Forest and Stream. 



A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 



Terms, $4 a Year. 10 0*8. a Copy. I 

 Six Months, $2. j 



NEW YORK, JULY 24, 1884. 



( VOL. XXIL-No. 26. 



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



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Forest and Stream Publishing Co. 

 Nos. 39 and 40 Park Row. New York Cnr. 



CONTENTS. 



Editorial. 



The Greely Rescue. 



A Sports Defense Society. 

 The Sportsman Tourist. 



Memories of Seuaebwine Lake. 



A Lo Hunt in the Staked Plains. 



"Woodcraft.' 1 



Rescue of the Greely Party. 

 Natural History. 



The Ground Snake. 



A Visit to a Heronry. 



An Amphibious lusect. 



Domesticating Quail. 

 Game Bag and Gun. 



Open Seasons for Game and Fish 



A Word for the Old Gun. 



Bullet versus Buckshot. 



Reloading Ammunition. 



Summer Woodcock Shooting. 

 Sea and River Fishing. 



Camps of the Kingfishers.— xi. 



A Morning's Fishing. 



Fish-Eating Plants. 



"Salt-Water Fishing." 



The Schoodics. 



Size and Weight of Black Bass. 

 Fishculture. 



Natural Causes Influencing the 

 Movements of Fish in Rivers. 

 The Kennel. 



Pointers at New York. 



Collie Show and Field Trials. 



at 



The Kennel. 



The Laverack Setter. 



Crystal Palace Bench Show. 



Sale of Sporting Dogs 

 Aldridge's. 



English Field Trials Rules. 



Kennel Notes. 

 Rifle and Trap Shooting. 



Range and Gallery. 



The Trap. 



Clay-Pigeon Points. 

 Canoeing. 



Weight of Centerboards. 



Royal C. C. Annual Regatta.— 

 June 28. 



Cruising Canoes and the A. C. 

 A. Rules. 



The A. C. A. Races. 



The Log Book. 



A Cruise on the Merrimack. 

 Yachting. 



Dorchester Y. C. 



Yachting in San Francisco. 



American Y. C. Steam Yacht 

 Races. 



Beverly Y.C. Second Champion- 

 ship Race. 



Steam Yachts and Steering 

 Gears. 



Quaker City Y. C. 

 Answers to Correspondents. 

 Publisher's Department. 



With Us compact type and in its permanently enlarged form 

 of twenty-eight pages this journal furnishes each weeic a larger 

 amount of first-class matter relating to angling, shooting, the 

 kennel, yachting, canoeing, and kindred subjects, than is con- 

 tained in all other American publications put together. 



THE GREELY RESCUE. 

 T/yiTHIN the week the wires have flashed around the 



* * world the news that the Greely party had been 

 rescued. The pitiful remnant of seven out of the twenty -five 

 men who made up the expedition have heen found alive. 

 They were starving, weak, almost in the death agony, when 

 the rescuing ships reached them— only just in time. Two 

 days more of this weary waiting would have ended the 

 struggle for all. The eager hands that have now brought 

 life and happiness to the survivors, would have had only the 

 mournful task of carrying to the ships, which were to bear 

 them home, the lifeless forms of the whole party. It would 

 have been another DeLong tragedy. 



The sorrowful tale of suffering and death is told on an- 

 other page. The heroism of each member of the little band 

 is unconsciously brought out in the graphic narrative of the 

 survivors. Everywhere throughout the account appears the 

 fact that the success of the expedition was very largely due 

 to the fortitude and ability of its commander. For the 

 expedition was successful, notwithstanding the fact that 

 three-fourths of its members perished miserably of starva- 

 tion. During the three years of their sojourn at Lady Frank- 

 lin Bay, there was but a single death, and they did not be- 

 gin to suffer seriously until, despairing of a rescue, they left 

 Port Conger in August of last year, and moved southward, 

 leaving behind them eight months' provisions. The diffi- 

 culties and dangers of the march greatly reduced the stock 

 of food which they had taken with them, so that throughout 

 the winter passed at Cape Sabine, they lived on quarter ra- 

 tions. At length their provisions entirely gave out, and they 

 were reduced to eating their sealskin clothing. 



