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Show C&&h. I i Mi THF GYASCUTUS - CL2 frtf COLORADO I W TOT ROAD SHAGAMAW ,M fCHypai i I : L "' 71 ! vov. v There's a lot of things you never learn at school, There's a lot of things that's never taught by rule; There's an awful lot of knowledge That you never get at college; There's a lot of things you never learn at school. Old Son, Author Unknown. i By ELMO SCOTT WATSON wV TIF THE grade s10019 te children t , nre takIn6 nature study. In ftjffljS i f high school they learn zoology "WSriP B and botany. In college they KyL j I broaden their knowledge of all Qytej J living things by studying blol-ga blol-ga I ogy. But there Is one branch of sc'ence which the textbook sjQVsjy? writers and the teachers have JlSmK'C neglected. It Is the somewhat-less-than exact science of unnat . . ural history the best exemplifl- cation of the sentiment expressed in the old song quoted above. ' For unnatural history is one of the things "you never learn at school." To become acquainted with Its fascinating facts you must go not to books ' but to the source of all true knowledge, to people. peo-ple. And there Is one class of men who are better fitted than any other to give these facts. They are the simple men who lived close to the soil and whose brief snatches of leisure between long hours of hard work were usually given over to spinning yarns for the amusement of themselves and their fellows. In telling their tall tales they invented in-vented mythical characters of heroic proportions who performed prodigious feats and whose every activity was carried out on a vnst scale. Such were the old-time lumberjack and the old-time old-time cowboy, who have given to us Paul Bunynn, the super-lumherjack, and Pecos Bill, the super-cowboy, super-cowboy, whom the students of folklore characterize charac-terize as the best and almost only examples of native American myth heroes. More than that. inv telling of the deeds of these legendary heroes, these saga-slogers peopled their world with strange creatures, bizarre in appearance and fan tastlc In habits. Not only did they Invent their yarns for their own pleasure but they often repeated and embroidered em-broidered them for the express purpose of "stuffing "stuff-ing the tenderfoot" or "hazing the pilgrim." So If you would learn the most. Interesting "facts' In unnatural history, go to a lumberjack or a cowboy cow-boy and by your unsophisticated manner and naive questions, give him a chance to tell you about some of the strange creatures which he has seen In the course of his career. If It's a lumberjack you're talking to, the chances are that one of the Urst animals he wIU tell you about is the hodng. Although the hodag Is now extinct, the one specimen having been captured cap-tured near Rhlnelander, Wis., years ago, all ium-berjacks ium-berjacks know about the hodng and how It came Into being. Once upon a time there was an ox which had led an unusually hard life at the liands of his various drivers up' In the north woods of Wisconsin; Among lumberjacks It Is believed that the hide of an ox Is Invulnerable to everything but the profanity of its drivers. When the animal ani-mal dies, its customary burial ceremony is cremation, and It requires seven years of continuous con-tinuous fire to reduce to ashes all the profanity which has accumulated In Its body during its lifetime. life-time. So when this particular ox died, a brush Are was built around its body and kept going for seven 'years to obliterate nil the curses which had been heaped upon it' In Engllsh.-french, Irish. Scandinavian and German while it had tolled In the lumber camps. At the end of the seventh year the fire was allowed to die down but Instead of there being left no trace of the ox, out of the heap of ashes, there rose, phoenix like, a fearsome creature, such us Is pictured above, which exhaled an obnoxious odor and the swish of whose tall made the earth tremble. For some time this nioriBter preyed upon the lumber camps, its favorite 'od being beef on the Jcoof. Then, according to "Lake Shore" Kearney of Wausau, Wis., an old-time lumberjack who has written a book on the hodag, E. g. Shepard Trapped by Walters in his Stuc(to of Rhlnelander, Wis., . another old-timer In the north woods, succeeded in capturing It by digging a hidden pit In a trail which the hodag was known to frequent and luring the hodag to It by having a young man of marathon fnme and a noted ski jumper lead tin ox nlong this trail with the hodag In hot pursuit. After Its capture the hodag was put to death, skinned and mounted. For years it was exhibited In an old ham near Rhlnelander and thousands of people Journeyed there to view It until the barn burned down and all traces of this creature vanished from the earth. But If you go to Rhlnelander today they will sell you picture pic-ture post cards of the hodag as proof of the fact that It did once exist. But even though the hodag Is extinct, there are other equally Interesting creatures still In the north woods, your lumberjack friend will tell you. some of whom make It exceedingly dangerous dan-gerous for a tenderfoot to stray far from the lumber lum-ber camp by himself. Of course, you may not . see them, but that doesn't prove that they are not there. If you find In the woods a set of tracks that puzzle you. they were probably left there by the tote road shagamaw. Its hind legs have the hoofs of a moose and Us forelegs the paws of n bear. When it Is tired of traveling on one set of legs, It continues on Its way on the other, which accounts for the peculiar trail which Is so bnlTllng to hunters. The tote rond shagamaw Is shy and harmless but look out for the agropelter and the gumberoo! The agropelter has a long body and arms like n spider monkey. It has a perpetual grudge ngnlnst mankind and It hides In hollow trees, out of which It springs, tears off n huge branch of a tree and cracks the skull of the luckless tenderfoot as he passes by. The gumberoo lives In burned-over forests and Is therefore easily avoided. It Is larger than a bear and has a round leathery body which nothing can pierce. If a hunter fires at It the bullet rebounds from Its tough hide, strikes the marksman