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FOREST AM) STREAM. 



A WEEKLY JOURNAL, 



D«VOTBI>TOFraLD AND AQUATIC SPOBTB, PRACTIOAL NATUEAL HiSTOBT, 



iTSU , CULTURE, TEj! PROTECTION OF GAJUE, PRESERVATION OK FoltKSTS, 

 AHT> THE INCULCATION nOlEN AJtD WOMSNOlT A HKALTHT INTEREST 



ra Oct-doob Kbobbatioh akd Stddt : 



PUBLISHED BT 



forest mi &tnam publishing (Sampans, 



IT CHATHAM STfiBST, (CITY HALL SQUARB) NEW YORK, 

 [Fobt Onrios Box 2832.1 



1 >rrai, Four Dollars » Year, Strictly In Aavane* 



Twenty-live per cent, off for CInbs of Three o 



Advertising Rates. 



Inside pages, nonpareil type, SO cents per line: ontside page, 30 cents. 

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

 columns, 40 cents per line. 



»»* Any publisher inserting onr prospectus as above one time, with 

 brief editorial no-ice oiliui:-; ait.ennoo thereto, and sending marked copy 

 to us, will receive the Forest and Stream for one year. 



NEW YORK, THURSDAY, APRIL 10, 1877. 



To Correspondents. 



All commnnlcationa whatever, whether relating to ousuaess or literary 

 correspondence, mnst be addressed to The Forest and Stream Pub 

 lishing Compant, Personal or private letters of conrse excepted. 



All commnnications intended for publication must be accompanied with 

 teal 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 Names will not be published if 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 cannot promise to return rejected manuscripts. 



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

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

 to Become a medium or useful and reliable information between gentle- 

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

 Ond our columns a uosirable medium for advertising announcements. 



The Publishers of Forest and Streak 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 



Wo cannot be responsible for the dereliction of the mail service, If 

 money remitted to as is lost. 



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



t3T" Trade supplied by American News Company. 

 CHARLES HAL.L.OCK. 



Editor and Business Manager. 



DON'T YOU FORCET IT. 



— On the 1st of May next the office of Forest and Stream 

 will be removed back to its original quarters, 103 Fulton 

 Street. 



What is Thought of Forest and Stream. — The Kind of 

 Pnlraiift Me ITnn. — Modesty won't hurt us, and so we print 

 the following letters. The first is from J. U. Gregory, Naval 

 Agent at. Quebec, who prides himself upon having securod 

 for FoitBST and Stream a club of fifty subscribers among 

 the leading gentlemen of that ancient city: 



Quebec, April 12. 

 Editor Forett ami Stream. 



Please send the Forest and Streaji to Hie Excellency, Lord Dufferin, 

 the Lt. Governor of tile Province of QtreDee. at Quebec. Our Lt. 

 Governor is a keeu sportsman, and It,m glad to be aide to add him to 



! ii( of subscribers, which I hope to increase. Sr.nd him all the 



back numbers of the prescut volume. Tours, very truly, 



J. TJ. Obesobi, 



The second letter is from Dr. Elliott Coues, XT. S. A., the 

 well-known nrnithologist, and we are bound to say that the 

 compliment conveyed in it has more than ordinary signifi- 

 cance; to have mimed it or gained it gives us pleasure. It 

 is the. reward that follows persistent endeavor, lightening 

 the burden of labor: 



n. S. Oeologicai. Scrvky, 1 

 Washington, D. C, April 13, 1877. { 



My Pear Bollock.— Permit me to thank you for lending the columns of 

 yonr paper to the purposes of my circular respecting Ilia proposed 

 "History of North American MammalB," as well as for the rordislly 

 appreciative expressions with which you were kind enough to preface it. 

 The compliments which We receive should react less upou our self-love, 

 and our self-satisfaction at anything we may have done, than upon our 

 Bensoof tho responsibility we incur in accepting them, and should 

 make us strive to become less undeserving of the confidence our friends 

 repose in ub. It Would ho idle to pretend that we aro indifferent to 

 praise, as part of a reward for our labors; but praise finds its highest 

 and truest office only when it serves as a stimulus to renewed ex- 

 ertion. 



