Wild sports in the South; or, The camp-fires of the Everglades

Front matter

1 ;ii4iir^ r

IIP /I

¥ttD SPORTS IN THE SOUTH;

Preface

The larger portion of the Sketches contained in this volume were contributions made by the Author to " The Spirit of the Times," a few years ago, under the title of " Camp-Fire Stories," and as some of them have been floating about in other papers, this statement seems necessary, lest the reader may regard these "twice-told tales" as lacking in originality.

Nothing more is claimed for this volume than that it contains pleasant reminiscences of hunting life and adventure in the peninsula of Florida, and counterparts of tales, some of them remembered, some of them fancied, that frontier hunters tell when assembled at night around their camp-fires.

The Author does not ask that each story shall be regarded as having occurred literally as written ; but he believes the spirit of the tales, the description of natural scenery, and the fragments of Indian history to be correct, and he has carefully striven not to offend the keen observation and long experience of his hunting comrades at the South whose eyes will scrutinize these pages, by any allusion to natural history which is not exactly true. If the book will recall the Author pleasantly to their minds, or awaken the remembrance of grand old sports and merry camp-fires in the States of the South, its object is attained.

Contents

PAOB

Introductory, ^

A Bear in the Camp, 40

Chapter I. Introductory

" flourish, hidden deep in fern, Old oak I love thee well, A thousand thanks for what I learn, And what remains to tell."

Tennyson.

A GOODLY creation is a tree ! Its mast-like trunk, supporting a thousand branches that weave and interweave, fretting the "blue air with their tracery; lithe to the wind, stubborn to the storm, the pUlars bend but do not break, in the long-dra-vvn leafy aisles of God's cathedral. Its roots, far-reaching, with tiny fibres probe the earth for moisture, and send the life-blood through the arteries to the fragrant blossoms and the topmost leavps that " clap their little hands in glee with one continuous sound." To its shadow not only the beasts of the field come for shelter, but millions of insects seek a home under the rough folds of its bark, or

■weave their cradles in its rocking boughs. On its branches the birds build their nests, and in its hollows the squirrel and the hooting owl conceal their young, and the wild bee stores its sweets, while both day and night the buds breathe their perfume, and the wind, the rustling leaves, and its feathered guests, chant an anthem of praise.

If it be a pleasant thing to see one plant thus munificently endowed, how does it delight the heart to look down the forest, where trees of every hue and form stand in countless numbers, and their shade, with its perpetual twilight, makes a new climate, where new flora gem the sheltered earth, where parasite plants and vines festoon the trees with corridors, gay with flowers, or purple with clustered fruit, where the moss takes the place of grass, and the last year's leaves fill the hollows — where the wild bird and timid game make their home, and gambol in the unrestrained indulgence of natural instincts ! To this scene add the brook cluttered with stones and filled with leaves, the open river tenanted with aquatic birds, and making vistas in the woods, and, lastly, the deep blue of the sea, fringed with the white of the breakers, and complaining of its limits, and you will have the view that is to be met in nearly every sea-coast forest in the land. But in the woods of the far southern States^ and more particularly in the Florida peninsula, Nature develops new beauties, and excites further thoughts of praise to its Creator.

There simmer first unfauld her robes, And there they langest tarry,

TUltoET HUJSTING. 11

bringing in her train the fragrance of the earth, with the colors of the sky, decking her tallest trees with flowers proportioned to their grandeur. There the lakes and rivers are broad and deep, and teem with curious animal life. There the birds of the air are painted with crimson, and sing in dialects consonant with the voluptuous clime. There the great queen lily rides the lagoon, where drooping moss from the live oaks so curtain its retreat that no eye ever sees it but the wild bird's, and there the earth is so prolific of her fruits that there is abundance for all the crowded forest. No single life is forgotten, and the minute insect that feeds on the pollen of the tiger lily, lives as abundantly as the alligator that takes his toll from the whole animal creation.

Thus from year to year have the seasons come and gone ; animal and vegetable life has reached its limit of years, has fallen and decayed, and wealth that would have enriched a nation has only formed the subsoil for anotlier age, nor eye of man has seen, nor pen of man has told, the wonders of that inner forest that was barred by nature and the Seminole from the civilized world.

