University of Virginia Library

CHAPTER X.

THE BLACKWATER FOUND—A GREAT NUMBER OF TROUT
TAKEN—MR. BUTCUT FRIES SOME FISH.

About daybreak, when our sleep was at the highest,
and the atmosphere the most chilly—the
twilight just emerging from the night—Doctor
Adolphus Blandy awoke from his dreams. Sleeping
next to Mr. Butcut—and that gentleman, taking
good care of himself even in his sleep, having contrived
to appropriate to himself, during the night,
the blanket that warmed the shoulders of Adolphus
—the doctor woke up at this hour yawning and
chilled. Contemplating for a while, the comfortable
party around him, and particularly contemplating
the exceedingly comfortable Butcut, just at
this time emitting the longest drawn and most swelling
notes of his horn; and also reflecting, somewhat
bitterly may be, that all this was doubly
enjoyed by But, at the expense of his own shivering
discomfort—himself sacrificed to this too complete
bodily satisfaction of the partner of his sleep
—and accustomed, no doubt, himself to his own

proper share of nocturnal indulgence: thus contemplating
the repose around him, the devil of that
dog-in-the-manger quality of our nature, that will
sometimes get uppermost in the breasts of the best
of men, arose and took possession of his soul.

"Aha, Mr. But!" said Galen to himself, "you
look mighty comfortable, indeed, with every bit of
my blanket wrapped about you—tucked in, too!
No wonder I couldn't pull it over me. I'll fix you,
Mr. Snug, for this, I think. If I'm shivering here,
you sha'n't sleep so comfortably there, and in my
blanket, too—confound you!"

So he deliberately arose, and set fire to the hemlock
upon which we were sleeping, starting the
flame at a point nearest to the object of his particular
malice. Having got his blaze under way, he
next picked up a hatchet, and finding a young fir-tree
so placed that when cut down it would fall
with all its branches directly upon the sleepers, he
went to work to fell it, a great deal of especial delight
beaming all the while from his eyes.

The hemlock being of the Pinus species, fire
takes hold of it rapidly, and soon the camp was in
a blaze. The flames spreading in close proximity
around Peter, crackling upon his ear, and flaring
in his eye, he awoke in great terror, and aroused the
camp with his outcries. Just at this critical moment,
down came the doctor's young fir-tree, that
he had been all the while industriously hacking at,

down right over the camp, with all its sweeping
branches, trapping the party. Of course, there was
no little commotion among us. The fire was instantly
put out, however, by a sort of instinct of
preservation common to mankind; and not yet
fairly awake, and a general impression prevailing
in the confusion that we were attacked by the wild
animals, we seized upon the rifles, hatchets, knives,
frying-pan, and but-ends of the burned wood-pile,
to sell our lives as dearly as possible. Missing
Blandy, however, who had concealed himself behind
a tree, the reality of the case began to break
upon us; and fairly now awake, we commented
variously upon the caricature alacrity that had been
exhibited by the expedition in defending itself from
the supposed assault of the beasts of the wilderness
—and took advantage of the occasion to get breakfast,
and make an early start for the day.

The breakfast was a repetition of the last night's
supper, which being said—it is enough. Presently
the sun reddened the eastern sky, and the hunters
getting the direction they proposed to try their
fortune in, we set off through the yet dank and
dewy forest. Our way was broken and rugged,
up and down, through ravines that were deep
chasms, and over great fallen trees covered with
moss and wet as a sponge. Deer we saw frequently
browsing about, and out here where perhaps they
had never seen a human being before, they would

lift up their heads and for a while gaze at us as if
in wonder at what it all meant. Once or twice it
was proposed to shoot one of them, but this was
cried down as an act of wantonness, since we were
already burdened with as much as we could carry;
and, uncertain as to our being at all in the right direction,
we were somewhat anxious and desirous to
hasten on our way, while yet fresh from the night's
rest.

