Forest and Stream. 



A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 



Terms, $4 a Year. 10 Cts. a Copy. I 

 Six Months, $2. J 



NEW YORK, APRIL 3 y 1884. 



( VOL. XXlI.-No. 10. 



| Nos. 89 & 40 Park Row, New York. 



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CONTENTS. 



Editorial. 



In April. 



What is the Use? 



Proposed Zoological Garden. 



The Lake Yacht Racing: Associ- 

 ation. 



"Woodcraft.'' 

 The Sportsman Tourist. 



Major Joseph Verity.— vtii. 



Down the "i ukon on a Raf t.— vin 

 Natural History. 



Preservation of Song Birds. 



Stearns's Natural History of 

 Labrador. 



An Interesting Relic. 



Bird Notes. 



A Proposed Zoological Garden. 



The Deadly Mink. 

 Game Bag and Gun. 



The Choice of Hunting Rifles. 



The Performance of Shotguns. 



Utah Fish and Game Law. 



Mucilaged Wads. 



Camp Cookery. 



Philadelphia Notes. 



An Explanation. 



Cruising in Florida. 

 Sea and River Fishing. 



Opening the Trout Season. 



Trouting on the Bigosh. 



The Dowel Question. 



Comparative Weight of Fly-Rod 

 Material. 



Good Work in Massachusetts. 



Michigan Lakes. 

 Fishculture. 



Progress in Fishculture. 



Fishculture. 



Trout in Wisconsin. 

 The Kennel. 



Pointers at Cincinnati. 



Champion Beagles. 



The New York Dog Show. 



Eastern Field Trials Club. 



I. C. S. Association. 



St. Louis Dog Show. 



English Kennel Notes. 



Toronto Dog Show. 



A New American Kennel Club. 



Non-Sporting Dog Show. ' 



Kennel Management. 



Kennel Notes. 

 Rifle and Trap Shooting. 



Rifles of To-Day. 



Powder Ignition. 



Range and Gallery. 



The Trap. 

 Canoeing. 



Keystone C. C. 



The Chart Locker. 

 Winnipeseogee and Merrimae 

 Rivers. 



Canoe vs. Sneakbox. 



The Galley Fire. 

 Canoe and Camp Cookery. 



Amateur Canoe Building.— xn. 

 Yachting. 



Weight for Light Airs. 



Petrel on a Cruise. 



Gleam. 



Business. 



Draft. 



Aneto and Gleam. 

 Answers to Correspondents. 



IN APRIL. 

 HPHE Ram makes way for the Bull; March goes out and 

 -*- April comes in with sunshine and showers, smiles and 

 tears. Th& sportsman has his gun in hand again with deadly 

 purpose, as the angler his rod and tackle with another in- 

 tention than mere overhauling and putting to rights. The 

 smiles of April are for them. 



The geese come wedging their way northward; the ducks 

 awaken the silent marshes with the whistle of their pinions; 

 the snipe come in pairs and whisps to the thawing bogs— all 

 on their way to breeding grounds and summer homes. The 

 tears of April are for them, for wherever they stop for a 

 day's or an hour's rest, and a little food to strengthen and 

 hearten them for their long journey, the deadly, frightful 

 gun awaits to kill, maim or terrify, more merciless than all 

 the ills that nature inflicts in her unkindest moods. 



Year after year men go on making laws and crying for 

 more, to protect these fowl in summer, but in spring, when 

 as much as ever they need protection, the hand of man is 

 ruthlessly against them. 



When you made that splendid shot last night in the latest 

 gloaming that would show you the sight of your gun, and 

 cut down that ancient goose, tougher than the leather of 

 your gun-case, and almost as edible, of how many well- 

 grown young geese of next November did you cheat your- 

 self, or some one else of the brotherhood? 



"When from the puddle, where they were bathing their 

 tired wings, sipping the nectar of muddy water and nibbling 

 the budding leaves of water weeds, you started that pair of 

 ducks yesterday, and were so proud of tumbling them down 

 right and left, you killed many more than you saw then ; 

 many that you might have seen next fall. 



When the sun was shining down so warm upon the steam- 

 ing earth that the robins and bluebirds sang May songs, those 

 were very good shots you made, killing ten snipe straight and 



clean, and — they were very bad shots. For in November 

 the ten might have been four times ten fat and lusty, lazy 

 fellows, boring the oozy margins of these same pools where 

 the frogs are croaking and the toads are singing to-day. 



