WHEN MAY comes to the north country it reminds me of a fawn walking out of the woods alone for the first time, wide-eyed and uncertain about what to do next. A timid month is May, and not sure of itself, for though the days may be warm, the nights are often sharp with frost and sometimes windowpane ice comes on the coves. Once in a while we have a snow flurry—“robin snow,” we call it.
Out in the shady place back of my cabin snow still lies under a shaggy spruce like a dingy white collar on a man who needs a hair cut. Spring is gaining, to be sure, but the tattered white patches in the woods on the north slopes of the Cache Lake hills show that winter is not leaving without a fight, In places the ice in the ground is like black flint, but where the sun strikes down through the branches water is running under the matted needles like a frightened little critter trying to get away without being seen or heard. Once it makes its way into the open, though, the trickle picks up strength and talks out loud to itself as it snakes through the moss and stones. Then, free at last from the thongs of winter, it hustles on down the hill to the lake, leaping over the ledges, ducking under logs and racing with all the excitement of a brand new brook. That’s how May shows up at Cache Lake.
When I came to the big woods years ago I used to get letters from a friend down south. In the spring when the ice on the lake was gray and just starting to honeycomb and I was still poking wood in the stove to keep warm, he would write that where he was summer had come. The trees were all dressed in new leaves and he was picking lettuce from his kitchen garden. Once, I remember, he wrote that a mockingbird was singing in a dogwood tree and the scent of honeysuckle and the drowsy droning of bees came to him through the open window. But here the wet, soggy snow of late winter still lingered in the forest.
Coming to me from time to time, first by rail and then by the hand of some trapper or prospector who passed my way, those letters started me thinking of spring as something more than just a time of the year. I began to think that if I could rise high in the sky and had eyes that could see a thousand miles or more to the south and as far east and west, I would look down upon a mighty tide of fresh new leaves bursting from brown shields, meadows covered with new grass and bright with the color of wild flowers. That would be spring on her journey out of the south, a tide of plant life moving into the valleys, spreading along the rivers and around the lakes, and rising up and over the hills to ripple quietly across the gray flat lands. A wonderful sight!
But that was not all I pictured, for behind the edge of the land’s green flood and high in the sky I would see another tide—millions of migrating birds of every size and color moving in a straight, strong current of hurrying wings from their wintering places hundreds, perhaps thousands, of miles away. Out of the tropics they would come, flying across the Gulf of Mexico or from island to island in the blue Caribbean, picking up others from the bayous and rice fields of Louisiana, from the swamps of Florida, the pine forests of North Carolina and the waters of Currituck Sound and Chesapeake Bay, all driven by a common instinct toward their nesting places in the north. Some would stop along the way; others would fly on, sweeping across the Great Lakes or winging up the Atlantic Coast until they looked down upon the lonely Barren Lands and the bleak waters of the Arctic Ocean north of Canada.
And so it was I came to think of spring and autumn as two great tides rising and ebbing, one bright northing green, the other a crimson and gold flood that begins to flow toward the south when the clear crisp nights of late tember give the signal to start.
All nature is now wide awake and alert, and neither frost nor a late flurry of snow will change her plans for long. Our season is short and summer, hot from hurrying, comes bustling along to get on with the business of growing things. All of a sudden the leaves are out, the tender plants that hid during the cool weather push up through the dark earth without fear, flowers unfold and soon the seeds begin to form.
From the doorway of my cabin at this time of year I can see a swamp maple, red against the dark wall of the forest across the narrows between Cache and Snow Goose Lakes. The tops of the birches make a feathery pattern against a sky that only May can show, and down by the water’s edge where the tracks of deer are sharp in the sand, a pair of black ducks are pretty sure to be sunning themselves. Their nest is probably in the marshy place across the cove.
The crest of the tide of wings reaches Cache Lake this month. One day all is quiet and then some morning the woods are filled with song and birds are feeding all about. I like them all, but somehow I think I listen hardest for the notes of the first eastern song sparrow. While the flight is at its height I give all the time I can to watching for the travelers that stop off for a snack on their way still farther north. It is worth getting up before the sun lifts over Hunting Wolf Ridge to catch just a glimpse of a fox sparrow and hear his morning song. He may not end his journey until he has found a mate in the wild lake country of Labrador or maybe over Hudson Bay way. And on warm evenings in the twilight I can hear the beautiful silvery chorus of the vesper sparrows. Sometimes they are called ground birds or grass finches.