There was one part of the wilderness which we
traversed this morning, where we came frequently
upon the traces of bear. Sometimes we would
come upon the trunk of a dead tree, some hundred
feet long, and five or six feet in diameter, scattered
and raked about in all directions by the bears to
get at the worms to eat. Sometimes we would
find a cluster of trees, with the bark worn smooth,
which the hunters told us was a certain indication
that a family of these animals had been here raised,
and were no doubt now in some hollow tree or fastness
not far off.

Thus we walked along for several hours, probably
at no greater rate than a mile an hour, and in
some evident disheartenment—for we were not at
all so light of spirit as we might have been, and
would, had we felt more certain of our course.
Every now and then when we stopped to rest, the
conversation would take a debating turn, the subject
discussed being generally the points of the

compass; one asserting that here was the north,
and another that it was in the very opposite direction.
Peter's mind was always opposed to the
hunters'; if they pointed this way for north, he
was sure to point in the opposite, and maintain his
point of the compass with much vehement speech;
for he was by this time fully assured that the hunters
had no knowledge of the country—in fact
knew nothing of wood-craft at all. These debates
were generally wound up by some very direct remark
of Triptolemus's, proclaiming it as his opinion,
that the hunters didn't know any more than he did,
where we were—when some one of the more discreet
members of the party would have to intimate
to Powell and Conway, that Trip didn't mean as
much as he said, for fear they might possibly lose
their good temper, and leave the whole expedition
in the lurch, by deserting us upon the first favorable
opportunity: in which event it is altogether likely
we would have remained out in the Canaan long
enough to have resolved ourselves into our original
wild elements, or to have become a pile of bones.
But Powell and Conway were good-tempered men,
and set down to the proper account all our insinuations
against their knowledge; and generally
retired to a little distance, and held some rational
parley with each other upon the matter in doubt.

At length we scrambled up a desperate hill, and
seating ourselves down to rest on its brow, we

heard Peter's voice back in the bushes, crying out
that he couldn't stand it any longer. Presently he
came in, out of breath, dragging himself along;
and sitting down on a log with an air of dogged
resolution, great misery in his countenance, he
swore he would go no further.

"Gentlemen, there must be an end put to this.
I can't stand it. It's all intolerable—terrific!"

"Let him stay here, then," said the Signor.
"We'll go on, and find the falls. We can then
send one of the men back for him."

The enterprise was growing desperate, so we
moved along, determined to find water at all hazards,
if we fell in our tracks. As we took up the
march again, each man gave Peter a parting volley.

"You had better struggle on, But, as long as
you can. If you should be left here, you will
never find the way in yourself."

"And bear it in mind, an expedition fitted out
for your recovery might not be more fortunate than
those to the North Pole."

"And, But, there is a possibility that government
mightn't think you worth discovering."

"Mr. Grinnell couldn't be calculated on for you,
Peter."

"And if ever you are found, you might be a pile
of bones—remember the lost man!" said Trip.

"Farewell, Peter! I'm sorry to leave you, old
fellow."

"Go to —," said Peter, "with your blasted
nonsense. Since you wont stop and encamp, I'll
show you I can walk with any of you."

And Peter got up and followed after, not liking
the idea of remaining by himself in the forest; and
thinking rightly it would be rather hazardous to be
left behind by the party.

About an hour after this we were walking along
the broad top of a ridge, when one of the hunters
stopped, and thought he heard something like the
distant sound of water. Reanimated by the thought
we pricked up our ears, and went on in better heart.
But Botecote, who was really suffering a good deal,
now came to a dead halt, and refused to move. No
persuasion this time, nor any banter—no argument
addressed to his hopes, nor any intimidation of any
sort, that the inventive genius of the expedition
could suggest—was of the least avail. The case
this time was desperate; and we held a council of
war over him, the chief question being what was to
be done with his body. He was too big to carry—
which was the suggestion of Triptolemus—so, of
course, that thought was dismissed; and, besides,
we had no idea of doing it: for we had still a lurking
belief that he was playing 'possum a little, in
order that he might accomplish an encampment.
Fortunately, however, and saving us from the desperate
measure of leaving him here in the forest,
with a chance that we should not be able to find

him again, old Conway had explored the side of the
mountain, and just now returned, saying that he
had come to a wide belt of laurel, and that it was
his opinion the Blackwater ran through it.

