Forest and Stream 



A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 



Tebms, $4 a Year. 10 Cts. a Copy. 1 

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NEW YORK, JUNE 17, 1886. 



I VOL. XXVI.-No. 21. 



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



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CONTENTS. 



Editorial. 



A Call for More Porous Plasters. 



Spring in the Yellowstone Park. 



The Boston Dumping Ground. 



Florida Foolishness. 



Capture of the Crow Reserve. 

 The Sportsman Tourist. 



Days With the Barmecide Club. 



A Day in Tuscany with the Quail. 



At the Agency Schoolhouse. 

 Natural Historv. 



The Bird Range Increasing. 



Boys and Birds. 



Poisonous Fish and Fish Poison- 

 ing in China. 

 Game Bag and Gun. 



The Shacker Band. 



Gun Slings for the Saddle. 



The Birds at Society Hill. 



Adventure in the Burnt Woods. 



Colorado Game aDd Fish. 



Dakota Game. 



How Long do Foxes Run? 



Massachusetts Game Law. 

 Cajmp-Fire Flickerings. 

 Sea and River Fishing. 



The President as an Angler. 



Camps of the Kingfishers. 

 Fishculture. 



Smelt Hatching. 



A Gold Medal for Prof. Baird. 



The Mew York Fish Commission 

 The Kennel. 



Hornellsville Dog Show. 



Dog Show Notes. 



Annual Meeting A. K. C. 



American Setters. 



Kennel Notes. 

 Rifle and Trap Shooting. 



Range and Gallery. 



Newark Tournament. 



The Trap. 



Illinois State Tournament. 

 Yachting. 



Brooklyn Y. C. Annual Regatta. 



Sandy Bay Y. C. Annual Reg. 



Atlantic Y. C. Annual Regatta. 



New Jersey Y. C. Regatta. 

 Canoeing. 



New York C. C. Regatta. 



Brooklyn C. C. Challenge Cup. 



Mohican C. C. Races. 



Lend Me Five Dollars. 

 Answers to Correspondents. 



CAPTURE OF THE CROW RESERVE. 



THE Crow Indian Reservation includes about 4,500,000 

 acres of land in Western Montana south of the Yel- 

 lowstone River. Except along the river bottoms it contains 

 little arable land, and nowhere can farming be carried on 

 without irrigation. But the broad prairies, rolling foothills 

 and mountain parks are luxuriant with nutritious grass, and 

 the reservation's advantages as a stock country are unsur 

 passed. This reservation is all that is left to the Crows of 

 the broad lands that once were theirs. Here they live, sub- 

 sisting on what the Government issues to them, for few of 

 them have made any progress in industrial pursuits, and 

 there is no game left. Some of the Crows have cows which 

 were issued to them by the Government, and they have a 

 good many ponies, but they have as yet done hardly any- 

 thing toward. learning how to till the ground. 



Over the length and breadth of the reservation the cattle- 

 men's herds feed and fatten on the acres which belong to the 

 Indians. The few cows belonging to the latter range with 

 the thousands owned by the whites, and are absorbed by 

 them. It is the old story of the poor man's one ewe lamb 

 which his rich neighbor coveted. 



The trespassing of these cattle on the reservation is ex- 

 pressly forbidden by the regulations of the Indian Depart- 

 ment. When the present Crow Agent, Williamson by 

 name, went into office a few months since, he at once ordered 

 all the cattle to be removed from the reservation. The 

 cattlemen were not slow to take the hint, and it is charged 

 that this order was the signal for them to put up money to 

 secure permits to graze cattle on the reservation. Such per- 

 mits have been issued to a number of firms, and, having 

 acquired this foothold, the cattlemen propose to make still 

 more sure of this great pasture land. They wish to secure it 

 beyond a peradventure and for all time. They desire to 

 fasten their grip upon these lands so firmly that it can never 

 be loosened. This is their plan : They have arranged with 

 the present agent to give them permits to throw their cattle 

 on to the reserve. Having secured these permits from the 

 agent, they have turned in the stock in large numbers and 

 are now taking possession of the best locations. The per- 

 mits which they have obtained cover the best agricultural 

 and grazing lands on the reserve, and on these lands the 



cattlemen are building permanent improvements, which will 

 enable them to hold the land, should the reservation ever be 

 thrown open to the public, and to bluff off actual settlers. 



