May 15, 1884.] 



FORES? AND STHEAM. 



805 



field glass— aud after the herders went off we went over 

 toward them, gOt good cover and shot at them at about l'-iii 

 yards. J. and I let Tracy have the first shot because he 

 shoots a situde shot cartridge gnu, while we both shoot a 

 Winchester.^ He killed, and John and I shot half a dozen 

 shots apiece at them as they ran off, and got two more down 

 and wounded three. I put for the team, soon got back, took 

 Tracy in. and wcut after a wounded one. Turned Nig loose. 

 when the antelope commenced to run off, and he killed it 

 after a chase of a mile. When we got to him he was lying 

 down biting it in the neck, surrounded by an admiring audi- 

 ence of Texas cows. lie smiled with his tail when he saw 

 us coming, and we gave him some water in a pan from our 

 keo; and put him and the antelope into the wagon and went 

 back for another; but J. had killed one and lost the other, 

 so we had to be contented with five. John drove for camp 

 a roundabout way, because the ground was rough and Tracy 

 and I went cross-lots on foot. We saw John stop and fin- 

 ally crawl out and shoot at five autelope that were coming 

 out into the hills from water; and finally we got into camp 

 and had two uours of daylight to get a good supper in. We 

 wont to bed soon after dark. 



The wind rose in the night, and when we got up next 

 morning it was snowing and colder than ever. I soon made 

 up my mind that staying in the tent through a bad storm 

 and having our horses stand out would be foolish, and told 

 the boys that I was going to the dugout aud that they could 

 do as they pleased. In half an hour we had packed and 

 started in a storm so severe that we could not see fifty yards. 

 When we got to the dugout I acted as spokesman, and we 

 soon had our horses under the lee of a big haystack and our- 

 selves in the dugout. The thermometer stood at 5° below 

 zero at 9 A. M., with a strong wind, and we stuck to the 

 house for the day. I fetched in some of our provisions, but- 

 ter, etc. — in fact, things that they did not have — and Ed. 

 Newell, who officiated as cook, and I got up a wonderful 

 New Year's dinner. The next day was not much better, but 

 Tracy got uneasy, and he and John started out on foot, 

 making me promise to meet them in the hils at about a P. 

 M. with the buggy to fetch in the game. When I went out 

 it was as cold as ever. The icicles hung to my mustache m 

 a few minutes and I was very cold, though 1 had so many 

 clothes on I could scarcely stir, and had half our blankets 

 and robes in the buggy. I finally found the boys, saw them 

 at a distance on a knoll. They had killed three antelope. 

 We bundled them into the buggy aud all rode home at a trot. 



The next morning by 9 o'clock it was warm and pleasant, 

 and we went out in the buggy across the bottom, through 

 the water where the crossing was good, past huudreds of 

 cattle that had come in to water, up a long slope and into 

 the red grass hills. A drive of a mile and we came to the 

 edge of a saucer-shaped prairie, and we could drive no 

 further. The prairie was a mile wide and two long, and 

 there feeding quietly were at least four hundred antelope in 

 bands of from ten to fifty. We unhitched and made a plan 

 of action. The wind blew directly toward us, and so John 

 and I crept and walked along the hills to the left of the 

 prairie, while Tracy worked down straight toward the 

 nearest bunch. We had got well past the first bunch and 

 crept up on the ridge as near as we could to the line we knew 

 that they would run, when Tracy shot, and here came the 

 band past us. We fired two shots apiece ineffectually, and 

 just as they swung past a point Tracy fired again and" down 

 came a buck. Tracy was at least four hundred yards 

 away. I ran out to the antelope, bled him aud looked for 

 the bullet hole. It was in the head, a little hole that showed 

 Tracy's .4A-caliber had done the work. Tracy was com- 

 ing, and I put (he point of my knife in the hole and gave it 

 a twist. It looked like a .45 then. Up comes Tracy: 

 "Who killed that antelope?" I silently pointed to the mark 

 of the big bullet in the head, and Tracy gave a grunt. We 

 were shooting for share and share alike," but of course every- 

 one wanted to kill the most, and I regret to say that at times 

 Tracy brags insufferably when he gets ahead. 