and usually kills him. The only thing that can kill It Is fire and often during forest for-est fires the lumberjacks hear loud explosions which are gwnberoos blowing up In the flames All of the foregoing animals are known to Iuli- berjacks of the north woods from .Maine to Minnesota. Min-nesota. When the lumber Industry expanded west, the lumbermen discovered many other Interesting creatures which are known both to them and to the cowboys, the scene of whose activities bordered bor-dered on theirs. For Instance there Is the rope-rite rope-rite which Is as large as a small pony and has a long rope-like beak with a slip-noose on the end.MVith this natural lariat the roperite catches even the swiftest Jackrahblt and sometimes ropes a tenderfoot. Then there Is the tripodero with two telescopic legs. Its beak Is like the muzzle of a gun with n siht on the end. Going through the brush it raises and lowers itself to look for game and, upon seeing some, tilts Itself to the right angle, sights along Its beak and then lets fly ith a pellet of clay, a quantity of these quids being always carried In the left check. The trlpo-dero trlpo-dero bfts fiver been known to miss n shot and as a resulf 1 mortality among tenderfeet In some parts oftfj-j West Is said to be appalling. Although lumberjacks and cowboys have been the principal contributors to the origins of unnatural un-natural history, too much credit cannot be given to editors, and especially editors of country papers, pa-pers, for their part In preserving It for future generations of Americans who are unlikely to "learn It at school." It is to a number of thera that the author of this article Is Indebted for Information about two creatures, without a des criptlon of which no unnatural history notebook would be complete. One Is the'gllly-loo or phllly-loo phllly-loo bird and from descriptions furnished by It. F. Fuller of the Rlmme (N. D.) Review, Lnrry Flint of the Sharon (Pa.) Herald, "Uncle Jimmy" of the Ilariowtovvn (Mont.) Times, Ben E. Mannlna of the Riddle (Ore.) South Umpqua News, W M. Huff of the Claflln (Kan.) Clarion and L. O. Johnson of Livingston, Mont, a fairly accurate idea of - the appearance nnd habits of the phllly-loo phllly-loo can be written as follows: The philly-loo Is a comic supplement of the ancient ranistarus, Is related to the wild coldshuts and fuzzj'-blllcd sidewinders and In some respects resembles the galllwampus. It has a beak like a stork, one arm to guide itself, and a long lizard tall, which it usually carries in the shape of a Q and which leaves a track like a modern non-skid non-skid tire. It Is covered with horse feathers and from It Is obtained not only horse feathers but colt slaw. .Its most distinguishing characteristic Is that it flies upside down and If it were not for this fact more would be known about it For when the' hunter shoots the philly-loo it falls up Instead of down and therefore but few specimens have been collected. The reason for Its flying upside down Is that It can thus absorb more violet vio-let rays from the blue sky and stave ofT rheumatism. rheu-matism. . . The other Interesting animal Is the gyascutus. Edltha L. Watson of the Colorado Graphic, Denver, Den-ver, the daughter of an old-time country newspaper news-paper man, has written the following description of this creature: The gyascutus is about the size of a white-tRll deer, has ears like a rabbit, and teeth like a mountain moun-tain lion. Its coat Is brlndle, and Its eyes are red. It has a long and prehensile tall, which It wrai.s around rocks when It turns around, for a little extra leverage. It has telescopic legs, which airangement enables en-ables It to graze around the sides of mountains, the two right or left logs, as the case may be, telescoping to about half the length of the oth-r two.- For this reason It can cat either to the right or the left, but has some difficulty in turning around, as It appears that tho two hind legs or the two front ones will not telescope at the some time, only ono side at a time having this power. Hence the long tall, which It wraps around the rocks, often pulling them out of the ground with the labor of its exertions in turning around. The gyascutus eRts the tan and green lichens which adhere closely to rocks on hills, and lit tho process, wara little trails around the mountainsides, mountain-sides, which many people have noticed. When disturbed, this animal digs a hole In the ground very rapidly, disappearing almost Immediately, Immedi-ately, so that sight of one is very rare. The holes are often mistaken for prospect holes, but the seeker for ore would be amazed to And a gyascutus upon farther digging. The gyascutus is seen only after a snalco-blte and the subsequent treatment by the observer. This causes one to wonder If this animal and the snake are not in some way affiliated. This Is a subject which will boar investigation. Gyascutl, while rare, are not extinct, but have been run Into the ground so often that they are almost .ink now n. Editors not only have done a good work In the Interests of unnatural history by preserving the accumulated data on many of these interesting animals, but they have nlso contributed to the science of their observations on some of the fauna which are found only around print shops. Go to any print shop and. If you will ask. the editor will be glad to show you some type lice. Then there Is the type lout, which Is an apprentice type louse, whose job It is around the print shop to eat all punctuation marks which are Incorrectly placed and to correct typographical errors. A lout being nn awkward fellow, the type lout sometimes some-times makes mistakes himself nnd that Is why you sometimes find your name misspelled in the newspaper. Another interesting nnlmal Is the studlo-Inkerus. It was Just by chance that one of these appeared while Artist Walters was mak Ing the sketches for this article and he was able to draw the picture of this Interesting little fellowthe fel-lowthe first time In history that Its portrait has ever been made. The studlo-Inkerus is the reason why the Ink bottles nnd luk wells on the desks of cartoonists and editors are always dry. The studlo-Inkerus eats nothing and drinks only Ink. |