FROM THE GAME FIELDS. 



"5 



way the Government is being robbed out 

 here. 



I hope you can find room for this letter, 

 giving my views of this game hog question 

 and I am more than anxious to see your 

 answer to it. Give it to me good and strong 

 for I will never trouble you again after this 

 and when I loose my position out here I will 

 come East and we will go out and kill a 

 dove, some sparrows or perhaps a wood- 

 chuck. We might have extraordinary luck 

 and get 2 or 3 fish ducks in some of your 

 Eastern ponds. 



Geo. H. Webber, U. S. Customs. 



The severest criticism that could possibly 

 be made on Mr, Webber is to print his let- 

 ters. I have given him plenty of rope and 

 he has hung himself. — Editor. 



ANOTHER U. S. OFFICER SENDS GREETING. 



Here is a copy of a letter sent me by the 

 United States Deputy Collector of Customs 

 at Port Huron, Michigan; but thank God 

 he belongs to a different class from that in 

 which the Vancouver shoat has put himself. 

 [The name of the writer of the following let- 

 ter will cheerfully be given to any one en- 

 titled to know It, though he requests that it 

 be not printed. The letter runs thus:] 



Port Huron, Mich., December 17, 1898. 

 Geo. H. Webber, D. C, Vancouver, B. C. 



Dear George: You convey the idea in 

 your letter to Recreation, that you are a 

 bad man a " Daddy a Coyote, and Mammy a 

 Sage hen " sort of a cuss. 



Many moons before you first sucked a 

 cigarette, there was a society on the upper 

 Yellowstone, called the A. O. S. In some 

 respects the members thought as you say 

 you think, but failed to put their thoughts in 

 writing — this being before the age of the 

 typewriter. Their ranks were composed of 

 the elite of the period. In fact their vassels 

 were legion — especially of the squaw sex. 



Had you been accepted by this famous 

 band the service would no doubt have been 

 saved the excrement cast upon it by one 

 whom the Almighty suffers to exist at the 

 wrong end of a gun. Get a transfer George, 

 to this Port, and we will teach you to shoot 

 ducks. You know we " Eastern dudes " use 

 teal to bait mink traps with; but we eat 

 canvasbacks if shot sitting. Small game, 

 should never be shot on the wing, unless you 

 are able to put the charge in the head. You 

 are liable to hurt your pet tooth on a grain 

 of shot, dontcherknow. 



I wish you would ask the editor of Rec- 

 reation about the A. O. S., for it's a safe 

 guess that you will need a letter of intro- 

 duction to its chief squaw-man, rather than 

 to the L. A. S. You are positive " game 

 was made to kill; " while we are certain 

 that razor backs should be placed in cold 

 storage during the open season, which, to 

 my regret, seems to last the entire year in 

 your district. Yours, Chad. 



a western man calls him down. 



Spokane, Wash. 



Editor Recreation: I'm "riled." Be- 

 cause why? Because I have read a letter in 

 your December issue from that ignoramus at 

 Victoria, B. C, who takes delight in mak- 

 ing public his swinish proclivities and who 

 poses as a representative Western sports- 

 man. He's no such thing. You know that 

 well enough yourself; yet there may be 

 those among your readers who would get 

 a wrong impression from his grunting. To 

 such I want to repeat, with emphasis — he's 

 nothing of the kind; and I would not be a 

 loyal son of my beloved State of Oregon, nor 

 a loyal citizen of my adopted State of Wash- 

 ington, nor yet a loyal member of the fra- 

 ternity of Western sportsmen in general, il 

 I did not resent Webber's imputations. 



Western sportsmen are sportsmen in every 

 sense. They are built on the snow-capped 

 plan — pure white and always up before 

 breakfast. That there should be one such as 

 Webber in the sunset land is a misfortune 

 for which I humbly apologize. 



Had Webber been with me during the 2 

 delightful months I spent in the woods (I'm 

 mighty glad he wasn't), he would only have 

 had to paddle the length of the lake any 

 summer's day, to have seen 10 or 20 deer, at 

 close quarters, with an occasional moose or 

 caribou thrown in for good measure. If the 

 exertion of paddling were too fatiguing he 

 could have lain in his sty and with a field 

 glass have watched their movements. He 

 could have caught more trout than his boat 

 would carry if he knows how to get them 

 without a set line or a gill net — which I 

 doubt. He could have gotten his desired 40 

 ruffed grouse every day in the week if he 

 could hit them. He could have had fat roast 

 duck and apple sauce for every meal if he 

 could " stalk " the ducks in open water, and 

 climb a tree for the apples on a deserted 

 farm. He could have seen more small an- 

 imals, such as foxes, squirrels, muskrats, 

 martins, minks, weasels, otters, and his cous- 

 ins the hedgehogs, and more birds of all 

 kinds, than he ever saw in the woods of the 

 Northwest. At least I did, and all this in the 

 vicinity of Moxie Pond, in old Maine. The 

 conditions are not greatly different through- 

 out that state while there is a varied and ever 

 increasing supply of game in all the Eastern 

 states where good anti-swine laws are made 

 and enforced. 



What an elegant roast for a Chinese fu- 

 neral that hog, with the United States ear- 

 mark, would make! L. B. Akin. 



And here's another. 



ANOTHER WESTERN MAN RESENTS WEBBER'S 

 GRUNTS. 



Rockton, Wis. 

 Editor Recreation: Lest the communi- 

 cation of Mr. Webber, of Vancouver, B. C, 

 in December Recreation convince your 

 readers that Western sportsmen, as a rule, 