Under such a wood, near where the Stinhatchee River empties its dark waters into the Gulf of Mexico, at Deadman's Bay, the grey light came to my eyes as I lay wrapped in my blanket, by the smoldering camp-fire, a few years ago. Hunters and negroes were all still buried in dreams, and the weary hounds lay stretched around indiscriminately among the sleepers. No tent was raised, for the elements required none, though a screen of boughs had been built as a break-wind, and to keep the reflected heat near the fire. Here and there were scattered accoutrements, or the relics of the last night's meal, feathers of birds, skins of beasts, antlers of deer. The serried leaf of the palmetto fringed us around like a hedge, and above us the tassels of the pine trees just began to be discernible against the mornmg sky. Once in a whUe a bird twittered in the trees, now and then a sound like dropping rain was heard, where some animal shook the dew-laden branches. All else was still, save the quiet murmur of the sea on the beach, some little distance off. Its low roar lulled me ; I shut my eyes to the coming dawn, and turned over in my blanket. How pleasant is that second sleep at the grey twilight !

I know not how long I slept ; but when I awoke the negroes had rekindled the fire, and a pleasant fragrance of cooking meats mingled with the pine scent of the forest. I started to my feet, and taking my gun, sauntered down the bank of the river, partly for a walk, and partly to search for game. The air was clear and cool, and all nature seemed to be coming forth to salute the day. The quail whistled in the distance, the grey and fox squirrels leaped from bough to bough, or half descending the great trunks of the oak trees, challenged with pert gestures the passers-by. Long trains of cormorants sailed overhead to their feeding grounds, and with measured beat the ibis and heron were slowly passing seaward. I saw the ducks feeding on the margins of the river, and the various tribes of woodpeckers, jays.

TURKEY HUNTING. 13

and hawks, flitting among the trees ; but noi\e of these excited my attention : they were rather the constant sights that one sees without regarding. At length the gobble of a turkey came faintly on the air. I have heard that sound often before, and trust to hear it many times hereafter, but I can never listen to its first clear note without a flutter of delight, that I verily believe is greater far than that of its sweetheart, as she listens from the jungle to this the loud love-call of her mate. It apparently does not strike the ear, but the heart, and then tingles outward through every nerve. There may be something in this of early association, but it is one of the pleasantest that a man has in this world, and which so often makes him rich when he has never a sou. I stoj^ped short and listened for a repetition of the sound, to tell from what direction it came, and also for any answer that might come back, as by directing my course toward the latter I could intercept the cock when he should take his course. The hundred little beings that talked around me in their various tongues were all speaking. The forest that I thought so still, was now, when attentively listening, full of life. How distinctly now came the booming of the sea, and the distant tap of the ivory-billed woodpecker ! Yet I could hear no cluck of hen, or responsive gobble of the younger cocks of the brood. Again the call was repeated. First a low chuckle, and then the rich guttural vowels poured out in a hurried volume.

It domineers over every other sound by reason of its peculiarity. There is no manner of representing it in language, tliough the negroes have a song that ends in a turkey chorus, which might be written thus : Chug-u-logga, chug-u-logga, chug-u-loggachug. In the liquid negro patois it is not dissimilar. Having taken the bearings of the turkey by his sound, and mentally estimated his distance, I ran on ahead, during a time equal to the interval between his calls, and then stopped and listened. In a moment the call resounded through the woods near me. I walked carefully forward, sheltering myself behind clumps of alders and trunks of trees, and having gone what I thought was a sufficient distance, waited and watched attentively. Again the note sounded, but it seemed in the air. I cast ray eye upward, and there, perched on the dead and topmost boughs of a tall sycamore, from whence he could overlook the surrounding forest, stood my friend. His erect and slender form was drawn ujd to its full height, his little head turned quickly to the right and the left as he surveyed the forest below him, lit up by the same early sun that was burnishing his own glossy breast. I could imagine the view he was eying, and it must have been the conscious pride of a chieftain viewing his native heaths and hills that drew his form to such stately proportions. From where he sat he overlooked river and lake, broad lagoon and open ocean, and hundreds of low lying islands ; he saw savannahs covered with reeds and osiers, and shady with taperiug canes, where bred the crab, and trailed the snail and centiped ; he heard the pattering rain of pecan and of beech-nuts on the upland,

TUKKEY HUNTING. 15

and saw the pawpaw bear its luscious fruit ; shady glens and pools of water invited to repose, and in fancy's eye his lazy harem lay beneath those trees, shuffling with their wings the clear white sand of the hummocks that bounded the sea. All this he saw, and then swelling his throat, he sent forth his clear alarm, herald of the morn, and gathering cry of his clan.