Among the firms and individuals who are alleged to have 

 succeeded in getting permits to throw cattle on the reserve 

 are the following: Briggs & Ellis, renewal of permit to graze 

 cattle on the reservation, at fifty cents per head. Hoskins 

 & McGirl permit to graze bulls on the reservation, when 

 not needed with the cows that graze north of the Yellow- 

 stone. Ash, permit to graze a small band of cattle on the 

 reservation. 



It is believed that there is no law for this permit system 

 which is being carried out by agent Williamson, and that 

 any cattleman has as much right to turn his cattle on the 

 reservation as those who have these permits. 



It is stated by those who are perfectly familiar with the 

 reservation that Nelson Storey, of Bozeman, is building a 

 permanent ranch on the reservation near Pry or Mountains, 

 and that he has a permit to graze his cattle on the reserve. 

 Whether he has such permit or not his cattle are there by 

 thousands. So also are those belonging to I. K. Dillworth. 

 making with those of Storey perhaps 20,000 in all. Last 

 winter and spring they dotted the whole country between 

 Pryor River and the western boundary of the reserve. Storey 

 had then a hay ranch and corrals on Clark's Fork. Several 

 of the cattle men have boasted that they have the reservation 

 securely in their power. 



It is not only the cattlemen who are encroaching on the 

 reservation, for Thos. Barry, a sheepman of Rock Creek, 

 stated last spring that he had a permit to graze his band of 

 6,000 head on the reservation up to June. 



On the south, a cattleman of Wyoming, H. C. Lowell, 

 whose stock ranges on Sage Creek and the Stinking Water, 

 takes advantage of his proximity to the reservation to graze 

 his cattle there too. As the case stands at present, the cat- 

 tlemen seem in a fair way to gain absolute control of the 

 reservation. This control will not benefit the Indians, who 

 are at present unaware of the state of things, and would 

 strenuously object were they not deceived in the matter, and 

 when the time comes for throwing open the reservation, the 

 desirable locations will be found to be all occupied by the 

 cattlemen, who will find some means of holding on to them. 

 The people and press of the Yellowstone valley are silent on 

 this matter, for the great cattle firms interested have too 

 much influence to be openly resisted. 



The greater portion of the reservation is now under the 

 control of the cattlemen. The Crows receive little or noth- 

 ing in return, certainly not enough to pay them for the risk 

 to their own small bands of cows and horses which are cer- 

 tain to be absorbed by the herds of the white men. The re- 

 servation should not be thus taken away from the Indians 

 without their consent and handed over to the control of the 

 rich cattle firms who, if they once fairly become established 

 in it, will with difficulty be removed. 



A searching investigation of this whole matter ought to 

 be instituted by the Interior Department. If the agent has 

 any authority for issuing these permits it ought to be known. 

 If he has no authority the cattle ought to be at once re- 

 moved and the agent too. 



A CALL FOR MORE POROUS PLASTERS. 



THE National American Swimmers' Association for the 

 Protection of Women and Children from Death by 

 Drowning convened in this city on Thursday morning of 

 last week. A large number of delegates from swimming 

 clubs and surf associations were present, and there were two 

 members of the Lighthouse Board. The president, in wel- 

 coming the members, referred to the growth of the summer 

 picnics, the multiplication of excursion steamers, catboats 

 and "death traps," and the consequently growing field of 

 usefulness for the association. A number of highly inter- 

 esting and valuable papers were read. The delegate from 

 the Wabash (Ind.) Swimming Club, presented a thoughtful 

 essay on the "Impeding Influences of Quicksands in their 

 Relation to Skirts;" and the delegate from the Ann Arbor 

 (Mich.) Swimming Club, followed with a paper based on the 

 researches of Prof. Arnold Guyot, showing that as the waters 

 are gradually receding from the land the ultimate success of 

 the Association was assured. 



The secretary then read his report, in which was embodied 

 the information collected by the Association since its last 

 meeting, showing the number of deaths of women and child- 

 ren by drowning in 1885. The total proved to be enormously 

 in excess of the number for 1884. This startling summary 

 had a powerful effect upon the assembly, and it was felt by 

 all present that something ought to be done about it. 

 The Law Committee reported, recommending that the 



picnic and excursion season be made uniform throughout 

 the States. 



