USA > Vermont > Addison County > Salisbury > History of Salisbury, Vermont > Part 6
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at least a few rods of ground, exclusively for the benefit of floriculture. The ladies in many parts of Europe, as well as in our own country, have taken the greatest delight in this pleasant recreation. At the same time it characterizes their taste, it leads to botanical research, and affords at once labor and re- creation to the body, both of which are greatly needed, especially by the ladies at the present time. It is hoped and believed that the females of this state will yet learn, that to bring down their list of mortality to a level with that of males, advantage must be taken of out door exercise.
But this subject must be left to the observation and reflection of the reader, while we content our- selves with making a few suggestions connected with the nature of the honey bee.
The flowers of most plants and trees produce honey and pollen ; both are essential to the life of the honey- bee. The honey lies at the base of the blossom, while the pollen is found slightly adhering to the stamens above. The peculiarities of sexual difference appear to exist in plants as well as in animals; there is a male and a female flower-though in some instances, as is the case with wheat, rye, and perhaps other grains, both sexes appear to exist in the same flower.
The blossoms of most trees and plants require some agency other than uncertain winds, to transmit the
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pollen from the stamens of one flower to the pistils of another, which transmission is essential to fructifica- tion. This important service is often performed through insect agency-thus affording an interesting illustration of Infinite design.
The honey is placed deep in the flower, so that while the honey-loving insect seeks its food, it uncon- sciously promotes the fructification of the plant; for in passing from flower to flower, and reaching deep for its food, its body and legs become covered with pollen, particles of which are loosed and dropped upon the pistils of the almost countless flowers which it may visit, thus unwittingly, perhaps, but providentially, stimulating the blossom to fructification.
The pollen from the flowers of different plants and trees, thus being mingled together by winds and in- sects, produces a great variety in our fruits and veg- etables. The seed of the potatoe, when planted at so great a distance from any other of its kind that there can be no admixture of the pollen from the blossoms of the two, will produce its like; but when many kinds are planted together, the seed will produce many new varieties. The same is true of melons, and other fruits.
It is a further illustration of Divine wisdom, that insects of different species, and varying greatly in size, are adapted to all the varieties of honey-produ- .
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cing plants. The honey-bee can rest upon the white- clover, and with his proboscis reach to the lower ex- tremity of the blossom, and extract the honey. He can do this, also, in the blossoms of most all our fruit and forest trees, and from flowers much smaller than that of the white-clover; but in flowers of too slen - der a make to bear his weight, the smaller insects find their repast. So, likewise, is provision made for the disposal of the honey in larger and deeper blos- soms ; for instance, the red-clover and lilac. These blossoms contain much honey, but the honey-bee can- not reach it; so here comes the humble-bee, and finds his share. Again, there is the hollyhock, the honey- suckle, and other plants which secrete honey in great abundance, but whose honey-cup lies so deep that no insect can reach it; here, then, the humming-bird is provided with her feast.
It is true, observations like the foregoing do not le- gitimately come within the history of a town; but in connection with the honey-bee they are very natu- rally suggested.
Keeping bees was not only a source of luxury, but a profitable business to the settlers. The forest trees yielded honey in great abundance, and little care of the bees was necessary, other than to hive them when they swarmed. They were generally kept in rough board boxes, and in hives, looking more like tubs,
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than any thing else, made from the sec ions of hollow trees.
These sections were selected without much regard to size, and were usually from sixteen inches to two feet in length. A board nailed over the end of these completed the hive .* In hives like these, of course it was necessary to destroy the bees in getting the honey, which was usually done in the early part of October, by smothering them with the fumes of burn- ing brimstone. The late swarms, and those which had passed three winters, were the ones usually pro- scribed. Even with these sacrifices, bees were kept with good profit, and produced a large supply of honey ; but afterward, as the land was cleared, and the hard timber destroyed, the yearly product of honey was very much lessened, and the interest in bees began to decline.
