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Rediscovering the East 
We are told that, as a people, we pursue an 
ever vanishing homing place; that the old 
word friend is changed for acquaintance, and 
no village or town or city block knows us for 
long; our children are often unable to tell where 
they come from and, more’s the pity, they grow 
up without the home sentiment. 
Perhaps so, but if we have sacrificed the indi- 
vidual home, we are at least loyal to our green 
hills, our smiling valleys, our lakes, our rivers 
and our forests, so dear to memory, so beloved 
of the aged.. For if, in our pursuit of fortune, 
we have ever followed the course of empire, and 
in our search for recreation have spent much of 
our time and more of our money overseas, it 
shall not be said of us that we have deserted the 
old home for good and all. If you will but look, 
you may see us now rediscovering and rehabi- 
tating—with a substantial assurance of having 
come to stay—our long deserted thirteen 
original States. 
The prestige and prosperity of the New Eng- 
land States, of Maryland, of Virginia, of the 
Carolinas, are returning to them with a new 
generation of home builders, a generation with 
fat pocketbooks and a vast leisure. Industrially, 
there is no rejuvenation, but these States are 
becoming the sailor’s snug harbor for the far- 
journeyed ships of our skippers who have 
“‘made good.” And as an appreciation of this 
homecoming, we look to these States of the 
East to tidy up their out-of-doors, build good 
roads, protect their fish and game, establish 
State forest reserves and game parks and make 
life within their boundaries worth while. There 
shall be gatherings of wealth and culture, deep- 
rooted and assertive, where conditions favorable 
to recreation and leisure are advanced, and the 
effete East may smile again in all her pristine 
pastoral charm. 
Accidental Shooting 
Early in the autumn the daily newspapers 
yearly chronicle instances of the accidental 
shooting of persons in the woods, and most 
often the unfortunate has been shot for a deer. 
It not infrequently happens that the individual 
who fires the shot is a near relative ora friend of 
his victim, and this, so the newspapers say, 
brings ‘“‘inexpressible sorrow” to the man who 
is guilty of the “unintentional act.” 
_ A good example of accidents of the kind was 
the shooting in October last of Jesse Hodges, 
a young rancher of Montana, by his friend and 
hunting companion, Mellie Baker. 
According to the newspaper report, Hodges, 
the two Baker boys and Claude West were all 
RECREATION 
up in the Snowy Mountains at the head of 
Cottonwood Cafion, deer hunting, early in the 
morning, when they caught sight of five deer. 
Hodges went up on the mountain around them, 
while the three others remained in the cafion. 
After a few moments Mellie Baker saw the 
bushes within a few yards of him moye and the 
next instant sighted a grayish-looking object, 
which he took for a deer, and instantly fired. 
A cry followed the shot, and when he ran to 
the spot it was to find that he had sent a bullet 
through the body of Hodges, one of his most 
intimate friends. The bullet, which was from 
a .30-30 rifle, and of the soft-nose sort, which 
expands after it strikes a body, inflicted a terri- 
ble wound, entering the middle of the back and 
coming out just above theheart. Death came 
several hours afterward, and the unfortunate 
man was conscious till the last. 
Hodges, about ten months before, had mar- 
ried Miss Kate Mahanna, the daughter of 
Charles Mahanna, of near Cottonwood. He 
had acquired a ranch on Upper Cottonwood 
and was working hard to build a permanent 
home for his bride. 
It is not possible in any Anglo-Saxon com- 
munity to punish a man for the purely acci- 
dental killing of another, but, in our opinion, 
restrictive game laws and their more vigorous 
enforcement should have a strong influence, as 
impelling rattle-brained hunters to see what they 
aim at before they pull trigger. For instance, 
had Mellie Baker been impressed of the cer- 
tainty of a severe fine and imprisonment (Mon- 
tana’s laws are excellent, as far as they go) if he 
should shoot other than a buck deer, it is not 
probable he would have shot his friend. But it 
seems the perverse decree of an unfortunate 
condition that hunters are allowed to kill does 
where the game laws are fairly well enforced, as 
in Montana, and where it is illegal to shoot does 
or fawns, it is no great risk to disregard the law 
Impossible, almost, we have said, to convict 
a man of manslaughter for accidentally shooting 
another. And how shall we discriminate be- 
tween the man who did not know the other was 
in the way of his bullet and the man who did 
not care? It would seem the strict enforcement 
of laws forbidding the shooting of does and 
fawns, of cow moose and elk and their calves, 
and the punishment of reckless shooters at the 
hands of their more sane companions constitute, 
for the present, the nearest approach to a 
remedy. If, by and by, we advance to the stage 
of issuing gun licenses wherever big game is to 
be had, a clause may be added to the section of 
the law pertaining to the issuance of such 
licenses that will make it possible to have the 
license of any shooter who shows himself unfit 
to carry a gun denied or revoked. : 