My circular, published as a "circular order" from the Surgeon-Gen- 

 eral's office, was addressed osteusiblyand especially to medical officers 

 of the Army, with whom I am nulled m the bonds of corps spirit and 

 sympathy;' but It was designed to have, and I trust it will have, a wider 

 application; and I beg that each one of my friends, whether known or 

 unknowu, who may be interested in tie matter, will consider tilmself 

 individually invited to co operate with me in this work, iu which I am 

 very much in earnest. I do not ltnow that anything els- hi 

 to what isstid in the eircuUr Itai U Unl ' ■ Mm "iteration with 

 empbadiof tho fact that I have much to learn beforelean make the 

 work all that I wautit to be. I shall probably cause the circular to be 



reprinted in a number of papers ; for you know that no one of u» can 

 claim any patent-right on the cuansela and methods of scientific in- 

 quirr- But I may truthfully say that I am particularly pleased to have 

 It in Forest and 8tbeam. a journal bo largely devoted to the increase 

 and diffusion of information in Natural History, which rcachos so large 

 and so cultivated a elrelo of readers who are interested in pursuits tike 

 mine, and which seldom il over reaches me without containing some- 

 thing that I Immediately cut out and file for future use in my own 

 writings. With renewed expression of my best wishes, which you 

 know you have always had, for tho continued success and increasing 

 good influence of your very ably edited paper, bolieve me, 



Yours cordially, Elliott Coins, 



A GLANCE AT THE INSECTS. 



ABOVE the worms and crabs wo rise into the world of 

 insects, and find completed in them the jointed (ar- 

 ticulate) plan in which they all agree. In this class the 

 body is no longer a mere chain of rings like the worm's, nor 

 is there a solid head-thorax as in the crab's; but we have a 

 distinct head containing a larger brain than before seen, a 

 separate chest or thorax, and behind it an abdomen. The 

 body-wall of insect's becomes a hardened crust; but it is 

 Biade up of a large number of pieces, so arranged that mo- 

 tion is not interfered with nor growth stopped. Each ring of 

 the thorax bears a pair of legs. The leg consists of six 

 points ending in a pair of claws, between which is a cushion- 

 like sucker, an apparatus that enables the fly to walk on the 

 ceiling. The great majority of insects have but three pairs 

 of legs, and constitute the order of six-footed insects (Hexa- 

 pods) ; but the centipedes, because they hare more rings in 

 the thorax, have many more pairs of feet. 



The wings of insects, consisting of two pairs, called the 

 fore and hind pairs, aro simply membranes stretched over a 

 frame-work of many tubes. Through these tubes the blood 

 circulates, and as they contain within them air tubes, the 

 blood is here exposed to the air and recharged with oxygen. 

 Thus the wings perform the office of lungs as well as flight. 

 The blood is usually colorless. 



The appendages of the head are more numerous and dif- 

 ficult to describe. The large prominent eyes are compound, 

 that is, they are made up of many (50 to 3,650) simple eyes 

 crowded together so that an insect can look in all directions 

 at once, though he can neither move his eyes nor turn hiB 

 head. From near the eyes spring two long, slender ' 'feelers" 

 called aniennce. They seem to be of use to the insect in 

 directing his flight as well as finding his food, and some say 

 that through them he can perceive sounds. On each side of 

 the mouth you will find the stout jaws, or mandibles, with their 

 sharp, three-toothed edges, shutting together sideways in- 

 stead of up and down. With these insects cut and tear 

 their food, passing it onto themore complicated maxfflce just 

 behind the mouth for finer chewing. There are still other 

 appendages to the head quite as important. 



Tho muscles of insects lie just underneath the crust, and 

 their power is enormous. A flea will leap 200 times its own 

 height, and certain beetles will bear up as many times their 

 own weight, while others are ablo to gnaw through lead pipes 

 and iron canisters. 