I recall that when I was a boy I stood in the moonlight on a spring night and heard the faint chirpings of birds high above me. That was when I learned for the first time that migrating birds fly mostly during the night and stop to rest and feed by day. Storms or head winds may delay them for a day or so at a time, but if the weather is fine they gather in great numbers at twilight, talking among themselves, and then as if by signal they lift into the sky, circle, and head away on their course. Some of the small birds make their long night flights at heights of a mile or more and all follow well-established sky trails year in and year out.
The food needed by those millions of traveling birds is one of nature’s big problems, which accounts for the fact that most of the birds keep behind the front of the spring tide line. If they arrive in the north too early there is no food for them. First the plants must grow to produce seeds for the seed eaters and the insects must hatch. The birds that can find food despite cold and even snow, start north far ahead of the first sign of spring and a few extra tough fellows spend all winter with me.
Almost any evening at twilight when not even a leaf stirs and the lake lies like a dark mirror, I will hear my first wood thrush singing back in the thickets. Later when darkness comes and the water turns to silver in the light of the full moon, the whip-poor-will begins calling from the ridge over toward Hank’s place. I can make a fairly good imitation of the call so I sometimes try to bring them a little closer.
It is about this time of spring that the white-footed mice are raising their first young. They will have two or maybe three more families before snow flies again. And the bats are busy with small ones too. Speaking of young, I have seen the first baby rabbits of the year out by the path to the spring.
With the water high and spread out over the marshes, the pike and pickerel are spawning in the shallows and if other fish didn’t eat many of the millions of eggs they lay, there wouldn’t be much fishing for any of us. The pike and pickerel are killers and the less of them the better for the game fish. I might also mention that the bass and the sunfish are making their nests in the sand in warm clear water near the shore. The male fans out the sand with his fins to form a hollow, then drives the female in to spawn. He guards the nest with great devotion, swimming back and forth over it, and woe it is to any other fish that comes near.
Every spring Hank and I go up to the beaver dam on Otter Stream to see how they’ve wintered. It is a caution how a few small animals can build a dam strong enough to control the waters of a large pond even when the spring freshets throw all their weight against it.
Beavers work just like human engineers, for some of their dams have rounded fronts while others are straight across. Now, an engineer would build a rounded front where he wanted to hold back a lot of deep water and maybe take care of quick floods. The straight dams are for quiet places where there is not much danger of extra pressure. Whether the beavers know the difference, I can’t tell you, but they build both kinds of dams and somehow I have a notion they have a pretty good idea of what they want in the kind of places they build.
I did quite a bit of whittling during the winter and the things I made include a brown bear—the kind you find in Alaska—a black duck, and a doe. However, there is nothing just like sitting out on a warm May morning and carving a piece of fragrant white pine. It must be dry so it won’t crack, and as clear of knots as can be found. Spruce carves nicely, too.
I have enjoyed whittling ever since I was a boy and have learned a few things that help to make it easier. As a matter of fact, once you get started it is not hard, and it is one of the pleasantest things you can do. Take a duck, for example. The grain should run lengthwise with the body so that the head and bill can be carved without having them break off. That is important, and the same rule holds true in carving a bear. The feet of a bear are important in making him look what he is, and if the grain is up and down the toes are apt to snap off. Take my word for it and have the grain running lengthwise from nose to tail because the legs are heavy and the snout thick, so there is not much danger of breaking them off. Now when it comes to carving a deer, horse, ox or such animals, the grain should run up and down in line with the legs, which are slender, and need a lot of fine work.
Most whittlers make the mistake of trying to carve with a dull knife. I keep a good whetstone right beside me and about every fifteen minutes I freshen up the edge and then hone it on a piece of leather or the sole of my shoe. What I want is a razor edge that will cut across the grain almost as smoothly as it does along it.