"I knew it," said Peter. "It's just as I said,
gentlemen. We've been enduring all this horrible
walking all the morning, when, by going more to
the left, we might have been in the Blackwater long
ago. Walked to death for nothing!"

And now it was suggested that the laurel should
be explored, the fact of the water ascertained, and
Peter put into it, to make his way to the falls down
the middle of the stream. This proposition was assented
to, as the best the case admitted of. Accordingly,
going down to the edge of the laurel,
and seeing Peter safely deposited in the brake—
with some appropriate encouragement of him as he
fought his way through—and hearing presently his
somewhat cheerful shout, announcing his safe arrival
in the stream—we made our way back again
to the top of the mountain—Powell being certain
now that we were on the Blackwater, and that in
the course of a mile or so we would come upon some
of its falls. Indeed, we were now convinced that
we heard the sound of them in the distance.

We pursued our march along the cone of the
ridge we were on for something better than a mile,
when, coming to a halt, we distinctly heard a waterfall
below us. There was no doubt about it now:

and we descended the mountain-side with a shout.
We met the laurel about half-way down the mountain—and
breaking into it, after the necessary fighting,
we filed down, one by one, along a great fir-tree
that had, happily for us, fallen there some ten
or twenty years before, and stepped out into the
Blackwater, on a broad surface of rock—the very
top itself of the falls we were seeking. In a few
minutes we fixed up our fishing-lines, and, dotted
along the edge of the fall which was about ten feet
high, middle of the day as it was when the fish
generally cease to bite, we took from the pool below
some sixty trout, as fast as we could bait our
hooks for them. Satisfied with this taste of the
stream, and assured of our hopes of trout innumerable,
we descended the falls, and looked about for a
suitable spot to construct a camp, and prepare our
dinner—for which, by this time, we were in no
little need, having eaten nothing since the early
twilight.

In the meantime, Mr. Butcut and Conway—fishing
down the middle of the stream, and having
caught some thirty or forty more trout as they came
along—arrived at the falls, and thus the party were
once more together—boastful over all our toil and
suffering, and in high and happy spirits at the successful
achievement of the enterprise out.

In the course of an hour a camp was constructed
by the banks of the stream, about a hundred yards

below the falls. A great blazing fire, such as we
had the night before, was soon under way; and lazily
stretched about on the hemlock, or out upon
the large, moss-covered rocks that bordered the
stream—now frying and eating a pan of trout at
returning intervals, as a not quite sated appetite
prompted, or taking a little sleep, as nature inclined
—we passed the hours until about four o'clock,
when it was deemed advisable to sally forth for the
purpose of laying in provision for our supper and
the next morning's breakfast.

Leaving some of the party to perfect the works
at the camp, and make everything as comfortable
as possible for the night, we divided the rest into
two bands, and set out—one up the stream, the
other down—to make a somewhat extensive foray
upon the trout.

We will not give a minute account of the evening's
fishing. We will state generally that the inroad
was very successful; that we took the trout as
fast as we could bait for them; that in a walk of
about a mile up the stream, and two miles down,
and back, we at length arrived in camp with about
as many fish as we could well carry—and were
back all of us about an hour before dark, and all
rather indifferent about taking any more trout that
evening.

Immediately in front of the camp, and about a
step out in the stream, is a large rock, in shape a

parallelogram, of some five feet by ten, rising above
the water about three feet, and of almost an entirely
flat surface, except where at one end it is scooped
into a slight hollow, that will hold some two or three
buckets of water. This rock we have appropriated
as our kitchen; and upon it we have counted out
some five hundred trout, varying in size from six
to ten inches—some of them, the black trout, with
deep red spots—and some salmon-colored, with
lighter red spots—all of them very beautiful, though
not, of course, of the largest size of the fish; for we
have yet to go down below the great falls of the
Blackwater to get at them.

All hands are now called into requisition to clean
all these fish; and it is not long before the whole
five hundred are prepared for the pan, and safely
put away in the hollow basin at the other end of the
kitchen, with a plenty of good fresh water around
them.