Cultivated fruit-trees and grasses could not be made to yield as much honey, nor of as good quality, as the hard timber which had been taken from the land. This, undoubtedly, will account in great meas- ure for the present degenerate state of the apiary throughout the country. Bees have been gradually declining since about 1804, except in the immediate vicinity of large tracts of land covered with hard
* Some persons used straw hives.
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timber. In other localities they do well, sometimes, for one or two seasons, when all may suddenly die from the effects of too much rain, or from a drouth, or other peculiarity of climate. Unless bees are lo- cated where they can have access to proper aromatic plants or shrubs during August and September, they are compelled to collect much of their food for their young from poisonous plants which grow on the low lands and in the swamps, which often engenders dis- ease among the young, and thus destroys what would otherwise constitute the winter stock of the hive; for the bees which are hatched in the latter part of August, in September and in the fore part of Oc- tober, are the only ones that live through the win- ter; hence the condition of the apiary in every lo- cality for the following spring, can be determined with great certainty in these autumnal months.
The best location for bees is near the base of the mountains ; for there those flowers which furnish the necessary food for the young are usually found, and the hard timber is more plenty, and if cut off is al- lowed to grow up again, which in a few years pro- duces honey.
In the year 1807, the bee-moth, an enemy more hostile to the apiary than any other, made its appear- ance. This moth has done the greatest injury to the bee interest, and it works in so subtle a manner that
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it is hard to be met ; its character has been but poorly understood, and not easily learned. After the careful observations of many years, we conclude that the moth is never the primary, but the secondary cause of the destruction of the hive, and is like the worm that consumes and destroys the carcass of an animal after the principle of life is gone.
Depopulation, by famine or disease, is always the first cause of the destruction of the honey-bee. The change of climate which took place at the beginning of the present century, the destruction of the hard timber, and of many honey-producing plants, brought famine to the bees, and then disease followed, as it always does, every where, and finally the moths ap- peared, to perform their disastrous work. The same facts have been observed in the settlement of other parts of the United States; famine to the bees fol- lows the axe-then disease-and finally the moths, to complete the work of destruction.
Hunting bees was made a source of considerable profit by some of the early settlers, until the bees began to decline, as already remarked.
The hollows of the innumerable pines which cov- ered the land, afforded suitable and abundant homes for the bees, and in them the hunters, every autumn, were sure to find a good reward for their time and labor. It was not uncommon for an expert hunter to
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find several swarms in a single day, each yielding from twenty to eighty, and sometimes a hundred pounds of strained honey. But the changes in the circum- stances of the country, and of the bees themselves have been so great, that hunting them has become more a matter of amusement than of profit.
Fishing was a matter of no little importance, in the early days of the town, for good supplies of fish were usually at hand for the temporary relief of the family, when game was scarce or" out of time." In those days, all the streams and lakes, and even the brooks, were stocked with excellent fish.
A species of large trout called longe, and the brook- trout, were caught in great quantities, (usually with a hook and line), the former in Lake Dunmore, the latter in Otter creek, and in all the mountain streams .. A quantity sufficient for a large family could be caught, at that time, in a few minutes, in most of the streams. This afforded a great relief to the sufferings of the set- tlers, when driven to extremities for want of food, as was especially the case in the spring of 1790. Not much time (which always seems the more valuable as the country is new), was spent in fishing for amusement- fishing, in most instances, was resorted to for the pur- pose of gratifying the appetite with a change from venison or bear-meat, or for replenishing their ex- hausted stores.
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Trout were often caught in Lake Dunmore, weigh- ing thirty pounds, and even more, but in later years they are seldom found in that water weighing more than ten or twelve pounds. Brook trout have always been considered superior to any other, for the table, especially those which grow in pure cold water.
Trout found in the ponds on the mountains, whose waters are from the neighboring springs, are of ex- quisite flavor. These fish, like the lobster, assume a reddish color in the ordeal of cooking, as also do the trout of Lana river, which also are of a delicious quality.
