EDITORIAL. 



259 



THE TAIL OF THE HOOP SNAKE. 



Port Jervis, New York, is a prosperous 

 town on the Erie Railroad, and its prosperity 

 is mainly due to the eity people that the rail- 

 road brings to it — farmers do little traveling. 

 In the summer season canoeists, anglers and 

 boarders fill the coffers of the tradesmen and 

 farmers who bring in their milk and other 

 products of their farms to sell to the city 

 oeople. Yet the heedless, short-sighted editor 

 of a Port Jervis paper called The Farmer, 

 talks of "fool game laws" for the especial 

 benefit of "city loafers." 



This is silly talk, but it would also be dan- 

 gerous if it really influenced the readers. The 

 reckless editor is doing all he can in his 

 small way to create a bitter and hostile feel- 

 ing on the part of the farmers towards the 

 good people who are the agriculturist's cus- 

 tomers. It is claimed, and truly claimed, that 

 the farmer gets pooi prices for his wares, 

 but it is also true that the city people are 

 compelled to pay outrageous prices for the 

 products of the farm. This sad state of af- 

 fairs is due to a faulty and criminal economic 

 system, and not the fault of either the coun- 

 try man who grows the vegetables or the 

 city man who eats them. 



But Recreation has naught to do with this 

 question of economics, and only mentions it 

 to show how silly and childish it is for our 

 brother editor to try and stir up class hatred. 

 Recreation has a much larger number of 

 real farmers on its subscription list than this 

 little Port Jervis paper, and Recreation 

 stands first, last and always for the preserva- 

 tion and perpetuation of our noble American 

 animals and forests. The truth is that the 

 editor of the Farmer belongs away back to 

 the hoop-snake age, and when he describes 

 the deer to be so plentiful in Connecticut 

 that they "are raiding the farms in great 

 numbers," and declares that they leap the 

 high fences with ease and "sweep the oats 

 and corn -fields clean," he shows that he is 

 possessed of a highly developed imagination 

 which might bring him fame as an artist, 

 poet or romancer, but is sadly out of place in 

 a journal which is supposed to furnish hard 

 facts for the farmer. When the Port Jervis 

 editor puts the game laws down as "fore- 

 most among the anti-farm laws" he deliber- 

 ately makes a statement which he cannot 

 substantiate, and which will only cause the 

 farmers to laugh. 



We give prominence to this man and his 

 paper, not because of their personal impor- 

 tance, but because they represent a past age, 

 when people believed that all snakes were as 

 dangerous and poisonous as rattlesnakes 

 and copperheads ; that every sort of insect 

 was a noxious "bug"; that every wood was 

 inhabited by terrible man-killing "swifts" ; 

 that the horn on the tail of a hoop-snake 



killed the trees it struck, and that the farm- 

 ers were stupid bumpkins whom such men 

 as the editor of the Farmer could stuff with 

 nonsense to suit their own little purposes. 



If the American farmers were really influ- 

 enced by such small ideas and narrow views 

 as this paper represents, then would the 

 Farmer of Port Jervis, be more dangerous 

 than the horn on the tail of a hoop snake. 



It may be interesting to the reader to know 

 that in the section of the country around and 

 adjoining 'Port Jervis there are more illegal 

 fish traps on trout streams and more illegal 

 hounding of deer than in any other section 

 with which we are familiar. This is not be- 

 cause of the influence of such editors as the 

 one previously referred to, but this editor 

 is evidently trying to write to please the law 

 breakers. However, few oi the deer hound- 

 ers and trout trappers in the wild country 

 around the Delaware read any sort of a 

 paper. 



YOUR NAME, PLEASE! 



In our camp fire department, we call atten- 

 tion to the fact that it is desirable that a 

 contributor should write his name and ad- 

 dress upon the manscript as well as upon the 

 envelope or letter that may accompany it. 



As an instance of the necessity of this, we 

 would point out that an article in last month's 

 Recreation on "Canoeing in the Adiron- 

 dacks" appeared without credit. This was 

 written by Mr. Borden H. Mills, of Albany, 

 and his name would have appeared in con- 

 nection with it had he written it upon the 

 manuscript. Don't hide your light under a 

 bushel ! 



AN OPEN COURT. 



We have on hand a lengthy correspond- 

 ence between Mr. S. Fullerton, game war- 

 den of Minnesota, and a subscriber, in refer- 

 ence to certain inaction in regard to violation 

 of game laws of that state and also in regard 

 to a leakage of information which should be 

 sacred; but as each correspondent flatly con- 

 tradicts the other, we must refrain from tak- 

 ing any action in the matter until further in- 

 vestigations give us more light on the sub- 

 ject. 



Recreation will not hesitate to speak out 

 forcibly whenever it has proper evidence of 

 wrongdoing, but we must bear in mind Davy 

 Crockett's famous saying and be sure we 

 are right before "we go ahead." 



WATCH THE NETS. 



In a recent issue of the Fishing Gazette, 



that paper's correspondent in the Maritime 



Provinces of Canada said : 



The season fo"i- salmon in the Bay of Fundy 

 closes by law at the middle of August, but it 

 usually winds itself up before that time, and the end 



