184 
the ranks of the martins thin out, and in less than a minute 
all have left the sand, flying out on the river, down toward 
the island, rising above the willows, and in a few minutes all 
is quiet, dark. The martins have gone to rest, and we will 
not disturb them. It would be difficult work to penetrate 
these willow thickets at night. ; 
The willows are about twenty feet high, and stand very 
close together. The ground is swampy in some places and 
it 1s covered all over with debris left by last year’s inunda- 
tion. We shall try to see them leave the willows to-morrow 
morning, 
_itis5 A. M., the stars have disappeared, with the excep- 
tion of a few bright ones. We are on the bluffs opposite the 
sandbar. The first break of day stands in the eastern hori- 
zon, but night still reigns west of us. This is the moment 
when the 1nartin leayes its roost. ‘They are already coming 
over the river; a few voices only, then more and more, and 
now the whole airis filled with the short calls of Proyne. 
They seem to be all around us, below and above, but we may 
stain our eyes in all directions, not a single bird can be dis- 
covered; it is too dark and the birds are too high above us. 
A few minutes later the bulk has passed, but it is getting 
lighter and we are able to see a few loiterers, mere dots pas- 
ing the zenith, following the others in a northwesterly or 
westerly direction, A few minutes more, the last will 
oN Bone and no martin will be seen at this place before 5 
IM: 
After migration has thus begun, it will be good for us to 
visit the scene of rendezvous every day. ‘The martins begin 
to arrive at 5 P. M,; they axvrive mostly low above the water, 
comparatively few ave coming at some height, As soon as 
a few hundred are together, they begin to sit down on the 
sand. In the beginning they are pretty restless, changing 
their places every few minutes, sometimes flying up in a 
cloud to settle down at or near the same spot again. If we 
are watching them now from a place south of the bar, we 
notice that not all settle down again. After swinging a few 
circles, part of the flock detaches itself from the rest, and, 
heading south, soon disappears in that direction. Although 
the number remains about the same for two weeks, we soon 
find that a change has been going on from the beginning. 
As early as Sept. 1 we become aware that we have almust 
entirely to do with birds of the year, ‘The old birds, the old 
males, at least, have mostly left. 
The most imposing sight may be had by disturbing the army 
at the moment when all have settled on the sand. The whole 
mass goes up in a body, turning right and left, forms two 
mighty streams which unite above the water in a great whirl- 
pool, rushes up and down, sweeping along the river to a dis- 
tant point, then coming back again like a huge cloud, which 
moves hither and thither until the neutral tint of night allows 
the safe retreat. On Sept. 7 and 8 the number of martins 
present was still as large, or larger, than ever. 
sultry, stormy weather of Sept. 9 and 10a cold northwest wind 
reduced the temperature to 66° on the 11th, and on this even- 
ing the martins assembled on the sandbar for the last time. 
The number was much smaller than usual, and when the 
cloud rose from the bank at 6 P. M. comparatively few re- 
turned. On the 12th no martin was sitting on the bar, but 
about a hundred flocked together low above the water near 
the bar and disappeared soon, moving slowly in a southerly 
direction. The same took place on all the following days. 
Small flocks began to collect at 5:30 and disappeared after 
staying about the neighborhood until a little after 6 P. M, 
The last were seen on the 18th, but only a few, and none to- 
day. O. WIDMANN. 
Sv. Louts, Mo., Sept. 19, 188+. 
SNAKE BITES. 
SUPPOSE it would not be far amiss to call me a snake 
erank, From infancy to gray-haired age 1 have been an 
admirer and close observer of the serpent. Their beautiful 
colors and graceful movements have always made them 
objects of interest to me, and there is a strong fascination in 
the latent power and mysterious danger lurking in the little 
flat heads of the poisonous varietics. Whenever a case of 
snake bite has occurred within my knowledge, [ have taken 
pains to get at the main facts so far as I could, and I have a 
more or less correct record of over forty cascs—including 
my own, which was published in Forest anp STREAM— 
size of snake, location of wound, treatment, with subse- 
quent condition of the patient. These are the important 
factors in a case of snake bite. . 
Of more than forty cases of rattlesnake bite only four 
proved fatal, and it is a startling fact that-three of the four 
cases were within easy call of medical aid, two of them be- 
ing in New York City and the third in a populous village. 
The fourth case was that of a young woman who was badly 
bitten while carrying two heayy pails of berries off the 
mountain under a hot July sun. She trod on the snake and 
was deeply bitten below the knee; then, falling down in her 
frantic terror, was bilten again on the inside portion of the 
thigh. The little village was some two miles distant, and 
she strove to reach it by running but fell down at the end of 
a milé and sent a companion ahead for help. Strong men 
soon came to her aid, but she was unable to stand, though 
she could give a coherent account of the accident. She was 
carried to the village, where she died before midnight, and 
was buried before sunrise the next morning, owing to the 
rapidity with which decomposition had taken place. It was 
the worst case I ever knew, and every circumstance con- 
nected with the mishap was against recovery. 
