Berry Picking And Trout Fishing

IN THE EARLY SUMMER there were wild strawberries to be picked. Raspberries, blackberries, blueberries and finally huckleberries followed in turn. Berry picking on the mountainsides was work and it was not always easy to find boys willing to undergo the hardships except the boys from the poor families who needed the money which could be realized from selling the fruit from door to door. Some of these boys were interesting companions, and spurred on by their mothers they could be depended upon to be on hand at an early hour and thus insure a good day's pick. Even in the long summer days, they would call for me before daylight and we would be well up the mountain when the early morning train from Rutland began to creep along the Otter Creek valley far below.

It was always a matter of wonder to us to observe how long it took the whistle of the train to reach our ears after our eyes had discerned the faint puffs of smoke making the announcement of the fact that the sound was on its way.

Fog generally followed the course of the creek; we had not been conscious of its presence while we were in it but viewed from high up the mountain it was clearly defined.

No part of the day is so entrancing as early morning; so full of hope and expectation. If one would see the pageantry of sky and cloud, let him go to the mountains at daybreak and breathe in the charm of it to the accompaniment of the songs of awakening birds and the fragrance of the wild rose.

Each berrypicker was provided with both pail and cup, the latter remaining buttoned on the suspender until the picking got under way. When the accumulation of berries in the pail justified the change, the pail was placed in the shade of a convenient growth of ferns and the berries were then picked into the cup and the contents emptied into the pail at convenient intervals.

The strawberries grew mostly in the foothills where the soil was slightly sandy. They were much smaller than garden strawberries and much sweeter. It required perseverance to pick even one quart of field strawberries but they were appreciated because of their scarcity.

Raspberries and blackberries followed the strawberries as the season advanced and they, in turn, were followed by the low-bush blueberries which grew in abundance on Green Hill, where the sour, rocky soil produced other things sparingly. Somehow the roots of low-bush blueberries, along with wintergreen and ferns thrived on the sterile soil of Green Hill, and other vegetation begrudged them not their sole occupancy. In return for such privileges as it enjoyed, the soil on Green Hill produced blueberries which were really blue and wonderfully sweet. Blueberries have now been domesticated but not so successfully, it seems to me, as the strawberries and the raspberries; some of the sweetness has been lost in the effort to increase the size.

The huckleberries were the last in the march of the seasons. They were larger and darker in color than the blueberries and lacked some of their flavor but they grew more abundantly and the bushes being high they were more easily picked. One can strip high-bush huckleberries directly in the pail and a good picker can fill a water-pail, holding ten to twelve quarts, in the course of a day. They also are content with small favors so far as soil is concerned; in fact they are even less demanding in their requirements than the blueberries. They grow among huge boulders at the bottom of White Rocks. No berrybushes are so prodigal in their giving and so modest in their demands as the huckleberries of the Vermont mountains.

Grandmother used to smile sweetly when I brought home my day's pick of huckleberries but I must admit that I was not entirely free from self-interest; I had grandmother's luscious pies in mind. While neither of my grandparents asked me to go berrying or even suggested it, grandmother never failed to express a genuine pleasure when her tired, sunburned, barefooted grandson made his appearance with a pailful of cleanly picked berries fresh from the mountainside.

When I was a child, father, yielding to my importunities, took me trout fishing one day, with the result that the virus got into my blood. From that day on, every mountain brook has had its fascination for me. Every likely pool beneath rock, log, or overhanging bank has been a challenge and I have yet to see a more thrilling sight than that of trembling, bending rod and glistening trout as it emerges from its cold, dark lair, dances aloft for a moment in the sunlight and then falls upon rock or bank my captive.

I have yet to see any more beautiful living creature than a brook trout. Note the perfect symmetry of outline and the delicacy and variety of its colors. Its mottled back varies in accordance with the color of the bottom of the stream and the water in which he has made his home; the darker his surroundings, the darker he is and therefore less easily seen by his enemies. Trout-fishing boys and men admire the rich red of the belly fins, but far exceeding all in beauty is the delicate coloration of the flanks of the creature with its crimson spots encircled with rings of azure blue. No artist, painting on Dresden china, could equal the shading of the multicolored sides of this creature of the cold sparkling streams of the New England mountains.

Why should men and boys find such joy in the capture and killing of so beautiful a creature as a brook trout? Our congenital instinct, I imagine; something we may get over in time. Not so very long ago, beautiful song birds were slaughtered for their flesh and their feathers. We have outlived that savagery and now think of such creatures as our best friends, delightful to listen to and to behold.

Perhaps our beautiful friends of the mountain brooks will come into their own some day; there are signs of it already. We don't often hear men speak of the number of brook trout they have "killed" in a day; modern fishermen no longer kill for the sole purpose of killing. It is not good ethics among sportsmen of this day to take from a stream more fish than they have use for.

Calling at the public library one day to ask for books on fishing, the librarian surprised me by asking, "which do you want, philosophical or practical?" The question amused me so that at first I laughed outright but eventually when I had thought the matter through, I answered, "I expect the book I am looking for is what you would designate as philosophical."

I had figured it out right. The practical fisherman is one who is interested primarily in "the kill." To the philosophical fisherman, the catch is only a part of the story, a very small part likely. He is interested in the great outdoors; he places first the opportunity to commune with nature and to partake of its healing power. He can follow a stream or sit in a boat as the case may be without the slightest sense of loneliness; he is the philosophical fisherman. Isaac Walton was one. He taught the religion of the outdoors and did more to popularize fishing than any other man in history. What delightful vistas of thought he opened up to the delectation of his own generation and generations yet to come. Professor Henry Drummond was a philosophical fisherman. Oh yes, in a humble way, that's the kind of fisherman I have been.