By the side of this rock, called the kitchen, a little
farther out in the stream—an easy step taking
you from the top of the kitchen-rock to it—is another
large sandstone rock, which is our parlor.
This last is about ten feet by twelve, and about
three feet also above the water, and perfectly flat and
smooth on its surface. Describing thus our different
apartments—all, like the statues of the heathen
goddesses in the "Groves of Blarney," standing out
"naked in the open air"—perhaps it would afford

the reader some satisfaction to know our manner
of using them. It is very simple; as thus:—

You will have the goodness to observe the movements
of Mr. Butcut at this moment. This gentleman
has a turn for good living, and consequently
he is something of an amateur cook. Indeed, it is
his pleasure so to indulge his genius this way, that
after he has himself eaten as much as he wants for
the time being, he takes great delight in exercising
his talents for the gratification of others. He is
now about to cook a mess for the Prior, who, coming
in the last from fishing, has now made himself
ready to enjoy his supper, having a very fine rage
upon him at present, and a particularly good capacity
at all times to go upon. Butcut takes up the
frying-pan, and repairs with it to the kitchen. Placing
it down by the fish, he selects from the clean
and beautiful hundreds in the basin about eight fine
fish—half of them black, half of them salmon-colored,
all of them of the largest and fattest—these
being just as many as the bottom of the frying-pan
will properly hold. He takes them carefully, even
daintily, by the tail, between his fore-finger and
thumb, and places them accurately in the pan in
alternate heads and tails. A little salt and a little
black pepper are carefully sprinkled over them. He
next cuts a few thin slices of middling of bacon and
places them about in the pan. He is now ready for
the fire. So he goes to the great blazing pile, and

raking out from underneath it, away from any
smoke, a quantity of the livest embers, he sets the
frying-pan evenly on these, and soon has the whole
delicate mess frying away in the most delightful
manner—the fat of the middling crackling and hissing
a most delicious music to his ear—also to the
ear of the expectant Master. The accomplished
Peter takes great care that the fish shall not burn
in the least, so he removes the pan from the hot
embers every once in a while. Cooked sufficiently
now, as he supposes, on the one side, he proceeds to
the operation of turning them. This he does after the

manner of tossing a pancake. He spreads a white
napkin upon the rock hard by, and giving the frying-pan
a toss of a very artful character, up go the
trout in the air, turning over and coming down into
the pan again precisely as the arch-cook desires it:
and all this is done without spilling even so much as
a drop of grease on the napkin. He now goes to the
fire again, and performs some more hocus-pocus, that
is all Hebrew-Greek to the ignorant, until the mess
is of a delicate brown hue—when he deems the
operation complete, and hands the frying-pan to
the Master with an air which seems to say, "A dish
fit to set before a king!"

The sharp-set Prior, in the meantime, has prepared
himself with a plate—of the real stone-ware
—that is, a flat, thin stone, of some twelve inches'
diameter, which he has selected from the bed of the
stream for his purpose; and emptying the trout upon
his plate, with a chunk of bread on one end of it
and his big knife on the other, he hands the frying-pan
to the next gentleman eagerly waiting for it,
and proceeds from the fireplace to the kitchen, and
from the kitchen to the parlor, where he sets himself
down, with his legs crossed under him after the
fashion of the Grand Mufti, and, with his plate before
him, dips in, and makes away with the spoils
of the Blackwater, in what in elegant life would be
considered a very short space of time, but which
excites no comment at all out here—it being common
to all the men we have seen feed in the country.

The trout is such light food, that eight of them,

some ten inches long, will not make a supper for a
hearty man, leading this wilderness life; and accordingly
the Master asks for another plateful. But
Mr. Butcut is by this time cooking another little
mess for himself, his appetite getting up again on
him: so the former gentleman has to wait for his
turn at the frying-pan, and try his hand for himself.

But enough. This will suffice to show the habits
of our indoor life out here on the Blackwater—and
give also some very just idea of the different apartments
of our dwelling, and of our felicitous manner
of using them.