Forest and Stream. 



A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 



Terms, $4 a Year. 10 Cts. a Copt. 

 Six Months, $2. 



NEW YORK, FEBRUARY 14, 188 4. 



( VOL. XXlI.-No. 3. 



I Nos. 39 & 40 Park Row, New York. 



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CONTENTS. 



Editorial. 



The Ohio Floods. 



A Pig in a Poke. 



Loading at the Score. 



The Flickering Ballot. 

 The Sportsman Tourist. 



Between the Lakes. — rv. 



Reminiscences of the Northwest 



Major Joseph Verity.— vi. 



Winter Fireside Thoughts. 

 Natural History. 



The Egret. 



The Corn Crake in New York. 



Antelope and Deer of America. 

 Game Bag and Gun. 



The Choice of Hunting Rifles. 



The BiFds in West Virginia. 



Another Cat Tale. 



Mucilage Edge Wads. 



The Performance of Shotguns. 

 Camp-Fire Flickerings. 

 Sea and River Fishing. 



Trouting on tne Bigosh. 



Gaffing a Sturgeon. 



Land-Locked Salmon. 



The Best Color for Leaders. 



Pennsylvania Anglers' Associ- 

 ation. 

 Fishculture. 



The Edible Qualities of Carp. 



Proposed Adirondack Hatchery 

 The Kennel. 



Toronto Dog Show. 



The Cincinnati Dog Show. 



The Beagle Club. 



The Kennel. 

 Cocker Spaniel Produce Stakes. 

 Crystal Palase Dog Show. 

 Kennel Notes. 

 Riple and Trap Shootkg. 

 Range and Gallery. 

 A Close Target. 

 The Trap. 



The Clay -Pigeon Tournament. 

 Canoeing. 



Amateur Canoe Ruilding. — vi. 

 Double vs. Single. 

 Fulton C. C. 

 The Galley Fire 

 Camp Outfits. 



Practi cal Cookery — Griddle 

 Cakes. 

 The Chart Locker. 



Inland Waters of Maine. 

 The Log Book. 

 Down the Mississippi. 

 Canoeing on the West Coast 

 of Florida. 

 A Canoeist's Whiter Spoit. 

 Canoe and Sneakltox. 

 Yachting. 

 The Corinthian Club. 

 Chesapeake Craft. 

 Patriotism with a Patent to the 



Rescue. 

 Number Twelve. 

 The Measurement- Conundrum. 

 Concerning Sails. 

 Steam Yachts. 

 Notes from the Delaware. 

 Answers to Correspondents. 



With its compact type and in its permanently enlarged form 

 o f Uvenby-eight pages this journal furnishes each ween a larger 

 amount of flrst-elass matter relating to angling, shooting, the 

 kennel, and kindred subjects, than is contained in all other 

 American publications put together. 



another, the nonsensical freak of keeping a ball cartridge in 

 the weapon is indulged in and frequently passes unrebuked. 

 There is but one way to meet this difficulty. It deserves 

 a severe penalty and should receive it. It will not do to 

 have a rule on the printed card and expect careless fellows 

 to take the hint. They won't do it. They need instructions 

 by object lessons, and the most effective one is to have a 

 heavy fine imposed, or better still to have a clear and marked 

 case of this fault drummed off the range for his act. The 

 rule should carry with it its own warning. There should be 

 no second or third trials for such an offense. The first act 

 of omission should bring an emphatic rebuke from which 

 there should be no appeal. 



THE OHIO FLOODS. 



LOADING AT THE SCORE. 

 A T several recent shooting contests we have noticed a 

 -^- careless disregard of the rule which requires that guns 

 should be loaded only after the shooter has stepped to the 

 score and is ready to take his chances at the trap. The 

 marksmen instead put in the cartridge and then stand about 

 with their weapons over the shoulders, or tucked away 

 under their arms, or perhaps standing butt on the ground as 

 the contestant sits waiting tor his turn at the trap. 