Tn thirty odd cases that recovered, the bite was inflicted in 
deep forests, on mountain tops, and remote places where 
medical aid was not available for the most part, and in more 
than half the cases whisky was out of reach. It is a notable 
fact, that the cases where no liquor was to be had recovered 
more quickly and thoroughly than those in which the patient 
was drenched with whisky, Three cases wherein whisky was 
freely used resulted in the recovery of the patient, but with 
the loss of a finger or toe. Where clay poultices and cold 
water was resorted to, there was no need of amputation, and 
the recovery was quicker and more thorough. I have no 
faith in whisky for snake bites. In my own case I am con- 
vinced it did no good. 
The best medical authorities are pretty well agreed that 
no reliable antidote for snake poison has yet been discoy- 
ered. 
Dr. Lacerda’s hypodermic injection of permanganate of 
potash may turn out to bea specific cure; but it needs fur- 
ther trial. Let alone that in a majority of cases it would 
not be available. 
The men who are most exposed to snake bites will never 
be found with permanganate of potash and hypodermic 
syringes in their knapsacks. Putting what I know with 
what I believe, if I were to be bitten again I would trust to 
After the) 
suction first, with pressing the surrounding flesh toward the 
wound: next to heavy clay or fresh earth poultices, with a 
constant pouring of cold water. It is simple, easily applied, 
and I haye never known it to fail. 
There is another style of treatment that Ihave seen used 
with excellent results, both in the United States and in the 
tropics. It consists simply of a liberal application of 
ammonia, followed by poultices of common salt. I have 
seen it applied to a hand stung by the gray scorpion, and 
also to the bite of a coral snake, and in each case the cure 
was speedy. 
Perhaps there is no antidote for the bites and stings of 
poisonous reptiles so universally believed in as ammonia, 
and, | think, with good reason. Yet, what old woodsman 
ever thinks of carrying a phial of ammonia in his knapsack? 
He knows that at long intervals and yery distant points some 
one is bitten by a rattler or a copperhead; but his sound sense 
teaches him that three men are struck by lighting where one 
is bitten by a poisopous snake. Does he, therefore, go 
a-hunting with a lightning rod on his hat? Scarcely. He 
may take along an antidote in the shane of a whisky flask, 
so to speak, but it will be used 19,785 times as a preventive 
before it is once needed as a cure. 
I could give a score of really true and rather uncommon 
incidents connected with snakes, snake bites and snake 
charming, but I should be using up valuable space, and 
some one might suggest that I had mislaid my G. W. hatchet. 
As regards snake charming, the stories concerning it are 
mostly relegated to the regions of the hoop snake. And 
yet, the man who is a close observer of nature and a dweller 
in the woods withal may happen to strike an incident or two 
in the course of three or four decades that will upset some 
Peeous opinions, and set him thinking for the rest of his 
ife. 
It is undoubtedly true that the black snake does not de- 
pend for a.living on his power of charming birds within 
reach of his jaws. Nor does Crotalus horridus make it his 
business to paralyze the man who ventures to gaze fixedly 
into his basilisk eyes: And the slender black snake, com- 
monly called the racer, does not ordinarily attain to a length 
of 21 feet, with a diameter no greater than a broom-stick, 
And still if is true that there are living men—naturalists— 
who have witnessed the strange power of the black snake 
over small birds or animals. (L think it is the black snake 
mostly. ) 
And I can name three truthful men who—though they are 
reticent on the subject—could testify as to the strange fasci- 
nation, mesmerie power, or whatever it may be, of the rat- 
tlesnake. 
As for the 21-feet racer, there are plenty of living wil- 
nesses who saw him measured, although it was more than 
twenty-five years ago. Probably not one man in a hundred 
would willingly believe that a native snake ever attained to 
such a length in any of the Middle States. The story went 
the rounds of the press at the time as a nine days’ wonder, 
and in nine days more was pretty well forgotten. We forget 
easily and quickly. 
I doubt if one man in ten can give the nani¢ of the ocean 
steamer that went on the rocks (not so very long ago) with a 
loss of 600 human lives; or name the lake steamer that, 
with her nose on the beach, roasted or drowned all her pas- 
sengers and erew save four. NESSMUK. 
Quam In ConrreMENtT.—A Hagerstown, Md., corres- 
pondent sends us the following note from the ews of that 
town: Messrs. Fred F, McComas and Geo, A. Davis have 
succeeded for the first time so far as it has come to our 
knowledge in having partridges [quail] breed in confinement. 