I understood his feeling, and yet raising my rifle I took aim at him (strange contrariety of man) and fired. A half-uttered gobble was suppressed, and spreading his wings he sailed away in a slanting direction. " Missed," I ejaculated, as I saw him skating along like a hawk. Just then, without an indication, he rolled over in the air and came crashing through the boughs of the pine trees to the earth.

I ran to my prize. His heavy beard and long spurs showed him to be an old gobbler, probably one of those lonely birds that, expatriating themselves from their flocks, wander about in self-doomed celibacy. Throwing my game over my shoulders, I returned to camjD and to breakfast, well contented with my success.

If the reader is desirous of knowing what is a wild turkey, by turning to Audubon's, Wilson's, or Bonaparte's Ornithology, he will discover it to be of the gallinaceous order, with conical papilla on the forehead, neck corrugated, beset with cavernous caruncles, frontal caruncle blue and red, and with scutellate toes, scabrous above and papillas beneath, etc. After pondering on Ihis description he may suspect that his ideas on tho subject may be rather confused, he may doubt if he would be able to sketch the bird from the description given, and may desire to hear it described' in simpler language.

If so, let him imagine a full-grown black turkey cock of the domestic species made shy and cautious in its movements, restless with its head and neck, high stepping over obstacles with its bare, sinewy legs, and erect, slender and game-like in its bearing. The wild turkey is to its barnyard kinsman what the racehorse is to the carthorse. See him in the early morn as he stands on some elevation, and welcomes the dawn, and announces to his family his movements for the day. His scarlet wattles lie pendent on a neck that one moment curves like a swan's and in another is erect like a crane's ; his comb is a soldier's plume, his eye is full and hazel black, gleaming with something of a human look from his shapely head, covered by the wiinkles of skin and a few scattered hairs, and tinged with blue and red. His neck swells very gradually to his body, and is burnished with a gloss of brown and gold that varies with every light. There is no pomposity or clumsiness about his air ; on the contrary, his whole manners are those of an accomplished gallant and a warrior.

You see him among the hens. Their gentle looks are on him, and they follow his unspoken directions Avith perfect readiness. They ramble hither and thither as fancy leads them beneath the wild plum-trees, picking the stray fruit that has ripened before its season

TURKEY HUNTING. 17

and fallen to the ground, then a russet persimmon or a choice pecan-nut shaken down by last night's wind. Their leader casts his eye from side to side, scanning everything that moves. Now a caressing love-note is uttered to his favorite hen ; then, drawing himself to his full height, he gives a glance of scrutiny into the woods ahead of him, where the little pine trees open an extended vision. Passing a rotten stump, with a stroke of his stalwart leg and claws he tears down the rotten bark. A half inclination of the head, more graceful than that of any gentleman, defers to the nearest hen a curd-white grub that has rolled out from the wood, and with a low cluck of acknowledgment she picks it up. !N"ow with one foot half raised, he searches for the cause of a sudden noise. Ah ! it was only that opossum, and the turkeys care little for him when they are in a flock together, and now in passing he leaps up and catches a beetle that was crawling in a bush above him, now a may-apple, then a spider or plethoric tadpole stranded in the hollow of the receding waters, are all espied by these wandering gipsies, and immediately appropriated. At length they reach the banks of a river; there is a little hurry among the young hens. They don't like large streams : there are alligators and garfish in the water, and wild-cats and eagles prowling around the banks, yet the river is to be crossed, and they are not half so good at flying as they are at running. Indeed they would walk round the head of it, had they not learned that all Florida rivers connect, in some way, one with another. As it is, they walk up and down a little while on the high bank, clucking and purring, with an occasional pick at some misplaced feather, just as an old lady smooths down her apron before expressing any decided opinion. The cock may occasionally spread his fan if the sun shines brightly where he stands, and utter his loud thrumming sounds like the roll of a drum. He has eyed for some minutes a low-limbed juniper tree, standing near, and presently, after much examination, flits into it. Up go the hens in succession, and from the juniper they all fly to the upper limbs of a dead cotton-wood standing hard by. There is a continuation of the duckings and notes of preparation, and then with the gobbler in the van, they launch themselves out in the air, and with broad extended pinions float in a slanting direction across the river, landing on the opposite side, at the edge of the underbrush, and are immediately lost to view.

