364 



FOnfiSl: AN£> STREAM. 



[Dec. 7. 1882. 



in the Artie Ocean? Take {mother look, sir,' angrily said 

 Hie captain. 



•' 'It's a whale, sir." sung out the mate in a seared kind of 



voice. 



" 'That's more like it, sir. I smell him now,' said the 

 captain." 



' Smelt him?" inquired the Doctor. 



"Yes, sna.eHed him, "replied Chips. "Don't you know 

 that, these old whalers can tell when a whale is around be- 

 fore they can see him? Then how do they do it if they 

 don't smell him? The captain called the mate down from 

 aloft, and the hark was steered for the big wliule. When 

 we got within a quarter of a mile of him, the boats were 

 lowered and we pulled tow aid him. I tell you he was a big 

 fish! ilis back loomed up like a mouutain.'and he appeared 

 to be a mile long!" 



"Po' gwaeioua," exclaimed the Doctor. 



"Didn't we feci seared when our boat got near him!" 

 Chips eonlinued. "I'd a given three months pay to be back 

 On the bark. When the boats got near enough, the mate he 

 says to the second niate, 'Mr. Toby, pull ymir boat ahead, 

 and throw the iron. What are you holding back for?' Then 

 the second mate ht! says lo the' mate, 'Mr. Blum, you pull 

 ahead and throw the iron. What are you holding back 

 for?' Then the mate he got nil in the i'ace, and he says, 

 ■give way. boys— who's afraid?' 



"'We were all afraid, and he knew it, but as he didn't dare 

 return to the bark before trying to harpoon the whale, we 

 mustered up courage to pull the boat near enough for him 

 to dart the harpOon, It Struck the whale squarely in the 

 back. 



" '.Stern all!' cried the mate, and 1 tell you we weren't. 

 slow in backing the boat out of his way. The whale was so 

 big it was .some time before he knew anything had hit him. 

 But when he did, wasn't he mad! lie just gathered himself 

 up and started; and the way he. took that boat through the 

 water was awful! 



"Now, about half a mile ahead of the whale, there was a 

 great iceberg drifting along. The whale saw it and he 

 steered for it. head on You see, he was so mad he didn't 

 stop to tlcnk. and he just ran his figurehead light into it. 

 He struck it so hard that the 'berg was knocked into little 

 pieces, no bigger than a good sized pumpkin, and it was 

 nine hundred feet High, and thiity -six hundred feet under 

 water!" 



"Fo' gwaeious!" exclaimed the Doctor. 



"He not only smashed the 'berg, Doctor," continued Chips, 

 "but what suited US better, he smashed bis own la-ad, for 

 wddeh we felt very much obliged to him; for, I am certain, 

 if he hadn't killed himself, we. couldn't have killed him. 

 The bark had followed the boats, and when the captain saw 

 the whale was dead, hC just ran her alongside of his carcass, 

 and made her fast. 



"Well, Doctor, it took four months to cut in that whale, 

 and we got eight hundred tons of blubber out of him!" 



"Say, look lea now, Chips," said the Doctor, "how many 

 tons was dat bark of yourn?" 



"Four hundred tons only," replied Chips. 



"Den how you put eight hundred tons in her?" 



"Why, you see, Doctor, that was blubber. When the oil 

 was tried out it shrank, and only left four hundred tons.- 

 That's clear enough. Don't you see it?" 



"1 'speets you's right, but 'taint quite elar." - 



"Well, anyhow, it filled the bark with oil, and we re- 

 turned home and were paid off and discharged." 



"Now, Chips, you don't 'speets dis nigger to believe dat 

 yarn? 1 think you is de boss liar of dis crowd." 



Ring-a-ding ding, sounded u bell, and a porter came for- 

 ward, singing out!" "Passengers for Bueksport will land from 

 the port side, aft." 



WILD RICE, 



EdU'ir Forest and StomflV 



In the spring of 1880 I received from Canada five bushels 

 of rice with directions for sowing. It came from one of 

 your advertisers, und while he said it was not so goods 

 time to sow it as it would be in the fall, yet he did not doubt 

 that a good deal of it would come up. The rice was sown 

 iu the shallow water at the head ot Moleehunkamunk, one 

 of the Rangeley Lakes, in Maine, sear my fishing camp, 

 Birch Lodge, and was also sown in one of the smaller ponds 

 near by. 



