Nov, 2, 1895^ 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



881 



got up and escaped. Next in a cornfield he pointed some 

 distance off. Before I could reach him the snipe got up, 

 but before leaving the place 50yds. he was firm on a covey 

 of quail (rather a scarce article here the present season). 

 His next point was on a bittern, which was allowed to 

 escape unheeded. The next was on a marsh hawk, which 

 on being put out of the rushes was seen to have been 

 feasting on a blackbird. He ended up the afternoon by 

 again pointing another crippled duck. I think now that 

 I have a remarkable dog, and the fact of his pointing a 

 lark, a frog, five snipe, a bittern, a covey of quail and a 

 marsh hawk and another duck (although crippled), is 

 proof of it, and all without a flush intervening. 



John Davidson. 



HINTS ABOUT NITROS. 



The beginner with nitro powder will generally load it 

 much as he has been loading black powder; there not 

 being enough wadding and the primer too weak, results 

 are poor. There being so little noise and recoil as com- 

 pared with his black powder loads he concludes that the 

 strength of the nitro has been very much overrated. 

 Next lot is loaded with a generous charge of powder, and 

 on the advice of some friend is loaded in strong primer 

 shells. As strong primers will develop far greater power 

 in the powder than the common ones, and a slight in- 

 crease in the quantity of powder seems to make a great 

 increase in violence of explosion, the experimenter has a 

 load of double or more the violence of the first lot, but 

 thinks he has only added 10 per cent, or less. If such 

 charges are used in a cheap gun the results may be dis- 

 astrous to gun and shooter. If the gun is a good one and 

 the shells are loaded according to directions of the makers 

 of any of the well-known nitros, there is very little 

 danger. The amount of powder must not exceed the 

 directions of the makers, and there must be plenty of 

 elastic wadding between powder and shot; not less than 

 #in. of felt wads, and twice that amount is better. The 

 generation of nitro gases is very sudden and violent, so 

 the elastic wadding is needed to give a little relief at the 

 start and also prevent swedging or balling of the shot, 

 which of itself is more or less dangerous in a fully 

 choked gun of some makes. Many guns are bursted by 

 black powder, but people have been so long accustomed to 

 it that little is thought about it. Some fellow says there 

 must have been dirt or something in the muzzle or it 

 would not have bursted, and they let it go at that, but 

 when nitro bursts the gun the powder is charged up with 

 all the blame every time. 



I recently saw a 12 -gauge gun bursted by a charge of 

 3drs. of nitro powder and l£oz. of shot. The break was 

 alongside the extractor rod, and examination showed 

 that the metal of the barrel had been cut away to make 

 room for the rod, so the thickness of the bursted metal 

 did not exceed ^?in. Hundreds of nitro charges had 

 been fired in the barrel before it gave way. 



O. H. Hampton. 



A GIGANTIC MOOSE. 



Boston, Oct. 25. — The big moose of the Buckboard 

 Road, in from Andover, Me., to the South Arm, is dead. 

 Mr. N. G. Manson came out from Camp Leatherstocking, 

 Richardson Lake, yesterday, and he finds that the big 

 moose is dead. Tom French and E. A. Rowell, having 

 got through the season with their steamers, are after 

 the moose. Geo. Thomas, a noted Andover guide, has 

 shot the first big moose. He was engaged by a couple of 

 Lewiston sportsmen to guide them on a hunting trip at 

 the lakes. On the way in, Mr. Thomas came upon the 

 tracks of the big moose, in the vicinity of Birch Guide- 

 board. He followed and came upon the moose lying 

 down. The animal started and George fired. He hit the 

 moose in the neck, when, instead of dashing away from 

 the hunter, the wounded animal charged, but George 

 killed it. A crew of men from Andover dragged the 

 moose out to the Buckboard Road whole, and carted him 

 down to the village. He weighed 7001bs. when he got to 

 Lewiston. The animal was a black bull, standing nine- 

 teen hands high, or higher than any horse. He measured 

 16ft. in length. This moose is the biggest one killed in 

 that section for many years. He has a handsome pair of 

 antlers. 



Mr. Manson had a grand time in camp, being there 

 three or four weeks. He had all the venison he wanted 

 in camp after the law was off. Partridges were plenty. 

 He is much pleased with his location, especially in the 

 fall. He was there after the bluebacks begun to run and 

 they obtained a good many. It has been well known to 

 the guides for a long time that these fish run up the Rich- 

 ardson and Beaver brooks in the fall to spawn. Mr. Man- 

 son says that the surface of the water was almost alive 

 with them at times. He tried to take them on the fly, 

 and bait was also tried, but without success. About the 

 only way to take them is with a net and a light in the 

 night as they crawl up the shallow streams. They are 

 seen for a few days in the fall, but never at any other 

 time. 



