JWMJT AND S'l'KKAM. 



t?£fe- 



A WEEKLY JOURNAL, 



DSJOTED TO FIELD AUD AQUATIC SPORTS, PRACTICAL NATURAL HlBTORT, 

 FlSH.CcaTLTItE, TUd PliOTKCTION OP UAKB.PKKSKRVATlONOy FORESTS, 

 AilD THE tttCCXCATION IN MEN AND WOMEN 01 A BZALTHT INTEREST 



m Out-door Kscreation and Studt : 



PUBLISHED BY 



Rarest snd &treani publishing (gcmyanp, 



AT 



IT CHATHAM STfiBET, (CITY HALL SQUARE) NBW YOKE, 

 [Pobt Office Box 2832.1 



Terin«, Four Dollar» a Year, Strictly lit A4vane*. 



Twenty-five per cent, oil for Clubalof Three or more. 



Advertising Ratet. 



Inside pages, nonpareil type, 20 cents per line: outside page, SO cents. 

 Special rates for three, six, and twelve months. Notices in editorial 

 columns, 40 cent." per line. 



PROTECTION OF SMALL BIRDS IN 

 EUROPE. 



NEW I0UK, THURSDAY, MARCH 8, 1877. 



To Correspondents. 



A'l commonlcations^whatever, whether relating to ouelness or literary 

 correspondence, must be addressed to The Forest and Stream Pub 

 LI8HIH9 Company. Personal or private letters of course excepted. 



All communications intended for publication must be accompanied with 

 real name, as a guaranty of good faith. Names will not be published if 

 objection be made. No anonymous contributions will be regaraed. 



Articles relating to any topic within the scope of this paper are solicited 



We caunot promise to return rejected manuscripts. 



Secretaries of Clubs and Associations are urged to favor ns with brief 

 notes of their movements and transactions, as it is the aim of this paper 

 to become a medium of useful and reliable information between gentle- 

 men sportsmen from one end of the country to the other ; and they will 

 dnd onr columns a uesirahle medium for advertising announcements. 



The Publishers of Forest and Stream aim to merit and secure the 

 patronage and countenance of that portion of the community whose re- 

 fined intelligence enables them to properly appreciate and enjoy all that 

 Is beautiful in Nature. It will pander to no depraved tastes, nor pervert 

 the legitimate sports of land and water to those base uses which always 

 tend to make them unpopular with the virtuous and good. No advertise- 

 ment or business notice of an immoral character will be received on any 

 terms ; and nothing will be admitted to any department, of the paper that 

 may not be read with propriety in the home circle 



We cannot be responsible for the dereliction of the mall service, if 

 money remitted to us is lost. 



Advertisements shonldbe sent in by Saturday of each week, if possible. 



fST" Trade supplied by American News Company. 

 CHARLES II A L LOCK, 



Editor and Business Manager. 



Slaves is Florida. — Many ot the leading newspapers, 

 including several in this city, are very much interested in 

 a recently publish! d statement that negro slavery still exists 

 in Florida, the original informant and imparter of this 

 starl ling news being "a gentleman who met a gentleman, 

 fresh from Florida, who informs him that the Seminole 

 Indians, who live in the swamps, are large slave owners." 



Now, if those who are interested in this newly discovered 

 fact, will refer to the files of Forest and Btbeam for 

 ifi73 (nearly four years ago), they will find in the issues of 

 November Gth, 13th and 20th, several columns describing 

 in minutest detail the domestic life and status of the 

 Seminole Indians and I heir dependents, the same being 

 embodied in Chapters XX and XXt of "Ilallock's Unmp 

 Life in Florida." 



FLORIDA Tourists. — There is great competition now be- 

 tween the St. John river boats, and the fares from Jack 

 souville for tie round trip is reduced to the vety low price 

 of .flli, which includes meals and staterooms. Board at 

 the Grand National and other .hotels is $3 per day, and 

 there is a general reduction at the boarding bouses. The 

 season is early this year; the sun has lately been too hot 

 for a promenade without umbrellas, and travel is falling 

 oil somewhat. 



