Nov. 16, 1895.] 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



423 



Spring Lake yet has failed to~get*diis gamejalthough some 

 amateurs have had to shoot at their ninth deer before 

 they could claim one as their own. A. B. Douglass. 



Vincenmes, Ind., Nov. 4.— Editor Forest and Stream: 

 The number of bevies of quail seem cut down over one- 

 half. We think it was owing to the severe weather and 

 deep snows last winter, a thing unusual for us, and I 

 think it will take several years before we get back to our 

 usual status. Albert G. Sloo, 



Indianapolis Ind., Nov. a— Editor Forest and Stream: 

 In the northern and central parts of Indiana there 

 are but few birds, but in the extreme southei'n portion 

 they are quite plentiful. The field trial grounds at Bick- 

 nell have their usual crop, owing I think to the fact that 

 the grounds are protected from shooters. The protection 

 of the birds at Bicknell this season will insure plenty of 

 birds for the Continental Field Trials Club's trials next 

 year. P. T. Madison. 



Blue Mountain, Miss.— Editor Forest and Stream: 

 Quail in this section are quite plentiful, more this season 

 tnan there have been for the last three years. I attribute 

 their increase to the fact that the game law has been more re- 

 spected the last two years than it has ever been here before. 

 Then the season has been all we could expect for them, 

 except the last two weeks of June, Which were excessively 

 wet, and no doubt drowned a great many young. Since 

 then we have had but few light showers, which has made 

 it exceedingly favorable for the later hatchings, conse- 

 quently two-thirds of the quail are of the late hatching, 

 only about three- quarters grown. Our first rain this fall 

 was on the 27th of October; the 28th was the first day a 

 man or dog could hunt with any comfort. Therefore 

 there has been very little hunting done this season. All 

 other game is scarce. S. N. Ayees. 



CHICAGO AND THE WEST. 



Two Peres. 



Chicago, 111., Nov. 1.— Several years ago, before the 

 fishing was spoiled in the Chicago River, this used to be a 

 great country out here, around the Great Lakes and the 

 Father of Waters. It was inhabited, as nearly as I can 

 learn, mostly by peres and Indians, who nearly always 

 did well together and liked the same sort of places. There 

 was Pere Hennepin and Pere Marquette, for instance. 

 They were two peres hard to beat, in their time (though 

 I have seen two peres beaten since then). They seem to 

 have hustled around a great deal in this country. The 

 former bad the drainage canal idea in his head, and in- 

 tended to connect Chicago with the Illinois River by 

 means of a canal, but he never built it, so he founded the 

 Hennepin Shooting Club instead. Pere Marquette is 

 well known to have been the architect of the Marquette 

 Building in Chicago, and the founder of the city of Mar- 

 quette, Mich. He was also the first man to paddle from 

 Montreal to Indiana in a canoe. Duty compels me to ad- 

 mit that he paddled mostly by proxy, for the ancient 

 peres could always hypnotize the Indians, as for instance 

 see the irrigating ditches, gardens, missions, etc. , which 

 the Indios reducidos did in Texas and California. The 

 Northern red man had to work just as hard, only paddling 

 does not leave the imprint on the century that piling up 

 stone does. 



Pere Marquette got in his boat — a grand birch bark it 

 must have been — at Montreal. He paddled up the St. 

 Lawrence and probably made a portage at Niagara Falls, 

 though history does not say anything about it, and hence 

 the fact is doubtful. He kept on paddling, close in shore 

 all the time, of course, for the lakes were wild waters we 

 may be sure, until he came to the narrow waters of the 

 Mackinac Straits. I don't know how he knew that Green 

 Bay was on ahead, but he checked his baggage on through 

 just the same. He paddled all night and he paddled all 

 day. When the lark arose in the morn he must have been 

 paddling, and when the cows came home in the evening 

 he must still have been paddling — that is, the Indians 

 must; or else he never would have got there. He 

 went up the big waters, and came to the Wolf River of 

 Wisconsin. I don't know how he knew that this stream 

 would lead him within two miles of Indiana, but he still 

 went on. He followed the Wolf up into Lake Winnebago, 

 starting myriads of wildfowl, frightening myriads of fish, 

 most of the descendants of which have since gone into 

 cold storage. He followed the stream on through Winne- 

 bago water, knowing that that shallow sea was only one 

 of the jewels strung on the string of this wonderful stream. 

 He kept on paddling, through the Butte des Morts marshes, 

 where the wings of the wildfowl were like the thun- 

 der of the waves on the shores of the big lakes. 

 He passed through more expansions of this stream, 

 Fox Lake, Puckaway Lake, Swan Lake, etc., changing 

 the name of his river from Wolf to Fox, just for luck. He 

 stopped little, even on this stream, wonderful for small- 

 mouth bass, but pressed on into the head waters of his 

 stream. He was now below the edge of the pine country. 