Mr. S. B. Woodman is on the list of disappointed hun- 

 ters. He has returned from his hunting trip to Prince- 

 ton, Me., a point beyond Calais, without any big game. 

 He went to the same camps last year and got his deer. 

 One of the party also shot a bear which Mr. W. brought 

 to Boston. 



Mr. George Lanphier's party was very fortunate in- 

 deed. The two moose killed were young bulls, two years 

 of age, with nicely budded horns, taken on the shore of 

 Upper Bema Pond. The party also shot a bobcat weigh- 

 ing 301bs. They got no deer, the leaves were falling and 

 there was too much noise in the woods. Mr. Lanphier 

 thinks that they must have started twenty in all, but it 

 was next to impossible to get a shot. The party was 

 made up of Mr. Geo. Lanphier, his brother Charles Lan- 

 phier, William G. Fisher and his son William G., Jr. 

 They were quartered at Philbrook Camp, Schoodic, Me. , 

 and they speak in the highest terms of the treatment they 

 received there. The camp is situated about half-way be- 

 tween Schoodic Lake and Jo Morry Lake. Mr. Lanphier 

 thinks that with a tracking snow he could shoot his quota 

 of deer in one day, and he wants no more. 



Coot-shooting along the Massachusetts coast has con- 

 tinued fairly good, though the shooters are hoping for 

 another storm. Since the big storm and blow of a couple 

 of Weeks ago the weather has been too fine for shore bird- 

 shooting. A Boston party went down to Scituate to-day 

 for shooting, and also to eat one of Gus Sherman's cele- 



brated coot stews. Gus is cook at the Harbor Light and 

 has got to be celebrated for his coot stews. The common 

 idea is that nobody likes coot cooked, but the coot hunter, 

 who knows, will quietly tell you that "you must go where 

 they know how to cook them." The Scituate party this 

 time is made up of Charlie Ripley, C. H. Gifford, Harry 

 Augustine, A. I. McLauthlin and C. McLauthlin. 



M. H. Adams and Henry S. Starr, of Cambridge; C. E. 

 Belcher, of Medford, and S. M. Bevin, of East Hampton, 

 Conn., are at Kingfield, Me., hunting in the vicinity of 

 Mount Abram. Special. 



SOME NOTIONS ABOUT MAN AND 

 NATURE. 



Editor Forest and Stream: 



The reports that I have received of the hunters of deer 

 in the Adirondacks have indicated that as many deer 

 were killed this fall as ever before, and that more people 

 killed as many deer as they could. I read in The Su?i a 

 few days ago of thirty-seven deer being killed by one 

 party. The dispatch was from Troy, I think, and the 

 party was one from Saratoga. I wonder how many per- 

 sons were in that party and how long they were in the 

 woods. If there were nineteen or more of them I would 

 like to know how many deer each individual killed. 

 Furthermore, I would like to know why the number of 

 deer to be killed by a party for stated periods of time is 

 not limited as individ ual scores are now limited. I should 

 think that a party of five that kills ten deer in a week ought 

 to be as liable to punishment as the man who kills three 

 deer in two months or a year. 



I knew a party of eleven to go into Moose River one 

 fall not many years ago, and when they came out ten 

 days later they gleefully told me that they had killed six- 

 teen deer. Now, sixteen deer was seventeen less than the 

 law would then have allowed them to kill. Those men 

 brought out pack-loads of jerked venison that, some of 

 them, weighed over lOOlbs. ; yet the stench from unused 

 fore quarters that lay about their camp was fit to sicken 

 one's soul as well as stomach. I could cite other cases 

 where men, hoggish for blood, were sinners inside a limit 

 law. 



It is like this: New York has a valuable safe deposit 

 vault in which are jewels of inestimable value. There 

 is a building around and over it that is good so far as it 

 goes, but there are yet cracks and holes and doors and 

 windows through which vandals can cart away the treas- 

 ure, and even the vault itself. It has a few watchdogs 

 of its own and they are inadequate or unfaithful to their 

 trust. It depends too much on clubs to preserve its jewels 

 and the vault— as if I'd set a guard of panthers and 

 elephants over fresh meat and a hay field. But each 

 year we see the forest — a vault of irreplaceable value — 

 melting away, as it were, before sawmills, railroads, aye, 

 and even sportsmen's clubs are going hand in hand with 

 these devastators. 



I can direct the reader to a forty-man lumber camp 

 that is stripping all spruce and balsam trees — winter 

 game shelter — for five miles along the road above North- 

 wood, Herkimer county. I can direct him to at least ten 

 sixty-men lumber camps that are disemboweling the 

 forests of northern Herkimer county. I can direct him — 

 I could lead him for miles along trails between heaps of 

 dead brown tree tops. I could even point out to him a 

 sawmill that eats 2,000 logs a day— logs that were mostly 

 cut on a sportsmen's club's lands. 