I remember a pretty incident in connection with a turkey hen falling under my own eye, demonstrating a knowledge of character on her part.

I had taken my stand on the end of St. Rosas Island, ofl" Pensacola, to watch for deer that the hounds were driving. After my arrival I noticed a turkey hen come skimming to the ground, and presently walk toward a knoll of grass a few yards from my place of concealment. Her anxious look and her feigned attitude of indifference immediately showed me that she was near her nest, and taking a little pocket spy-glass I carried with me to watch the water channels, I presently saw

TUBKET HUNTING. 119

her settle herself down among some low willows, until I could discern nothing but her head.

Shortly afterward a fox came by, and coming across the trail of the turkey he turned short about, and throwing up his sharp nose, scented the different spears of grass the bird had touched, and then taking up her trail, commenced following it slowly and cautiously toward where she was sitting. "With noiseless foot and undulating body he wound along in the trail, when suddenly, to my surprise, I saw the turkey hen leave her willow clump, and returning on her own trail, walk directly toward the fox. She picked hither and thither, in a nonchalant manner, and when within some ten or fifteen yards of her enemy, who had crouched in the sparse grass when he first saw her coming, she diverged slowly to the right, and the fox, as she turned aside, recommenced his crawlings, keeping his eye on the bird and leaving the trail he had been previously following. In this way they progressed some hundred yards in a direction contrary to her nest, when coming near a low tree, with a soft chuckle, which seemed to say, as plain as accent could make it, " what a fool you are," she flitted up in the tree.

The fox being then on open ground, at once knew himself discovered, and raising from his crouching position, after one or two longing looks, and a whimper of disappomtment, trotted over the sandhills, and was lost to sight.

Chapter II. The Camp Fiee

*' Under the shore his boat was tied, And all her listless crew Watched the grey aljiigator slide Into the still bayoii."

LOXaFELLOW.

" Turkey buzzard ?" sarcastically cried my friend and hunting comrade, Poke, as, returning to camp, I laid my game down, and seated myself by the blanket that was serving for a table, and around which Poke, the hunter Mike, and the two negro boys were busy at their breakfast.

" Spring turkey ?" inquired Mike, in delicate allusion to the age of my turkey.

It was generally the habit of the party to quiz each other at every success, and even mishaps were treated as sources of amusement.

" Da is har nuff to pizen all Floridy," said Scipio Africanus, raising the long tassel of beard hanging at the turkey's breast.

" Pooh !" said Poke, " I don't believe in that nonsense ; it wouldn't kill a cat."

" Jis you try him, da's all; ya cut em up fine, and put um in de grog or de bread, and don't he work um ? Din't ole Ma'm Lize, on de Robinson plantation, take off Maussa Robinson? She be real nigger witch! Ole man, he took sick, and all ee doctors in Swanna couldn't cure him all winter, an' in de spring he die ob turkey beard. Dat's Gospel !"

" You nigga, mussen come cooking 'fore our fire, or we be habin' turkey beard too," retorts Caesar, as with his black muscular arms, bare to the shoulder, he elbowed his darky brother aside to put a dish of meat before the party.

