The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1903-04-26

HON~-
man spoke:
Come to Yongers to go over to
Alpine, Ell? Selfish fellers, those AL
nine shad fishermen. They don't seem
to want to die. The old folks live to
be nigh on to a hundred before they
give their sons chance. And they've
been living there, father and son, pref
ty near 200 years, just catching shad
all that time
That was all the man vouchsafed
until the boat, a few minutes later,
scraped the shore at the foot of the
New Jersey Palisades. Then, as his
passengers disembarked. he shifted his
chew and broke silence.
Il calculate you'll find 'em darned
interesting" he said briefly.
True to the riverman's prediction,
the fishermen OF Alpine were found
exceedingly interesting, for they are
not only skilled in the ways of fishing,
but they have built their doll-like
homes on historic ground, and every
mothers son of them has the culture
that is looked for only in a Boston
drawing groom. Because of their schol-
arly attachments and other qualities
equally unusual in the class to which
they belong, they are probably the
most remarkable of all the thousands
of men engaged in this years shad
industry.
Ask an ordinary shad fisherman
a question which he fails to grasp and
he will laconicaly query:
"Hey?"
Put the same question in the same
way to one of the dozen men in AL
pine, and he will reply:
BEG pardon, but I fear you will
have to ask me that question again.
1 didn't quite understand you"
An Art Photographers.
The colony's attitude on education
and culture is aptly illustrated in Will
liam Block, as healthy and rough-and-
ready a specimen of humanity as can
be found.
Clad in the garb of the man of the
water 'front.' he was standing idly by
the colony's net drying poles when he
behe1d the man with the camera. In
stantly he became all attention.
'May 1 examine it?' he asked.
Then, as he looked the instrument
over, he talked learnedly of photogra-
ply in general and of artistic photog-
raphy in particular.
1t soon transpired that this rough
looking fisherman, when it isn't prof
liable for him to cast his nets, amuses
himself by making art photographs;
and his little house, built by his great
grandfather at the beginning of the
last century, holds many picture that,
if placed on exhibition, would attract
favorable comment.
But William Block is not the only
one of the colony who has not allow
a loads
make him provincial, narrow and I'M
couth.
Thomas Mclean, the head of the set
Element, believes in studying literature
between hauls. He can converse IN
diligently on almost any subject
sprung on him, and when it comes TO
Shakespeare and the poets, he can
quote them until his breath gives out
and his hearers depart.
The rest are like unto Block and Nc
Lean. Even the children abstemiously
refrain from dropping their gs and
mixing their lenses. They are as pre-
else of speech as the far-famed young
sters of Boston.
A Picturesque Colony.
Yet with all their culture the hand
full of men who have hung their homes
on the side of the Palisades do not
lack picturesqueness. Physically, they
have imbibed the ruggedness of the
cliffs that hug them about and isolate
them; despite their high standard of
education they believe that their old
est house, which, tradition says, was
used as headquarters by Lord Corn
wallis during the Revolution, and
which was certainly occupied by Con-
tinental soldiers, is haunted; and in
congruously they go to Brooklyn, in
stead of Yonkers, just across the river,
for their wives.
The unusual qualities possessed by
these fishermen are also evident in the
fact that, while they believe treasure
lies buried under the roof of the house
that figures in Revolutionary history,
they have never laid plans to dig it up
They are content now and then to pick
out from the rubbish a few ancient
pieces of money and revolutionary
soldiers button, and let it go at that.
Their attitude on treasure is largely
that of the head of the colony.
Perhaps treasure is there, and per-
haps not" he said eff we dug and
found nothing wouldn't we be exas-
perated to think that we had lost so
much time when we could have been
making money with our nets?'
A Record for Longevity.
The colony has a firm belief, found
ed on family records, that none or It's
members can possibly die before he
has passed his eightieth year and
that from then on the chances are
that death will not overtake him until
the century mark has all but been
reached.
That is why no funeral is looked
forward to in the shad settlement for
the next thirty-five year. Then
Thomas Mclean will be 81 years old.
Mclean says that he has no inten-
ton of breaking the colony's record
of longevity. Il don't intend to die
in my babyhood,". he declared the
other day. I've some pride in our
settlements envia'ble reputation"
'Why do we live so long?" he re-
peated, as he attached a pole ring to
his net. Because we're not greedy.
Look across the river" and Mclean
nodded in the direction of Yonkers,
whose noises of business could be
fCintly heard at times across the mile
of water. They're working their
lives away over there, because they're
too greedy for money and comfort.
Many of them get money, but not
many comfort, for just about the time
they discover, they can take things