reach it; two from above, on either bank, and one from
below, on the west bank. The one way by the east bank is exceedingly
arduous. To approach it from the west bank, the traveler journeys up the
Cullowhe road from Webster. It is a delightful ride, over a picturesque
highway, to where the river is struck at Watson’s. By dismounting there,
you can follow, without difficulty, on foot down stream to the desired
point. This latter approach is preferable to the one undertaken by our
party. We left the highway about three miles below Watson’s. It is a
rough walk of two miles to the waters, half a mile below the falls.
There is no trail to follow, and it requires some activity to scale the
rocks, jump the logs, and crawl through the thickets. Hard by the river,
over a cliff 200 feet high, Rough-running brook pours its waters in rain
and mist. If a certain guide’s story is to be believed, over this cliff,
three deer, closely followed by an eager pack of hounds, once plunged
unwittingly.
Along this part of the river the trout are thick and hungry enough to
afford all the sport you wish; and, if there is a dark sky and dark
water, it will be a gala-day. The scenery of the falls is as
interesting as the fishing. On the left rises a gray, granite cliff,
perfectly plumb with its base, 150 feet above the river. It is somewhat
mantled with green vines and mosses, and a few shaggy cedars cling to
its front. On the right, the cliff is less precipitous, and on it the
forest and its undergrowth springs dense and rank. In front pours the
water, a great sparkling cloud. For 60 or 70 feet down, it is a
perpendicular, unbroken sheet; then a projecting ledge catches and
breaks it into two columns, to fall through the last 25 feet of space.
The frowning cliffs, primeval pines, gigantic boulders, and the vista of
blue sky sighted through the cañon, form a picture of striking
sublimity. If you do not object to getting wet from the mist and rain
created by the cataract, you can stand on a great rock in the whirling
pool and fish for trout and salmon, with success, for hours. The cliff
on the right can be scaled by a boy or man, and the river ascended for a
mile to Watson’s house on the road. However, before reaching the road,
the upper falls are to be passed. Here the scene is different. For
several hundred feet the waters pour over a bare mountain’s face, whose
slant is several degrees from a perpendicular. At its base the stream
widens out, for there are no cliffs to hem it in, and huge boulders
being absent, a level, little lake lies buried in the forests. A fine
point from which to view this fall is half way up the mountain on the
opposite side of the river.
Fair fishing is still to be found in the Cullasaja. It can be reached
from either Franklin or Highlands. In a beautiful valley, close by the
bank of this stream, stands the homestead of a pioneer settler of the
country, Silas McDowell. It is only a few years since he ended his
pilgrimage. In his old age he took great delight in narrating his early
experiences in the wilderness. The first trout fishing expedition
undertaken by him in 1839, and told by him to the writer, will serve as
an illustration of what the primitive angler had to encounter.
One bright morning, he, with two young companions, started up the
Cullasaja. As a matter of course, they had excellent sport, and met with
no adventure, until, in the ravines of Lamb mountain, a magnificent,
antlered buck, startled by their sudden appearance, leaped up from
behind a cliff and started up the stream. There was no outlet for him on
either side, for the walls of the gorge are perpendicular. A short
distance ahead, a cliff, over which the water tumbled, would stop his
career. They had no guns with them, and, although the game was securely
bagged, their only way to kill him was with stones. They pushed on
pelting him with these. At length, maddened with the stoning, the old
stag turned and rushed by them, breaking the narrator’s fishing rod as
he passed. Just then he fell between two large boulders, and one of the
young men, springing on the animal’s back, soon dispatched him with his
knife. They sank the carcass in the cold, rushing water; fished until
noon, catching several hundred trout, and then returned home to send two
servants with a pack-horse after the game. The return of the servants
was expected that evening, but it was not until the following afternoon
that they appeared. They related that they had found the deer, but it
was dark before they were ready to start. Thinking it was best to wait
for the moon to rise, they placed the deer on a large, flat rock in mid
stream, and then laid down beside it to sleep until that time. An
unusual sound awoke them, and by the moonlight they saw an immense
panther crossing the foot-log toward them. He had scented the fresh
meat, and was about to investigate, but on the unexpected awakening of
two human beings, he fled, as much startled as they were. The night was
intensely cold, and finding it impossible to start, and also being
afraid of wild animals along the lonely way, they remained on the rock
until the sun had risen and warmed their numbed bodies. Thus they
accounted for their long absence.
A few miles from Brevard, the headwaters of the French Broad, and
farther south, on the Jackson county side, the streams hidden in the
wilderness of the Hog-back and emptying into the Toxaway, and the
head-waters of the Chatooga, can be recommended to the followers of
Isaak Walton. The writer does not know from actual experience of any
trout inhabiting the Linville waters, but there are sign-boards on the
banks prohibiting fishing.
Close on the Mitchell and Watauga county boundary, is the Elk river, a
famous trout stream. The best approach is from Tennessee, up the
narrow-gauge railroad, through Carter county, to the Cranberry mines.