The same species of fish caught in Middlebury river, or in any of the streams which empty into Otter creek (whereby the latter stream is made a place of winter quarters), are not so good for the table as those taken from the pure waters of the mountains. Otter creek is a sluggish and impure stream, and im- parts to its fish a whiteness and softness which ren- der them less palatable. Fish taken from Lake Dun- more are of far superior quality to those of the same species taken from Otter creek. &
But Otter creek affords many fish which are eaten, and which are really good; for instance, pickerel, suckers, bull-heads, rock bass and perch.
As the settlement advanced and the number of inhabitants increased, fish of all kinds diminished,
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both in numbers and in weight; the erection of dams and mills appeared to be unfriendly to their rapid increase. Moreover, the largest of them appeared to have been caught; at any rate they disappeared, and an evident decline of the fisheries was observed about 1800. Eels had never been seen previous to about this time, in Otter creek, or in any of its tributaries above Middlebury falls; subsequently, they increased with great rapidity for a number of years, and were caught weighing from two to six or seven pounds .* As none of the best kinds of fish in Lake Cham- plain had found their way above the falls at Ver- gennes, the people in Salisbury and several adjoin- ing towns formed companies in the year 1819, to supply the creek and other waters in this region with fish from that lake. This they undertook by en- gaging seines at the lake, and hiring men to draw in fish of every sort they could get, rejecting such only as were already here. These fish were taken from the seines and put into hogsheads of water, in wagons, and brought to the banks of Otter creek, at various places, and there again committed to the water. This laid the foundation for a numerous stock of valuable fish, which made their appearance in almost incredible numbers, in the course of three or four years.
* These fish have been very rarely seen for many years. 9*
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But these, in turn, after devouring a great share of the small fish, which were the original occupants of the creek, were so incessantly caught by the hook, spear and net, that they soon began to diminish both in number and in weight. Undoubtedly a great many went back [into Lake Champlain again, by a safe journey, in high water, over the several inter- vening falls.
Pickerel, rock bass and mullet are the only kinds of these Lake Champlain fish now remaining in town.
Pickerel have been caught in Otter creek weighing nearly thirty pounds, though they are not often found to exceed two thirds that weight ; their usual weight, as now taken, varies from one to six pounds, with an occasional one weighing as high as fifteen and even twenty pounds. The other fish mentioned are smaller, the rock-bass varying from a half of a pound to two pounds, and the mullet from one to four and some- times six pounds.
There are many other kinds of fish in town, of an inferior character, and of no apparent use, unless it may be to serve as bait in catching the larger kinds. Of these it is not our purpose to speak.
The first inhabitants found a good deal of diversion as well as profit in the chase. It is within the memory of the author, when salted venison and bear meat were very common upon the tables of many of our
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people, especially among those who took delight in the chase.
The skins of. the deer were dressed, and used in making moccasins, mittens and over-alls or breeches. The furs of several different kinds of wild animals were used for various purposes, while the surplus (and furs always commanded a fair price,) was sold to fur dealers.
Among the valuable furs, that of the otter stood first, then came that of the fisher, the sable, the mink, the raccoon, the musk rat and perhaps others. These · animals were taken in traps or shot, and were found in quite large numbers.
The beaver had mostly left this part of the coun- try before the settlement of the town commenced, though these animals must have been here in great numbers, not many years previous, for their dams are yet visible on many if not all the small streams.
It is believed that none of the trappers and hunters in Salisbury have accumulated much wealth from the sale of their furs, and yet there are a few persons who do a fair business for a few weeks at the return of every spring and autumn, in catching a few of these wild animals when their skins are valuable.
Many of the wild animals which frequented these regions seventy years ago, are now extinct or have sought a home elsewhere. The catamount has not
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been seen here since 1809; the wolf and deer took their final departure about 1833 or 1834; and though it was not uncommon, at one time, to see the bears roaming through theclearings in the woods, even in the day time, they now can but rarely be found anywhere. They were compelled to flee to the mountains, where an occasional one may yet be caught; and even on the mountains, the wild cat, the wolverine, and lynx, now are scarcely known.