In carving an animal, getting it blocked out in the rough form of the beast is half the battle. If you can’t see the animal in real life, pictures help a lot. Learn to draw outlines and then shape up the heavier parts, leaving slender legs, ears and tails to the last. Some tools that help a lot in carving are a coping or jig saw, a sharp rasp, a good medium-coarse half-round file about ten inches long, a small rat-tail file, and the best quality pocketknife you can find. With those tools and plenty of sandpaper to finish off, you have everything you need to carve the finest pieces. Some carvings look best if you leave the knife marks as they are without any sanding, but this finish requires more skill for sandpaper rubs off many mistakes.
In carving a bear some folks like a smooth finish. I prefer to show the fur. That can be done by using the edge of a file or making fine knife cuts to get the little marks running the way the hair does. The effect, to my way of thinking, is very lifelike. It’s just a matter of how you look at it.
In case you want to try some whittling, don’t make your animal too big. A bear four and a half inches long and three inches high at the shoulder is plenty of work for any man. What is more, it is not always easy to come by good, dry carving wood. Up here I use white pine, spruce, and some birch, but there are other woods that are fine for carving. Apple wood is always treasured by experienced whittlers, and pear and cherry and mahogany are very choice, too. You can finish carvings with wax or rub them with boiled linseed oil. I’m partial to a little beeswax rubbed on with the palm of the hand, which warms the surface and gives a nice polish.
As soon as I get around to it I’m going to carve an otter out of a piece of white hawthorne that was sent to me by a friend. It seems that he had a tree that had to be cut down and knowing it was a beautiful wood he had it sawed up in chunks and dried very slowly so it didn’t check. It’s extra fine grained and almost white. Once I carved a piece of white holly, which is just about as precious as gold, and I have always wanted to glue thin strips of dark wood and white holly together to make a block for carving a zebra. I figure that would be something to have.
Now that summer is coming on I am busy making a small saddle-pack for Tripper. Wolf has been helping me carry loads in the summer for several years, so I figured Tripper should carry his share this summer. By saddle-pack I mean little canvas bags laced to a wide strap of canvas or hide that can be tied around the dog just back of his shoulders, so he can help to lug supplies. It is necessary to be careful about overloading a dog, although I have known some big fellows to carry as much as twenty pounds. Ten is load enough, and the trick is to be sure that the weight is balanced on each side of the dog so the saddle won’t slip one way or the other.
I still laugh over the time years ago when I had a big dog named Nipper who loved to chase rabbits. We were on a trip and in Nipper’s saddlebags were several pounds of white beans in paper bags. That was a mistake in the first place—no paper bags in the woods. All of a sudden Nipper spotted a rabbit on the trail ahead of us, and away he went. The flaps on the saddlebags got loose, the bags broke, and old Nipper sowed white beans all over the north country, or that’s what it seemed like to me. I spent half a day picking up individual beans, because they were precious food. I was thankful they were white.
It is getting on to the time when we will be out in the woods more, so I have been looking over my outfit and one of the things I made is a new sheath for my hand axe. For years I have used one made of heavy moosehide, but this time I decided to try something new. I got my friend the pilot to bring me in a sheet of sixteenth-inch aluminum from which I shaped a sheath the like of which has never been seen in these parts. It is no heavier than the old leather one and to my way of thinking it gives much better protection. Aluminum shapes easily and my sheath is simple to make once you cut a cardboard pattern to the size of your axe. It goes together with four rivets and has slots on the open side to hold it in place with a thong.
I’ll still use the heavy leather sheath for the large axe, for it has a copper insert on the blade side to keep the edge from cutting into the leather. It is nothing more than a strip of thin copper that fits about halfway up the inside of the sheath with small holes to lace it snug along the upper edges. Being soft metal, copper never dulls the edge of the axe and is a very effective guard without adding much weight to the sheath.
Although it is chiefly for home use, another thing I made is a long-handled bacon turner fashioned from an old kitchen fork. It is just the thing to keep your hand out of reach of the hot fat when it splatters from a pan. All I did was to file off the rivets on the fork handle and replace the handle with one sixteen inches long. I used maple and rubbed it down with boiled linseed oil. It’s the most useful thing to have around the kitchen you ever did see, and it is good for meat cakes and the like, too.