John went back after the buggy, and Tracy and I went 

 on and soon reached ground that was slightly "rolling, with 

 a band in sight about a mile off. They were moving up 

 wind and uneasy, sometimes feeding a little, and we sneaked 

 after them like coyotes, walking when we could, crouching 

 along sometimes, and occasionally crawling on hands and 

 knees for a hundred yards or so, but keeping out of sight. I 

 have worn the skin off my knees till they bled three times 

 this winter by this fool trick of crawling. " We finally got to 

 within about 225 or 250 yards, and as we could get no nearer 

 both shot together at the' word. Tracy shot his buck through 

 the paunch, 1 missed. Here is where Tracy has the best of 

 me with a .40-85 rifle against my .45-60. I can beat him at 

 100 yards, but when an animal is over 150 and I miscalculate 

 , the distance a little I shoot over or under, while his gun 

 shoots on so flat a trajectory that he don't have to raise his 

 sight anywhere within 200 yards. His gun is sighted for 125. 

 The band ran off, but the buck soon stopped, and we went 

 around him aud approached him so that when he got up he 

 would run toward the way the wagon was coming from. 

 When he saw us he got up and ran just the way we wanted 

 him to and stopped after about a half mile run. We had 

 lots of chances to get a shot at 50 yards, but we kept driv- 

 ing him on till at last here came Nig over a ridge a mile 

 away, close to a badly wounded antelope, John after them 

 in the old buggy, the horses on a run, making the buggy 

 bounce over the rough prairie. Nig soon had his buck by 

 the leg and the buck showed fight, John stopped aud looked 

 on, and Tracy and I ran for the scene of action, but before 

 we got there John had unhitched the team and tied them to 

 the buggy, ran up and helped Nig kill the game and had a 

 broad grin on his face as we came panting up. He had shot 

 the buck as he was going back for the buggy. Hitching up 

 and all getting in we soon found the other, but he "had 

 enough life in him to give Nig a run of about a mile, in a 

 circle. Nig made a giab at his fore leg when he got up to 

 him and threw the buck heels over head; before he got up, 

 Nig was at the back of his neck and gave him a few big 

 bites, aud by the time I got to him he had about kicked his 

 last kick, and we drove for the Harwood dugout with an an- 

 telope apiece. At least Tracy said so. 



That night as we sat around the fire we heard the coyotes 

 howl, and just as I opened the door to hear them more dis- 

 tinctly—for I like to hear them— down the wind came the 

 long-drawn, hollow howls of a pack of big wolves. They 

 were the first I had heard for several years, and it seemed 

 pleasant, for it showed we were in a wild country. The next 

 morning Tracy had another bashful fit, and nothing would 

 do him but to move down the creek two miles and leave 

 that nice dugout again, and to keep peace in the family we 

 did so. We put the tent inside a roofless claim cabin belong- 

 ing to the Harwood Company, and as it was late concluded to 

 get some dinner before we went hunting. As we sat around 



the little fire drinking black coffee and eating some of that 

 everlasting liver that T. is so fond of and even the name of 

 which he rolls like a sweet morsel in his mouth, and which is 

 rather poor fodder in my opinion, the old man gazed intently 

 up and across the creek, and said, "After 1 eat some liver I 

 am going up to kill one of them antilope yonder." I looked 

 in the same direction and saw some light-colored spots skip- 

 ping around that did look like antelope in color, but pretty 

 soon I saw a large, dark object get up and charge around a 

 little and fall down again. I got my field glass, and sure 

 enough it was fifteen big wolves killing an A yearling. I 

 remarked in an off-hand way that they were wolves, and it 

 would have tickled you to see the boys drop the liver and go 

 for their guns. I had to scratch, too, for they were off be- 

 fore you could say scat. We ran up the creek and the year- 

 ling "got up and came down toward it, with the wolves 

 worrying her. Several saw us and ran back for the hills, 

 but five came on, not noticing us. As the heifer passed us 

 at 125 yards one big wolf reared up, put his paws on her 

 stern and commenced bitiug her at the root of the tail. The 

 blood was all over his head and foreparts, and the heifer was 

 all bitten to pieces. T. and I shot. I shot just over the 

 wolf's back and T. also missed, and the wolves ran over the 

 hills and far away. The heifer went down to the spring 

 branch, waded in, drank, and then lay down. 1 knew that, 

 I could not save her life (she died that night), so I left her 

 and struck for the hills, following John and Tracy, who 

 were away ahead. I soon saw them stop and commence 

 crawling to the right to get out of sight of a band of antelope 

 coming down toward water; but they were too late, the an- 

 telope had seen them and ran back, aud I made a run of 

 halt a mile and caught up with the boys, a little out of 

 breath. 