By-Laws for Game Clubs. — As we have to distribute ft 

 large number of copies of Constitutions and By-Laws to 

 aid the fotmationof new Game Protective Clubs, all over 

 the country, we shall feel thankful to the Secretaries of 

 Clubs already in existence if they will send us a few copies. 

 Our supply is running short. We beg to acknowledge 

 previous favors of the kind now solicited. 



— The regular monthly meeting of the New York As- 

 sociation for the Protection Of Game will be held on 

 Friday cveuing at the Hotel Brunswick. The Senate and 

 Assembly committees on Amendments to flic Game Laws 

 are expected to be present. 



j?pcE .— Thin German humorous and satirical illustrated 

 journal, will appears on the 14th, printed in (he English 



■*•♦ 



—Alligators in South Carolina have been out of Ihe mud 

 for some two weeks, and are quoted as lively. They are 

 seldom seen so early. 



THE good example set some years ago by Prussia, 

 Switzerland, and some of the minor German Stales, 

 in making stringent laws for the protection more especi- 

 ally of those birds indispensable to agriculture, has gradu- 

 ally been followed by other States of the Continent. In 

 many countries, indeed, there are laws already iu existence 

 protecting the species of birds well known and recognized 

 as useful, though, as a rule, they have fallen into disuse. 

 This was the case in regard to Germany a few years ago, 

 but Prussia took the lead iu passing stringent laws in favor 

 of the small birds. The killing or exposing, and selling 

 of them upon the weekly markets; the capturing of these 

 birds by means of net, line, snare, etc., was forbidden. 

 Special permission was lo be given for the capture of any of 

 the species enumerated in those districts where bird-catch- 

 ing formed a principal means of the subsistence for the 

 populations, as, for instance, some villages iu the Harz 

 Mountains, iu the Thuringian Forest and elsewhere. In 

 these districts, however, the capture of birds has greatly 

 decreased within the past few years. Prussia did not *ake 

 the step without first having the opinion of her most cele- 

 brated ornithologists and agriculturists; and it was an 

 exceedingly valuable preliminary report, prepared for the 

 Prussian Ministry of Agriculture by Dr. Sladelmann, of 

 Halle, the general Secretary of the Agricultural Society of 

 Saxony. 



Though Prussia's laws have been adopted in most parts 

 of Germany, and the movement set on foot has extended 

 to German Austria, it has been found necessary to agitate 

 for au International Convenlion for the protection of the 

 singing and useful birds, for, while Germany was doing 

 her best to protect, not only her native birds, but also the 

 migratory ones, the peoples of southern Europe took every 

 measure to destroy as many as possible. This charge 

 has been made more especially against Italy, where the 

 slaughter of birds, which has been carried on for decades, 

 was sanctioned by the Italian Parliament in Ihe hunting 

 laws of a few years ago. Year after year the Germans 

 have bad to complain of the loss of millions of thalers 

 through the ravages of insects upon whole districts. In 

 18(50" cockchafers indicted a loss of $1,200,000 upon the 

 fields and forests of four communal districts, in the Harz 

 Mountains. In 1855, nearly five million cords of wood 

 wa< killed in the East Prussia, Lithuanian and Polish 

 forests, by the ravages of a species of caterpillar. In 1804 

 and 18G5, the Canton of Berne paid out $51,800 for 30,000 

 impel ial bushels of cockchafers and 30,000 bushels of 

 canker-worms. The number of both together was esti- 

 mated at 2,150,175,000, which, had they lived till the 

 spring of 1807, would have increased thirty fold— to 64,- 

 500,000,000! They would have destroyed the entire harvest 

 in 1807 had not the Canton taken such energetic measures. 

 Similar instances could be recorded by the columu. What 

 was the cause of the unusual appearance of these insects? 