Up to the time of the arrival at Cape Sabine the health of 

 all the men had been excellent. Scurvy, the most dreaded 

 disease to which travelers in the Arctic are exposed, had not 

 attacked them. Their camp at Cape Sabine was opposite 



the spot where the Proteus sank in 1883, and yet no'adequate 

 supply of food was found to have been deposited here for the 

 benefit of the explorers. A few stores had been tossed ashore 

 and abandoned, but nothing had been done in the way of 

 establishing a depot of supplies. Lieut. Greely is reported 

 as saying that if £00 pounds of meat had been left at Cape 

 Sabine by the Proteus the lives of his whole party would 

 have been saved. 



The terrible loss of life appears to have been due wholly 

 to the mismanagement of the authorities at Washington. 

 Garlington was ordered to push through to Lady Franklin 

 Bay, and in trying to do so lost the Proteus, and turned 

 back. By some strange fatuity he had been ordered to 

 leave provisions on the east side of Smith's Sound instead of 

 on the west side, where Greely was stationed, and where the 

 latter had directed that supplies should be left. Even with- 

 out such instructions it might have been supposed that in 

 the event of a retreat being made the natural thing for the 

 party to do would be to make its way south along the coast 

 as rapidly as possible.' Smith's Sound in the late summer — 

 the time at which such a retreat would be begun— is often 

 partially open water, and impassable for heavy boats or 



The Greely party — as was to have been expected— retreated 

 down the west coast of this body of water, while the care- 

 ful authorities at Washington had laboriously placed all the 

 provisions on the other side of the sound, at Littleton Island 

 and elsewhere. Thus, when the party under Greely reached 

 Cape Sabine they found no stores, although two costly ex- 

 peditions had been fitted out and despatched to their rescue. 

 Through sheer stupidity and blundering at Washington 

 nineteen out of the twenty-five men belonging to the party 

 were thus allowed to perish. 



The work done by the expedition is said to be most im- 

 portant. A vast quantity of meteorological and magnetic 

 observations have been made, and many photographs secured. 

 We shall know better what the scientific results of the expe- 

 dition are after they have been submitted to the examination 

 of specialists. 



It is apparent that if the work of Arctic exploration is to 

 be continued, those who are to engage in it must be pro- 

 tected in every possible way from the dangers to which the 

 dweller in the Arctic is inevitably exposed. Of all the 

 circumpolar meteorological stations, Fort Conger was in the 

 most dangerous position, from the fact that it was accessible 

 only about once in three years, and yet these men were 

 allowed to station themselves there without having any base 

 of supplies on which they could depend. They were to rely 

 for rescue wholly on the chance of an open summer, when a 

 ship could come through to them. There are many people 

 who believe that this exploratory work should cease — that the 

 results to be obtained from it are not commensurate with the 

 suffering and death which has ensued. The work of the 

 Greely party, however, shows very clearly that such Arctic 

 observatory stations can be supported, and that the observers 

 may maintain themselves, even in this rigorous climate, with- 

 out any great degree of suffering and in perfect health. But 

 to do this they must have food. 



Beginning at some point which is always accessible, on 

 the west shore of Smith's Sound, houses should be built at 

 short intervals, certainly not more than fifty miles apart. 

 Each of these houses should be as well fitted up and as well 

 supplied with provisions, tools, and all the implements and 

 articles required in Arctic travel and living as if it were to 

 be the winter home of an expedition for several years. 

 Then from the northernmost of these houses, a short ad- 

 vance should be made and another station built, fitted 

 up and supplied. No long advance northward should 

 be permitted, no matter how apparently favorable the 

 conditions, but a slow and steady progress should be 

 made, each summer being devoted to the establishment of a 

 station further north than the last one. Each summer ves- 

 sels should be sent out carrying men and material, which 

 should be left at the northernmost station accessible, and 

 thus the waste at the northern end of the line would be 

 constantly supplied. The observers would be always within 

 easy reach of warm quarters, and the supply of food could 

 be made inexhaustible. 



It may be objected that the plan suggested would be 

 enormously costly and very slow, but even so, it would be 

 sure to accomplish what is required, and the money would 

 be well spent which should save human life and lessen 

 human suffering. 



If these explorations are of real scientific value, as we be- 

 lieve, it is certainly worth while that they should be carried 

 on with such system that they will be productive of the best 

 results. 



