1^ ^^^^ 

 THE AMERICAN SPORTSMAN^S JOURNAL. 



lEntered According to Act of Congress, in 1 be yesr I87n, by the Forest uad Stream PubUsHmK (J-jinpHuy, m the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington 



*s?.°^^i NEW YORK, THURSDAY, AUGUST 26. 1880. 



CONTENTS. 



BDITORIAIj-.— 



FlshlDg-in the Kans-i'lf'V i.akes; A Fast Vacht; The Ameri- 

 can Association ; How to Studj- Nature; The FaU Meeting 

 Programme; Fair Dealing for Sportsmen .■- ' 



The Spohisman Tourist :— 

 Camp Notes; Bail Shooting on the Delaware; All About 

 Cobb's Island; The Eagle and other Lakes In Maine; 

 Camp Cream O' Tartar ' 



Natural Histoky:— 

 Packard's Zf)olofrv; Tlie Captive Woodcock; Food of 

 Snakes; Xr.tes on Snakes: Albinos; Food of Squirrels; 



MOKkini? Bird in Canada I 



Fish Culture:— 

 The New York CoTumission ; A (iood Crop of Salmon Eggs; 

 Shad Hntcbiiig and Shad Laws; Frlfc^ate Mackerel Again 

 Heard From; Carp in Tennessee; Growth of Black Bass 

 In California - ' 



Sea and Kiver Fishino :- 

 Salmo Wllraoti Again; The Ichthyophagists; Black Bass m 

 Iowa; Bass Fishing in Kinderhook Lake; Salmon and 

 their Migration ; The Use of the Hook on tlie Salmon's 

 Jaw; Salmon Migration on the Pacdlc Coast; Cattish Eat 

 Snakes; Menhaden Pleutv, but Weak; Fish in Market; 

 Fly- Fishing for Blaolv Bass . 



Game bag and Gu.n :- 

 Post the tiaa'O Laws on ilailroads : Wanted, More Like 

 Him; Virginia Quail Shooting; An Ancient Fllnt-Lock ; 

 Georgia Dove Shooting ; Notes ; Shooting Matches - . . 



The Kennel :— 



National American Kennel Club ; Pennsyl\-ania State Field 

 Trial Association ; The St. Louis Dog Show; Pennsylva- 

 nia State Agricultural Society Colley Trials; NebiMka 

 Field Trials; Of Englishe Doggcs; Kennel Notes 



Range anil Gallery; Dr. Ruth's Exhibition Shoot; Creed- 

 moor Fall Programme 



Akchbry:— 



HIghlandPark 



Cricket :— 



Matches ; News Notes 



VACDTING AND CAKOEINO:— 



New York Yacht Club; Yatcbttng- News; TheOanOG Con- 

 gress - 



AHSWERS to COBnESPONDBNTS 



PUBI.ISHEHS' DEPARTSIENT 



For advertising rales, instructions to correspondents, 

 etc., see prospectus at end of reading ^natter. 



Forest faSxREAM. 



NEW YORK, THURSDAY, ATJGUST 36, 18S0, 



Fishing at the Rasgeley Lakes.— We bear from 

 the Rangeley Lakes excellent reports of the trout 

 flsliitrg, whicli is said to be exceptionally good this season. 

 September is (be month in which the largest trout are 

 usually cauglit, and, though we do not altogether ap- 

 prove of taking the lish so late, as they are then prepar- 

 ing to spawn, there is usually a rush of flshermen to the 

 lakes in the early fall. The Boston and Maine Railroad, 

 in another coUimn, publishes a schoihile of fares which 

 may be of use to some of our reatlers 



A Fast Yacut.— Mr. Jas. G. Bennett's new steam 

 yacht Polynia has turned out an exceedingly fast vessel. 

 She beat the famous little Leila, of Bristol, last Thure- 

 day in Narragansett Bay. As the Leila is easily good 

 ■ for nineteen miles, the Polynia must have been mak- 

 ing twentj', and, as she was not crowded, twenty one 

 or twenty-two are within her capacity. This makes the 

 Polynia at least an eighteen knot steamer, and prob- 

 ably the fastest steam yacht in America. 