All insects breathe air, or air mixed with water, which en- 

 ters through little holes along each side, a system of intri- 

 cate tubes and valves called travhece, and is thus distributed 

 all over the body. In many insects there aro little sacs in 

 various parts of the body which may be filled or emptied of 

 air at will, thus increasing its weight. Some, however, 

 when perfect, and others in their larva and pupa stages, 

 have regular little gills by which they breathe. The way in- 

 sects grow by metamorphosis, or the change of one form into 

 another, is very curious — almost as much so as the alternate 

 generations in the development of jelly-fish or Salpa. Take 

 for example the history of the dragon-fly or "devil's darn- 

 ing-needle," that terror to all peaceful hummers and buzzers. 

 In laying her eggs in July and August, the dragon-fly 

 "alights upon water-plants, and, pushing the end of her body 

 below the surface of the water, glues a bunch of eggs to the 

 submerged stem or leaf. * * * There must be more 

 than one hundred eggs in one of the large bunches." You 

 can easily see this process if you are watchful, but you will 

 ere long discover that not every fly that hovers over the 

 water or alights near its surface is there to deposit eggs. 

 The eggs soon hatch out little beings called lan:a> (meaning a 

 mask), which is the name given to the very first or youngest 

 stage— the babyhood of all insects. " Caterpillars, '• 

 " grubs," " canker-worms " and so fo.rth are common names 

 for the larvse of moths and butterflies. AU larvse are per- 

 fect, gluttons, spending their whole time in capturing and 

 devouring their food. It is at this time in their life that 

 such insects as Jive upon plants do so much damage to our 

 crops and shade trees; for many of those terrible pests, when 

 fully grown, are beneficial to us rather than injurious. 



But to go back to our immature dragon-fly, actively 

 plundering in the bottom of its native pool. It has much 

 the shape of the adult, except that the abdomen is fatter and 

 there are no wings worth mentioning. Instead of the for- 

 midable weapons we. should expect to find about the mouth, 

 there is only a broad, smooth mask covering the face. This 

 looks innocent, certainly, but let some unwary insect come 

 within striking distance, when quicker than flash the battery 

 is unmasked, the terrible jaws dart out, and the victim ia 

 Beeured. 



If now you should put Borne of these larvro into an aquarium 

 and watch them, you would observe that the skin would 

 split along the back, through which rent the insect would 

 literally crawl out of its skin. But now it is different from 

 what it was before, and yet it is not a perfect dragon-fly. It 

 bus become the chrysalis otpupa, and although now consid- 

 erably larger and nearer perfect than the larvse, there is yet 

 another change to come, and early in summer tho pupa 

 crawls up some plant close to the surface of the water to 

 await it. 



"Again tho back yawns wide open, and from the rent onr 

 dragon-fly slowly emerges. For an hour or more it remains 

 torpid and listless, with its flabby, soft wings remaining 

 motionless. Tho fluids leave the surface, the crust hardens 

 and dries, rich and varied tints appear, and onr dragon-fly 

 rises proudly into its now world of light and sunshine, a 

 gorgeous but repulsive being." Before, each of these changes 

 took place the body of the next form had fully formed un- 

 derneath the skin, so that we might say, ns the larva hatched 

 out of the egg, so the pupa hatched out of the larva, and the 

 perfect insect or Imago out of the pupa. 



The natural classification of insects, Dr. Packard thinks, is 

 the following : 



CLASS. ORDERS. 



I Hkxa coda, Six-footed insects. 



Insects. ) Abachstda. Spiders. 



( Mvriopoda. Centipedes. 



The lowest of these orders, the myriopods, embraces the 

 thousand-legged worms that scamper off so lively when you 

 upturn a rotten log. They have from ten to two hundred 

 rings, with a pair of legs to each ring, so it is no wonder 

 that they get away pretty fast. The well-known and dreaded 

 scorpion of tho Gulf States, whose, bite is dangerous, though 

 not always fatal, stands just here next to the true Bpiders, 

 which constitute the. sub-order, Araneina, the web-makers. 