A SPORTS DEFENSE SOCIETY. 



IN its original form the bill introduced into the English 

 Parliament to suppress pigeon shooting contained a 

 clause extending the operation of the act to "any vertebrate 

 animal, whether of domestic or wild nature, kept in confine- 

 ment or captivity." This was a blow at the sports of hunting 

 the carted stag and coursing hares in inclosures. The fol- 

 lowers of these three pastimes, with other sportsmen, re- 

 garded the bill as "the thin edge of the wedge," and they 

 thought that in time other sports, fox hunting and grouse 

 shooting, would be interdicted. Accordingly a society known 

 as the National Sports Protection and Defense Association, 

 has been formed. Its avowed purpose is to resist all measures 

 intended to interfere with the various forms of sport men- 

 tioned, and our English exchanges report that the member- 

 ship of the association is sufficient guarantee of its influence 

 in this direction. 



We surmise that the society will be powerful so far as it 

 keeps abreast of and reflects the popular sentiment of the 

 times. If public opinion in Great Britain condemned 

 hunting a carted stag and chasing rabbits in inclosures, as 

 public opinion does in this country, no society could with- 

 stand the attacks that would be sure to be made — and 

 eventually with success— upon these practices. No society 

 could ever be formed in this country strong enough to bolster 

 up the repute of such exhibitions as, for instance, are occa- 

 sionally given by the Newport huntsmen in their chase of 

 maimed foxes. 



"Who Wins?" — This is the query propounded to news- 

 paper editors by anxious correspondents. Most often the 

 dispute is over a game of cards, or a bet on a horse race, or 

 a presidential election. Our esteemed contemporary, the 

 Spirit of the Ttmes, usually attends to the card and horse 

 puzzles, and the New York Sun, in addition to its matri- 

 monial advice, dispenses oracular utterances on election 

 bets. It is with no little jealousy that the Forest and 

 Stream witnesses the confiding trust of the bet-befogged 

 public in other journals, while its own opinion on similar 

 themes is seldom sought; and it is with a genuine thrill of 

 complacency that we once in a while read a letter like this: 

 "Hamburg, N. J., July 11. Editor Forest and Stream: Will 

 you be kind enough to decide the following bet through the 

 columns of your valuable paper? A bets B that he can tell 

 him where he got his supper on a certain night. They bet, 

 A names the place where he supposes B ate supper, and B 

 says T had no supper.' Is the bet a draw, or who wins?' — 

 Stiff." Now, if we should devote our time and intellectual 

 powers to the earnest consideration of such intricate prob- 

 lems as this, we might in time convert the Forest and 

 Stream into a vehicle for the dissemination of useful in- 

 formation; but we shall do no such thing. We smother 

 the ambition that would lead us into such an exalted path, 

 and deeply as we are touched by the confidence displayed in 

 us by "Stiff," we must content ourselves with keeping the 

 Forest and Stream what it is to-day, a journal of shoot- 

 ing and angling, the best in the world, and we shall do this 

 even though A and B and all the rest of them remain for- 

 ever suspended on undecided bets. 



The Food of Nesting Birds.— The veiy interesting 

 communication on this subject published in our natural his- 

 tory columns last week deserves more than a passing uotiee. 

 The observations there recorded by this careful observer 

 teach a lesson to the agriculturalist which he will do well to 

 lay to heart. They show how important it is that our insec- 

 tivorous birds should be rigidly protected, not by law alone, 

 but by public opinion as well. If we assume that at each 

 visit to the nest but a single insect was brought — and prob- 

 ably five would be nearer the truth — we see how great a 

 check these birds are on the rapidly multiplying insect life 

 of our summer months. Of these insects a large proportion 

 unquestionably belong to species injurious to vegetation, and 

 their destruction is of the greatest benefit to the farmer. It 

 is this class above all others that is especially interested in 

 the protection of our small birds. The care and patience of 

 the observer during his long vigil deserve high praise. 



The Maryland Association.— The Maryland Associa- 

 tion for the Protection and Preservation of Game and Fish 

 has gone out of existence, owing, it is said, to the indiffer- 

 ence of its members. This is the more to be regretted be- 

 cause of the importance of the work which the association 

 was organized to do. We hope to see a revival of the 

 society. 



