St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1894-08-23

streams and is incorporated to pre-
serve the region from devastation,
to protect game and to develop the
property by opening up new trails
and building camps. No hunting of
deer is allowed, and fishing is allow
ed by purchasing permits limited to
one day. Deer are therefore very
plenty around the lakes, and mine
host" Munroe Holt of St. Hubert's
Inn Cottage saw % on Upper Au-
sable Lake one day somewha earlier
in the season. Mr.. Holt has achiev-
ed further fame by catching the
largest lake trout of the season. The
fish tipped the beam of a Fairbanks
scale at the seven pound notch. The
largest speckled or brook trout
caught here this year weighed three
pounds and - ounces. Both the
Upper and Lower Ausable lakes are
in the Reserve and are we'll stocked
with trout. Many of the city folks
are excellent fishermen and Mr..
Hoffman of Philadelphia returned
from the lower lake one day last
week with nine pounds of trout that
had risen for his flies.
The entrance of the reserve is only
a few rods from St. Hubert's Inn
and a macadam;zed road extends
three miles through the woods to
Lower Ausable Lake. Here one takes
a guide for the trip through the
lakes. The lower lake much resem-
bles Willoughby Lake and high
mountain cliffs tower several thou
sand feet above the dark water on
both sides. The day we made the
trip up the lakes heron served as
our pilot for short distance, and
young eagles screamed and whistled
on the top of the inaccessible cliffs.
At the upper end of the lake is cave
that extends hundreds of feet into
the mountains. 1t is called the ice
cave, as ice never melts here even at
its entrance and tons Of frozen water
cover the impenetrable depths.
Leaving the Lower Ausable an easy
trail of one mile takes US to the up
per lake. This lake is wider than
the other and the mountains though
more distant are no less grand.
Charles Dudley Warner has said of it
that, Sin the sweep of its wooded
shores and the lovely contour of the
lofty mountains that guard it, this
lake is probably the most charming
our greatest travellers and keenest
observers his opinion is of more value
than guide books or folders. Thir-
teen log cabin camps dot the shores
Of the lake and are the property of
the authorized guides of the reserve.
A night spent in one of these pictur-
esque camps with fr-balsam bows
for bed and pile of blazing logs
for fire is an experience never to be
forgotten. And meal of trout with
griddle cakes for desert convinces
one that the Adirondack guide is a
most versa tile and accomplished
genius.
But the guides do not take kindly
to these reserves and private hunt
ing grounds. They would prefer the
good old times that "Old Mountain
Phelps tells about when deer and
speckled trout were as plenty as
mosquitoes in a damp day in July"
The deer, bears, panthers, and
other wild animals retreated into the
depths of the mountain forests be-
fore the advance OF civilization. The
sportsman must not come here in Au-
gust expecting that he will be supplied
with trout or that he can hunt the
deer in the closed season. The game
laws of the state are very strictly en-
forced and deer can be hunted only
month and one-half in the fall and
no person can kill more than two
deer IN one season. But if one wants
to get ''far from the madding crowd"
and worship nature and natures
God by rushing rivers and noun
| tain lakes we can recommend no bet
ter course than a sojourn in the
Keene Valley.
ALL SORTS.