The sight of the smoking food brought every man's thoughts and fingers to the subject before him. The huge roll of cookery smelled good, but was by no means comely to look at. As layer after layer of green leaves were pulled off, there presently rolled out what might have been a pig in civilized life, but which we immediately recognized as an oppossum. His skin and hair adhered to the wrappings that had been bound around him, and which kept him from the ashes and the burning coals, and nothing now remained but the steamy fat little carcass that would have made a vegetarian forego his creed. Added to this there Avas a venison steak and some corn-bread, and Poke had a canteen of whisky hid away (the sensual dog!) and we feasted like kings, or rather as kings are supposed to feast, with great good humor and monstrous appetites, but which I verily suspect kings rarely have. Each one pulled at the 'possum, or cut strips from the venison, as he liked, and as fast as one cake was eaten, another would be ready on the stone in front of the fire. Beyond the cu'cle sat the hounds, awaiting, with expressive attitude, the stray bits that were handed them from time to time ; and joke, and tales, and future plans, were one by one rehearsed with laugh and hopeful wishes.

Poke was a jolly fellow. A critical judge of character might have said he was a little lazy, but none of us were critical, and who could blame a man who never lost his temper in all his life ? His face was like an orange, so full and gentle, and the soft flaxen curls that clustered tight around his head were like a child's. A shrewd observer, he never saw a leaf changing color but he inquired the reason, and with his gentle air read human character with great facility. He seemed to know everything, medicine, and the arts, and the commonest little handicraft, and the greatest human theories, and he would discourse up to his waist in a miry slough upon the beauties of some aquatic plant as gracefully as in a parlor on the color of a painting. His true name was Earnest Pollock. His acquaintances called him Doctor, for he had studied medicine at Paris ; the newspapers call him the Honorable Mr. Pollock, for he had once been appointed bearer of dispatches to Russia : I called him Poke, for I loved him. Poke was short in stature, and ready to talk. In this respect he was the counterpart of Mike, or Michael Hone, or Mike the Spook, as he was termed by different classes of people. Mike was gaunt, though not over tall, slow in his motions, and very quiet

THE CAMP FIEE. 23

in whatever he did. There was no pretension or ostentation about him, and so far did he carry this negative virtue, that he never mentioned himself if he could avoid it, and no one could tell his intentions or anticipate his motives until the act was done. A leather dress, and a leather cap, the same colored shoes and belt, with a blue flannel shirt, buttoned in front by two polished alligator's teeth, was the invariable costume of the hunter. Once he had a cabin at Tampa, where he would come and go with such uncertainty that he obtained the name of Mike the Spook. Thence, at evening, when the settlers with anxious eye regarded the forest that environed them, dreading the whoop of the Seminole on every wind, Mike would flit into the shadow, and begone a month or more, appearing again on the limits of the peninsula at Fort Dallas. The great interior wilderness was his home, and in its solitudes he had acquired his taciturnity. His voice was low and singularly musical. He might not speak for hours, the indication of his finger and the expression of his countenance being sufficient for all ordinary language, yet when he did, his tone was as efiective as a command. The villagers at Micanopy called him Injun Mike, and said they never saw him come or go but in a storm, and they, hunters as they were, seemed afraid of his reckless will and strong arm.

Mike acted as guide in our wildwood roamings. He had undertaken it partly from a liking for me, and partly, as I suspected, from mere curiosity to see the Doctor and myself in the woods, for he would sometimes sit by the hour in his silent way, watching our motions and conversation. He never added a word, but if his opinion was asked, and the subject one that had been in the range of his observation, he answered the querist in the simplest manner. There he sat by the fire that morning ; I remember him as if painted before me. His mahogany face wrinkled in kindly lines, and his chin covered by a long, thin beard. He was smoking in the Spanish fashion, rolling cigarettes from dried leaves across his knees, and his quizzical eye wandered over us with a considering look, as though we were children. A big, black and dun hound, with a melancholy face, stood beside him ; it was said either of them could track a bear by the scent. He had acquired the Indian habit of inhaling smoke for some minutes, and then driving it out of his mouth and nostrils in dense volumes, as a whale fills his lungs with water, and then spouts it into the air.

The negro boys, Scipio and Caesar, regarded him with feelings of respectful veneration. He excelled them in all their own handicraft. He knew every tree in the woods, and its uses ; the habits of wild game, vegetable poisons, and the best manner of cooking ; he could swim, ride, hunt, and shoot better than they. He had a close acquaintance with the Indians, and, the boys said, witli the devil, and therefore there was a superstitious awe in regard to him, that was exhibited to no one else.