 The canker-worm is developed into the cockchafer in the 

 spring, the very time when lire migratory birds are ac- 

 customed to make their appearance. But birds did not 

 make their appearance in anything like the numbers de- 

 signed by nature; they had first to pass over the Italian 

 plains and mountains, and millions never got beyond the 

 kitchens of Milan, Florence or Home. The Italian peasant 

 is the declared enemy of all that flies; everything with 

 wings is palatable to him, and he is remorseless. 



German naturalists, like Brehm and Tschudi, have long 

 ago called attention to Ihe fact that, with bird-slaughter in 

 Italy, no protection of birds in the North could fill up the 

 gap in the household of Nature. Brehm says in his Lcben 

 der Vogel:— 



"When the migratory bird first appears in Italy, the 

 roccolo stands upon every hill-top, and his net is in every 

 bush. It is all the same to him if the wanderers be large 

 or small, useful or injurious; he kills them all, from the 

 thrush lo the golden crested wren. And this slaughter is 

 carried on all through Iheyear. The Italian even easts his 

 net o'er the nest Of the songster, and sacrifices brood and 

 parent birds to Ills appetite. 11 And Tschudi complains in 

 Ids Thii litben tier AipemreU that, not only are the snipe, 

 quail, thrush, pigeon and other game birds captured, but 

 eveu ihe swallow, the beautiful garden warbler, nightin- 

 gales, the little singers of all species, are uninterruptedly 

 hunted in the dtalh, bringing "land of the citrons and 

 oranges," without respect of old and young, by merchants, 

 mechanics, priests and nobles, with traps, nets, tiieit guns, 

 sparrow-hawks, screech owls; and even the hook and line 

 is used during the period of ihe annual migration. Even 

 Italian naturalists and scientific men have not been silent 

 on tliis bird slaughtering business of their countrymen. 

 The Italian Alpine Club has long directed its efforts towards 

 terminating the slaughter. Its organ has published many 

 excellent articles against it. 



The old adage that every sin brings its own punishment, 

 is never more strikingly illustrated than in regard lo those 

 errors which man commits agjinst nature. The old story 

 of the destroyed forests is ever new. France, Spain, 

 Prussia, Switzerland, Italy, have all experienced the ill- 

 effects of deforestation, in reduced agricultural fruitful- 

 ness, in innundalions, and sudden changes of temperature. 

 Frederick the Great was a great monarch, but a poor 

 naturalist. One day^he found that the sparrows were 

 eating up his beautiful grapes in the Terrace at Suns 

 Souci, and at once ordered them all to be killed. Next 

 year no birds came; but the caterpillars did not leave 

 Frederick a whole cluster of his favorite grapes. The cruel 



order was then rescinded. The anecdote applies very well 

 to the Italians. Their charges against the birds are that 

 they came just when their luscious fruits are ripe, and do 

 great damage to the grapes; Ihey do not think that if the 

 birds did not come, the caterpillars, etc. , would hardly 

 allow a bunch of grapes to ripen. But the bird-slaughter 

 is carried on indiscriminately, no mailer whether il de- 

 stroys insects or grapes, for all iimke a palatable dish for 

 the Italian gourmand. This fact is admitted by Gaslaldi, 

 who wrote on the new game laws of 1889: "Looked at 

 from the scientific standpoint, this law is ira insult to Ihe 

 Italian, nay, to European civilization. Its defenders say 

 in subslauce: The hunting of birds with nets must be per- 

 mitted in the southern provinces, eveu during the season 

 where it is prohibited in other places, since the hunting of 

 birds is there an industry, by which the people earn their 

 bread. It must be permitted in Sardinia because it is 

 there a remunerative employment. Lombatdy would 

 sooner commence a revolution than give up the hunting of 

 birds with nets, traps, mid other means of capturing in use 

 since lime immemorial. Unfottunalelv (says Gastaldi) it 

 is so. In the whole of Italy the unchecked capturing of 

 birds is an employment for the vagabond, by which he 

 makes money; but when people call it under this pretext 

 an "industry," why do we not say the same of begging 

 and other occupations which are stringently punished by 

 moral nations?" 