 His journey, since leaving the great marshes of the lower 

 part of this river, had been through a lovely oak-opening 

 country. The hardwood trees were tender in their spring 

 colors, brave in their fall colors, sad in their winter col- 

 ors. There were vast islands of timber, with long 

 tongues of grass lands running in between. The marsh 

 still clung to part of the stream, but it was narrow.' Pere 

 Marquette, tired with sitting in his boat, and tired of eat- 

 ing fish and duck, called a halt. The Indians went out 

 and killed some rabbits, some squirrels and some ruffed 

 grouse in the woods. They were at the end of the road, 

 The conductor called out, "Far as we go," set his bell 

 punch back to 0, counted his change, swung the trolley 

 around to the other end and started back to Montreal for 

 the next Pere. 



But Pere Marquette, glorious man in a glorious time, 

 sat upon the grassy bank of the little lake at the head of 

 the stream, and his face was still toward the West. 



Pere Marquette had proved you could paddle to Indi- 

 ana all but two miles. He made, here at the head of his 

 faithful river, the trifling portage which separated the 

 great lakes from the Father of Waters. You might 

 think that a great wall of hills and rocks must uprise 

 here, separating the east-bound Fox from the west- 

 flowing Wisconsin, but such is not the case. The snipe 

 marsh seems to run almost from the one stream to the 

 other. What glorious snipe shooting Pere Marquette 

 must have hadl The divide is easy, gentle, unnoticeable. 



Yet, just to the west the noble Wisconsin River, still 

 almost fretful after its passage through the rock gorges of 

 the dells, was flowing then as it is flowing now. Pardon. 

 Not as it is flowing now. At this time we have sawdust 

 in our rivers, and at the mouth of each there is a log boom 

 and a cold storage house. 



So here they built Portage City. And seeing a good 

 chance to spoil a snipe marsh without doing anybody any 

 good, the Government spent $1,000,000 in building a canal 

 across this little portage. Two locks of 4ft. each, and 

 there you are. You no longer need to put your birch bark 

 on your head. If you have a schooner, or anything much 

 bigger by way of a boat, you would better start over with 

 it the way Pere Marquette did; but it is a good canal for 

 canoes, and it was very kind of the Government to pave 

 the way, so to speak, for any future peres who might 

 want to go from Montreal to Indiana. 



Pere Marquette's face was set toward the west. He fol- 

 lowed the noble Wisconsin, reached the vast Mississippi, 

 followed down till he found the Illinois River, pressed up 

 it to the Kankakee, and so through much fever and ague 

 reached South Bend, Indiana. Here he portaged to the 

 St. Jo, near which stream he ended his voyaging forever. 

 What a journey, through what a country ! What a land 

 was this that day! Ahl Pere Marquette, Pere Marquette, 

 would I had had blessing at your thin and saintly hands ! 

 Would that the mellow call of the wild goose woke us all 

 of mornings now, and not the brazen trumpetings of this 

 that we call Industry! Alas! Pere Marquette. 



At the Portage. 



This week a friend and I stopped for a few hours at the 

 portage of the old Indian waterway. "Where was it that 

 they made the carry?" I asked of a leading citizen at the 

 depot. 



"What carry?" he said. 



"Where they made the portage over from the Fox into 

 the Wisconsin?" 

 "Who did?" 



"Why, Pere Marquette, you know." 

 "Who was he?" asked the leading citizen. 

 "Oh, a Frenchman." 



The leading citizen shook his head. "Must have been 

 a long time ago," he said. "I've been here over twenty 

 years myself. You can look right through the canal all 

 right. Nobody never carried anything acrost here as I ever 

 knew of." 



But none the less my friend and I, as we looked out of 

 the windows of the train which bore us from Portage 

 City down to Horicon, had glimpses of the same river, 

 the same lakes, the same oak openings and wide grass 

 lands which must have gladdened the eyes of the good 

 priest, wearied with gazing out over the waters of the 

 lakes. Even to-day the region is one loved of the wild 

 creatures. If you wish ducks, bass, snipe, squirrels, rab- 

 bits, ruffed grouse, follow the old waterway to the divide 

 and hunt in the country there and immediately to the 

 south. If you be of reasonable turn of mind you can have 

 sport to please you. Especially is this a ruffed grouse 

 country. I do not at this writing know of any better. 

 Pere Marquette's water trail, singular to say, passed 

 through the very best shooting and fishing country of all 

 this part of the West. It is only a shadow now of what 

 it was, but I give the above tip for what it is worth. 



Beagles and Birds. 