Bo far as 1 could judge, the water and the bottom were 

 both favorable to its growth, but none of it came up. We 

 made careful search many times, but could never find any 

 stalks. Thinking that the spring sowing was unfavorable, 



1 have this tall Bent for, and received, ten bushels of this 

 eason's growth from the same person, and last month it was 



sown in several places in the same waters. I shall report 

 results, if any there are, next season. 



I have been told that wild rice was sown in Lake Umba- 

 gog, the lower of the Rangeley chain of lakes, several years 

 ago, and that it now grows there to a limited extent, but. 

 have not been able to verify the statement. There seems to 

 be no reason why wild rice should not grow in Maine, and 

 if it can be once Started in the Rangeley waters it will add 

 very much to the attractiveness* of toe region as furnishing 

 food for ducks and wild geese, and thereby greatly improv- 

 ing the fall shooting. It is to be hoped that others who 

 have experimented With it will accept your invitation to re- 

 port results in your columns. Law -rea'ch. 

 Boston, Xov. 36, 1883. 



Hunting Accidents. — Detroit. Mich. — The nnmber of 

 casualties litis been very large. The first ambition of the 

 settler in the wilderness is to In-come the possessor of an old 

 army musket; the second, to slay some fur-bearing animal 

 and make .himself a cap liom the skin. Mis favorite mode 

 of hunting is to conceal himself in the thick brush beside a 

 runway and there await the passage of deer or turkeys. 

 Enthusiastic .young sportsmen who are 01 the look-out for 

 game of any description catch a glimpse of his fur cap in 

 the bushes. " Tney Creep nearer and nearer, trying to make 

 out what manner of animal it, is. Suon it moves and Ihe 

 young sportsman instantly fires. If he be troubled with 

 ' "buck-ague, ? ' the settler may fortunately escape, but the 

 newspapers have teemed with accounts of just such killings 

 for the past six weeks, interspersed with obituaries of the 

 gentlemen w In. go through the thick, brush dragging their 

 guns by the muzzle, or step over a log and pull their guns 

 after them.— W. 



Breeding °f Quail,— Crockett's uiuiT. Ark., Nov. if — 



Flushed a bevy of quail yesterday mneb too small to shoot, 



— Bykke, 



THE PINE SISKIN. 



Chriiffmiiri* pmus. 

 BY DH. ELLIOTT OWES. 



HERE we have a humble and, in fact, obscure member 

 of the feathered circle, notable chiefly for the lack of 

 any one of those strong points which muy'commeud a bird 

 to public notice or general favor. Diminutive in statute, 

 of simple streaky attire, albeit faced with buff or yellow, 

 lisping in speech and withal oftencsl mixed up with SUCll 

 more notable birds as crossbills and purple atal goldfinches, 

 the pine siskin is out of the question of possible notoriety. 

 Nevertheless, his individuality is well marked; his history 

 is already a long if not a brilliant one, and 1 question what 

 one of our birds is better known to ornithologists than this 

 "poor relation" of the gaily-plumed goldfinch. 



Like many of Bis relatives of the finch family, this siskin 

 iB a very sociable little creature, so fond of the society of las 

 fellows that the roving (lock- can hardly be persuaded to 

 separate even during the breeding aud nesting season. 

 Large numbers commonly make choice of tin- same piece of 

 woods, or encamp for their summer homes within sound of 



THE PINE SISKIN. 



each other's querulous chirpings, though each pair mind 

 their own affairs with little heed to Ihe general welfare. At 

 all other seasons Ihe (Jocks are inseparable. You will 

 oftener see a dozen or a hundred of these birds together than 

 find one by himself. 



They are restless to the last degree. Even when most, as- 

 siduously engaged at their repasts they are in continual mo- 

 tion from one seed vessel to another, and often quit one 

 feeding ground for another, however eligible, as if actuated 

 by a sudden incontrollable impulse. Their thin wiry voices 

 are incessantly heard as they move about, now in a lisping, 

 querulous undertone, as if they were soliloquizing, now 

 with a harsher, rattling note, as they take alarm and move 

 off on swift, undulating wing, to another tree or to a patch 

 of diy, rustling herbage, like the uneasy gadabouts they 

 surely are. Yet it is not an unpleasant sight to see a flock 

 of siskins once settled comfortably in some inviting tree 

 where seeds are plentiful, and observe with what address 

 they shell out their food from its husk, how nimbly they 

 creep and flutter about, what striking attitudes they momen- 

 tarily assume, and how completely absorbed they become in 

 the practical question before them, only stopping now and 

 then to utter a drawling note or two. as it were, with their 

 mouths full, and from sheer force of their loquacious habit. 