From the old forge to Louis Banner’s, or Dugger’s, the distance is eight
miles. The road winds upward along a clear, dark stream, rushing over
light-colored rocks. Steep mountain sides, heavy with wild, brilliant
forests, darken the highway with their shadows. In the morning and
evening, the woods are filled with melodious birds. Logging camps are
numerous in this neighborhood, the solitudes resounding with the crash
of falling timbers and the songs, or more likely the oaths, of the
lumbermen. Besides catching trout in the Elk, there is a good chance for
killing deer along its margin, or in some of the vast hemlock forests in
which the high valleys of the southwest corner of Watauga are embosomed.
In Ashe county, the tributary creeks to the North fork of New river rise
amid picturesque mountains, and teem with trout.
[Illustration: OCHLAWAHA VALLEY, FROM DUN CRAGIN.]
AFTER THE ANTLERS.
Rise! Sleep no more! ’Tis a noble morn;
The dews hang thick on the fringed thorn,
And the frost shrinks back, like a beaten hound,
Under the steaming, steaming ground.
Behold where the billowy clouds flow by,
And leave us alone in the clear gray sky!
Our horses are ready and steady.--So, ho!
I’m gone, like the dart from the Tartar’s bow.
_Hark! Hark! Who calleth the maiden Morn
From her sleep in the woods and the stubble corn?
The horn,--the horn!
The merry sweet ring of the hunter’s horn._
--_Barry Cornwall._
[Illustration: T]he Smoky chain, whose summit bears the long boundary
line of North Carolina and Tennessee, attains its culmination between
the deep, picturesque gaps of the French Broad and Little Tennessee, and
is known as the Great Smoky mountains. For the distance of sixty-five
miles it forms a mighty barrier, affording, with the exception of the
Big Pigeon, no passage-way for mountain waters, and broken, except
toward its southern end, by no gaps less than 5,000 feet in altitude.
Nineteen peaks of over 6,000 feet in altitude, and 14 more within 400
feet of these figures, connected by massive ridges and interspersed by
peaks but little lower than those just mentioned, make a marked cluster
of massive mountains.
Clingman’s dome, 6,660 feet high, the most elevated summit in the range,
is 372 feet higher than Mount Washington of the White Mountains, and
only 47 feet lower than the loftiest peak of the Appalachian system.
From its dome-shaped summit, in close communion with the clouds, and
encircled by a dense grove of balsams, high above the line of scrubby
oak and beech, and higher still above the majestic forests of cherry,
locust, chestnut and the walnut, which clothe its lower slopes, the
observer, as from the basket of a balloon, looks down upon a varied
world spread wide and rolling beneath his feet. To the north lies that
level and fertile portion of East Tennessee, watered by the French Broad
and the Holston. Villages dot the plains; and, afar, the crests of the
Cumberland mountains and their spurs form with the transparent sky a
purple horizon. On the other hand, the lofty heights of the Bald, Black,
Blue Ridge, Balsam, Cowee and Nantihala ranges, with lapping ends and
straggling summits, make a distant, circling, boundary line to a central
ocean of rolling mountains. Directly south, one obtains a wide-spread
prospect of the most wild and picturesque portion of the eastern United
States--that land embraced by the counties of Swain and Macon--the once
romantic habitation and hunting ground of the Cherokee Nation. Here lies
the fertile valley of the upper Little Tennessee, and its picturesque
but almost uninhabited lower reaches; the emerald green Ocona Lufta with
its rich lands; the Indian reservation on the banks of the Soco; the
beautiful Tuckasege, and the narrow and wildly romantic vale down which
courses the Nantihala.
A noticeable feature of these mountains is their smooth, bald summits;
not a sterile baldness like that of ranges higher or in more rigorous
climates, but only bald as far as concerns the growth of trees and
underwood. Atmospheric forces have played their parts on the pinnacles.
What once must have been sharp crowns of rock, have, with time, storm,
and frost, become rounded hillocks. Due, perhaps to the sweeping winds,
the dense balsam forests--the characteristic tree of the loftier heights
of the Smoky, Black, Balsam and Blue Ridge--stop around the brows of the
extreme tops, leaving, oftentimes, perfectly level tracts of treeless
land, in some instances of 1,000 acres in extent. The soil is a black
loam. A heavy sward, green, even in winter, covers these meadows. On
them, around occasionally exposed surfaces of rock, the scarlet,
blossom-bearing rhododendron, and clumps of heather, similar to that on
the Scottish hills, are found. Every spring, thousands of cattle,
branded, and sometimes hung with bells, are turned out on these upland
pastures. It is an unequalled grazing land. Water wells forth even from
the extreme higher edges of the forests, and on every slope are crystal
streams.