My friend and myself were up at the beagle trials at 

 Columbus, Wis., about seventy-five miles northwest of 

 Milwaukee, last week, and it was thus I found we had 

 blundered into a very fair shooting country. The even- 

 ing we got there a shooter had seen some woodcock fly- 

 ing about right in the town. A bag of twenty-one snipe 

 had been made along the Crawfish River that same week. 

 Squirrels were mentioned as often numerous and we 

 were told that ruffed grouse could be found in good 

 numbers. In the course of the beagle trials we put up 

 several grouse and about twenty -five rabbits the first day, 

 and every day we saw some game. At the close of the 

 beagle trials we found the rabbits all frightened into the 

 ground for the time, but Henry Hiller gave us two fine 

 beagles to use (one of them Duke, winner of first in the 

 Derby), and with these we got two good hunts right near 

 town. On one of these days old Mr. Hiller took out the 

 beagles, and Mr. Grout, our landlord, went with us. We 

 struck some very dense cover, and found the shooting ex- 

 tremely difficult, but the little hounds made the merriest 

 sort of music for us, even though we had only five rab- 

 bits to show them in return for their singing. But we had 

 also two squirrels, and best of all, a nice bag of ruffed 

 grouse. We struck in all over a dozen of these birds, and 

 I had four shots myself, more than I have fired at grouse 

 for years. I thought I was lucky to bag two of these 

 screechers, Mr. Grout was still more fortunate and got 

 four to his own gun. We prized them very much, as the 

 shooting was under the hardest of conditions. 



One of my grouse was killed in a peculiar sort of way. 

 It^sprang without any warning at the foot of a tree about 

 8yds. from me, and started across a little break in the 

 cover about 10yds. in extent. It had gone only about 

 5yds. when I fired at it, and I thought it was blown to 

 pieces, though my gun was a cylinder with about the most 

 scatter of any gun I ever saw. On picking up the bird I 

 found its head cut clean off and missing. Both the wings 

 were broken at the butt, with not a feather touched be- 

 tween there and the tips. I think the bird must have had 

 its wings upright above its back at the instant the charge 

 struck it, and that its head was carried on about the line 

 of the butts of the wings, and a little up. The lower neck 

 and shoulders were not touched. It would be a hard shot 

 to repeat with a cylinder-bore gun. This shot, and one 

 in which I killed a running rabbit in the brush with a .32 

 rifle, gave me a great deal of comfort, so that I was ready 

 to quit and go home. Candor compels me to say that I 

 did not hit the rabbit in the head, but in the hindleg. In 

 fact, I hit him twice running, for the first shot did not 

 stop him, though it cut his leg clean off. We all discussed 

 the fact that a rabbit will take a lot of shooting with a 

 rifle, whereas if you hit him with a pellet or so of shot he 

 keels over at once. I prefer to let my reputation rest with 

 this rabbit, and Bhall not state how many I missed with 

 the shotgun. There is no use spoiling a good Btory. Mr. 

 Grout got most of the game. My friend said that he 

 would not go into such cover to shoot, and one could get 

 no shooting any other way. He stayed at the wagon, and 

 ate apples and made pictures. The weather was so glori- 

 ous it was a pleasure just to be out doors and to breathe. 



There are a few prairie chickens around Columbus yet, 



I found, much to my'surprise. Opening day sees some 

 very fair bags— a dozen or so to the gun very often. We 

 saw a couple of flocks flying across into the marshes. 

 There are also a few trout streams near there, where a 

 dozen trout or so may be taken of a day in season. One 

 gentleman of Columbus, Mr. Brill, has some artificial 

 trout ponds fed by an artesian well, and here he runs a 

 little hatchery of his own. We saw several 31b. and 

 4lb. trout darting around here. The Chippewa affords 

 fairish bass fishing too, they tell me, though of course not 

 to compare with that of the Northern Fox, over on the old 

 Pere Marquette trail. 



We intended to go from Columbus up to Berlin, which 

 is in a good grouse country west of Oshkosh. We found 

 that there is good grouse shooting along the St. Paul Rail- 

 road running north of Portage City. We went northwest 

 about thirty miles to Portage, then went about sixty miles 

 southwest from Portage. Here we found ourselves at Hori- 

 con, the station for the Horicon duck clubs. We thought 

 for a while of going out for some ducks, but finally con- 

 cluding we had enough fun, started south for Chicago, 

 about 150 miles or some such matter. We saw enough to 

 make me believe that one who is fond of upland fall 

 shooting can get into very pleasant surroundings at any 

 one of a dozen points in the section of country of which 

 the Portage is the center. 



Getting Close. 