— The suggestion of a correspondent that the stations 

 and baggage cars of the railroads entering New York be 

 posted with the law prohibiting the carriage of snared 

 game and game killed out of. season, is simjile, sensible 

 and practicable. The plan, if atlopted, wiU undoubtedly 

 do very much to lessen the traflic in this plunder. Let it 

 be tried. It will at least accomplish more than an after- 

 dinner- speech. 



The American Association Meeting.— The twenty- 

 uintb meeting of the American Association for the Ad- 

 vancement of Science commenced yesterday at Boston. 

 This meeting, of which Mr. Lewis H. Morgan is Presi- 

 dent, promises to be very largely attended and verj' suc- 

 cessful, and we shall hope to give some particulars of it 

 iu next week's issue of Forest and Stream. 



HOW TO STUDY NATURE. 



HUXLEY modestly calls his book* an introduction 

 to the study of zoology, but the reader wlio oli- 

 tains a few crayfish, or crawfish, as we Americans prefer 

 to call and spell it, and takes note of their outside ap- 

 pearance as described by the author, and afterward dis- 

 sects them according to the very plain directions laid 

 down, will find himself a zoologist by the time he lays 

 the book down, and will then be qualified to take up a 

 bird, beast or fish, and describe it, or at least understand 

 it, its structure, movements and all that comes under the 

 observation of a trained naturalist. O that such a book 

 hSd been written years ago ! What months and j-eats 

 of pottering it would have saved us ! The common cray- 

 fish of our fresh waters is a most wonderful animal to 

 those, who study it fir.st, but it is not a l)it more wonder- 

 ful than others, and its study will only prepare the stu- 

 dent to ao farther ; will tempt him, in fact, and he, or 

 she, will find the desire to learn more grows antl takes 

 possession of one like an evil habit. This book, writ- 

 ten by one of the greatest living zoologists, is a valua- 

 ble contribtition to our small list of really good pri- 

 mary zoological text books, and the story is most sim- 

 ply and charmingly told, being as free from all strange 

 terms as it is possible to be and yet be explicit, al- 

 though, as a matter of course, the re;ider must learn a 

 few names of parts of whose existence be was before 

 ignorant. He begins by telling tis that many persons 

 seem to believe that what is termed science is of a 

 widely different nature from ordinary knowledge, and 

 that the methods by which scientific truths are ascer- 

 tained involve mental operations of a recondite and 

 mysterious nature, comprehensible onlj' by the initi- 

 ated, and as distinct iu their character as in their sub- 

 ject matter, from the processes by which we discrim- 

 inate between fact and fancy in ordinary life, and that 

 yhat is called science is only that common sense which 

 sees things as thej' are, or, at any rate, without the 

 distortions of prejudice, and reasons from them in ac- 

 cordance with the dictates of sound judgment. 



After giving a description of the external parts, ;t.ccom- 

 panied by a plate on which letters refer to the names of 

 the parts, it.s movements, food, habits, method of cap- 

 ture, etc., he gays : "Thus far our information respect- 

 ing the crayfish is such as would be forced upon any one 

 who dealt in crayfishes, or lived in a district in which 

 they were used for food, It is common knowledge. Let 

 us now try to push our acnuaiutance with what is to be 

 learned about the animal a little further, so as to be able 

 to give an account of its natural history," etc. And thus 

 he leads the reader along into the mysteries of the struc- 

 ture, of its shell or exoskeleton, the attachment of its 

 legs and swimmerets, its jaws, gills, circulation of blood 

 and its digestive and generative organs, until finally there 

 seems nothing more to be known concerning the indi- 

 vidual. 



It must be borne in mind that it is the common cray- 

 fish of Europe which he is describing, and,that we have 

 several species in diflierent parts of our country which 

 differ in shape of claws and other particular)? whijh are 

 really unimportant as the European animal is the type 

 of the family, and although the common crayfish is the 

 title, and its life histoiy and structure the main part of 

 the book, all the relatives of the animal, such as shrimps, 

 lobsters and crabs, are considered, and their peculiarities 

 treated of, so that one gets a good idea of all the Crusta- 

 cea at the same time, and gettiug it, so to speak, from 

 the fountain head, he is sure that what he is learning is 

 what is accepted as truth by scientists in all lands. 