If I beat my horse with a club or starve it or burn it 

 with fire I am taken before a man whose f aee shows his 

 horror at my crime and his detestation of me, and by 

 this man I am sentenced to pay a penalty. Better yet, the 

 newspapers tell the people of my wretchedness, of my 

 barbarous instincts, of my lack of appreciation of civil- 

 ization, and say that my punishment is not severe 

 enough. But I can grievously wound nature; I can 

 torture her, I can bring tears of blood from her eyes, I 

 can scar her with iron and steel, I can destroy her, and 

 there is none to say "No" to my cruelty. There is no 

 penalty to pay, for I have no heart, only a pocket. 



Let us— not sportsmen, but the State— buy the ground 

 that lies beneath nature, and if they who own it will not 

 sell, let us declare the forest a public highway, and then 

 pay a fair price for it, and they'll quickly take the lucre. 

 Then when a man or woman wounds that nature which 

 we own or that nature's children, let us punish them as 

 you would punish me if I maltreated my beast. 



Raymond S. Spears. 



Brooklyn, N. Y. 



WHERE NESSMUK LIVED. 



Editor Forest and Stream: 



These notes of a famous Massachusetts hunter which I 

 take from the Worcester Spy are doubly interesting 

 because Mr. Dudley's hunting has been in the country of 

 Nessmuk's youth: 



On the Sutton road, about three miles from the Webster 

 post office, in an old-fashioned New England farm house, 

 lives the veteran fox-coon hunter of Worcester county, 

 Reuben Dudley, who with his helpmeet and married 

 daughters, residing on adjoining farms, now leads a life 

 of contentment known only to well-to-do farmers of New 

 England. 



Mr. Dudley was born in Douglas, Mass., March 21, 1829. 

 As a hunter he has no equal in the county, and many is 

 the time when parties from Worcester have enjoyed him 

 as guide in their hunting trips. The Spy man the other 

 day heard his wonderful stories of his hunting trips, 

 which have been his recreation from a mere lad. Mr. 

 Dudley wants the Spy to ask its readers to notice the dif- 

 ference in trout fishing when he was a boy from that of 

 to-day. Some fifty years ago he, with a 4-cent fishing 

 tackle, in contrast to a $50 output of to-day, would catch 

 brook trout, which were never weighed, but measured. 

 One would fill a spider where now a dozen would hardly 

 fill it. He has fished the celebrated five-mile stream 

 that has its rise at the old Coffee House Dam, which flows 

 south from Buck Hill woods through Thompson and has 

 its mouth below Putnam, Conn,, emptying into the 

 Quinebaug River. His largest string of brook trout was 

 forty-two in number, which weighed 421bs., caught when 

 he was only 16 years of age. He took them to Thompson 

 and was offered 5 shillings, or about 5 cents per pound, 

 for them by Moses Hoyle, of East Thompson. The 

 mother of Mr. Dudley on her old spinning wheel twisted 

 the line which, with a birch pole 18^in. long, constituted 

 his outfit, at a cost of 4 cents. Once at Joslin's mill dam 

 pond, now the old crumbled down saw and grist mill, he 



caught two trout that weighed exactly 2£ibs. each, and 

 was offered only 50 cents apiece for them. His compan^ 

 ions in fishing were Erastus Joslin and Royal Marsh, with 

 whom he used to supply parties in New York city. Later 

 on he guided such men as Samuel Slater and Lawyer 

 Rogers, of Webster, and John Eaton, of Thompson, in 

 trout fishing. He enjoyed a hearty laugh when he al- 

 luded to the trout fisherman of to-day, with his costly rig* 

 a 5oz. scale in his vest pocket and a basket of 3oz. trout 

 as a big day's sport. 



As a coon hunter Mr. Dudley has no superior in the 

 State, He has in his day, in one, two and three weeks' 

 trips, from 5 to 40 miles distance, to Union and Stafford, 

 Conn., bagged 700 coons, and intends this fall to visit his 

 old grounds as his last hunt for coons. He casually 

 remarked that this was the favorite sport of Daniel 

 Webster. Mr, Dudley has also killed 150 foxes, having 

 one of the best kennels of hounds in the county. He 

 raised 92 hounds, disposed of several to leading sportsmen 

 in the country, and has at present five hounds ready for 

 the season's hunt. He hunted last winter more than ever 

 before, and is anxious for his farewell season. He has 

 trapped 20 otters, which he states is the most sensible, 

 cunning animal he ever hunted. Has caught and killed 

 67 rattlesnakes, 20 of which he kept alive, catching them 

 at Mine Dam Brook in Webster, selling them at $5 each to 

 parties who would exhibit them throughout the country. 