A short, walk and we saw the band of antelope grazing 

 quietly, and 1 had to crawl about three hundred yards and 

 re-skin my knees. We got to within 125 yards, and when 

 we shot, i kflled dead, Tracy missed, and John's cartridge 

 failed to explode, and so John exploded. We went on after 

 the herd, and the boys walked me down in about two miles, 

 as I had chased a runaway horse about five miles in the 

 morning before we started, and was pretty tired before we 

 commenced huntiug. So I sat down and they went on and 

 killed three of the biggest bucks I ever saw. By the way, 

 out of thirty -four antelope that we killed on this trip, there 

 were but three young ones; all the rest were six years old or 

 over, and only six does out of thirty -four. John said that 

 we were probably sent down by providence to kill them be- 

 fore they died of old age. We sent John back after the 

 buggy by drawing matches to see who would go.* He was 

 gone a long time, and when he came back we bundled in 

 our game aud started for camp. The reason he was gone so 

 long was that he had to take the tent down, as a man came 

 to camp that wanted to roof the cabin. When we got in we 

 had a roofed home to sleep in and the man was still at work. 

 I got supper as quick as possible, liver as usual, at Tracy's 

 special request, and invited Brown — the man who was fixing 

 the house — to eat with us, which he did at once. I started 

 after supper for the Harwood dugout, to bake some bread, 

 for it is tedious work baking bread outdoors. I was invited 

 to stay all night and of course accepted. Brown came up, 

 and staid all night too, and nearly talked us all to death. I 

 went to sleep trying not to listen to the monotonous drawl 

 which that pestiferous sheepman inflicted on us; and when I 

 awoke next morning he was talkings till — perhaps he stopped 

 a few minutes to sleep, but 1 doubt it. As a singlehanded 

 talker I will back Sheep Brown against the world for ten 

 cents; but I won't stay around and judge the match. When I 

 got to camp the boys had gone hunting afoot and left me a 

 letter, written on a feed box, to follow them with the team. 

 When I found them they had four dead and four wounded. 

 Nig caught three of them, and we went to camp with seven. 



We decided to start for home the next day, and at day- 

 break we started, with Tracy's lumber wagon stacked lull 

 and seven in my buggy. Passing the dugout we bid the 

 Harwood hands good-bye. aud commenced pulling across 

 the forty-five mile dry strip against a head wind. It was so 

 cold that we had to walk almost all the way, and got to 

 Crooked Creek at 12 midnight in a blinding suow squall. 

 We overtook a man with a team on the road and we all went 

 into camp together in the brush, made a big fire and cooked 

 a lot of eggs that the new man had in his grub box. I ate a 

 sparing meal of eight boiled, washed down with coffee, and 

 slept tranquilly as an infant. When we awoke the sun was 

 shining and we got some breakfast and started off on the 

 home stretch. When we reached the Arkansas it was frozen. 

 We crossed in good shape and soon were in my house, where 

 liver is not the popular food. It is good to go hunting, and 

 it is better to come home. W. J. D. 



FISH AND GAME IN MANITOBA. 



Editor Forest and Stream: 



In your issue of April 17 "Delta" was giving "3. E. B.'' a 

 lesson in geography. About the lakes in Northern Michigan, 

 I haven't much knowledge, but I am of the opinion that 

 there is no lake in Manitoba, called Birch Lake, certainly no 

 very large one. He is quite right about the fish, but they 

 were caught mostly in Lake Manitoba and in the Assiuiboine 

 River and Long Lake, which is an old bed of the same river; 

 and he is astray in the distance from the railway, as Lake 

 Manitoba is not more than ten miles from the Canadian 

 Pacific Railway. 