 The quail and bear season in the South is getting 

 mighty close, and one -could be forgiven for getting un- 

 easy at the invitations which keep coming in to head for 

 Dixie. I have already mentioned the latchstring of Dr. 

 Taylor, of Brownsville, Tenn., who has two good dogs, a 

 big house and a million quail. I don't see how one can 

 stay away from there. And now comes further mandate 

 from Mr. T. H. Glover, of San Marcos, Tex. , who sched- 

 ules "three fair dogs, two good horses, three Parker 

 guns, three Marlin rifles, a .38-55 Winchester, a few deer, 

 two buggies, several vacant rooms, a lot of smoked venison 

 hams, a tolerably good cook, and a 60-year-old father 

 who kills nine out of ten shots all day long and can walk 

 the legs off the best of us." Moreover, Mr. Glover has a 

 friend with a meat dog, which latter compares very well 

 with his own blue-blooded dog, that does not always show 

 stability of character in the field. Mr. Glover voices a 

 popular feeling in saying, "when I have put money and 

 beefsteak and confidence in a dog I expect it to under- 

 stand that noblesse oblige." 



Game Cases. 



The Kewanee freezer cage, appealed, 'comes up for trial 

 soon, and was expected to be called this week, though no 

 word has yet been received by the sportsmen's attorneys 

 here. 



The case of Williams, the proprietor of the Lakeside 

 restaurant here, who was arrested last summer for serv- 

 ing illegal game, came up for trial this afternoon. The 

 attorney for the sportsmen not being at first on hand, the 

 prosecuting warden acted. Defense called for a jury, and 

 in five minutes had one — one probably of "regulars." 

 Attorney Baird then appeared for the prosecution, and the 

 case was dismissed without prejudice. It will be taken 

 up next week before Judge Bloom, in another division of 

 the city. 



The case of Mason, one of the Fox Lake "sooners," is 

 expected soon to be brought up at Waukegan. 



The cases of Beckwith and Nelson, arrested for shoot- 

 ing from an open-water blind, are to be tried next week 

 probably, at Antiocb, III. 



Fowl In the South. 



Geese, ducks and swans are this week in thousands on 

 the Waponaca Club marshes on the St. Francis River, op- 

 posite Memphis, but the water is so low they can hardly 

 be gotten at, but remain out in the middle of the inac- 

 cessible open water. Shooters in the upper portion of the 

 South have had some rain, but are crying for more. 

 Texas has had a fairly wet season. 



Fowl In the North. 



Never in the history of the country has the wildfowl 

 shooting been so poor in all this section as it has this fall. 

 Our sportsmen are entirely discouraged. This is the second 

 dry year, and the waters are unprecedentedly low all over 

 Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota and most of the Dakotas. 

 No game of consequence is reported this side of North 

 Dakota. Snow geese in thousands came in on the Devil's 

 Lake waters three weeks ago. Chicago duck shooting 

 now means good club shares or a journey of a thousand 

 miles. 



Poachers recently shot two of the Tolleston Club watch- 

 men with heavy shot. The wars of that club wilh the 

 poaching element would fill a book if recounted in full. 

 The shooting in the last case was done after dusk by un- 

 known parties, who escaped. E. Hough. 



909 Security Building, Chicago. 



A FAMILY AFFAIR. 



Helena, Mont., Nov. 2. — Editor Forest and Stream: 

 It has been my custom for a number of years past to in- 

 dulge in an annual hunting and fishing trip in the Rocky 

 Mountains. This season, early in September, I was taken 

 with the hupting fever, which must be contagious, for to 

 my dismay my wife was stricken with what I considered 

 an insane desire to go too. In vain I described the hard- 

 ship of sleeping on the ground in a tent, with mice and 

 bugs and possibly snakes for bed-fellows, and the plague 

 of flies, mosquitoes and yellow jackets in the daytime. 

 To all of this she turned a deaf ear, and simply said she 

 was going. So the next morning, when Mrs. T. and four 

 chips of the old block climbed into the wagon, there was 

 hardly room left for the camp outfit and provisions for a 

 two weeks' trip for a family of six. 



The first night out we camped in the Belt Mountains, a 

 spur of the Rockies, and we did not have to dine on "Mis- 

 souri chicken" either (a Western term for bacon), for I 

 had picked up six grouse along the road, The following 

 day we reached the mouth of Sheep Creek, a tributary of 

 Smith River, and there we enjoyed some of the best trout 

 fishing to be had in Montana. We remained several days 

 in this camp, and one evening while we were eating supper 

 just outside the tent two deer came down to water and 

 stood about 100yds. distant looking at us. They were so 

 tame that I had time to get my rifle, which was under the 

 wagon and unloaded at the time. An instant later I had 

 shoved some .38 55 cartridges into the magazine of my 