The study of our spiders is extremely interesting, not only 

 from the large number of species in this country and their 

 varied localities and dress, but also from the astonishing in- 

 stincts which they show, and the wonderful webs and pit- 

 falls which they build in order to trap their prey: 

 " ■ Will you walk Into my parlor? ' 

 Said tne spider to the fly; 

 'It's' the prettiest little parlor, 

 That ever you did spy.' " 



They all subsist upon what they kill, and destroy many 

 insects which, if allowed to live, would do harm to our 

 crops; moreover, we have no species in the Northern States 

 whose bite is poisonous, so that there is less reason for our 

 killing every spider that comes in our way than many other 

 insects. I would advise you to read Mr. J. H. Emerton's 

 article in the second volume of The American Naturalist, if you 

 prefer reading how a spider builds its web to finding it out 

 for yourself. Now I have only enough time to merely 

 name the seven great groups of six-footed insects, to give 

 you an idea of the extent of this great study of entomology. 

 They are as follows : 



1. The Neuruplera, including the dragon and May-flies and 

 other low-forms. 



2. The Ortlwptera, or grasshoppers, crickets, locusts, etc., 

 among which are some of the InTgpst and noisiest of all our 

 insects; and this noise is made by rubbing their peculiar 

 wings together. 



3. The Hemiptera "bugs" proper, like plant-lice, bed-bugs, 

 and a great many small, compact forms found in the gross, 

 all of which have mouths fitted for biting and sucking. 



4. The Colec/ptera, or beetles, which are perhaps the most 

 interesting of all, and certainly the most numerous. You 

 can find them anywhere in the woods, on trees, in the grass, 

 in midst of the desert, and cast up by the ocean. 



5. The Diptera you are familiar with as flies, but have 

 you noticed the fact that the various kinds of flies that you 

 see all agree in having but one pair of wings ? Our com- 

 mon house-fly, the blue-bottle, and flesh-fly, with manyothers, 

 belong to the family Mlsotdce. 



6. The Lepidoptera, gorgeous butterflies and moths, are the 

 most striking of all the class. Butterflies are distinguished 

 from moths by their antenna? being knobbed instead of 

 thread-like or feathery. Most of our ordinary day-time but- 

 terflies belong to the Fnpilionida; but there are other equally 

 abundant species, especially of moths that only fly at night. 

 They lay their eggs in early summer, which are soon hatched 

 by the heat; their changes are then rapidly passed through 

 when they appear in sudden abundance. With some, like 

 our little sulphur-yellow butterfly (Volias), there are two 

 broods in a season. 



7. The JJymennptent, are the last and highest of insectH, 



typified by the bees, wasps, and ants. And they deserve 



the highest place, for no chapter in natural history 



is more surprising than that which tells the story of their 



wonderful ways. 



«■«• 



• 



American News Company. — This agency has, in a com- 

 paratively brief period, become one of the most potent and 

 extensive institutions of the country. Its ramifications ex- 

 tend everywhere, and its usefulness is readily acknowledged 

 *y those who have been served by it. Probably in these 

 days success could hardly attend any newspaper enterprise m it 

 having an immense capital and influence behind it, if it 

 were not assisted and fostered by the American News Com- 

 pany. Wo have found the gentlemen who control it to be aB 

 impartial in their service to publishers, journalists, dealers, 

 and others, as can be consistent with good judgment saga- 

 ciously exercised. It will astonish those who are cognizant 

 of their small beginnings and upward struggles at Ihe outset 

 to make an inspection tour of their magnificent new build- 

 ings in Chambers Street. Such a complete system of accom- 

 modation and delivery has scarcely everbcen developed as one 

 finds there. Tho machinery is as complete as that of ourposr- 

 office. We offer our feeble congratulations to those who have 

 willingly helped to make ns ns strong as we are, and we trust 

 and expect that TFcboth will continue to grow together, live 

 long and prosper. 



•»•«• 



— In the vicinity of Tampa tliev have corn waist high, and 

 watermelons and other vines are in bloom. 



-Kilt suits for Spring and Snnimur are d'Sfilayei by Baldwin, the 

 clothier, uf New York and Brooklyn. Hm B iya' Department is the 

 leading place of the kind In America. Prices from ten to twenty per 

 cent, less than elsewhere — Exchange. 