A person who has not actually been here can hardly 

 believe how fish swarm in the lakes and rivers. I have no'l 

 yet heard any one express a fear that the supply will ever 

 become exhausted. 1 have seen the pike, or jackfish as they 

 are called here, so thick in the Seine River, a tributary of 

 the Red, which empties into the Red at St. Boniface, that 

 the half-breed children would go to the banks with manure 

 forks and throw them out on the shore, and even kill them 

 with sticks; and that while the water was so thick with 

 sediment that the fish could not be seen, but were killed 

 with random blows. In the ditches along the C. P. R. from 

 St. Vincent, in Minnesota, to Winnipeg, the jackfish are 

 very plentiful and are caught with wire'~nooses' on the end 

 of a pole. The stupid fish will not move a fin while the 

 noose is slipped over his head. The jackfish is not con- 

 sidered so good a fish as the whitefish, those caught in Lake 

 Winnipeg especially, being very fine. 



The spring here has opened fully two weeks earlier than 

 last year. The birds are nearly all here. The chickens have 

 wintered well, and from present appearances we will have 

 splendid shooting next fall, This is the breeding ground of 

 geese and ducks, and both are here in great numbers. Have 

 no geese yet, but the ducks are very tine. We have larger 

 game than those, of which I will have more to say at some 

 other time. Northwest. 



Carbekrv, Manitoba, April 26. 



A FUND FOR GAME PROTECTION. 



Editor Forest and Sb 



There are now before our Legislature at Albany two little 

 jokers iu the shape of amendments to the game laws which, 

 if passed, will not only do away with the efficiency of all the 



gune laws, but will eventually do away with all the game, 

 ne of them is to allow the farmers to snare and trap on 

 their own lands, and the other one to prevent practically any 

 search warrant, to be put into operation, by giving the owner 

 of the ice box ample, time to clean out his ice box before any 

 inspection takes place. 



Is it not about time that the sportsmen wake up out of 

 their lethargy, aud take out of the hands of a very few inter- 

 ested demagogues the making of the laws? I am told that 

 to-day or any other day of the year, open or closed season, 

 there are to be had from any wholesale poultry dealers, game 

 of all kinds, quail, woodcock or partridge. For an illustra- 

 tion to what I say, I send you herewith two quail, gotten 

 this very morning" from a wholesale poultry dealer. 



If there is any" "detective fund" needed anywhere, it is 

 certainly for New York city, where the game laws are noth- 

 ing but a dead letter. If you think yourself able to raise or 

 start such a fund, I for one will subscribe to it at once lo 

 the amount of ten dollars. We have real spoilsmen enough 

 in this State to make this fund a perpetual fund of about one 

 thousand dollars, to enable us to employ somebody to repre- 

 sent us ably and decently, and by able "argument counteract 

 the workings and doings of a few" parties interested in having 

 the game annihilated to enable them to sell it the whole year 

 around. G. 



New York City. 



PHILADELPHIA NOTES. 



THE forest fires have extended over a large portion of the 

 woodland section of our State, and I fear many nests 

 of the ruffed grouse have been destroyed. In the Wind Gap 

 section the hillsides have all been ablaze, aud from the upper 

 Lehigh and Pocono comes the news that the woodlands have 

 been swept over by the blaze. The Pocono section has 

 always been good grounds for grouse, and it was upon the 

 plains of Pocono that the "heath hen" once existed. No 

 better field for "pheasant" or ruffed grouse shooting could 

 be found in Pennsylvania than the latter, but I fear all pros 

 pects of sport of this description for the coming autumn are 

 destroyed, for an early hatching is now out of the question. 



It is reported that Mr. John MeC'arty, who owns an exten- 

 sive property six miles from Hagerstown, Md., has liberated 

 2,000 quail in his section, together with twenty-four pairs of 

 English pheasants. This being correct, we may expect the 

 region for miles around Hagerstown to be well" stocked by 

 the coming season, if the birds hav^ been properly put out. 

 It is a great mistake to put out more than one or two pair of 

 quail in one particular spot; they should be vrell scattered 

 to prevent any possibility of the birds running together into 

 a covey or pack, in which case they very often remain in a 

 flock and refuse to pair the first' season, especially in a 

 strange country. 



Snipe shooting has been a failure hereabouts this spring. 