We have been talking about having an “eat-out” soon, which recalls a little grill I once saw up in northern Canada. Just two horseshoes joined by two rods welded to the sides of the shoes. Mighty fine for broiling or holding a pot over a picnic fire, but too heavy to carry on a trip where weight counts.
Every year about this time I make a trip up river to see what’s going on at the bear den on Skeleton Ridge. There has been a bear family in that den off and on for many years. I hiked up to the carry on a nice warm day about the middle of the month and found a good spot on a rise that looks straight across to the ridge and on beyond to Faraway See Hill, standing clear and sharp high above the dark forest. Expecting to see some action, I took along the old spyglass that used to belong to my grandfather who was a seafaring man. Sure enough the first look gave me a chuckle. The old mother bear was sunning herself at the mouth of the den and out in front where the earth was warm the two little cubs were playing. Not much bigger than good-sized ground hogs, they were, and having a good time romping around. Once they got so wild they walked all over their mother’s head and quick as a flash she gave them a cuff that sent them rolling over and over. But that didn’t bother those young fellows more than a minute. In no time they were at it again and one knocked the other over the edge of the bank and he slid down only to come scrambling up for more.
Standing on their hind legs they boxed and wrestled for a while and then all of a sudden quit that game and started climbing a little pine tree, one nipping at the heels of the fellow above. The way they played out on the end of a limb looked like sudden death to me, but never a fall did they have. After a spell they got tuckered out, scrambled down and curled up in a sunny spot near their mother, one with his little black head on the neck of the other.
On my way home I went down to the river to catch a mess of trout for supper. I nearly always have my rod along at this time of year and never take more than I can eat in a day. I got one two-pound squaretail that made my mouth water. I tap fish on the head when I pull them out, which is the right thing to do.
On the way back to the cabin I spotted a nice patch of cinnamon ferns and picked a hatful for supper. Mighty good food when they are young and tender in the fiddlehead stage. You just boil them with a little salt, the way you cook spinach. I like a touch of hot bacon fat on mine, and a few drops of vinegar. They’re good cold, too, for salad.
As soon as I came out into the clearing I saw Hank and Chief Tibeash sitting down by the lake. They had come over to talk about the canoe trip we take every summer so that the Chief can look over the trapping country for next fall. The Chief always likes to be doing something, so while he and Hank waited for me he made a sling stick, a very old Indian game, to show Hank that it was better than a slingshot. It seems the Chief was a champion sling stick shot when he was a boy and the way he can throw a stone with that contraption is something to see.
He started by whittling out a tapering birch stick about two feet long with a tip that is flat on one side and about three quarters of an inch wide. The handle was a little smaller than a broomstick. He told Hank that hickory, ash, or maple make good sticks, but that pine or spruce is too soft. The lighter the stick the better. The Chief cut notches on the narrow edges of the tip and just below made a shallow hollow to hold the stone.
When he finished the handle and smoothed it down with the sharp edge of a scrap of broken glass, he tied a flat moose-hide thong to the notched tip and made a loop on the end just opposite where he would hold the stick. To load the sling the Chief put a small stone in the hollow under the thong at the tip, holding the loop down with the thumb of his throwing hand. He then swung the stick back over his shoulder in much the same way a fisherman handles a bait rod in casting. At the end of the cast when his arm came up high he let go the thong and the stone sailed far out on the lake.
The Chief says you can use sling sticks to shoot arrows, too. The only change is to tie about ten inches of strong cord with a knot in the end to the loop. The arrows are exactly the same as you use with a bow, except that you cut a little notch in the shaft about six inches below the head to catch the knotted string. To shoot arrows you throw from the side at hip height, holding the end of the arrow with the left hand and pulling it back hard before snapping the stick forward with the right.
While the Chief was working on his stick, Hank sat on a log twisting grass blades. I couldn’t make out what he was up to for a while, but soon he got down on his hands and knees and began crawling around with his nose to the ground and holding something to his eye. It seems that when he was young he used to twist a grass blade into a little loop just big enough to hold a drop of water, which makes a fairly good magnifying glass. Hank claims a drop of dew, which is sure to be clear and clean, makes the best kind. The loop should be about an eighth of an inch in diameter. If you don’t get just the right amount of water in the drop it produces the opposite effect of a magnifying glass and makes everything look very small. I think a paper clip twisted up to a loop would make a good one.