The same striking difference, between the slopes of the Blue Ridge, is
seen in the Great Smoky mountains. On the Tennessee side, the soil is
sterile, in comparison with the North Carolina side. Bare, rocky faces
are exposed to a stronger sun-light; the streams flow through slaty
channels, heaped with gigantic boulders, and a sultry air pervades at
the mountains’ base; still, flourishing forests cover the winding
hollows, secluded coves, and even the craggy heights. One notable
mountain cluster, the Chimneys, terminate in sharp, thin spurs of rock,
differing in this particular from all the peaks of the Alleghanies
south.
The North Carolina side is a luxuriant wilderness, where, not content
with spreading overhead an unbroken roof of branches, brilliant with a
foliage like that of tropical forests, Nature has carpeted the ground
with mosses and grasses, and planted in vast tracts impenetrable tangles
of the rhododendron and kalmia. These tangles are locally called
“Hells,” with a proper noun possessive in remembrance of poor
unfortunates lost in their mazes. There is no better timbered country in
the United States. The wild cherry, of large growth, is found here in
abundance, and other hard woods of a temperate clime attain majestic
heights. The arrowy balsam shoots up to 150 feet, and the mast-like
cucumber tree dangles it red fruit high above the common forest top.
The valleys are cleared and filled with the pleasant homes of hardy
mountaineers. These farms, to the careless observer, appear to be the
only marks of civilized life on the Smokies; but high above the main
traveled roads, amid vast forest solitudes, beside small mountain
streams, and in rich coves under sheltering ridges, are located many
quiet cabins with no approach except by trail ways and known only to the
tax-collector and cattle-herder.
Some of these trails, or poorly-worked roads lead the unsuspecting
tourist into thickly-settled localities. Such a surprise awaits him if,
at the cañon of the Cataluche, he leaves the highway leading from
Haywood county to Knoxville. It is the most picturesque valley of the
Great Smoky range. The mountains are timbered, but precipitous; the
narrow, level lands between are fertile; farm houses look upon a
rambling road, and a creek, noted as a prolific trout stream, runs a
devious course through hemlock forests, around romantic cliffs, and
between laureled banks.
But, to the observer from Clingman’s Dome, the clearings on the slopes
of the Smokies are hidden from the eye. On all sides stretch wild, black
forests, funereal in their aspect, wakened only by the cry of the raven,
or the tinkle of the bell of some animal lost in their labyrinths. The
great wildernesses of the deciduous trees lie below, mantling the ridges
and hollows. In vain the eye endeavors to mark their limit: it is
blanked by the misty purple into which the green resolves itself. Here,
for the bear, deer, wolf, and panther, appears the natural home.
Nowhere is there a more perfect roaming ground for these animals; but
the hound, rifle, and trap, brought into active use by the Indians and
mountaineers, have greatly thinned out the game; still, no better
hunting is to be found east of the Mississippi.
Swain county, along the Graham county line, appeared the least inhabited
section; and when, in the early part of October, we contemplated a deer
drive, the above information regarding the skirts of the Great Smokies
tended to drift us down the Little Tennessee. Our approach lay from that
point in Haywood county which was then the terminus of the Western North
Carolina Railroad, via Waynesville, Webster, and Charleston. We were
mounted on stout horses, and were dressed in a manner anything but
conspicuous; still, a party of four men, each with a Remington rifle or
a breech-loading shot-gun, strapped for easy carrying across his back,
forms a cavalcade of striking interest to denizens of mountain ways and
the citizens of quiet villages.
Had we paid any attention to the opinion that, in the wilderness, we
would be taken for revenue officers, and, as such, shot on sight by
blockaders, we would have ridden uneasily. There is bravery in numbers,
and then we knew better than to give countenance to such fears.
Blockading, or “moonshining” as it is sometimes called, because the
distiller works by the light of the moon, is not as prevalent in these
mountains as is generally supposed; and, besides, it is growing less
with every year. That an unobstrusive stranger stands in danger of being
shot down by a blockader on suspicion of any kind, is a bug bear, in
spite of its prevalence, almost too absurd for consideration. For the
commission of a crime of this nature, it would take a strange
combination of circumstances: a distiller with a murderous cast of mind;
a tourist representing himself to be a United States officer, and the
presence of an illicit still. Now, the blockader, like the majority of
drinking men, is a good-natured fellow, who, while he deems himself a
citizen of the United States, confounds natural with civil liberty, and
believes he has the right to manufacture, drink and sell whisky in
whatever manner he pleases so long as he does not interfere with the
private rights of his neighbors. The tourist is generally a voluble
fellow, anxious to make friends as he travels, and showing stronger
inclination to have his bottle filled than to burst copper boilers or
smash any barrels of mash. The still is hidden in retreats where a
stranger would be as likely to stumble upon it as he would to finding
the philosopher’s stone.
The tourist, traveling the lonely mountain highways, need have no fears
as to the safety of his person or his pocket. It is true that murder
cases are often on the county dockets, but these are the results of
heated blood, and not of cupidity. Honesty is a strong trait of the
mountain people.