"Well, it's a long time to wait from November till the 

 earth ripens and browns to autumn again. Life is short and 

 shooting days are few at most. Let us shoot our goose 

 while we may, though she would lay a golden egg by and 

 by." 



Farmers do not kill their breeding ewes in March, nor 

 butcher cows that are to calve in a month; it does not pay. 

 Why should sportsmen be less provident of the stock they 

 prize so dearly; stock that has so few care-takers, so many 

 enemies? Certainly; it does not pay in the long run. 



PROPOSED ZOOLOGICAL GARDEN. 

 HPHE suggestion that a zoological garden be established in 

 -*- the Yellowstone National Park is one which deserves 

 careful consideration. Practically, if the law is enforced, 

 the Park is already a great zoological garden, a place where 

 the observer can go and study wild animals in a state of 

 nature. But, if we understand it, Mr. Talbot's plan looks 

 toward the capture and keeping under close surveillance the 

 species which he mentions. This is something that r an be 

 readily done, but it is perhaps open to question whether it is 

 at present desirable to do it. 



The people now feel that they have got hold of their Park, 

 having wrested it from the grasp of a lot of greedy specula- 

 tors, and the first thing that they desire is to see that it is 

 properly protected and cared for. That it will be subse- 

 quently improved, we do not doubt, though we hope this 

 improvement will never take the shape of anything like 

 landscape gardening. The project suggested by Mr. Talbot 

 will bear discussion, and we shall be glad to have our read- 

 ers' views on it. 



In the list of species of animals stated to be found in the 

 Park the caribou is given, and we should be glad to learn if 

 any of our readers have any knowledge of that species oc- 

 curring in this region. That it is found a little further west 

 and north is well known, but has it ever been killed in .the 

 Park ? The moose is fairly common there. 



A Pleasant Letter.— Such epistles as the one printed 

 below are very grateful to the- editorial heart, for it is no 

 small thing after all to feel that by our efforts we help to give 

 pleasure, such as that mentioned by our kindly correspond- 

 ent. 



March 29, 1884.— Edit or Forest and Stream: Your favor of the 27th 

 is received, and I wish to assure you that anything I send for the 

 paper can take its turn either into the columns of Forest and Stream 

 or into the waste basket, and in your own good time. Of course we 

 all like to appear in the paper, but all correspondents should have 

 sense enough to know that they cannot all be first. The paper is 

 most excellent, and improves all the time, and its arrival in my 

 family from week to week, is looked upon as an important event. All 

 of us read it, f and my sons, the daughter and their mother scan its 

 columns with ever increasing interest. My own life is one of study, 

 care and labor, and that paper has afforded me more genuine relaxa- 

 tion than all other publications that reach me put together, and I 

 am greatly indebted. I have made the rifle a sort of hobby for many 

 years, and have acquired most valuable information from the pages 

 of Forest and Stream all along. This afternoon I have been out 

 practicing at 200 yards, and came in very much elated; as I made six 

 successive shots at that distance from a sitting position— using a 

 coarse hunting sight on the muzzle and Lyman rear sifcht— and put 

 them all into a three-inch ring. This with a 50-cal. Maynard, 24-inch 

 barrel. I used a new cartridge of my own make, and have something 

 of interest to write about some of these days, unless I find I am mis- 

 taken in some way. 



Fish and Game Protection seems to be rapidly gaining 

 in popular favor in Boston, if not all over Massachusetts. 

 The new game bill reported to the Legislature is received 

 with more favor than its warmest friends dared to hope, and 

 appears to be sure'of a passage without essential modifica- 

 tions from the draft already reported in these columns, un- 

 less some unforeseen difficulty arises. There is a change of 

 sentiment even among marketmen— the best of them. One 

 of them, a gentleman of integrity, remarked to the president 

 of the Massachusetts Fish and Game Protective Association 

 the other day, that if tho ~ <? game bill passed it would ruin 

 his business. The bill was fully explained to him in all its 

 bearings. He heard it through, owned squarely that he had 

 been mistaken, and wound up with desiring to be proposed 

 as a member of the Fish and Game Protective Association. 

 He will be received gladly, and christened as another friend 

 of the good work. Boston is going to get rid of the name 

 which has been put upon her of being the "dumping ground" 

 of all the illegal fish aad game of the country. 



WHAT IS THE USE? 