Getting back to that canoe trip I mentioned before I got off the trail talking sling sticks, we generally go when the black flies and mosquitoes thin out. Before we start this year I have to make myself a new stern paddle. Canoe paddles are just like shoes—they work best when they fit right, and I like to make my own. Spruce is best for open lake work where you have plenty of water, but maple or ash are the woods for rapids and shallow water where you may hit rocks. The best length for a stern paddle is the height of your shoulder, and for the bow one that comes up to your eye level. Because you steer with the stern paddle it helps to have the blade a little wider than the bow paddle. The lighter they are the better, because in steady traveling a good canoeman dips his paddle about twenty-five times a minute and that is over 1,500 strokes an hour. When you are working like that for hours at a stretch just an ounce in weight makes a big difference. I have a favorite spruce stern paddle that weighs just fourteen ounces and I have worked it all day without being tired at sundown.
Paddles remind me of people: some of them are stiff and don’t seem to want to help a fellow, but others are light and lively and bend just enough to give you that extra thrust at the end of the stroke. A good one slides out of the water as quietly and smoothly as a beaver. Paddles can be light yet very strong if you know how to shape them. The section of the handle where it joins the shoulder of the blade is a spot that takes a lot of punishing strain. That is why you should carry the thickness of the shaft part way down the center of the blade, tapering off gradually toward the edges. This gives strength in the center and at the same time lets the blade cut the water cleanly.
I have seen men paddle as though they were trying to churn the lake into a froth. A good canoeman leaves only a smooth oily whirl of water and a wake that dies out quickly. He hardly makes a sound. He keeps his right arm fairly straight and stiff, with the left arm slightly bent, and swings his body forward on the driving stroke, which gives power that can’t be got any other way.
What I’m trying to say is that you make your body from the waist up do most of the work, using the arms almost as if they were fixed brackets to hold the paddle in the right position. If there is no canoe handy you can practice by sitting on a log or box. The short Indian stroke is the secret of handling a canoe with the least labor.
A spruce board that has a good straight grain and is free of knots is the right stock for a light paddle. Have it plenty long, eight inches wide and near the bottom about two inches thick so you will have lots of room to work. Lay out the shape of the paddle and set the proper measurement for length according to who is to use it. Then saw out the rough outline, leaving room on all sides for finishing to the right size. A vise is a help and a drawknife makes the job a downright pleasure. You can finish off with a small plane and then sandpaper to a glass-smooth surface. It can’t be too smooth, for a fine finish makes for easy paddling. Then varnish with two coats of spar varnish, using very fine sandpaper between coats when the first is two days dry. If you follow that plan you will have a good paddle, and if it is maple it ought not to weigh more than two pounds.
Just a word about caring for paddles. Don’t abuse them by pushing against rocks or the bottom, which spoils the clean, thin edge that means so much for quiet and powerful paddling. Always have an extra paddle for you can’t tell when one will break. In rough water, shallow streams, or rapids use your maple paddle. Spruce is not tough enough for that kind of work. And don’t leave your paddles lying in the sun. Just remember a good workman has the right kind of tool for each job and if he loves his work he’ll take good care of his tools. That’s the idea with paddles, too. I almost forgot to say that I like the way some Indians cut little grooves in the handle to fit the three middle fingers, which gives a firm grip. I have one paddle I decorated with the tracks of moose and wolf, and another that has a drawing of an unmapped lake.
I got so interested talking to Hank and the Chief about our trip that after they left I began going over my gear, checking on supplies and the like. I guess I don’t have to tell you that the most important thing in the woods is having something to start a fire with. Matches are the first thing I think of and how to keep them dry is the next. Of course at home, here in the cabin, I keep them in covered tin cans so the mice can’t get at them and start a fire. In the woods you can carry them in tightly corked bottles, which is all right except that the glass is apt to break. The best trick I know is to waterproof the matches. The way to do it is to melt up old candle stubs or wax in a can set in boiling water so the melted wax won’t catch fire, and pour the liquid wax over layer after layer of matches in their box until finally the matches are sealed in a cake of wax. After that you could drop them in the snow or the lake and still have good dry matches to be dug out when you need them most. Being waxed they burn longer and are fine in a wind or wet weather. But they ought to be kept in a covered tin even on the trail, for if there is anything mice, squirrels and chipmunks love, it’s wax.