No habit can be more reprehensible than this. There is 

 absolutely no excuse for it. The saving in time is insignifi- 

 cant, if there is any at all, while the chance of a mishap is 

 so great that no one but the most reckless marksman would 

 take it. There is some reason for carrying a loaded gun 

 in the field where a snap shot may be called for at any 

 moment, bwt even then the charge should always be with- 

 drawn when there is a long tramp to be taken, a boat ride, 

 or a wagon trip. The man who is careless of these minor 

 points of safety on the trap grounds is generally a tyro. He 

 is- the greenhorn who thinks it clever to take risks, imagines 

 it is a mark^of experience when he puts himself above the 

 rules of safety, and reseats as an imputation on his ability 

 to take care of himself any warning which may be offered 

 In rifle shooting the same difficulty presents itself — marks- 

 men will parade about under arms. They seem to imagine 

 themselves on the picket line in active warfare, »r on the 

 skirmish line with the enemy in view, and really careful 

 shooters are put to no small nervous strain in watching the 

 •omings and goings of these dangerous fools. Often ia 

 shifting from range to range and from one firing point to 



T?VERY winter and spring we hear the same news from 

 -*- i the Western rivers. The Ohio and the Mississippi, 

 with their tributaries, are swollen by the melting snow within 

 their watersheds, overflow their banks and cause the destruc- 

 tion of millions of property and scores of lives. The floods 

 come with regularity, and appear to'Jbe each year a little more 

 destructive than they were the year before. The people who 

 live upon the river banks, undergo their usual drowning, 

 or w r ashing out, as the case may be, and then after the floods 

 have subsided, go about their vocations as usual. Subscrip- 

 tions are taken up for the relief of the sufferers, the general 

 government makes appropriations for their relief and spends 

 money in building dams and dykes, which shall restrain the 

 Mighty streams and keep them within their banks. The 

 annual lesson seems to teach nothing, however, to the peo- 

 ple of the United States. These people are not usually re- 

 garded as fools, but how slow they are in appreciating the 

 palpable facts, that these damaging floods are a direct result 

 of their destruction of our forest lands. 



The snow falls now upon the land as of old, and the hills 

 and fields lie beneath the pure white mantle for months. 

 Then comes a warm rain. All at once the snow melts. 

 Each trickling spring becomes a roaring brook, each brook 

 a torrent, and the entire precipitation of a month or two is 

 thrown, almost in a day, into the stream. This is large 

 enough to carry off the water had it been gradually supplied, 

 bat when it comes all at once, the task is beyond its capacity, 

 and the choked up waters rise, carrrying devastation and 

 death to the surrounding country. 



When the forests covered our land, it was different. The 

 snow came then and lay among the great forest trees, beneath 

 the spreading pine and hemlock, and the naked branches of 

 oak and hickory. When the warm rain came the snow 

 melted, but much more gradually. The freed drops did 

 not then as now hurry down the hillside as if they hoped by 

 a single impetuous bound to reach the sea. They trickled 

 here and there by devious ways, and stopped among the 

 mosses, and dived down into the crevices of the rock, 

 loitered among the grass roots and soaked into the ground, 

 for there were not then a million of their fellows behind 

 them pushing them on with an impatience that knows no 

 curbing. ■ Then they could take their time, and they did so. 



This week it is stated that Congress has reported a bill 

 providing the -appropriation of $300,000 for the aid of the 

 sufferers by the Ohio floods. This is well. > It is right to 

 pay for damage done. But Congress ought not to stop 

 here. Annual appropriati®ns of hundreds of thousands of 

 dollars for cure, and not a penny for prevention, is the 

 height of improvident folly. How much wiser and more 

 economical it would be to enact some intelligent legislation 

 to provide the TJnited,States with a competent forestry com- 

 mission, and then to give it money enough to carry on 

 its work intelligently, wisely and liberally. Should we 

 alone of civilized nations be- behind hand in a matter which 

 so deeply concerns the material prosperity of our country? 



The fact that our country is a comparatively new one, and 

 that until recently its forests have appeared to the short- 

 sighted and superficial eyes of our lumbermen inexhaustible, 

 seems to be the only excuse for the criminal laxity of legis- 

 lators, State aud Federal, in this important matter. It is 

 time this supineness ceased. It is time that measures be 

 taken to protect our citizens against losses such as are now 

 occurring in Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky, and such as will 

 a little later take place in those States which lie along the 

 Mississippi River. The press and the people should take 

 the matter in hand, and urge upon their representatives the 

 needs of the country in this respect. We have preached the 

 sermon so often and from so many points of view that it 

 seems needless to urge it further. 