 In the first place the birds were scarce, and in the second 

 place we have had but little fitting weather. Homo. 



CAMP TINWARE. 



Tl/TY entire outfit for cooking and eating dishes comprises five pieces 

 -"■*■ of tinware. This is when stopping in a permanent camp. When 

 cruising or tramping, I take just two pit- ces in the knapsack. 



I get a skillful tinsmith to make one dish as follows: Six inches 6n 

 bottom, Clinches on top, side 2 inches high. The bottom is of the 

 heaviest tin procurable, the sides of lighter tin, and seamed to be 

 water-tight without solder. The top simply turned, without wire. 

 The second dish to he made the same, but small enough to nest iu the 

 first, and also to fit into it when inverted as a cover. Two Other 

 dishes made from common pressed tinware, with the tops cut off and 

 turned, also with mt wire. They are fitted, bo that they all nest, tak- 

 ing no more room than the largest dish alone, and each of the three 

 smaller dishes makes a perfect cover for the nest larger. Tiie other 

 piece is a tin camp-kettle, also of the heaviest tin, and seamed water- 

 tight. It holds two quarts, and the other dishes nest in it perfectly, 

 so that when packed the whole take just as much room as the kettle 

 alone. I should mention that the strong ears are set below the rim 

 of the kettle, and the bale falls outside, so, as none of the dishes 

 have any handle, there are no aggravating "stickouts" to wear anil 

 abrade. The snug affair w T eighs, all told, two pounds. I have met 

 parties in the North Woods whose one frying-pan weighed more— 

 with its handle three feet long. How ever did they get through the 

 brush with such a culinary terror? 



It is only when I go into a very accessible camp that I take so much 

 as five pieces of tinware along. I once made a ten days' tramp 

 through an unbroken wilderness on foot, and all the dishes I took 

 was a ten-cent tin ; it was enough. I believe I will tell the story of 

 that tramp before I get through. Fori saw more game in the ten 

 days than I ever saw before or since in a season; and I am told that 

 the whole region is now a thrifty farming country, with the deer 

 nearly all gone. They were plenty enough thirty -nine years ago this 

 very month. — "Nensmuk'' in "TToorZen/fY." 



WHAT THEY SAY OF "WOODCRAFT." 



The Indianopolis (Ind.) Journal, April 30, says: "Poet as well as 

 woodsman and philosopher, his writings possess a peculiar grace 

 and worth and all that he so diffidently suggests is so wholesome, so 

 very reasonable that the reader is won over to his view, mi less indeed 

 the reader be already a crank in matters pertaining lo wood-life. 

 This book is written for tue masses, the author not caring to waste 

 his efforts on men of means sufficient to have everything their own 

 way. To those who care to enjoy a summer on Our- in the best, 

 easiest and cheapest manner, this book of bints is indispensable, It 

 is woodsy and wholesome in every line. The author's fifty years of 

 life among the summer forests fits him for what ho lias at last under- 

 taken; a guide to the best, easiest and most enjoyable maimer of pre- 

 E axing to spend a vacation in the woods. The investment of one dol- 

 ir here will make rich returns." 



"Seneca" in a private letter praises the book iu thiswise: " 'Wood- 

 craft' certainly is a work that stands without a peer in its field, as 

 was only to be expected from the years of experience and hahits of 

 observation of its author. Its main value is iu its thorough Iv practical 

 instruction, and the veriest tenderfoot ought to enjoy camp-life as 

 tie in Highly with this book at hand as the oidest hunter. "Neesmiik 1 

 hits me in a tender spot in his talk about grogging and about still- 

 hunting from the patient sitting on a log, fori have been there in 

 both cases to the fullest extent of enjoyment possible, and these two 

 particulars have been a hobbv of mine ever since 1 can remember. 

 Old 'Nessmuk' never wrote, anything that showed his happy style 

 better than the description of his ten days' tramp through Michigan, 

 which reads like a veritable fairy tale." 



Marshalltown, la.. May 4, 1884.— A few days ago one 

 of our best shots, Mr. Hank Bruner, spent the day in a call 

 on the Scolopax, aud returned with a bag of 42. Reports 

 last few days are of the scarcity of birds, and opinion pre- 

 vails they have continued northward. — Disner. 