Sitting around the campfire one night while I cooked some biscuits we got to talking about a fine outdoor oven I learned to build, when I was a young fellow, on the north shore of the St. Lawrence River. Many of the French people who live in that part of the country like the old ways of doing things and some still bake their bread in outdoor ovens.
The French Canadian ovens, made of clay or mortar on a foundation of stone or cedar logs, are built waist-high for easy working. On top of the foundation they make a floor of the same clay or mortar that is used for the roof of the oven. Being several inches thick, the floor can be laid on a log foundation without danger of fire damage, though I figure a stone is best and not so likely to sag and crack the oven.
After the floor is dry you are ready to begin work on the oven, which is about four feet long, two feet high and maybe two and a half feet wide at the bottom. To form the arched roof you can either pile up sand to the right shape or cut a barrel in half and lay on the mortar to a thickness of about eight inches. Before doing that, however, you place a short smooth log about as big as a stovepipe at one end of the form to keep an opening for the chimney. The ends of these ovens are closed in with thick walls of mortar, leaving an arched or oblong door eighteen inches wide and a foot high at the front. While in use this door can be closed with a flat rock or board sealed with clay so that none of the heat will be lost. A fancy oven can have an iron door on hinges. The chimney log, by the way, is pulled out while the mortar is still slightly soft.
When the mortar has dried thoroughly, which requires several days, the inside form can be removed. If sand was used it can be pulled out through the door with a hoe. In the case of a half barrel, you just light a fire and let it burn out the barrel, being careful to start with a small fire and let the barrel catch on slowly after the wood is well heated through. This is to prevent cracking the roof if any dampness is left in the mortar.
To bake a batch of bread the first step is to start a hot fire in the oven with the chimney open. The fire is kept going for several hours until the oven is heated through. Then the fire is raked out and in goes the bread, which bakes best in single-loaf pans. The chimney is then sealed with a close fitting board or flat stone and the oven door closed. The heat stored in the heavy floor and walls of the oven does the rest. According to Hank you can’t beat that kind of bread. I will take his word, for he knows good food. It makes my mouth water to think of a thick brown crust fresh from a hot loaf and spread thick with good country butter.
Partridges—the Indians call them Ben-asee—are drumming and I hear them almost every day and now and then after dark. It begins with a thumping sound and then the drumming begins, slowly at first, then faster and faster, until it becomes a strange rolling beat. The sound is made by the quick motion of the wings against the air and it’s a wonderful sight to watch a cock partridge standing on a mossy log in dappled sunlight with his tail spread wide and low, his head high and the ruff lifted, flashing his wings in the wild drumming ceremony. One of the strange things about partridge drumming is that it fools the best of woodsmen. Often when you go straight to the place where you think the sound starts you find that it is either to one side or the other, and like as not much farther away than you thought.
The best partridge country around here is close to Jumping Sand Spring, which is just off the trail on the way to the settlement. Chief Tibeash showed it to me years ago and I never fail to stop by that clear cold spring on my trips out. The Indians have used it for generations and the great canoe birch that rises above the spring is covered with messages and marks they left on their travels.
When you come to a stand of pine where the trail joins an old tote road along which pale green grass grows between two red lines of dry pine spills that have settled in the shallowed ruts, you are near Jumping Sand Spring. I never have known what it is about a spring that makes a man want to keep its location to himself. Maybe it’s just because he wants to feel that it is his own. But that’s the way it is with most of them, so the path to Jumping Sand Spring has no blaze to mark it. You know it by an old pine, where you turn sharp left, and walk down a short slope into a clearing where the fireweed blooms in August. Right there you are more than likely to flush a partridge, be it spring or fall, for the cover is right for them and the feeding is to their liking. Standing there by the spring where the woods thin out toward a swamp, you can look west across Caterwaul Creek to Lobstick Hill, which is close to the portage to Megusee Lake. It is fine country.
