406 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



fDEO. 16, 1886. 



THE NEW LAW OF CUBA. 



Editor Forest and Stream: 



By royal decree promtilgated in Cuba by publication in 

 the Official Gazette of Nov. 16, the anomalous law of re- 

 qiiirin^ one license to caiTy a fowling piece and another 

 to use it, has been superseded by the following, viz: 



Art. I. No person will be permitted to use arms of 

 whatever kind, or go hunting or fishing, without having 

 previously obtaraed the corresponding license issued by 

 competent authority, subject to the conditions prescribed 

 in this decree. 



Art. II. The civil governor of each province will issue 

 these licenses under his responsibiUty after proper investi- 

 gation in regard to each applicant. 



Art. III. There will be six classes of license. 



1. For use of all kinds of arms not otherwise prohibited. 



2. For the use of firearms for defense of rural property. 



3. For the use of pistol or revolver for personal defense 

 outside of cities or villages.- 



4. For the use of pistol or revolver for personal defense 

 inside of cities or viUages. 



5. For the carrying of fowling piece and to use it, and 



6. For fishing in rivers, lagoons, tanks and pools. 



Art. IV. The License of the first class may be obtained 

 by all Spaniards of twenty-five years of " age, heads of 

 families and taxpayers, excepting criminals. 



Art, V. The hcense of second, tMrd and fourth classes 

 may be obtained by all Spaniards of more than twenty 

 years of age, except criminals. 



Art'. Yl. The license of the fifth class may be obtained 

 by those competent to obtain those of preceding classes, 

 also persons between the ages of fifteen and twenty 

 years, who are guaranteed in writing by their parents or 

 tutors. 



Art. VII. The license of the sixth class may be obtained 

 by all Spaniards without exception. 



Art. V III. In order to obtaui any of these licenses a pe- 

 tition to the civil governor will be required, written 

 upon government stamped paper and accompanied by the 

 personal cedtda of the applicant, and said petition shall 

 be registered and filed in the archives of the government 

 and the eedula returned. 



* * w * « * * 



Art. Xni. In extraordinary cases or for motives of pub- 

 lic order, the civil governors are authorized to declare 

 suspended all or any of these licenses which they may 

 have issued. Nemo. 



THE CARE OF QUAIL. 



BALTIMORE, Md.— Editor Forest and Stream: I intend 

 to keep over some live quail to turn out next spring, 

 WUl you please let me know the best food for them ? I 

 have kept them successfully, but forget the exact food; I 

 know too much wheat is too heating. Should there not 

 be a variety of f ood_? H. M. W. 



Editor Forest and Stream: 



The experience of the Brooklyn Qim Club, on Long 

 Island, after trying two winters, has taught us not to 

 keep our quail in confinement, but to turn them out as 

 soon as we get them. We have spent huncheds of dollai-s 

 on coops, with nuining water, gi-avel, etc., but have lost 

 95 per cent, of our birds. We now turn them loose in the 

 coldest of weather, but before liberating them we prepare 

 the ground for them by putting a scattering of wheat 

 sheaves all over the ground where we want them to stay. 

 The sheaves attract their attention and they come right 

 back to them; in fact they stop around them all winter. 

 We put new sheaves out twice a week to give them plenty 

 of food. After a little while they get quite tame, so 

 much so in fact, that we can coimt them and know 

 exactly how many we lose, which does not amount to 10 

 per cent. The sheaves must be placed on high ground, 

 so that in case of a freshet or hea^^^ rain followed by a 

 cold snap, they do not get buried under the ice during the 

 night. As an experiment we built a hut for our bu-ds 

 last winter, with the opening toward the south, putting 

 sheaves inside of the hut, and after a few nights the quail 

 went in and roosted inside the hut. We intend to build 

 several of these huts this winter. 



Member Brooklyn Gun Club. 



[We advise "H. M. W." to try screenings as the right 

 food. Will others who have had experience with quail 

 kindly give any information likely to be of benefit to 

 others ?J 



NEWFOUNDLAND CARIBOU. 



