Forest and Stream 



A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun, 



Terms, $4 a Ykak. 10 Ors. a Copy. I 

 Six Months, $2. J 



NEW YORK, SATURDAY, AUGUST 10, 18 9 B. 



( VOL. XLV.-No. 6. 



I No. 818 Broadway Nbw York. 



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A HIGHER STANDARD. 



Haa 7 e the sportsmen of to-day reached a higher and 

 better sportsmanship than that of their predecessors of a 

 few generations ago? At best, the question can have but 

 a speculative answer. So far as one can judge, the ethi- 

 cal standards and practices of the present are more com- 

 monly advocated and observed than they were. But we 

 must fairly consider the conditions of the times, past and 

 present, in their relation to the evolution of sportsman- 

 ship. At a period which' is so recent that it is within the 

 knowledge of a majority of men still living, game large 

 and small was in such abundance everywhere that it was 

 comparatively easy for any one to gratify his desire either 

 for sport or slaughter. The number of sportsmen and pot- 

 hunters was relatively a very small number compared 

 to the number at present. The quantity of game now 

 is very small as compared to the quantity then. Con- 

 ditions thus have greatly changed. There is not the op- 

 portunity now for such slaughter as obtained in the past, 

 even if there were the inclination for it, since there is a 

 scantiness of material. 



In justice to the sportsman of the past it is a pleasure to 

 believe that there were then men whose ideas of sports- 

 manship were as good and true as are the best ideas of 

 the present day; men who fearlessly denounced slaughter 

 for slaughter's sake, and who diligently sought to establish 

 the ethics of a higher sportsmanship. However much 

 good there was in the theory of sport at that time in prac- 

 tice it largely resulted in destruction. So merciless was 

 the pursuit that some species were practically exter- 

 minated, others were exterminated in such sections of 

 country as were not obstructive to their pursuit, while 

 others were greatly reduced in numbers. The quantity 

 killed was at that time commonly accepted as the test of 

 success. 



That there has been a general evolution and transform- 

 ation in sportsmanship there is much in evidence to 

 show. The adoption of game laws by all the States and 

 the strong public opinion against large bags are proof of 

 a conservative interest. The boastful and bloody era 

 has become greatly modified. Killing and quantity are 

 not of themselves considered as being all of sport. 



While the present time is not free from the depreda- 

 tions of the game butcher, the better and more refined 

 pleasures of the sport are more generally understood and 

 practiced. Men go into the wilds equipped with a 

 camera to photograph wild animals in their native haunts. 

 Others take canoe trips on the waters of the wilderness. 

 Camp-life, which in olden times was a necessary incident 

 of killing game, too rude and rough to be considered as a 

 means to a healthful outing, is now adopted as one of the 

 most popular forms of outing, whether for fishing or 

 shooting. In old times the killing was the sport. Now, 

 the manner of pursuit and killing are considered. The 

 modern sportsman pursues under certain restrictions 

 whereby the skill of the hunter is pitted against the 

 native wariness and fleetness of the game. It is intelli- 



ence and skill against wildnesa and cunning. The killing 



is but an incident of the real enjoyment. The beautiful 

 and the wholesome have succeeded that which was mostly 

 savage. There is far less of the wanton slaughter of a few 

 years ago, when deer were left to rot in the woods and 

 fish on the bank. 



Probably many causes have contributed to a better 

 order of things. Opportunities to kill are less, and the 

 youth of the present day are being better taught in the 

 higher ethics of sport with gun and rod, than were the 

 youth of the past. A better and greater variety of 

 sportsmen's literature is available to teach good lessons of 

 sportsmanship. A more thorough teaching of the youth 

 of this country in the ethics is certain to result in a more 

 cultured class of sportsmen. When men learn sports- 

 manship by experimenting or by bad teaching, it is sure 

 to be learned imperfectly. A certain training and in- 

 stinct are quite as necessary to make the genuine 

 sportsmen as to make the gentleman; therefore, do not 

 neglect the education of youth in these essential accom- 

 plishments. 



A WORD ABOUT THE TRAP. 



Trap-Shooting as a sport was never more firmly seated 

 in popularity among American sportsmen than at the 

 present time. Its growth has been constant and rapid, 

 and its ranks receive fresh accessions every week. It is 

 not too much to say that there are to-day two trap-shoot- 

 ers where five years ago there was only one; and it is 

 possible that even in these figures we under-estimate the 

 growth of the sport. 



That there is a more healthy tone about everything that 

 pertains to trap-shooting is the chief cause for congratu- 

 lation. Forest and Stream has always worked for the 

 purity of the sport, and has spared no one whom it has 

 held to be guilty of doing a dishonest or an unsportsman- 

 like act. The publicity of the press — a turning on of the 

 light, as it were — is the bugaboo only of those who, we 

 are told, love the darkness because their deeds are evil. 

 An honest man's actions will always bear inspection. 



There is, however, a cause for anxiety on the part of 

 those who have the best interests of the sport at heart. 

 There seems to be a danger that the promotion of tourna- 

 ments may be overdone, and that a reaction hurtful to 

 the sport may ensue. It costs 90 per cent, of those who 

 attend an ordinary tournament a considerable amount of 

 money to take part in the sport. Traveling expenses, 

 shells, hotel bills, etc., all cost money, not to mention 

 possible, or rather probable, losses of a large proportion 

 of the entrance moneys. Nowadays there are so many 

 men of equal caliber in attendance at each tourna- 

 ment that the moneys are split up into so many 

 portions that straight scores often do not return anything 

 over the money paid in, especially if 3 cents be de- 

 ducted for targets. Tournaments where, by means of a 

 large amount of added money, the management 

 offers inducements for trap-shooters will always be a suc- 

 cess, but the day has gone by when the average gun club 

 could hold a tournament and expect to fill its ^coffers at 

 the expense of its guests. All it can hope for is a fair re- 

 muneration for the good time it has afforded its guests. 

