c* 



208 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



[April 13, 188S. 



bedded, I leave it for those familiar with the habits of eels 

 to say — F. T. (Providence, B. I., March 24, 1882.) rWe 

 should bo glad to hear from the "eel-sharps"]. 



Earlt Birds in Maine.— Our birds have been arriving 

 from CbE South earlier than usual this' season. Besides Hie 

 first arrivals noted in March, the blue snowbirds, robin* 

 bluebirds, purple tin eh, rusty grakle, fox sparrow, soiur spar- 

 rows, and yellow rumped warblers, of our common birds 

 I saw a lly-catcher April 2, aud two warbling vireos 

 April 6 I first observed the osprev. Canada, tree sparrows 

 white-throated sparrows, hermit thrush, and white-bellied 

 swallows. It snowed here during the night of April 6 and 

 there are yet quite deep drifts of snow to be seen in the fields 

 and roadways. Also saw a snake April 0. Two ring- 

 neck ducks, rare visitors to Maine, were shol near this city 

 March 31,— EVERETT Smith, (Fori land, Me., April 7. 1882.) 



Bed-Headed Woodpeckers tn Maine,— I observed three 

 birds of this species near this city yesterday, and within the 

 last few years specimens have been taken in Maine each sea- 

 son, fhey were not uncommon in the autumn of 1877 in 

 Cumberland count)-, but 1 know of no instance of wood- 

 peckers of this species [M. rrijlhnx'cphiilvx) having been 

 observed in this State until within a dozen years or less. It 

 LB p.-cl.,.l:.l. hat it m : ;v breed here now ;n isolated instances 

 A specimen has been taken east of the Penobscot River in 

 Maine— Everett Smith, (Portland. Me., April 4, 1882) 



$mqe J?a# m\d 



A GREAT MAINE BEAR HUNT. 



I AM to-day in receipt of the following letter from Hon. 

 Henry O. S. Stanley, Commissioner of Fish and Game of 

 the State of Maine, which maybe of interest to your readers: 

 Dixfield, Ale. , April 14, 1882. 



My Dear Cousin— A famous bear hunt has been the excite- 

 ment in this section for the past two weeks. He has just been 

 killed after having been followed steadily night and day for fif- 

 teen days. All the hunters and a large proportion of the pop- 

 ulation took part in the pursuit. On the. last morning I ran 

 into him on the Gateo Hill within a mile of the village". If I 

 had supposed the beast was within ten gun shots 1 should have 

 been on the watch and could have easily shot him, as I was 

 within fifteen feet of him when he started. T had been talk- 

 ing with another hunter for several minutes before he ran. We 

 were at a station expecting that he was on the other side of 

 the mountain and would be driven out by the parties who 

 had been close on Ids rear. He was killed at noon in the 

 adjoining town of Carthage, Oxford county. He was an 

 enormous brute, being seven feet in length, and measured 

 nine inches between his ears. His long run, following a 

 winter's hibernation, left him very thin. 



I am engaged most of the time in the oversight of the fish 

 hatching houses and the distribution of eggs, young fry and 

 ■fish, but have some spare time to devote to tying "flies and 

 fox-hunting. As to the latter, the results are' not equal to 

 preceding seasons, as I have only killed seventeen. 



Henry O. Stanley. 



Mr. Stanley sends me some additional details concerning 

 this remarkable bear hunt. Bruin was started by some 

 woodmen near Webb's River, not far from Dixfield," a town 

 of some 500 inhabitants. The news arriving speedily in the 

 village a large number of men and boys, armed with rifles, 

 shot guns, muskets, fusees and pistols, abandoning shop, 

 farm and school, started in pursuit. Business was suspended, 

 except the side of powder and shot. The women and 

 children were gathered in groups talking of nothing but the 

 hear crnsade. The more expert hunters soon struck his 

 trail and followed it for several days over a large part of 

 Dixfield and through the adjoining towns of Mexico, Rox- 

 bury into Byron. Scores of men joined the chase, and 

 bruin had considerable business on his paws, (although his 

 pauses were few) as ten fresh men took up the hunt and cry 

 when one. fell out exhausted. Several times he was closely 

 surrounded in dense thickets where he had taken refuge, and 

 the army of braves were sure of their prey, but when brought 

 to bay he rushed forth with such ferocity that the line of 

 hunters was driven back and broken, and the fierce animal 

 escaped. A hunter by the name of Babb followed his track 

 closely for seven consecutive days, having traveled over 200 

 miles. Some of the parties carried fish horns, which were 

 used as signals and to start bruin from his hiding places. 