Just at this time, however, we should think that the need 

 of forest preservation would have presented itself very forci- 



bly to those who have suffered in Pennsylvania, West Vir- 

 ginia, Ohio and Keatucky. Surely there ought to be some 

 converts made from those States. Surely the representatives 

 at Washington of these unfortunate people ought to be able 

 to tell a moving tale, and to urge, from their own experi- 

 ence, the needs for forest preservation of at least one section 

 of our country. 



More important than the hardship which will result 

 from the absence of timber for commercial purposes, and 

 prior to it in time, comes the danger from floods. We 

 are just beginning to experience thi« danger, and before 

 the need for action is fully appreciated, no doubt we 

 shall have to pass through a severe school of suffering. 

 The dwellers in fae fertile Ohio and Mississippi valleys 

 will be the first to sustain loss, they should be the first to 

 cry for forest preservation everywhere throughout the land. 



A Bill Introduced into the New York Legislature this 

 week, and passed by the Senate, deserves the support of all 

 sportsmen. Its provisions forbid the use of batteries in the 

 pursuit of wildfowl on any waters within the State. Here- 

 tofore it has been lawful, in certain Long Island waters, to 

 shoot from batteries, a practice which we now hope to see 

 stopped. Really, it seems at last a if the legislators in cer- 

 tain States were beginning to have some appreciation of the 

 necessity far game protection. The passage by the Penn- 

 sylvania Legislature of a law forbidding fowl shooting after 

 Jan. 1, is certainly a movement which is as encouraging 

 as it was unexpected. And, now that Pennsylvania has set 

 the example, we may hope that New Jersey, New York, 

 Delaware and the New England States will sooner or later, 

 for very shame, follow the good example set them. The 

 abolition of spring shooting is the first step toward the 

 preservation of our wildfowl and shore birds, and when the 

 importance of this change in the law has made itself felt, a 

 long step will have been taken in the right direction. Let 

 every sportsman do what he can to agitate this subject, and 

 impress its importance upon his neighbors. 



Skates and Rifles. — The latest thing in target shotting 

 is the skating rifle match. A target is set up on the edge of 

 the ponfl or"stream. Two lines are drawn on the ice, one 

 ten yards above the target, the other ten yards below. The 

 contestants, at given distances, skate across the ice, and 

 when between the two lines, while skating at full speed, aim 

 and fire at the target. This novelty has exerted great inter- 

 est in certain ice-bound districts. It is hardly necessary to 

 call attentisn to the extreme caution which should be ex- 

 ercised in setting up a target of this kind. Firing is apt to 

 be wild, and when a bullet has once left the muzzle there 

 is no device yet discovered by which it may be recalled, 

 even though speeding straight for a farm-house. 



The Average Man takes the average dog into the field, 

 talks to it in a way which presupposes on the canine's part 

 a perfect comprehension of the English language. As a 

 matter «f fact, the dog knows very little English. Then 

 when the average man discovers that the average dog does 

 not understand all that is said, he straightway looks about 

 for a club with which t© beat his commands into the canine's 

 noddle. The average man may with profit to himself and 

 his dog read a communication on this subject in our Kennel 

 columns. 



The ; 'Off-Season" may be very profitably employed. If 

 an angler, one may practice fly-casting. The ice is a capital 

 place for this. That is where some of the most successful 

 tournament fly-casters found their training. If a gunner, 

 this is a good time to experiment for determining the best 

 way of loading, ete. Trap-shooters in many sections of the 

 country have had ample opportunity for keeping their 

 hands in. . 



Death of D. C. Sanborn.— Just as we go to press we 

 receive intelligence of the death of Mr. D. C. Sanborn, of 

 Dow ling, Mich. He died last week at Alamo, Tenn. This 

 announcement will be received with sorrow by the very 

 many friends of Mr. Sanborn. Few men were so widely 

 known among sportsmen; no one was more highly respected. 



New Game Laws.— We again repeat the request that our 

 readers in different States send in the new game laws that 

 are enacted this year. 



