the club has made provision for canine entertainment, and there is a Master of the Hounds, whose duty it is to enforce all the rules, regulations, and by-laws relative to hunting. There is a Master of the Fish, who has control over the pisca torial sport, and direct supervision of the hatching and breeding boxes, and all that mode of using it. It was determined to play a joke on him, and to this end two of the members went out in the evening, took a couple of ducks from the ice-house, and then discharged their guns at the surface of the pond. The shots brought out Mr. Verdant, and as the jokers walked leisurely up from the pond with the dripping ducks in their hands, he was anxious to know where they obtained their game. "Out here in the pond," was the reply. "We shot them by firing at the phosphorescent light on their feathers." Verdant was told that there were plen pertains to the cultivation and preservation of fish, the finny game. The game sports of the club are not limited to fish, birds, and animals; they include billiards, whist, and other light THE BALLYHOO BIRD. amusements, boat-races on the pond, and | ty more of the same sort, and immediateoccasional pranks played by the members on each other. New and verdant members are frequently entertained with stories of hunting and fishing that would put Baron Munchausen to the blush, and make a severe strain on the swallowing capacities of an anaconda. On one occasion there was a new member who had equipped himself with all the latest hunting gear, but was not well versed in the ly went for his gun. When he came out, all armed for the fray, his attention was directed to the moonbeams dancing on the water, which was gently ruffled by a light breeze. On the assurance that the light came from the phosphorescence of a duck's feathers, he fired; and as another light was seen following the splash, he fired again. Then he took a boat and rowed out in search of his game. His tormentors stood | in duty bound, but somehow the victim on the shore and directed his movements, of the fish trick never laughs as heartily and they kept him working at the oars for as do his companions. Sometimes the half an hour. Then they called him back sold party inclines to anger, but it is far again, and set him to shooting more phos- better for him to put a smiling face on phorescence; and they encouraged the the matter, and watch for a chance to resport by going with him in the boat, and venge himself on some one else. pretending to take in his prizes. The two ducks were gathered several times, till he had some ten or twelve, and proceeded to open a basket of Champagne in joy over his good luck. He made arrangements for carrying his birds to the city next day for distribution among his friends; but it was given out that the ducks were stolen in the night, and he did not know the trick that had been played on him until days afterward. Another green South-Sider was sent in pursuit of birds as remarkable as anything in the mythology of the ancients: they were provided with four wings and two heads, and possessed the wonderful power of whistling through one bill while they sang through the other. They inhabited a marsh about a mile east of the club-house, and were only to be taken at daybreak. The ambitious hunter rose early, and went breakfast less to the field indicated. He waited till long after sunrise, but saw no sign of the curious production of ornithology, and he went there three days in succession, only to be disappointed. Finally, on the fourth morning he discovered a bird answering to the description, and after creeping through the wet grass, and nearly getting mired in a bog, he fired, and brought down a clever composition of wood and pasteboard. Subsequent references to the "ballyhoo bird" were never relished by the victim of the practical joke. We are told in history that when Cleopatra and Mark Antony were one day on a fishing excursion the sport was enlivened by the employment of divers, who surreptitiously attached dead fish to the hooks of the fishers. The trick has come down to our day, and nowhere is it played with greater effect than on Great South Bay. Even the old stagers are sometimes taken in, and I have recollection of a veteran who had passed many summers on the south shore, who one day threw himself into a whirl of excitement while hauling in a six-pound lead that had been attached to his line while his back was turned. He was happier while hauling than when he gathered in his prize and contemplated its figure. He laughed, as The South-side Club is open the entire year. During two months-March and April-when the trouting season is open, for none but members and masculine guests, but for the rest of the year members are privileged to be accompanied by their families, under certain carefully drawn restrictions. The Olympic is open during the summer months only; and while the buildings and grounds are freely subject to the inspection of ladies at any hour between dawn and sunset, the rules do not permit the residence of the fair sex within the Olympian limits. Across the bay from the Olympic is the Wa-Wa-Yanda Club, which is also a bachelor establishment, and has its doors hermetically closed during the winter. Like Little Buttercup in the days of her baby-farming-hood, the WaWa-Yanda is young and charming, as it is only an infant in age, and