Editor Forest and Stream: 



I your issue of the 35th ult., '*E. Langrishe-Mare " is 

 polite enough to insinuate that I have written several un- 

 truths in my contribution to a late number of your peri- 

 odical, entitled, "Caribou Stalking in Newfoundland." 

 He refuses to believe that I had good sport or shot so 

 many deer in the peninsula of Avalon, and states that 

 caribou are so scarce in the peninsula that the Legislature 

 has been obliged to protect tliis game by special laws. Of 

 course I am not here to defend my veracity against the 

 imputations of a wi-iter whose name I never heard till I 

 saw it in the accusing letter; but yom- paper is a respect- 

 able one, and this I think justifies my reiwy, I do not know 

 how scarce deer may be on the island now. My hunting 

 excursions, the imperfect accounts of which I have given 

 to Forest and Stream, were made fifteen yeai-s ago; for 

 I have not set foot in my native island since 1874. My 

 hunting, as described in your weekly, was chiefly confined 

 to the isthmus joining Avalon to the gi-eat northerly 

 portion of the island. I leave it to those who have limited 

 m this region at that time to say how much I could have 

 exaggerated the number of northward-marcMng deer at 

 that place in the spring. Mr. Mare recommends to sports- 

 men the books of Capt. Kennedy, R. N., and General 

 Dashwood (I presume the Captain has become a General 

 since the pubhcation of his book), but I beg to add to his 

 list the book brought out in London by the Rev. Moses 

 Harvey and Mr. Joseph Hatton. This work makes a 

 much higher estimate of the number of mai-ching deer 

 than I have done. Mr. Mare says that he has "crossed 

 the country from sea to sea half a dozen times." As he 

 has taught me a lesson in rudeness, I beg to say that I do 

 not beUeve he has crossed it half a dozen times, or 

 ever crossed it. There ai-e several resident and 

 visiting sportsmen in Newfoimdland, Mr. Editor, who, 

 because they shoot along the Placentia road in the 

 autumn foi- a few days, sti'aightway imagine that 

 they have "crossed the country," and set themselves up 

 as authorities upon island sporting. Now and again a 



bewildered deer turns up along this track, but no genuine 

 hunter will bother about such sport. To get deer in New- 

 formdland you must "rough it" and lie out in the "drokes" 

 at night: while your correspondent, I am credibly in- 

 formed, is a man who would not stray away for a six- 

 hom-s' tramp from the warm beds and the ham and eggs 

 of the "Mountain" or the HaK-way House. 



I shall not discuss gestation, the di-opping of liorns, or 

 such other questions with your "nauseated" correspond- 

 ent; but I would add, taking into account the tone and 

 terms of his letter, and his eulogy upon Captain Dash- 

 wood's book, that his literary and intellectual discern- 

 ment are on a par with his manners. Pray, excuse this 

 trespass. Edmund Collins. 



Xew i'oRK, Dec. 8. 



SHOOTING IN ASSAWOMAN BAY. 



SOME good shooting in the goose line has been done by 

 members of the Jersey City Heights Gim Club of 

 late. There are two bays of the above name on the east- 

 ern coast of Maryland, the Little and the Big Assawoman, 

 the former celebrated for its excellent duck shooting in 

 its season, prmcipally redheads, pintails and a few canvas- 

 backs. The larger bay is a good resort for geese. Ben 

 Payne and Ms young son, a bona fide "chip of the old 

 block," returned about the 1st inst. witli 44 geese besides 

 then ducks. Rumor says the yoxmger Benny rather 

 wiped the paternal eye on several occasions. On the lltli, 

 Cbas, B. Jordan and Jerry Maber, two more of the club 

 members, returned with 83 geese, 28 ducks, 62 quail and 

 3 woodcock, the result of ten days' shooting, and a good 

 bag considering some of the weather. The old residents 

 say that for years there have not been so many geese in 

 that neighborhood. What would not Bill Lane do doAvn 

 there with his educated honkers? Two of the geese 

 Charlie Jordan brought home to present to friends 

 weighed 291bs., more than 141bs. apiece. The subscriber 

 was remembered by the returned wildfowlers, two Anas 

 canadensis dropi^ing at his door last evening, one weigh- 

 ing llllbs., the other lO^lbs. One -vnM be mounted with 

 wings 8j)read, just drooping to stool, as Jeny M. shot 

 him, and will adorn the walls of the club room. 