Foxes are not often seen in any new country, but come in as the settlement advances. The same is true of the skunk.
One of the first of these last-named animals, (an animal at once mischievous and loathsome) found in this town, was caught in a trap on Holland Weeks' farm, in 1796. This incident gave to the hill on which the skunk was caught its present name, " Skunk Hill."
Grey-squirrels were rarely met with before the com- mencement of the present century, though they are now quite numerous; while black-squirrels, though now nearly if not quite extinct, were then found in quite large numbers.
Partridges, which once were so plenty, and afforded so much amusement as well as food, have gradually though not altogether disappeared ; and quails almost entirely left the country, many years since.
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The common house-rat did not make its appearance here until about the year 1800, but since that time it has proved itself to be one of the most loathsome and mischievous animals among us.
Rattle-snake hunting was made a profitable busi- ness by some of the settlers, though catching rattle- snakes was too hazardous an undertaking to induce many· to enter into the business. These snakes fre- quented the vicinity of Sawyer's Mills (now Salisbury village), but their favorite haunts were on the point of the mountain east of Lake Dunmore-and it was this fact that gave it its present name, "Rattle-Snake Point."*
These reptiles converted the holes in the rocks of the mountains into places or dens for wintering, in which they were made quite easy captives by the hunter, at the return of every spring and autumn.
Though armed with deadly fangs, they never use them, unless it be in self defence, and even in this case, not unless aggravated by being stepped on, or otherwise, and not without first giving timely warning by shaking their rattles, which are located at the end of the tail. This rattle may be heard distinctly at the
* This mountain has received several different names. Those more classically inclined, call it the Gnomon, from its resem- blance to the hand of the dial.
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distance of several rods, and it is said by hunters that it is always shaken nearly a minute before the snake attempts to bite.
These snakes emerge from their subterraneous re- treats in the spring, as soon as the outer atmosphere is warmer than that in their holes ; and as soon as the atmosphere is sufficiently warm, so that they do not suffer from the coldness of the night, they leave their habitations entirely, and seek a living on the plains below.
The time in the spring for hunting them is, as the hunters say, when the bark begins to slip on the trees and shrubs growing in the vicinity of their winter quarters.
Again, as the frosts of autumn indicate the coming winter, these snakes are seen seeking their subterra- neous retreats, (which usually happens about the middle of October), appearing, nevertheless, occasion- ally, on pleasant days, until their final winter retreat. These snakes have no rattle until they are at least two years old. On this account the young snake is per- haps the more dangerous-not being able to give no- tice of his presence only by his movement-which, by the way, is represented as being very quick and spiteful. These young rattle-snakes were allowed by the hunters to escape, and so given time to grow to maturity. Mr. Amos Goodrich, who was often en-
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gaged in these snake-hunts, informed the writer that he and Asahel Beebe used to kill forty or fifty in a day -each snake having from two or three to sixteen rat- tles-and that the oil which they obtained from them (and it was the oil which induced these hunts, for it was sold to the apothecaries at a considerable profit), varied from half a gill to nearly half a pint on each.
The gall, likewise, of the rattle-snake was highly valued by the early settlers, and was considered a sure cure for most kinds of fever, when taken in its incipient stages. It was usually administered in a powdered or grated form, mingled with a weak pota- tion of brandy.
But these snakes have long since disappeared from about Salisbury village, and have become so reduced on the mountains that hunting them has ceased to be an object of gain, and now they are only occasionally found on the plains about Lake Dunmore.
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CHAPTER XI.
MINERALS-WATER-COURSES AND WATER-POWERS.