 Certain malicious persons, however, averred that they were 

 u«"d for the purpose of keeping his majesty at a safe dis- 

 ance. 



uesides Mr. Stanley many of the most prominent citizens 

 of Franklin and Oxford counties joined the chase, the ex- 

 citement waxing greater and greater as the bear was driven 

 near the. villages and towns. His tracks were, frequently 

 very distinct, measuring about the size of a No. 11 boot. An 

 Oxford county hunter fired at him when lint twenty feet dis- 

 tant. The bear disappeared in the brush unharmed, the 

 hunter disappeared in the opposite direction, going at a 

 lively pace toward the settlement. 



In* Byron ursus w T as headed and prevented gaining the 

 dense wilderness extending clear over the mountains to 

 Canada and turned toward Dixfield again, where he had 

 probably a long occupied den. He was believed to be an old 

 "ranger," who f$>r years had raided on the sheep and lambs 

 of the farmers, and 'even killed and eaten several large calves 

 and destroyed many a bee hive in his search for honey. It 

 was hoped "that he would take to his abode in some cave or 

 old hollow tree, where he would have speedily fallen a vic- 

 tim to tire, bullets and buckshot. He wasdriven right I hrough 

 the village of Berry's Alills in midday, taking possession 

 first of a grist mill and then of a school house. The teacher 

 did not have to dismiss the scholars. When fhey heard the 

 fish horns, shunts and uproar and saw the bear coming, they 

 made a hasty exit by doors find windows. For a half hour 

 bruin "held the fort" and kept school at the same time. 

 The women and children barricaded I lie doors and windows 

 of their houses, and from the upper windows waited the 

 arrival of I heir husbands, fathers and brothers, who were on 

 the trail of the monster, which actually bad possession of the 

 entire village. From Berry'ti Mills he struck out over Spruce 

 Mountain, in Weld, and spent the night, but didn't rest any. 

 His vindictive enemies swarmed in the woods and raised the 

 echoes with the lishhorn serenade and frequent musket 

 shots. In the morning he started again toward Dixfield. 

 Kbw the gathering multitude fairly enveloped the_ wild ani- 

 mal in a deadly narrowing ojrele. Driven from thicket and 



i ij] he at last fell pierced by b hundred bullets, 



The story of the "fifteen day bear hunt" will long he 

 remembered in Northwestern Maine. 



It is quite surprising that a score of these wild beasts were 

 not driven from their haunts during this remarkable hunt. 

 But fhey probably had not awakened, or if awake, prudcntly 

 kepl qniel in then- secret retreat. This section of Maine ha's 

 long been noted as a resort of the black bear. Many are 

 killed annually. One of my guides, Stephen Taylor, form- 

 erly the school teacher in Byron, has killed twentv-seven. 

 His brother-in-law, Addison Young, of Byron, who has also 

 acted as my guide in the Maine woods, has killed twenty- 

 two. All these within fifteen years. They followed an bid 

 bear eleven days before securing him. An elegant black 

 robe in my library reminds me of their bravery and skill. 

 Another sleigh robe was formerly the outer covering of an 

 immense creature killed by the great chief of the Banueley 

 bear hunters, who has destroyed over forty of these wM ani- 

 mals in twenty years. Notwithstanding the large number 

 killed they are actually increasing. Last fall the frontier 

 fanners suffered terribly from their depredations, and earnest 

 petitions were sent out for hunters to come to their relief. 