 Not that; they are at all unhappy, or have anything to com- 

 plain of, but they never seem to" forget that they are "poor 

 critters" after all, as the Widow Bedott would say. 



Nevertheless, these forlorn little creatures fare bountifully, 



TUB AMERICAN GOLDFINCH, 

 if not sumptuously, a great variety of food to their liking 



I jt-iiitr always accessible. The seeds of all the conifers where 

 so many siskins spend their time— of the alders, birches, 

 buttonwoods, and many other deciduous trees; of plantains, 

 thistles, and an endless array of composite and amentaceous 

 plants, furnish a plentiful and varied repast, to be had in 

 turn as the fancy takes them. You may see a flock of sis- 

 kinsone moment swinging on the globular, slender-Stemmed 

 fruit of the buttouwood, as represented in the figure, and 

 the next find them fluttering almost on the grrjund, in a 

 patch of planteins— occasionally on the ground itself, pick- 

 ing up scattered seeds that have been shaken out of their 

 dry and splitting capsules. Eire into the busy group, if 

 you care to, and, ten to one, the victims of your curiosity 

 will be found so fat that you will have some trouble in 

 preparing them for the cabinet, and their distensible throats 

 so crammed wit * seeds as to perceptibly set the feathers of 

 the throat awry. We unconsciously associate the word 

 "crop" so closely with fowls and pigeons, that all are not. 

 aware how many birds have the swallow' tube dilated into a 

 kind of crop, which bulges to one or the other side, for the. 

 temporary reception and maceration of seeds hastily plucked, 

 while the gizzard below maybe already full. Very many 

 finches possess this peculiar structure of the oesophagus, 

 and this siskin is one of them 



In most parts of the United States the siskin is assoeiable 

 in our minds with tally weather, leafless trees and fields 

 which, having yielded up their crops, are left to the in 



roads of coarse, arrogant herbage.. Eor the bird, in most 

 places, is a winter visitor, who comes oftenest with the 

 winds that bring us redpolls, crossbills and snowbirds from 

 their homes in higher latitudes. But this species is fai 

 from being the very "Northern stranger" that; Wilson, uho 

 first described it, considered it to be. Further on 1 shall 

 show bow numerously it breeds in many of nur States, to 

 gay nothing of the vast extent, of Alpine Country in the 

 Wesl, and even in Mexico, which it inhabits- in 'summer. 

 This strange misconception, originating with Wilson, has 

 been faithfully perpetuated to the present day. Thus, Dr. 

 Brewer state- in one place that, il extends its irregular migra- 

 tions into the Central States, as far as Southern Pennsyl- 

 vania, having it inferrible that, thus it goes no farther; yet 

 on tie- next two pages, he quotes his humble servant, and 

 Audubon, too, as authorities for the presence of the hjid in 

 Soul h Carolina and Kentucky. 



For the Pacific side of Ihe continent Dr. Brewer oil one 

 page assigns Northern California, as the southern limit, and 

 on the next cites Snmichra.st for the fact that, the bird is a 

 common resident of Mexican table-lands. Such contradic- 

 tions are unworthy of their practiced author, though per- 

 haps inseparable from manuscript prepared for the press 

 iu the peculiar manner in which these bird biographies ap- 

 pear to have been wrought. The fact is, as stated by Ihe 

 writer I here regret fully criticise, that this bird "bretds 

 throughout the British Provinces, Northern Maine, New 

 Hampshire, Vermont, New York, Michigan, and thence to 

 Washington Territory, in all the evergreen forests," and 

 that, furthermore, it also breeds in the Alpine regions of 

 Oregon, California, Utah, Nevada, Idaho, Wyoming, ( 'olo- 

 rado, Arizona, and New and Old .Mexico; that some indi- 

 viduals may be found the year through in the places where 

 they live in summer, and that others' spread in winter over 

 all the United States iu suitable places, unless the extreme" 

 South Athntie and Cull' States are to be excepted. 



Its movements, however, are so erratic, that no periodical 

 migration at particular times, nor abundance in any given 

 locality, can be safely counted upon. At all times' except- 

 ing during the breeding season, the state of the weather 

 seems to have more to do with its movements than the 

 orderly advance of the seasons ; and its ultimate local dis- 

 tribution depends still more upon abundance or scarcity of 

 .suitable food in this or that spot. The extreme northern 

 dispersion of ihe species is probably not yet ascertained with 

 precision; but we have advices of its presence in summer 

 from Labrador to the Saskatchewan. 



