42 Sport and Life. 



As a general thing, with the exception perhaps of Idaho, the law 

 has gone to the other extreme, and the bag a stranger is legally 

 entitled to make is of such ridiculously limited proportions as on 

 the face of it to suggest that a wide berth had better be given to 

 the Western States. The resident, on the other hand, enjoys the 

 wide privileges of a " settler " who can kill game practically at any 

 season of the year, and in quantities no law has as yet attempted to 

 define, always provided that the game is for his own use and no 

 part of it is sold. 



What is the use one may well ask of the Montana law limiting 

 a stranger to two wapiti so long as there are no officials to see that 

 this number is not exceeded ? In a country where in the wilder 

 parts you can still travel and hunt for weeks without seeing a 

 human being, it would require an army far larger than that of the 

 whole United States to enforce such regulations.* And even were 

 such an army available, the investment of 50 in a " ranch " 

 makes the stranger a " settler " in the eyes of the law. 



In one respect care has to be exercised ; it is concerning the 

 trophies. These should not be brought to the railway stations in 

 numbers exceeding the law's limit, for blackmailers, prompted by 

 the reward in the shape of half the fine, have of late years more 

 than once caused English as well as American shooting parties 

 considerable trouble and expense. The task of transporting the 

 trophies out to the railway should be left to your hunter or guide 

 to accomplish after you have left. If he is worth his salt, he will 

 manage to get eight or ten picked heads to the railway and dispatch 

 them, packed in cases, without any trouble. 



* How difficult such supervision of less vast areas is, actual experience nas 

 shown. Thus the force of cavalry that guards the National Park has often 

 proved useless in preventing regular poaching- raids, in some of which the small 

 remaining herd of bison has severely suffered 