 When we reflect that this "happy hunting ground" for the 

 noblest large game east of the Rocky Mountains is within 

 thirty hours of New York city, what better incentive is 

 needed to induce a goodly number of the sportsmen to go to 

 the relief of the despoiled tiller of the fields, and at the same 

 time achieve a record far brighter than can be secured at a 

 glass ball or even a pigeon tournament? I am going after a 

 bear; who will join me? Geo. Suepard Pace 



Stahley, N. J., 1883; 



SOUND SENSE FROM WISCONSIN. 



I DESIRE to refer to some of the obstacles that seem to lie 

 in the way of efficient game protection, and hope to pro- 

 voke suggestions and remedies from the whole line, as the 

 evils to be eradicated, the prejudices to be uprooted arid the 

 selfishness to be combatted ne'ed the moral force of the entire 

 army of conservative spoilsmen. 



In the score of years just passed the great West, has es- 

 pecially felt the tramp of civilization. The white hunter 

 and trapper has followed the red, and the soldier has cleared 

 the way for the husbandman. This irresistible and ungov- 

 ernable tide, sweeping onward, has sacrificed the abuudanoe 

 of nature's stores without stint, and has strewD the pathway 

 with the evidences of slaughter and improvidence. 



Westward, northward and southward Ibis destructive ad- 

 vance is still reaching out, and, regret it as we may, it caunot 

 lie stayed, and neither the red man nor the game can stem 

 the title or impede the advance, while, the resorts of the one 

 and the haunls of the other are needed in the great modern 

 fabric, and fhey must move on. 



With scarcely an exception, the classes of animals and 

 birds that most interest the sportsman in no way assimilate 

 with the elements of progress that accompany the march of 

 civilization, and hence wherever the tide turns toward them 

 they must either go or be annihilated. 



The enterprising husbandman of the West is not satisfied 

 with his possessions wTule a marshy place remains unre- 

 claimed or a thicket is found to be uprooted, and the majes- 

 tic grouse and the sprightly' quail are deprived of the last 

 clump that offers shelter or food. 



The draining of marshes reduces the volume of water in 

 lakes and rivers, and the migratory water birds rind the fa- 

 miliar chain of lakes and ponds they were: wont to follow on 

 their spring flights northward contracted and disconnected, 

 aud the bounteous Supplies of food and unlimited shelter 

 destroyed and the limited areas under range of numerous 

 breech-loading guns that relentlessly deal death and destruc- 

 tion until the season has sufficiently advanced for the shat- 

 tered flocks to find sustenance and rest far to the northward 

 beyond the line of settlements. 



The destruction in the timbered sections and the general 

 clearing up of all portions adapted to agriculture has also 

 materially reduced the number of birds and animals hereto- 

 fore so abundant therein. 



Legislate and contrive as we may, the elements of destruc- 

 tion that accompany civilization cannot be stayed or com- 

 batted; they are inevitable. 



The great problem, therefore, for the sportsman is to re- 

 tard and control that which cannot be averted, and by pre- 

 cept and example aid in limiting the destruction to the" inevi- 

 table advance, and I beg the indulgence of the fraternity 

 while criticising many things that have the element of time to 

 sanction a practice that seems open to censure. 



The jealousies of sportsmen and the animosities of the mar- 

 ket hunters must be reconciled, and the improvidence of one 

 and the greed of the other controlled. 



Legislation must contract and limit the season at the period 

 most affecting the market-hunter's interest, and more con- 

 servative practices in killing must he urged among respect- 

 able sportsmen, until it shall not be considered sportsmanlike 

 to kill, take or destroy beyond the necessities of the occasion, 

 and success shall not be measured by the number of lives 

 destroyed nor the sole enjoyment centred in catching and 

 killing. 



The market-hunter needs the. strong arm of the law tight- 

 ened about him, and too many sportsmen need the elevating 

 and ennobling influence of the gospel infused into them. 



The aristocratic millionaire, able to run palace hunting- 

 cars from the Atlantic to the Pacific, desolating with dogs 

 and guns any section he takes a fancy to drop down on, re- 

 gardless of propriety or necessity, should carry a missionary. 