We have had so much stuff offered to the public as 

 popular natural history, which was compiled by men who 

 did not even know who was good authority and who was 

 not, that we regard it as the sign of the beginning of a 

 new era when men like Huxley begin to write books for 

 the people instead of only for the leai'ned. The publish- 



« The I Crayfish, i an Introduction to the Study of Zoiilogy, | tiy 

 I T. H. Huxley, P. R. S.,— with eighty-two lllustrationa. | New 

 York : I F). Appleton and Company, i 1, 3 and 5 Bond street, I 



ers (Appleton & Co.) have published many of the works: 

 of modern scientists, but we doubt if any volume of their 

 " International Scientific Series," of which the present 

 volume is the twenty-eighth, will do more toward awak- 

 ening an interest in the study of the life by which we are 

 surrounded, and a knowledge of which ia really neces- 

 sary in order to form an idea of man's place in nature, 

 than the present one. 



The Fall Meeting Progkahmb.— The very moderate 

 and unpretentious list of competitions for the eighth 

 Annual Fall Prize Meeting at Greedmoor has been is- 

 sued and may be found in our rifle columns. There 

 is plenty of variety in the competitions, however, and 

 riflemen who snoot for the pleasure of the art maj' 

 find plenty of chance for enjoyment in the few days 

 of the meeting. Reduced into plain, hard figures, the 

 prize list is a meager affair ; voiy much so. There is 

 nothing to tempt the grubbers for gain, who make 

 the rifle a lever for their purposes of self-enrichment. 

 There are simple badges whose value ranges far above 

 their intrinsic worth in the eyes of their holders, be- 

 cause they represent an achievement, a victory won, 

 and a struggle successfidly gone through with. 



With the true sportsman's idea in the minds of the 

 contestants, it would be sufficient to prepare a pro- 

 gramme of matches to secure a roll of entries, If it is 

 necessary to bait the programme with a liberal prize 

 worm, or to sugar-coat the shooting conditions aa 

 though tiio match were a nauseous affair only made 

 endurable by an addenda of liberal prizes, then it were 

 better that no match should take place. The National 

 Rifle Association is not fulfilling i's object— the encour- 

 agement of rifle practice — if it is only to act as tub- 

 monitor for a set of 'greedy cormorants who flock about 

 to pick over the good things of the feed set before them. 

 The programme for the September meeting will afford 

 little satisfaction to these gentry. To lead in a match 

 brings honor, but little profit, and this.is as'it should be, 

 if we are not to have the logical result of liberal prize 

 lists as instanced in the reCent Wimbledon false-mark- 

 ing scandal. The prospect already points to a good 

 meeting. The meeting between the regulars and the 

 militia will be more nearly on an equality than at any 

 previous time. The men of the army have been work- 

 ing up, anxious to show the people generally that they, 

 as professionals, are not ridiculously behind the ama- 

 teurs of our State regiments. The meeting gives promise 

 of good management under Col. Bodine, and, with a fine 

 speU of weather, there is a prospect of a deal of good 

 work in tKe several contests. 



Fair Dealing for Sportsmen. — The letter about Cobb's 

 Island ia a sufficient reply to our request that its author 

 should tell us about the present accommodations there 

 for sportsmen, and our Poughkeepsie correspondent 

 is doubtless as much pleased as we are ourselves 

 to have such an explicit account as that given by 

 "Chasseur." Cobb's Island is not by any means the first 

 place which has ruined its greedy managers and obUged 

 them to come down to a reasonable scale of prices. We 

 never knowingly recommend to our readers a place whei'e 

 extortion is the rule ; but now that the landlords at 

 Cobb's Island have reformed in this respect, we can in- 

 dorse all that is said in praise of the sport to be had there. 

 The columns of the Forest and Stki.am aie always open 

 to praise of resorts whicli deser^-e goud words, and to the 

 exposure of other places where the sportsman is fleeced ; 

 and it always means to ast^ortaiu the true condition of 

 affairs and do justice to all. We will thank our corres- 

 pondents at all times to bear this policy in mind and to 

 aid us in carrying it out. 



— A Baltimore child clairvoyant has discovered the 

 North Pole, which she describes as an island, full of 

 tropical trees and flowers. There are also vast hordes of 

 monkeys, o-striches, swans, geese, ducks, quaU, robins 

 and humming birds. Rather an inviting field for a good 

 dog and a breech-loader. Perhaps when the other game 

 fields of the world are exhausted, the sportsman may he 

 1 "first in" at the Pole. 