Reports from clubs were then in order. These were par- 

 ticularly eloquent and instructive as showing the lamentable 

 state of general apathy of the non-natatorial public regarding 

 the cause of protection from drowning. Some dissension 

 was caused by an inexperienced delegate from Philadelphia 

 who made the point that, inasmuch as in every case of 

 drowning narrated by the speakers and of which they had 

 been eye-witnesses there had been an abundant supply of 

 all sorts of life-preservers, life-rafts, casks, hen coops, feather 

 beds, hatches, oars, cork jackets and patented life-saving 

 devices, the respective women and children would have been 

 saved had the members themselves simply heaved some of 

 these appliances overboard. Another new member some- 

 what incoherently formulated the proposition that in other 

 cited instances, where infants had perished in very shallow 

 water, the stalwart members of the National American 

 Swimmers' Association for the Protection of Women and 

 Children from Death by Drowning might have plunged in 

 and personally rescued the little ones. These novel proposi- 

 tions were quickly shown by the older and more experienced 

 delegates to be puerile and impracticable ; and, harmony hav- 

 ing been restored, it was unanimously resolved to pass 

 resolutions. A committee was appointed to draw up the 

 resolutions. 



As it was now nearly noon and as the convention had before 

 it important business relative to amending the rule of handi- 

 capping contestants in its three days' kitten-drowning tour- 

 nament, the committee was empowered to adopt its own res 

 olutions and send them to the press. After wrangling over 

 the handicap kitten-drowning rules (during which the Light- 

 house Board delegates "slid out") and the election of officers, 

 the delegates took the noon boat for Coney Island, where an 

 exhibition was given by the champion of the association, 

 who succeeded in drowning out the ninety lives of ten cats 

 in ninety minutes. The regular contests then began and 

 continued until late Saturday night, the ties being drowned 

 off Monday morning. The resolutions given out by the 

 committee are as follows: 



Whereas, The number of women and children drowned in the waters 

 of the United States is annually increasing at a most alarming rate ; and 



Whereas, If the deaths by drowning multiply in the immediate 

 future as they have in the immediate past, there is serious danger 

 that the race may become extinct; and 



Whereas, It is the unanimqus conviction of this convention that 

 something ought to be done about it; therefore, be it 



Resolved, That we, the members of the National American Swim- 

 mers' Association for the Protection of Women and Children from 

 Death by Drowning.do respectfully petition the Congress of the United 

 States and the Legislatures of the respective States to make suitable 

 provision for the increased manufacture of porous plasters to be ap- 

 plied to the resuscitation of the drowned. 



Beab Meat. — "Mountain mutton" is the usual term em- 

 ployed by such of the Adirondack hotel men as serve up 

 venison out of season. Last Monday a gentleman, who has 

 been prominent in organizing a new club in the Adirondacks, 

 was relating to us the wonderful increase of the weight 

 attained by one of the members during a few days stay at 

 the new club grounds, which increase was thought to be due 

 to the wonderful air, the trout and the "bear meat." In the 

 course of the conversation, by a kopsus Ungues, it transpired 

 that the ' 'bear meat" was from a May killed buck. The 

 hotel keepers of Franklin county may still learn a point or 

 two in culinary phraseology from the club men of Hamilton 

 county. 



The Maine House Burners, — Another one of the 

 Shacker Band, of Wesley, Me., has been convicted and sent 

 to jail for his part in the burning of Game Warden Munson's 

 house and barn. In another column will be found an 

 account of the reign of terror exercised by these ruffians. It 

 is an extraordinary story. Dr. Hunter and his friends, who 

 have at great personal peril assisted the authorities in the 

 detection and punishment of the criminals, deserve great 

 praise for their courage and public spirit. 



Are Thebe Deer in the Catskxlls? — In a report of 

 the visit of Forestry Commissioner Cox to Slide Mountain, 

 in Ulster county, N. Y., it is stated that in that region of the 

 Catskills, bears, wildcats, foxes and deer are still to be found. 

 We should like to have verification of the presence of deer 

 there. Of the bears, wildcats and foxes, no question can be 

 raised. 



Abolish Spring Shooting.— The Illinois Sportsmen's 

 Association, as reported elsewhere, will endeavor to have 

 spring shooting abolished from that State. It ought to be 

 abolished from every State. 