 And we believe that the sooner gun clubs and kindred 

 organizations realize that fact the better it will be for the 

 sport of trap-shooting. "Generous emulation," words in- 

 corporated in Article II. of almost any club's constitution, 

 is better served by club medals, inter-club team races and 

 league shoots than by a dozen two- or three-day tourna- 

 ments. 



SNAP SHOTS. 

 After the first day of 1896 a game law will go into force 

 in the unorganized territories of the Northwest. Buffalo 

 will be protected until 1900, and close seasons will be in 

 force for musk ox, elk and other game, big and small. 

 But Indians and inhabitants will be exempt from the pro- 

 visions of the law; and travelers, explorers and surveyors 

 in need of food may kill for their necessities. The head- 

 hunters and skin-butchers are not provided for. 



At the annual meeting of the British Medical Associa- 

 tion in London last week, the effects of the new weapons 

 of war being under discussion, Sir William McCormack 

 expressed the opinion that the next great war would be 

 more destructive of human life than any of those past. 

 Our notion is that in this the eminent surgeon is mistaken. 

 The next great war will not involve the destruction of any 

 human lives whatever. It will all be fought out in the 

 columns of the progressive "news"papers. The editors 



have just very successfully conducted a bloody and fero- 

 cious Bannock war without any actual harm to anybody 

 save a number of the Indians themselves, and having dis- 

 covered how simple it is, they may be trusted with con- 

 fidence to follow up the achievement with further and 

 more ambitious campaigns. They know little of the en- 

 terprise of a modern journalist who dream that his mili- 

 tary achievements are to be confined to Holes or a remnant 

 of beggarly Bannocks, 



The Fort Myers, Fla., Press gives the recorded tarpon 

 score for 1895 as 221 fish, taken between Dec. 22, 1894, 

 and June 26, 1895. Mr. G. R. W. Armes, of New York, 

 is credited with the largest tarpon of the season, one 

 measuring 7ft. in length and weighing 1801bs. A jewflsh, 

 taken in April by Mr. J. R. Stonebraker, of Baltimore, 

 weighed 3101bs. Tarpon fishermen resorted to Florida 

 from all parts of this country, and many Englishmen this 

 year sought the new fields of fishing conquest and renown 

 so charmingly described by Mr. Harmsworth. 



Our St. Louis correspondent, who wrote of the waters 

 where ducks darken the sky, tells us that the non-resident 

 Chinese wall doesn't amount to anything in Missouri, 

 Sportsmen from other States are welcome and will be 

 given the best that the country affords, whether that best 

 be clad in fur, feather or scale. We are glad to know 

 this, for it is an American way of doing things, and that 

 is better than the Chinese way. 



It's the big fish that finds his way into print, but for 

 every big one heralded a thousand smaller ones go to the 

 frying pan unchronicled. If there were no fun in fishing 

 except when a big fish was captured, the aggregate of 

 disappointment and disgust would far outweigh the 

 sum total of satisfaction found in the average fishing of 

 the average fisherman. As it is, one may find a day full 

 to overflowing with interest and bright memory storing 

 experiences, and yet not catch a fish worth the weighing. 



A golden precept is to make the most of the fishing open 

 to you. If you are chained to business, don't sulk be- 

 cause you cannot journey to the far away and famous 

 resorts, where the giants are waiting for fly or spoon or- 

 bait^ but take a half-day and go to the home waters. 

 There you may hear the birds, find the flowers, catch a 

 fish or two, get yourself soaking wet and tired and too 

 hungry to look pleasant; and then, being at home, you 

 may have a more comfortable bed to sleep on than you 

 could possibly have in the woods. There is so much of a 

 silver lining to the cloud. 



- V 

 It is reported that the island of Anticosti, in tho-. Gulf 

 of St. Lawrence, is to be purchased by M. Menier, the 

 millionaire chocolate manufacturer of Paris, and con- 

 verted into a game preserve. The country will be stocked 

 with game and fish, and the preserve will be conducted 

 after the fashion of the Continent. It is worthy of note 

 that a description of Anticosti and the sport to be had 

 there was the first paper published in the first number of 

 the Forest and Stream twenty-two years ago. The 

 writer was Lieut. R. Hutchinson Poe, of the Royal Navy. 



The death of ex- Judge Slocum, of Nyack, N. Y., from 

 poisoning by eating mushrooms last week, and that of his 

 companion Frank Briggs from the same cause on Monday, 

 give a melancholy emphasis to Mr. Kephart's warning 

 as to the camper's use of mushrooms for food. There are 

 so many poisonous mushrooms, and their distinction from 

 the edible ones is often so extremely difficult to deter- 

 mine, that he actually takes his life into his hands who 

 ignorantly experiments with them. 



The most interesting work we have ever seen relating 

 to mushrooms is the book by Capt. Julius A. Palmer, of 

 Boston, who for more than a quarter century has given 

 his leisure time ashore to a study of the subject. As he 

 wrote in this journal as far back as 1877, "I am a pro- 

 fessed fungus eater, using various species of toadstools for 

 food daily. I gather them fresh in summer, and dry my 

 superfluous stock for winter use." A tribute paid to 

 Capt. Palmer by the late Paul Casamajor, the well- 

 known sugar refinery chemist, is unique and worth re- 

 printing. "In taking a ship around the world," he wrote, 

 "there are thousands that can equal you; in speaking 

 foreign languages you will own that there are many who 

 excel you; but where is the man who can step into a grove, 

 pick up a score of different toadstools, make a meal on 

 them and Live to write about it?" 