has a delightful situation not far from the entrance of the bay. The Wa-Wa-Yandans fish, hunt, and sail for amusement and health, and the half-dozen boats belonging to the club are kept pretty busy in the fair days of summer. The members boast of cool breezes when New York is mopping its forehead in agony, and they also boast of a cat which is a most remarkable feline production. He is thus described by one of his intimate friends: "Tom isn't a bit afraid of the water, like every other cat I ever heard of. He will go in swimming of his own accord; and if the boys take him out several yards from the shore, and put him in, he will swim as unconcerned as a Newfoundland dog, and when he gets to the land, he shakes himself, and stands there ready to be put in again. He will catch the little fish that swim close to the shore; he is fond of fish, and sometimes watches for them for hours. He doesn't dive in for them, but sticks his paw into the water and scoops them out, and the boys say that one day he plunged in and caught a fish four or five inches long. When he was a kitten they used to put him in the water and play with him, and in that way he got over his fear of being wet." Wonderful cat is Tom Wa-Wa-Yanda. The city men who go down to the bay to hunt for ducks and other feathered game are generally disposed to be very scientific in their sport, and scorn to kill any game except in the approved style. But the native is not so particular; and a story that is told by a well-known New York judge is a fair illustration of the ways of Long Island hunters. The judge was out one morning in pursuit of snipe, but was not fortunate enough to bag a single bird. While bewailing his bad luck, he met an old negro who was the happy possessor of a dozen or more as fine snipe as a sportsman would wish to see. Naturally he asked, "Where did you get those birds, uncle?" "Over yere on de meadow," was the reply. "Do you shoot them on the wing?" was the next query. "Oh yes,' was the cheery response, "on de wing, on de head, on de tail, anywheres, it don't make no difference." There are sad memories connected with the South Bay as well as pleasant ones. The fishermen can tell you of numerous wrecks on Fire Island Beach, and hardly a year passes without one or more additions to the melancholy record. Most of these disasters are unaccompanied with loss of life, but occasionally there is a fearful calamity, in which the sea swallows up passengers and crew, and sometimes leaves none to tell the story. The government maintains a line of life-saving stations along the coast, and nowhere are they more needed than on this sandy shore. The Olympic Club has mementos of some of these wrecks in the shape of timbers that once belonged to ships which came to grief on Fire Island Beach. The upper part of the tall staff near the water front of the club grounds came from an English ship whose name I do not recall; a smaller stick on the cricket lawn, a few yards from the door of the principal building, was the main-boom of the bark Elizabeth, on which Margaret Fuller was a passenger from Leghorn, with her husband and child, in 1850. Old fishermen on the bay are familiar with the storm in which the Elizabeth went ashore, and can readily indicate the spot where husband, wife, and child were lost in the waves. At the sale of the wreck the mournful relic of the bark was bought by some of the members of the club, and for many years it was a part of its principal flag-staff. As it became weak with age another and taller support for the national standard was erected, and the older one, reduced in height, now sustains a miniature house of tasteful design, where a large family of English sparrows make their home, and enliven the air with their continual twittering. PRINCE YOUSUF AND THE ALCAYDE. IN Granada reigned Mohammed: Yousuf, brother to Mohammed: Him the king had seized, and sent Prisoner to a Moorish castle, Where ten years his life was spent. Ill and feeble now, the usurper Felt his death was hastening on, Calling then a trusty servant, "Hie thee to the brave Alcayde To his hands give thou this letter, And for many a league he rode, Pale he grew, and sat and trembled, "Now what ails thee ?" cries Prince You- 66 66 'Doth the king demand my head?" 'Read it!" gasps the good Alcayde. "Ah, my lord, would I were dead!" Yousuf reads, "When this shall reach you, Slay my brother, and his head "So!" cries Yousuf. "This I looked for. I was losing, you were winning, All amazed, the poor Alcayde Played his knights and bishops wrong, In his mind Prince Yousuf pondered: "Surely, surely, he is dying, And if I must lose my head, My young nephew will succeed him "Though my keeper still is friendly, Then, aloud: "Come, good Alcayde, In his lonely life the keeper Dearly loved his game of chess; Therefore needs he little urging, Though sad thoughts his soul oppress. For an hour or two they battled, And the Alcayde gained amain, For the prince, with restless glances, Gazed beyond the window-pane. Still the chess-board lay between them, And the Alcayde played his best; Took no note of gliding hours Till the sunset fired the west. Yet he gained not, for Prince Yousuf Through the western windows gazing And two knights appeared advancing, Faces flushed with joy they bring. The king is dead! Long live King Yousuf! Long-lost lord-our rightful king! |