ADIRONDACK IMAGES AND TALES; Sabattis – – – A Guide

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Sabbatis is a fine guide and a hard worker, but his most important attributes are perseverance and integrity.

Sabbatis is an Abenaki Indian, small, strong and agile. His instincts and knowledge of the North Woods are unmatched by other guides.

Sabbatis’ knowledge of the woods is not limited to his intimacy of the arts of hunting, fishing and trapping. He has a creative bent with working wood. He knows which woods swell slower or faster than others. He knows how they shrink or grow. He knows which woods to use as the seat of a chair and which ones to use as the legs. Those who he has built chairs for say that they never wobble; even after ten years.

We should get back to Sabbatis’ perseverance. He never leaves a dead deer in the woods. His tracking ability is legend but it is his perseverance is what makes him track a deer all night if necessary.

And if his tracking ability is legend then his integrity is what makes his life story. But an example is necessary.

A Vermont preacher and customer who uses Sabbatis’ guiding skill had become aware that the guide was about to lose his home for failure to pay the mortgage on time. This preacher was also aware that Sabbatis’ could not shake the habit of whiskey.

They made a deal. The preacher would loan Sabbatis the money for his mortgage if Sabbatis would give up drink.

The following year, in the cold February snow and wind, Sabbatis with the aid of two horses pulled a large sled out of the Adirondack Mountains, across Lake Champlain and into Burlington, Vermont; the home of the preacher. On that sled were major portions of many deer, black bears, a mountain lion, sable skins, brook trout, ruffed grouse, mink and fox. All that and Sabbatis also had $100 cash to add to his debt to the preacher. His mortgage loan was more than paid for.

Sabbatis continues to guide and has never taken another drink.