 His life has been one of work, and this hunting and 

 fishing came after farm work was over. His farm, now 

 comprising 68 acres, is the last farm in Webster on the 

 Sutton road, south of the Sutton town line, and years ago 

 was a part of the camping grounds of the Nipmuck tribe 

 of Indians. North of the lane leading from the highway 

 to the house is the Nipmuck Pond, covering 10 acres of 

 land, fed by natural springs, which has been flowed and 

 enlarged by Mr. Dudley, and stocked with trout and other 

 fish, and each year supplies to the local market pounds of 

 fish. He also has found 250 swarms of wild bees, 13 of 

 which he found the past year, the largest swarm having 

 150 pounds of honey. 



NOTES FROM THE GAME FIELDS. 



Haddam, Conn., Oct. 22.— From my observations in 

 this vicinity I find partridges fairly plenty, but scattered 

 singly and in pairs throughout the woods in pursuit of 

 food, making it tedious hunting, for they are also very 

 wild. Quail are more plenty than was expected in the 

 summer, and it seems to me that there are more than we 

 have had for several years. Woodcock have been unusu- 

 ally scarce thus far, and we can hardly expect many more 

 flights after this cold snap. Gray squirrels are quite 

 plenty, but seem very wild and will not remain on the 

 tree up which they are driven by the dog; so if one does 

 not get to the tree soon after the dog barks he will find 

 the squirrel has fled to other trees, which makes it impos- 

 sible to locate it. The trees and bushes are still loaded 

 with foliage, which makes either squirrel or bird hunting 

 quite difficult, and adds another proof to my often-ex- 

 pressed opinion that the open season in this State should 

 not begin before the 15th of October, and, I think, should 

 close the last day of November. I am sure if it were so 

 we would have pleasanter shooting and in the end more 

 game. A. 



Under date of Oct. 24, Mr. J. B. Stoddard writes con- 

 cerning game conditions about Newton, N. C. : "There 

 has been no rain for over two months. Birds are uncom- 

 monly scarce, and weather and scarcity of birds are a 

 hard combination to struggle against. It is almost 

 impossible to get work on the few we do find. No doubt 

 more birds will be found after we have rain. I was out 

 this morning early and only found one bevy. The trials' 

 will be slow unless rain sets in. I would not be surprised 

 to see birds scarce on the field trial grounds. Our best 

 day was seven bevies with good dogs. The best record 

 here so far is nine bevies in one day. Most dogs will not 

 find a bevy in a two-hour run any place near Newton. 

 The people here give as a reason for the scarcity that the 

 birds were froze out. 



Game Preserves and the Unfortunates Left Out. 



Providence, R. I,— Editor Forest and Stream: It 

 rather looks as if our little State here would in time 

 become a game preserve, and that those of us who don't 

 happen to have the price of admission to the riug would 

 soon be advertising our guns, dogs and the reBt of our 

 duffle in the Forest and Stream for sale. 



Now what is the general idea of the readers on this 

 question of posting all the good covers? 



Game preserving is undoubtedly a vastly good thing, 

 but it hardly seems right for those who are more fortunate 

 in worldly goods to buy up or lease all the good covers and 

 keep out the poor chap who likes his day afield also. It 

 savors too much of the old style English park system, and 

 we will soon have poachers and sneaking pot-hunters 

 arising from the ranks of those who don't believe in that 

 sort of thing now. 



It does seem that good game laws, properly enforced, 

 should keep up the supply of game without the forming 

 of these preserves which exclude many of our true sports- 

 men. 



Rhode Island has many good covers, but just try a day 

 and see where you will be at, and what you will find. 

 Warwick Neck, an old stamping ground, reserved for a 

 select few; the Harmony, Greenville and Summit squirrel 

 and rabbit grounds posted; in fact there are very few good 

 places now that one can find without the "eheu" provok- 

 ing "No trespassing, under penalty of the law. All persons 

 forbidden shooting or entering upon these grounds." 



No doubt this keeps off the pot-hunting Dago et alii., 

 including a few of us who can't well afford to buy a few 

 hundred acres for a day'B shoot now and then. 



What is the opinion of the Forest and Stream fra- 

 ternity? Tode. 



Mourning' Doves Protected in Michigan. 



Holland, Mich., Oct. 24.— Editor Forest and Stream: 

 In your issue of the 12th, Julian, of Lansing, Mich., reports 

 the killing of twenty mourning doves. Was not this 

 shooting illegal? Our last State game warden held that 

 mourning doves were protected by the law which forbids 

 the killing of song birds at all times. Acting under this 

 decision, our Fish and Game Protective Association has 

 stopped the shooting of these birds here. 



Arthur G. Batjmgartel. 