The best account that we possess of the breeding habits 

 and nesting of the pine siskin has been furnished by Dr. C, 

 Hart jMerriam, iu the interesting article published in 

 Forest .USD Strkam of July 18, 1878, to which the reader 

 is referred. 



To Ihe excellent figure of the bird given with this article 

 avc add tin equally characteristic portrait of the American 

 goldfinch, AafragftUnus Iris/is, the siskin's nearest relative 

 in this country. 



HOOP SNAKES. 

 Ei/ifor ForeU and Stream: 



I was greatly interested in the discussion of the hoop 

 snake in your columns during the past summer and fall, and 

 i I..-.- il; . discussion was begun I have had opportunities 

 for gathering a few facts that may or may not be new. Let 

 me premise by saying that like* most "wonder stories," 

 those told of the boop snake are not yvholly without foun- 

 dation. There is no doubt; some reptile, possibly more than 

 one, that has been made the subject of many slight inac- 

 acuracies, until the grand result is the deadly hoop si.ake. 

 Last summer while strolling in the woods near White River, 

 in company with a very supers! itious colored man, I shot 

 a medium-sized snake which he declared to be the rattlesnake's 

 pilot, and gravely informed me that my luck as a sports- 

 man would" be bad for the rest of the season, a prediction 

 that has not been verified. The snake's tail had a sharp 

 horny point. On rejoining some friends who had taken a 

 different route, they reported a similar find, and had severed 

 the thorn from the" tail, and had it with them, to the great 

 horror of our colored friend, who insisted on hunting alone 

 for the remainder of the day 



A few days after, on the other side of the river, I was 

 hunting in company with a friend who had once lived in 

 Georgia, the ancestral home ef the Loop snake. He called 

 my attention to a reptile which he assured me was the 

 original and only genuine "hoop." 1 killed him. fortunately 

 hitiing him with only one shot just back of the head. The 

 motions of his snakeship while in the death agonies were 

 suelr as to leave no doubt as to which he considered the 

 ''business. end." Repealed blows with the tail were aimed 

 at the. place where the hurt was received. I have no 

 library of reference sufficient to enable me to identify the 

 specimen, but his "descriptive list" is as follows: Specimen 

 not full grown, length thirty-two inches, color on back blue 

 black with metallic" luster, on belly brownish, with darker 

 spots, shading off into a rusty color toward the tail, sides 

 mottled with bright red spots about the size and shape of a 

 pine tree shilling, square with irregularly rounded corners, 

 head subcorneal or heart-shaped, supposed to be character- 

 istic oj venomous reptiles, tail with sharp horny spike not 

 fully developed forward, as the specimen was young, but 

 perfectly hard and sharp al point, rows of scales 19. g. 

 175. This is probably the reptile best entitled to the honors 

 belonging to thenatne of hoop snake. 1 do not vouch fo his 

 taking his tail in his mouth and rolling like a hoop. That 

 is a inere trifle anyhow and OUgllt not lo be insisted on. 



Su.mon Roe, 



Jackkoxf-ort, Ark., Nov. 20, 1882. 



[The specimen killed is undoubtedly Farunm abaeurn*, 

 B. and G., a southwestern species. There are several species 

 of serpents in which the tail ends in a hard point.] 



Look Out van Them, — Snowy owls are being shot in 

 Pennsylvania, showing the approach of a cold winter. Two 

 were lately killed near Scranton; one last week was taken 

 to a Bethlehem laxidennist for mounting; while, in New- 

 York State, 1 hear of a number. Will not you request your 

 correspondents that have any come under their observation 

 to make known the facts? Perhaps other Arctic species 

 have shown themselves. — Homo. [As already noted in 

 these columns, crossbills, pin* grosbeaks and snow buntings 

 made their appearance in Massachusetts soon alter Nov. 1.] 



WHIT!! DtiEH.— The West Sullivan, Maine, Butielin of 

 Nov. 86 reports! "On Monday some of our gunners shot a 

 very large deer; he was white, pink ears, and had the largest 

 antlers of any deer which has been shot for years past, This 

 fine specimen should have been preserved, as this herd of 

 !■• will soon be exterminated." 