Clubs that claim respectability and are sending out annu- 

 ally large delegations that scour fields and forest streams (Jay 

 after day like a swarm of locusts, bringing to bag everything 

 that shows tail, fin or feather, need the benign influence of 

 t ru c sportsman sh ip. 



Slate aud club conventions that meet and banquet and 

 rail at the pot-hunter, and resolve fhat. game shall be 

 protected, etc., and then in an informal session over the 

 champagne and cigars, this one recites how during his last 

 season's "hunting he succeeded in killing fifty birds in fifty 

 minutes, when he had no earthly use for more, than a dozen; 

 and then another while in the Lake Superior region filled one 

 of those "approximate twenty pound baskets" from a single 

 pool, without thinking that he could cot possibly use them. 

 but had glorious sport, and the extreme satisfaction also, of 

 sending skyward to the buzzards smells of greed and im- 

 providence—all these need the regenerating jnlluence of a 

 new dispensation. 



Here, gentlemen Sportsmen, is (he keynote of the preserva- 

 tion we talk of, and here is the ground to estimate preaching 

 and practice, and instead of the salutation "how many did 

 you kill," measuring the success or failure of the sportsman, 

 let us adopt something more appropriate while we advocate 

 preservation and protection, rather emulating in preserving- 



It may hardly be considered sportsmanlike, yet I have 

 sometimes hoped to see the day that is fast approaching, and in 

 some places is even now at hand, when the man that only 

 finds his pleasure measured by destruction, will return empty- 

 handed and disappointed often enough to lay aside the rod 

 and gun he has disgraced a,. . ■'■■- / :-, mi the ranks. 



This annihilating spirit must be controlled to make laws 

 useful and effective, as, if unrestrained, we have hunters 

 enough to obliterate all traces of game within the settled por- 

 tions of the country in a few years more, even with a season 

 limited to thirty or sixty days in each year. Even tt 

 bility are not exempt from this spirit of 'wholesale slaughter. 



Read the record of the catch of salmon in the Provinces. 

 Do the scores dilated on look like preservation'? Docs it 

 appear that they could make use of, and is such a record 

 more creditable to (hem than to ordinary mortals without 

 royal blood or hereditary titles? 



Sneer as we may at, the ragged half-breed with a string of 

 insignificant ungcrlings, aud the uncouth backwoodsman 

 with a loin of venison tn exchange for necessaries, they are 

 kings compared with such nobility, and are entitled t'o far 

 I more consideration, as they only appropriate from nature's 

 stores to meet their necessities, and I hey stand morally and 

 j lawfully justified. 



f can hardly believe lhat the millcuium is at hand, yet I 

 hope lo see the day when a change in the tone and practice of 

 : men and papers devoted to field sports shall be apparent, and 

 | that the time may not be so very far distant when the integ- 

 rity of a sportsman's good intentions shall be called, in 

 question and his record impeached wdien accompanied by 

 evidence Qf improvidence and slaughter that is now often pa- 

 raded for emulation in columns that, ought to countenance 

 and inculcate only legitimate practices. 



The sportsmen of the United States to-day in numbers and 

 influence stand second to no single combination of interests 

 that can be brought against them in the matter of legislation, 

 and by precept and example this body can exerciser moral 

 force that shall render butchery odious, and so retard and 

 control encroachments as to preserve even to our children's 

 children some of the choicest of nature's treasures fhat have 

 so abundantly filled our forests and streams. Here, then, 

 gentlemen sportsmen, we can occupy and possess the land, 

 and by cultivating more of the old Walfouian spirit find fhat 

 true enjoyment accompanying the legitimate use of the rod 

 and gun. Mills. 



CARROLL'S ISLAND DUCK-SHOOTING. 