Col. John J. Toficey and Wm. B. Wheeler, two members 

 of the J. C. H., with friends left on the 13th for St. Mar- 

 tin's River, a tributary of Big Assawoman Bay, where 

 they have a commodious schooner fitted up with all the 

 accommodations for a sportsman's party. Eight bunks 

 in an ample cabin, with a good kitchen, first-class stewai-d, 

 with Captain Dukes (and no better gunner or truer-hearted 

 man can be found on the beach) for the skipper. All this, 

 with a locker fuU of the good things, necessaries and luxu- 

 ries, and where the birds are we speak for Col. Toffey and 

 rty a glorious and successful time. We would like to 

 there. Will let you know how they fared. 



Jacobstaff. 



GUNS IN THE OLD COUNTRY. 



I FEEL that I am but reflecting the sentiments of every 

 intelhgent lover of field sports when I fiay that the 

 jomnal you so ably edit rendered a service to the science 

 of gimnery and to the shooting world, in your last year's 

 tests of trajectories, that camiot be measined in words. 

 It is what has long been requhed, but it was your act that 

 gave us in figures the facts we have all so greatly desired 

 to know. If you would add to the obHgation already 

 imposed u]?on us, and make a test of the relative power 

 and penetration of double shotguns, the work would be 

 complete. 



The tastes and opinions of Englishmen are so different 

 from those held in America in respect to sporting guns, 

 that many of those best kno^vn and most popular here are 

 scarcely ever heard of in England, There the guns in use 

 among the gentry ai'e generally from London builders. 

 Of these, Pm'dey stands at the head in point of workman- 

 ship and price. His average make of hammerless .13-bore 

 cannot be had for less than £80, and the highest grade 

 Purdey guns cost about £100 or $500 in American money. 



Next to Piu-dey come Boss, the Lancasters, Woodward. 

 Baker of Cockspur street, Holland, a famous builder of 

 large-bore rifles for elephant shootmg, Lang, Westley- 

 Richards, Grant, Reilly, Greener, Cogswell & HaiTison. 

 Williams & Powell, Tiiraer, another famous rifle-maker; 

 Dougall, Beattie, Murcott, Rigby in Dublin, and Henry in 

 Edinburgh,both of whom build Expressriflesof imequaUed 

 accm-acy and power, and Tolley. You see I have left 

 Scott out of the list because I never saw one of his guns in 

 the hands of an English gentleman. There are many 

 other capital gtm makers in England and you can scarcely 



§0 amiss in ordering from any of the Birmingham makers, 

 ne of the best guns I ever owned was made by Needham, 

 in Piccadilly, and Daw, the father of the Modem breech- 

 loader, is still to the fore, while Egg (who fifty years ago 

 had scarcely a rival in the making of duelling pistols, and 

 how many a fine fellow has gone down on the sward of a 

 morning before one of Egg's "neatest tools" held by a 

 steady hand and sure eye) still has a regular lot of old-time 

 clients, generally well-to-do countiy squires,whose fathers 

 "when George IV. was King," shot -vvith Egg's guns, and 

 their sons cling obstinately to family trathtion. 



Moore & Grey are another old-time house whose work 

 is honest and true. I think one of the handsomest guns I 

 ever saw was the workmanship of HoUis, of Bhmingham, 

 There are cei-tain well-known country makers of a 

 centmy's standing, whom we seldom hear of on this side 

 of the' Atlantic. Tliey are somewhat like old Patrick 

 Mullen used to be in' New York, having but a few cus- 

 tomers and doing their work deliljerately, but with the 

 most perfect neatness and care. 