Experience is here the best teacher, and both Italy and 

 her northern neighbor, Austria, have at last fell the ne- 

 cessity of coming to au understanding on the. subject of 

 the protection o! birds. The southwestern Austriau 

 provinces have of late years suffered severely from the 

 ravages of insects upon Ihe fields, forests anil gardens, and 

 naturally the Austrian governmeut lays the charge to the 

 Italian bird-killers, though she too is not guilty of paying 

 too much attention to the protection of the useful birds. 

 The two governments determined to lake measures for a 

 correction ol Ihe evil, aud sonic years ago a commission of 

 eminent scientists met at Florence aud held a conference 

 upon Ihe subject. This was the basis for the legislation 

 which resulted in the present protection laws in Italy and 

 Austria. 



Stuffed Wiiitefish on Ice.— Last week we received 

 from the packing establishment of E. P. Paxtou, Esq., at 

 Detroit, a box of fine large wiiitefish in us good order and 

 as sweet as when taken from the water last fall. There 

 was positively no difference discernible in quality aud 

 flavor. We have in previous numbers of Forest AND 

 Stream described the extensive fisheries of this establish- 

 ment, which are located on and among the several islands 

 that beautify ihe Detroit river, aud mark the boundary be- 

 tween Canada -and the United States. Mr. Paxion, we be- 

 lieve, furnishes ten tons of these delicious whitelish ton 

 single consignee in this city. He i> also extensively 

 engaged in the manufacture of Caviare, which we have 

 also repeatedly written of. Caviare is a preparal ioa of fish 

 spawn, salted and dried. 



By the way, this same gentleman sent us a couple of 

 stuffed specimens of white fish, large and fine, a year ago, 

 for our cabinet. So well prepared were they, ami so per- 

 fectly did they retain their original shape and complexion 

 that it was difficult to distinguish them at a glance from 

 the edible fresh fish which arrived in the box the other 

 day. They have been much admired by those who are 

 fond of ichthyology, and a sight of them has certainly 

 made many mouths water. Now, the editor of this paper- 

 intends that it shall be said that "there is nothing mean 

 about him." Generously he apportioned the box of fish 

 among his coadjutatois and friends, reserving bul one for 

 himself; and messengers were at once dispatched to the 

 domiciles of the several Benedicts, to present the fish lo 

 the cook. One recipient (not connected with the office), 

 who resided in New Jersey, preferred to take his own fish 

 home, and meanwhile ordered it to be laken to French's 

 hotel and put upon ice. A faithful observance of his in 

 junctions was promised, and just here, good reader, begin 

 to laugh! No sooner had he gone forth to his avocations, 

 than the fresh fish was dispatched to his home, and the 

 UitJJed fifhmut to Ihe ice. In the evening the gentleman 

 called iu due time and look his prize home to his cook aud 

 family, and — well, we can only imagine, the sensation aud 

 bewilderment that followed; we prefer to ring the curtain 



down. 



»»*■ 



Bird Skims and Eggs. — Collectors in search of bird 

 skius and eggs will possibly be able to find what they want 

 by examiniug the very large stock of both at the old 

 curiosity shop of Uncle John Krider, corner of Walnut and 

 2d stretts, Philadelphia. We stepped into his place the 

 other day, and -were astonished to And that his modesty 

 had prevented him from vaunting his valuable wares, some 

 of which are very rare. 



Uncle John has oecupied.this same corner for fifty-one 

 years, and though the building is antiquated, one should 

 not judge of its contents from the exterior. The structure 

 itself is very curious, being built of black and red bricks; 

 and this generally received impression is that the black 

 ones aie "iron bricks," but Uncle John is reticent on this 

 point. Any person having any curiosity in the matter 

 will do well to ask him. 



■♦♦*■ 



North Carolina.— The Kaleigh N. C. Mvn thinks the 

 Legislature should pass a law to protect the partridges 

 (quail), and states that up to the 15th of January 50,000 

 had been shipped, chiefly front High Point, Greensboro, and 

 Company Shops, aud the birds still continue to be sent to 

 our markets in large numbers. 