THE following letter from an old member of the Carroll's 

 Island ducking club will doubtless be interesting to fowl 

 shooters, certainly "to Philadelphia sportsmen, who have long 

 since learned lo accept whatever is related of the movements 

 of fowl by any of this association. It is Surely time to lake 

 urgent steps for the stopping of night shooting not only at 

 the points spoken of by our correspondent, but aU along* the 

 New Jersey coast. .Nothing tends to decrease the numbers 

 cf ducks in an> locality than their ;iisturban:v it. night on 

 their feeding grounds, as well as by the adoption of "the 

 double box" hiding place on the flats since the invention of 

 breech-loading guns. It is surely more skillful and more 

 sportsmanlike to stop a "high flying" duck as it. passes over 

 a point, than to kill one coming* right up to within twenty 

 or thirty yards of a "battery" anchored directly on tin- feccf- 

 ing grounds and surrounded by an immense flock of two or 

 three hundred modern imitations. The point our corre- 

 spondent raises against American made shells of large gauge 

 we have no doubt will be remedied. Thus F;i,r our manufac- 

 turers have not paid the attention necessary to shells for this 

 class of shooting. Their shells for upland shooting excel 

 the English make. Our correspondent writes: The wild fowl 

 shooting in the fall mouths was considered Unusually fair, 

 and although there were less ducks killed on Ihe i flats at 

 Havre de Grace than has been in former years, at all the 

 clubs and private points the shooting was; unusually flue. 

 Tin falling off m th: quantity of rlutks m the flats is un- 

 questionably owing to the persistent, mil.'iwful practice of 

 night shooting with large and small guns, carried on by a 

 few lawless men, and, if permitted to continue, this will soon 

 make wild fowl shooting about the waters of the Chesapeake 

 a thing of the past. How strange it is that the residents of 

 Havre de Grace and the hundreds of others who gel a good 

 living from the killing of wild fowl, do not make energetii 

 efforts to put a stop to this villainous practice. Here tire a 

 few men, well known to those who follow the water and 

 shooting, who are destroying the means of a large mass of 

 people from obtaining an honest living. There will be some 

 prompt measures taken by non-residents ere long, bul to mil 

 an effectual stop to this practice, which is certain to drive 

 away the fowl, as has been proved in many eases, will re- 

 quire the active co-operation of men who live among these 

 rurals and whom they are tabbing of an honest living. Let 

 this night shooting contiuue and the fowl be driven away, 

 "" and Baltimore counties will grieve 

 looting points left to waste, arid 

 uoney yearly spent among them for 

 relher. How well I remember the 

 d to have in old times in the Sa.ssa- 

 Blkj the Upper Bush River and old 

 the Upper Gunpowder. But these 

 and if night shooting is added to 

 'ch-loaders, it will be bul. a few years 

 the grand old times we used to have" 

 inds. It is not a selfish feeling 

 that pro&pta this •erasade against the villainous practice of 

 night shootiug, but a love of sport and a desire to prolong, 

 if possible, the delights and healthy sport of duck-shooting, 

 and preserve the game. I doubt much if there is a gentle- 

 man who comes from Boston, New York or Philadelphia to 

 this shooting place mi the Chesapeake or its tributaries who 

 does not spend five dollars apiece for every duck he kills. 



The spring shooting has fairly Commenced, the waters of 

 the Gunpowder and Bush rivers are swollen and muddy from 

 the heavy rams, and the drift stuff on the Susquehanna 

 interferes much with the shooting on the flats. Bul the 

 waters around Carroll's Island and the Middle and Back 

 livers are comparatively clear, arid - i of canvaas- 



backs and redheads are feeding here". The sport is excellent. 

 Ore- gentleman tells us that he lulled in three days last week 

 117 canvass-1 tack's and redheads from his point ''overhead 

 shooting," which must tie considered good sport, as ducks fly 

 much higher over these points Chan in the olden time. 

 Owing to" these ''high-dyers," those who are foud of "po 

 shooting" — and it mus; ':;, c nc led to be the most artistic 

 shooting of all fowl shooting -have been obliged to increase 

 the weight aud calibre of their guns, and I : 

 excellence" now, is-a No. I cnty- 



tWo pounds. Heavy No. W», from seventeen to icie 



: ffai 



uitifu 



and the peopl 



over the fact of I) 



thousands of doll 



sport, withdrawn al 

 glorious shooting we 

 i'rass and Bohemia, il 

 Ably Island Point B 

 are things of the pa 

 "double boxes" and t 

 when we wall recur t< 

 in the present shooting g 