Of this class the best tyjies are Turner, of Reading; 

 Piper, of Cambridge; Webb, of Oxford, who has had on 

 his books the names of nearly all the great men of Eng- 

 land; Bm-tenshow, of Leeds; Little, of Staft'ord: Jeffiy, of 

 Norwich: McLeod, of Aberdeen; Gartside, of Sowerby: 

 Bales, of Ipswich, and Hugh Snowie, of Inverness, with 

 many others, whose name on a gun is a guarantee of its 

 excellence in every respect. 



The handsomest work that comes to America in large 

 quantities for the trade is from the Scotts, at Birming- 

 ham. They will do what you ask, which is more than 

 can be said of some other makers, and wiU take the 

 trouble required in a special order out of the common line 

 I without extortionate charge or grumbling. Every deer 

 ; hunter— in the South particularly, where we shoot about 

 i 60yds. at running deer— knows the difiBculty in getting a 

 gun bored to shoot buckshot efi'eotively. 

 I In 1881 1 went down to Birmingham and visited the 



Scotts' factory. I found them extremely pleasant people 

 with a better knowledge of America than one often finds in 

 Men-y England. I explained to the senior member of the 

 firm that I wanted a 10-bore gmi for large shot and took 

 out of my pocket a load of oiu' taxget shot or "blue 

 whistlers." Tlnee months thereafter I got the gmi. It 

 had two sets of barrels. Tlie enthe weight with the 10- 

 bore barrels was 10-f lbs., with the other set almost 2lb8. 

 less. The balance with, either set was adnm-able. At 

 fifty measured yards the 10-bore barrels— cyUnder — 

 would put nine buckshot inside a 2ft. cu-cle, right or 

 left, the left shooting a ti-ifle closer than the right. With 

 No. 1 and 2 BB. nothing could liave been better than the 

 shooting of tliis gun, I had the old-time, wide, flat rib 

 on both sets (I found it so much better than the narrow 

 concave), roughed, as it is on rifle baiTels. I advise every 

 sportsman in ordering a gun to try it. 



At the suggestion o"f Sir Samuel Baker— the most fam- 

 ous of the old-time elephant hunters— I had Silver's anti- 

 recoil heel plate put on the butt. It takes up the recoil in 

 a wonderful way. Sir Samuel told me that with this heel 

 plate on a 10-bore, lolbs, double rifle, he could shoot ten 

 drams of powder with no more inconvenience than one 

 feels in a Sir-cham charge in a 12-bore. Some time, when 

 your patience, Mr. Editor, shall be great, and my leisure 

 permits, I would like to tell you of some shooting and 

 gun tests made in the Mississippi Lowlands. 



November 15, 1886. 



VIRGINIA GAME NOTES. 



LEXINGTON, Va., Dec. 10.— I havebeenreadmg with 

 pleasure the Foeest and Steeam since Oct. 7, 1886, 

 and observing that your game notes from Vu-ginia are 

 meager, have thought it might not be amiss to give you 

 some information as to game in this, the great valley of 

 Virginia. 



Our hunting club took its annual hunt early in Novem- 

 ber, and notwithstanding the unfavorable condition of 

 the weather, succeeded in bagging fom* deer, one an nn- 

 usually fine buck. About the same time another party in 

 this county killed seven; and large numbers have been 

 killed in the adjoining counties. 



Quail are more plentiful than for years. On Saturday, 

 Nov. 4, a companion and myself were out, and although 

 it snowed vigorously all day, we succeeeded in bagging 

 forty-five by 2:30 P. M. This was accomphshed by aban- 

 doning the open fields and confining our work to low and 

 sheltered spots. We worked tliree dogs, two setters and 

 a pointer bitch. One of the setters, a large black puppy, 

 of the Bridget Plunket sti-ain, did capital work and gave 

 promise of making a most valuable dog. 