In the present case the mother was left entirely to the birds 
themselves, care being taken to place the birds as nearly as 
possible in the conditions similar to those they would natur- 
ally seek in a wild state. A cage was built of iron frame work 
covered with wire, except the west side which was of board 
to shelter from the wind. This cage was placed on the 
eastern slope of a hill, the earth forming the bottom, which 
was partly in grass sward and having a dwarf evergreen, 
and seme tufts of tall grass for hiding places and in one 
corner the grass was removed, and sand, gravel and pounded 
oyster shells, sheltered by a board, were placed to give the 
birds a Gusting place and at the same time gravel and shell 
material. In this cage early in February was placed a male 
and two female partridyes. At first the birds were very 
wild, and they are quite shy.as yet. In their natural state 
they should haye hatched out a brood about June, but these 
birds gaye no evidence of their intention to raise a family 
until in August when a nest of some five eggs was discovered; 
these increased to ten, and on the 22d of this month after 
setting over three weeks, the greater part of which appeared 
to be done by the male bird, six young birds were hatched 
out, one of which died, the remaining five appear to be 
doing well. The food of the old birds consisted mainty of 
wheat, cracked corn, green corm and hungarian seed. 'The 
young birds have been given hard boiled eggs with cracker 
crumbs, cornmeal and cracked wheat. The one great 
difficulty found in a cage placed on the ground is from 
prowling dogs and cats, who for a time had made a beaten 
track around the cage keeping the birds in nightly alarm, 
This was finally obviated by taking the long shoots from 
ihe osage orange filled with sharp needles and stringing 
them around the cage for a distance of three feet. The 
effect was gratifying; for afew nights could be heard the 
howl of a surprised dog or cat, but in a week’s time there 
was peace. 
Wotves anp AssArasprta.—Hditor Forest and Stream: 
It may not be generally known that the wolf has an appetite 
for assafcedita that is phenomenal, and that it will scent the 
drug and come in pursuit of it from an incredible distance. 
T have heard that my grandfather, a physician in Virginia, 
was followed by an enormous wolf when riding at night in 
a region that was thickly settled, and being unarmed, had 
to gallop with all speed for shelter. The brute seemed te- 
solved to take away his saddle bags that contained the drug. 
—P.C.M. [The fondness of the wolf for assafcedita has 
been often remarked and is alluded to by many writers on 
natural history. ] 
aN, 
“ANGLING TALKS, 
The famous “Winter Talks on Summer Pastimes,” contributed to 
the Formst anp STREAM by Georgé Dawson. A series of eleyen chap- 
ters about fishing for trout, bass, grayling and salmon, angling re- 
sorts and anglers’ reminiscences, pen pictures of outdoor life, anec- 
dotes, wise sayings, humor, and a deal of sound sense. The book is 
one of the ‘Forest and Stream Series,’ bound in cloth, and sent post- 
paid on receipt of price, 50 cents. 
beaver, Sept. 1-May 1. Partridges, Sept. 20-March1. Black 
Game Bag ayd Guy. 
OPEN SEASONS FOR GAME AND FISH. 
REVISED TO ocr, 2, 1884, 
New Brunswick. 
Moose, caribou, deer, Aug. 1-Feb. 1, Mink, otter, sable, 
duck, wood duck, teal, Sept. 5-May 15. 
Aug. 14-March 1. Salmon, July 1-Sept. 15. 
No person, or party, shall kill more than 8 moose, 5 caribou 
and 5 deer in any one season, Chasing moose, caribou or deer 
Snipe, woodcock, 
with dogs is prohibited. 7 
7 
A person not domiciled in the Province must take out an 
annual license before taking any kind of game, fee #20, 
Daniel MeLennan is the Provincial Secretary, who issues 
such licenses. Address, Fredericton, N. B. 
To officers in Her Majesty's service and officers of the army 
and nayy the license fee is only $5, 
North Carolina. 
Wild turkey, partridge (quail), dove, woodcoek, pheasant 
(grouse), Oct. 1-March 15, ; 
ROD AND GUN IN WEST TEXAS. 