WHAT is the use in legislatures enacting laws for the 

 protection of fish and game if those laws are not en- 

 forced ? What is the use in the appointment of game con- 

 stables, who are laggards in the performance of their duties 

 and perhaps wink at violations of the laws, which it is their 

 special office to enforce? What is the use in the formation 

 of fish and game protective associations, which are not pro- 

 tectors of fish and game, and whose only business is eating 

 and drinking and shooting glass balls and pigeons of flesh 

 or clay? What is the use in two or three earnest men be- 

 stirring themselves to organize a club which starts with the 

 honest intention of enforcing protection, when none of the 

 twenty or thirty or fifty members besides themselves will do 

 aught but sit still and grumble at what is done by them, and 

 tell what should be done, what they would do! Well may 

 these faithful few ask this question', when their associates, 

 after the first warmth of the club's new life has vapored it- 

 self away, grow cold and stand aloof, never helping, but ever 

 finding fault, and perhaps are known to break the laws 

 which simply as good citizens they are bound to abide by, 

 and have also given their word of honor to uphold. 



Laws unenforced are worse than no laws, and worse than 

 useless ; so are unfaithful officers, and so are societies living 

 only in name, and so are cold or only lukewarm members of 

 societies, from which the living spirit has not entirely de- 

 parted, and pretenders and hypocrites ten times worse. But 

 it is always of use to urge the enforcement of good laws, the 

 appointment of faithful officers to back them with aid and 

 sympathy, to believe that laws were made for our observance 

 as well as that of others, to endeavor to arouse the apathetic 

 and instruct the ignorant, always of use to preach earnestly, 

 and above all to practice as faithfully as we preach earnestly.' 



Preach to t all men, practice, practice, practice! whether 

 the eyes of men be upon you or not. 



A Summer Tramp in the Adirondack^.— The annual 

 "summer tramp" of Professor Jordan and party will be in 

 the Adirondacks this year, instead of in Europe. These 

 "tramps" are organized to combine pleasure with the study 

 of natural history, and have been successfully conducted for 

 the past three years. The circular says : ' 'The total dis- 

 tance traversed on foot will be about 300 miles, the itinerary 

 depending somewhat on the desires of the party and on the 

 condition of the weather. The number of members of the 

 party will be limited to about fifteen. The total expenses 

 (from Fort Ticonderoga) will not vary far from $65. This 

 includes a director's fee of $15. This tour is designed es- 

 pecially for those who enjoy walking and find pleasure in 

 woods and rocks, and who are willing in some degree to 

 'rough it' for the sake of being brought close to nature. 

 Those who prefer hotel parlors to mossy logs should not joi* 

 us." The director is David S. Jordan, Profesoor of Biology 

 in the Indian University, Bloomington, Ind., and his assist- 

 ant is Cornelia M. Clapp, teacher of zoology at the Mount 

 Holyoke Seminary. The party will meet at Fort Ticonder- 

 oga, June 28. Spending the Sabbath there, they will pro- 

 ceed on foot to Crown Point, Bulwagga Mountain, Moriah, 

 Crowfoot Pond, Deadwater, Euba Mills, Bouquet River, 

 Hunter's Pass, Chapel Pond, Roaring Brook, Noonmark 

 Mountain, Keene Flats, Au Sable Ponds, Mount Marcy, 

 Avalanche Lake, Calamity Pond, the Deserted Village, In- 

 dian Pass, Clear Pond, North Elba, John Brown's Grave, 

 Lake Placid, Old White Face, An Sable Chasm, Port Kent, 

 and across Lake Champlain to Mount Mansfield and Camel's 

 Hump; leaving the mountains July 28. 



Henry Bainbridge, the senior partner of one of the most 

 prominent wholesale stationery firms of this city, died at his 

 residence, No. ?6 Lefferts place, Brooklyn, Saturday, March 

 29. Mr. Bainbridge was a genial hearted and social man, 

 and was held in high esteem by his extensive circle of busi- 

 ness associates and friends. One of his most marked char- 

 acteristics was a genuine love of truth for its own sake — a 

 keen sense of honor. He was an enthusiastic sportsman, and 

 much of his leisure was devoted to his dogs and his guns. 

 He was one of the earliest subscribers to Forest and 

 Stream, and even during his last illness looked forward to 

 its weekly coming, as one of his friends says, "with singular 

 eagerness." Mr. Bainbridge was a diffident and sensitive 

 man, but greatly beloved by those who knew him inti- 

 mately. He leaves a widow and two daughters, one of 

 whom is the wife of Col. I. M. Faville. His funeral was 

 very largely attended, from St. Luke's Episcopal Church 

 Clinton avenue, Brooklyn, on Tuesday last, April 1, 