IT may well be doubted, that the mines and mine- rals of this town will be made, at least for many years, a source of great profit; for, although considerable search has been made, no discoveries hitherto would warrant the outlay- necessary to commence any con- siderable operations in digging for ore. Mr. Ad- ams, in his geological survey of this state, has given Salisbury a passing notice, as follows :- " Brown iron ore has been found in Salisbury, but the locality has not been examined. A good specimen has been brought to the geological depot by Mr. Huntley.
It is not improbable, that iron may at some future day be found in the mountains, in quantities suffi- ciently large to render digging a profitable business ; indeed, some good specimens of iron ore have already been picked up in different places on the mountains.
But it is believed that the limestone rock (which is found of the best quality and in inexhaustible quanti- ties on almost every farm in the middle and western parts of the town), can be made a much more certain
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and immediate source of profit than digging for ores.
This rock, when converted into lime, may be turned to the greatest advantage in recruiting worn-out lands, and in supplying a deficiency of this important component in some of our alluvial lands, or it may be made a profitable article of export to other states, where the lime-stone rock is less abundant.
The town of Salisbury is marked throughout with springs of living water, and nearly every farm has, running through it, a river or a rivulet which, even in the dryest seasons, never fails.
The water in the eastern part of the town is most of it soft, and fit for the ordinary purposes of washing ; but that from the springs and wells of the western and middle parts is what is commonly called hard.
The most healthful, and in all respects the best water for drinking and for culinary purposes, accord- to a late agricultural surveyor of Massachusetts, (who visited this town and made many very close and accu- rate observations on its physical character), is found in spring near the Indian Garden, and is brought by an aqueduct of logs into a watering-trough on the bridge, at Salisbury village .*
* This supposed Indian Garden lies a little to the east of the village, and contains several acres of very handsome land, 10
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There are several springs in town that are slightly impregnated with mineral substances, which are found to be more or less medicinal, though none of them have been properly analyzed. One spring on the farm of the writer has formed a large mass of cinders which will effervesce when placed in vinegar. Its water has been found useful in the cure of sore eyes, salt-rheum, and other cutaneous diseases. It has also been successfully used in allaying inflammation in the feet and legs, in cases of poison by the meadow ivy. It is also found that domestic animals which are allowed to drink constantly at this spring, during summer, are never attacked by malignant diseases.
Another spring similar to this, a few rods distant, has found its way through a ledge of lime-stone rock, where the gas or effluvium from the water has caused the rock to decay, flake off and pass away with the water, so as to form considerable of a cavern, of the depth of thirty feet or more.
Another spring which deserves notice, is found on the farm of Mark Ranney. It is in a dense cedar
bordered on the north side by the river which constitutes the outlet of Lake Dunmore. Here many arrows, pestles, earthen vessels, and other articles of Indian manufacture, have been picked up, which, together with other indications of a former savage home, gave the spot the name, Indian Garden.
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swamp, quite a long distance from any hard land. On pressing a staff down about four feet, it was found to be logged up in a triangular form, suffi- ciently large to admit a small pail or bucket. At what time this spring was thus prepared for use, must be left to conjecture, though it was undoubtedly done by the Indians at some remote period. The old logs and cedar trees about it, indicate that it was vis- ited perhaps hundreds of years ago. Its water is very pure and cold.
But the most remarkable spring in town, is found to the west of Mt. Bryant, by the side of the road leading from Mr. Charles Eager's factory to Lake Dunmore. This spring is situated about one hundred and forty feet below the level of the lake, and is re- markable for the great quantities of water discharged from it ever since its earliest discovery, and for the gradual increase in the amount of its water for sev- eral years past.
This fact of increase has excited the curiosity of many observers, and it has been suggested that this spring receives its water from Lake Dunmore, through passages far beneath the surface of the earth, and that the increased amount of its discharge is owing to the enlargement of these passages. This may be the case, though it is doubtful.
This spring furnishes quite a large part of the
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water of Beaver brook, which accounts for the fact that nearly the same quantity of water is found in this stream in the summer as in any other season.
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