AM afraid that I have undertaken too much. ‘The head- 
ing, West Texas, represents too big a country to be de- 
scribed in the short space of a-letter, Still we ean speak of 
a part that is a fair average of the whole, and leave for the ~ 
reader the task of thinking of the whole as like the part but 
larger. One day in camp, while it was raining and 1 had 
exhausted all the amusements that could be had by me, such 
as cleaning and oiling my guns and fishing rods and reading 
all the matter at hand, which consisted of a solitary news- 
paper, I amused myself by trying how much in quantity and 
otherwise my mind could conceive of. I thought of a 
thousand posts set up in line; they were too many. I 
thought of a hundred and wasn’t quite sure. I thought of 
ten; that was easy enough, I multiplied my ten by ten to 
see how far I could go, I shall not commit myself by say- 
ing how far l went; the reader may try it, But unless you 
have seen it, unless you have been all over it, you cannot 
conceive or think of a vast country such asis this Westerm 
Texas, Its endless and interlacing chains of hills, its mag- 
nificent valleys and broad, level expanses of prairie combine 
to make up a domain that is grand and magnificent in ex- 
tent. One travels over the country, and each new hill com- 
mands new vistas of country; but all, while they bear some 
likeness to one another, are not alike, and present an ever 
varying study and pleasure. 
This evening coming over the “‘divide,” after a fine day’s 
shooting, I stopped to rest just as the sun was going down 
in the western sky. The air was pure and cool and the last 
rays of the sun lighted upascene that 1 could but think 
was the realization of a boyhood dream, a sporting dream, 
in days when on my father’s farm, hemmed in by fences 
and woods, I caught rabbits in traps and seduced quail into 
custody by the figure 4, the making of which was looked 
upon by me in those days asa science. Away to the west- 
ward I could see the trees that skirted pretty little Dove 
Creek, and tracing the green line, I saw in the north where 
Dove became Spring, and further on where Spring became 
lost in the waters of the South Concho, and then coming 
back up South Concho one saw ‘‘pretty and bright, sping 
like a silver light,’ Burks Oreek in the valley al my feet an 
in that beautiful bunch of pecan trees by the spring, which 
is the head of the creek, I saw a little white spot that was 
the tent which meant to me “‘home sweet home.”- Let me 
see! One, two, three big valleys in sight, which open out on 
a broad prairie that is covered with antelope. Too numer- 
ous to count are the little “draws” from the hills which are 
full of big coveys of brown quail which feed down into the 
valley, leaving their cousins, the mountain quail, the right 
of ogcupancy of the mountains and hilltops. The streams 
in sight are full of black bass, they call them trout here, and 
will soon be noisy with the quack, quack of the duck, Such 
is the part of West Texas wherein lics the experiences of the 
writer and which isa likeness of the whole of Western Texas! 
Such is a part of the Knickerbocker ranche, in Tom Green 
county, whose owners are all lovers of the sport of the rod 
and gun. One of them is an enthusiastic hunter and a true 
sportsman, he has lately imported a pretty little pointer 
biteh whelped out of imported Rose and sired by Bang 
Bang, 
We were talking at the ranche the other evening about the 
fish which the native Texan invariably calls trout, but which 
is a black bass species. One of the gentlemen present 
thought they were not bass because of the difference m col- 
oration from the black bass which had come under his obser- 
vation in the waters of the North. I told him that ecolora- 
tion aud shape of armor were not to be relied upon in the 
bass family as distinctive marks, but that the coloration de- 
pended—frst, upon its water, whether swift and clear or 
still and full of flags and weeds;.second, upon its food. I 
have caught bass in swift-running, slone-bottomed waters, 
like portions of the South Concho and Spring Creek, to 
which 1 have alluded in the beginning, that were bright and 
distinct in their coloration, and whose scales were close and 
compact, with the line which separates the dark and light. 
part plain and distinct. Again, | have caught them in quiet 
places, where the water did not run and where there was 
much vegetable matter in the water, that were indolent and 
lazy, whose coloration was indistinct and murky, where the 
dividing line was not apparent, but where the colors seemed 
to assimilate one with another, yet whose shape and like- 
ness was so much like the other that they were both surely 
of the same family. ‘‘Climate,” said a writer of a magazine 
article a short time ago, is to a country what temperment is 
to un individual,” and so I suppose it is with the relation of 
Yood and water to fish, and I am not quite sure but that, 
climate affects the fish as well as it does the individual. 
“7 had an old bass in a hole up here that it took me two 
weeks to catch,” said one of the Knickerbockers. ‘I fished 
for him and fished for him but the old chap wouldn’t bite 
until one day I selected a fine minnow, one of those long 
silvery fellows, with a pretty pink stripe down his side, and 
putting him:on my hook and letting if run slowly down to 
the old fellow, he made a jump for itand | caught him, He 
made a sharp fight but 1 got him—darn him,” and the 
speaker puffed out a big cloud of tobacco smoke and I have 
ao doubt saw in the smoke the hardy fight of the fish and 
went through again all the pleasant excitement of the catch. 
The writer ventures to assert that the black hass is the prince 
of game fish. Who will dispute me, and upon whut grounds: 
of comparison? The largest bass I have caught here tipped 
the scales at four pounds and fourteen ounces, but I have 