Bags of forty and fifty have been made to the single 

 gun. Grouse, though somewhat scarce, have been 

 brought in in considerable numbers. T. M. S. 



Oenithology oe Typogeaphy?— New Jersey's legisla- 

 tors don't know the difference between a wild turkey and 

 a prairie chicken, says the editor of the Railway, N. J., 

 Advocate, Tlie two bu-ds are almost as distinct in form 

 and api>earance as the dodo and the dove, but our law- 

 makers in 1874 cared naught for ornithology, and passed 

 the following act, which was approved March 27, 1874, 

 and which stands to-day on our statute-books as follows: 

 Sec. 9. — That no person shall kill or expose for sale or 

 have unlawfully in his or her possession after the same 

 has been killed, any pinnated grouse or wild tnrlcey, com- 

 monly called pratrie chicken, prior to the first day of 

 No^•ember, aimo domuii one thousand eight himdred and 

 eighty, under a penalty of fifty doUars for each bird so 

 killed or had in possession. The law has since been 

 changed. Was this legislative ignorance or a transiDOsi- 

 tion blunder in the State printing office ? 



Manitoba. — Toronto, Ont.— In the notes I sent you of 

 a canoe trip, I mentioned the system of appointing game 

 wardens in Manitoba as being one that answered very 

 well, and suggested its adoption in Ontario. I inclose a 

 paragraph froin the Neepawa, Man., Register, which will 

 speak for itself and illustrate what I said: "Four gentle- 

 men from Toronto, including an alderman from that city, 

 came to Neepawa last week and jjroceeded to bag aU the 

 prairie chickens in the vicinity. They were permitted to 

 carry on their work of destruction for several days, but 

 complaint was at last made to Game Guardian Brownell, 

 and they were promptly notified to quit. Constable Mc- 

 Lean seized upward of 200 chickens which they had shot. 

 They, however, satisfied the guardian that they would 

 not ship them East, whereupon they were permitted to 

 take them and go."— J. A. W. 



Maine Laege Game.— Rockland, Me., Dec. 3.— I 'have 

 just returned from a deer hunting trip on Machias waters, 

 near the scene of the Fletcher Brook tragedy. We found 

 game plenty; got four deer, all we wanted. After read- 

 ing the conimunication from "Special" I agree with him, 

 as I have tramped and canoed", hunted and fished over 

 Maine, from the coast to St. Francis. Just as soon as the 

 State appropriates a sufficient sum to make it an object 

 for the local hunters to turn game wardens, it wiU be un- 

 pleasant for poachers. I was informed that some chaiJS 

 from Lowell and Passadumkeag were camped near 

 Nicatous and were putting out dogs. It is a hard job for 

 a game warden not familiar with the country to get 

 evidence sufficient to convict them. — Buck. 



Chinese Pheasants in Oeegon— According to the 

 San Francisco Bv.lletin, there is talk of inti-oducing a bill 

 at the coming session of the Oregon Legislatm-e to repeal 

 the law protecting the Chinese pheasants shipped to this 

 country oy Judge O. N. Denny. Both htmters and farm- 

 ers have grievances against the foreign birds, which, they 

 claim, are becoming a jiest. The former claim that the 

 Chinese pheasants have driven all the native grouse and 

 pheasants away, and but few can be found where a few- 

 years ago they were as thick as crows in a cornfield. The 

 farmers say they infest the grain fields and make short 

 work of growing crops. 



AUBTJEN Gun Club.— Auburn, N. Y., Dec. 10.— At a 

 meeting of Auburn, N. Y., Gun Club Dec. 1, the follow- 

 ing officers were elected for ensuing year: President, C. 

 W. Tuttle; Vice-President, H. N. Howland; Secretary, 

 H. R. Kidnev; Treasurer, S. F. Rathbun; Executive Com- 

 mittee, H. Howland, J, M. Mudto, Frank Steel.— H, 

 R. Kidney, Secretaiy. 



IS 