The brook trout are not only the most beautiful of creatures, they are the most shy and intelligent of fish. Men love to match wits with them and a sophisticated brook trout wins against all except the most experienced.

In the business of outwitting brook trout, long-bearded Ed Sabin, the tinner, and 'Peg-leg" Pratt, the coffin-maker, knew no superiors. They were individualists pure and simple and while their technique varied greatly, the results were the same-they caught the trout. Ed placed his catch in a creel while "Peg-leg" would cut a crotched stick from the underbrush, cutting one side close to the crotch and leaving the other side long enough to accommodate the expected catch when strung through their gills. "Peg-leg" ordinarily was slow in his movements but his return from Roaring Brook was always a march of triumph; his head was held high and his peg leg played a staccato tattoo on the board walks of the village. As a rejuvenator, trout fishing takes high rank.

As was the case with berrypicking, my fishing excursions began before the light of day. What mysticism there was in those early morning hours; all the world was mine. Even grandfather, early riser though he was, had not thought of stirring. I used to make my way quietly down the cellar stairs to the swinging shelf, on which I would generafly find a platter of brook trout, the result of a previous day's fishing. They had been rolled in corn meal and fried in buffer and even though they were cold, they constituted a fine breakfast.

Then I would take the chunk of dried beef which always hung in the cellarway and from it cut several sizeable slices, my only provision for lunch. I abhorred impediments and early discovered that a tiny package of dried beef washed down by cold water from the brook, supplied the necessary nourishment.

I'm a merry mountain brook

Hiding in some shady nook

Babbling, laughing all day long

Running, dancing with a song.

 

I'm as free as winds that blow

Little care I where I go

Only let me have a run

Splashing, tumbling all in fun.

 

An obstruction in my path

Simply makes me swirl and laugh

Nothing stops me as I flow

Over rocks to pools below.

Birney C. Batcheller.

Child's Brook was my favorite; its source was a spring well up in the hills at the foot of White Rocks. The water near the spring, being protected from the summer sun by huge boulders, trees and bushes, remained frozen the year round and was locally known as the "ice bed." Within half a mile of the "ice bed," I could begin fishing the icy waters of Child's Brook. Creeping through the undergrowth in the wooded stretches and through the long grass bordering the brook in the pastureland, I would let my bait float down into promising holes. Sometimes the results were disappointing; in spite of my efforts to conceal myself from the vision of the trout, the shy creatures had seen me. All I had seen was a flash upstream or downstream like a streak of light, a slight muddying of the water where the belly fins, serving as feelers, had stirred up the bottom of the stream.

Then again hungry trout would rise to my bait one after the other, several perhaps from the same hole. I can still feel the thrill of it; the desperate last second of resistance and then the catch.

It was my custom to fill the capacious pockets of my jacket with ferns and mint gathered along the brook and to bury each captured trout in my thus improvised crypt, there to remain until I arrived home when I would cast the entire conglomeration into a trough of crystal spring water, and proceed to separate the trout from their clinging shrouds, preparatory for cleaning, gloating the while at each prize and recalling the very hole from which it had savagely risen to strike the bait.

When the sun had risen to a position directly overhead, I would rest and, in the shade of spreading friendly beech tree, enjoy my simple luncheon while luxuriating in the view of the valley, the music of the brook, the aromatic fragrance of the mint, the soft breezes from the mountains an occasional butterfly of gorgeous colors flitting without apparent purpose from place to place, honeybees gathering sweet nectar from the wild flowers of the mountainside, and the rustle of the long grass bending gracefully in the wind.

What sweeter music than the song of the brook. A friend of mine, whose photographs in the National Geographic magazine have brought joy to millions of readers all over the world, told me that once while traveling in the mountains with the two great naturalists, John Burroughs and John Muir, he came upon Burroughs lying on his side on the floor of an old and seldom used bridge. Upon inquiring as to what he was doing, the grand old man replied, "listening through this knot-hole to the music of the brook." Some hear sounds to which others are deaf. Few indeed enjoy to the fullest the senses of sight, hearing, smelling and feeling. What a privilege the companionship of these two men, who styled themselves, "the two Johnnies-Johnnie of the birds and Johnnie of the mountains."

After lunch with knees planted on convenient rocks and hands on others, I would let myself down and drink from the icy water. The brook increased in size as it continued its course down the hillside, through the meadow and into Otter Creek. The trout increased both in size and sophistication as they entered the broader waters. Neither brook nor creek was famed for large tout, even half-pounders being exceptions. The two largest I recall having been taken from the steams in our neighborhood were two pounders. I saw one of them and greatly envied the fortunate captor.

I became fairly proficient in the art of angling as time advanced but never to compare with Mr. Ed Sabin or Mr. 'Peg-leg" Pratt; they could catch trout in any brook however bad its reputation might be. No brook was ever fished out to them and they always fished alone.

I usually finished my sport late in the afternoon and returned to the village, a tired but happy boy, after my adventure in solitude. If there were sick folks in the village my catch was shared with them; grandmother would have the trout crisply cooked and done up in a snowy napkin and I was never too tired to make deliveries.

Grandmother had her other charities as well and in those, I was her willing messenger. Many a basket and many a pail of delicacies I have taken at her behest to the sick and needy. Two aged sisters, one of them stone blind, both serene in their afflictions, were regular recipients of grandmother's bounty and they always greeted me with a smile and sent their messages of love and gratitude to grandmother.