Besides the human members of our party, there were a dozen dogs of high and low degree. Mike had two ;

they were long-eared, sad-looking hounds, with fierce eyes. I had a couple ; one was a hound, and one a terrier. The negroes had four or five ; you could not tell precisely how many, for they would appear and disappear like sprites, and sometimes one would be gone for a week or more, and then come to light at the most unexpected moment. The Doctor had one, and his name was Wag. Now there were two ways of seeing this dog, and therefore two ways of describing it. If he should be regarded through the Doctor's eyes, he was a Gelert in courage, of the sagacity of a fox, and so graceful and beautiful, and of such winning ways, that all the world loved him. But anf one else in speaking of him would have called him a rusty, ragged, ill-tempered mongrel, with an elfish disposition for mischief. He stole our food, he frightened our game, he howled away our sleep, and whenever he saw vengeance coming he slunk away to his master's protection. He knew he did evil, and, with one eye on his pursuer, and his tail wagging, he would stand until standing was no longer safe, and then run for his life. Why the Doctor loved that dog I never could divine. He said he found him when a pup, and rescued him from some boys who had a rope around his neck preparatory to givmg him a swmg; if so, his humanity brought sad discredit on the canine race.

It is beyond the scope of my story to describe the toils and successes of each day in the campaign which had commenced that morning. Scenes of hourly interest to the actor, and adventures which to the hunter and

Zb WILD BPOKTS IN THE SOUTH.

naturalist would be beyond expression exciting, would be dull to the reader. Therefore, in a long winter's trip, that extended from the Suwanee River almost to Okechobee Lake, I can only recall those scenes that remained most strongly on my mind after the lapse of months, and which sometimes, when my brain is most active, will come ^ip to me in my dreams, when in sleep I hear the wash of waves and the ringing music of hounds and guns, and the frantic rush of the chase in the deep everglades of the Seminoles. Yet there are many little minutiae of an extended hunt to explain, as they form the regular duties of camp life.

After the breakfast has been dispatched, the one saucepan, one coffee-pot, and two tin coffee cups, are neatly cleaned, the two little vagabond horses which are possessed by the party are caught and led uj) with leading ropes around their necks. They are vicious, ragged-looking little beasts, but invaluable as pack-horses. On their backs we strap a couple of blankets folded in half; over that a little open frame-work, in which and to which we may fasten anything that is to be carried. This novel pack-saddle resembles a kitchen chair turned upside down. In it is put the little box containing our salt, pepper, vinegar, cloves, lard, etc., little matters, but of great use — we familiarly called the box*' the kitchen;'' also a small keg of powder, a bag of shot, another of bullets, caps, needles, thread, scissors, etc., then a joint of venison, or a turkey, or any article of food, the Doctor's trophies, skins of birds, skulls of animals, or strange flowers or sketches. Then the coffee-pot, frying-pan, etc., are hung on the perpendicular legs of the saddle, two axes are strapped to the sides, and the ponies move off after making two or three malicious kicks at the dogs and bystanders. Mike leads the van with a cat-like motion, his long rifle lymg on his arm, and followed by his dogs. I generally came next in line, then the negroes and the ponies, and then the Doctor. We passed for the most of our tune through an open pine country with a sandy soil. Here and there a grove of closer vegetation could be seen, and now and then a pool of water, surrounded by o.aks and cypress, but generally the long vistas of slender trees would only be interrupted by some climbing plant, or the high knolls that traversed the country, following the general course of the drainage of the water. We only made one march a day of about eight hours, and then selecting some spot for the beauty of its location, or the abundance of its game, we pitched our camp, built our fire, turned out our horses, that is to say our ponies, and made ourselves as much at home as though we never expected to change. There were many days that we never broke up our camp, for the great abundance of game would entice us to stay, and then our resting-place gradually assumed a very comfortable appearance. A tent of boughs carpeted with skins, a a substantial fire, a well-stored larder, a pine slab table, and the Doctor, half reclining, smoking his pipe, and watching the frying joint, lest Wag should steal it, formed an agreeable picture of contentment in low life, and made one marvel how few are the necessaries in this world essential to our happiness.