Forest and Stream 



A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 



Terms, U a Year. 10 Gts. a Copt. ) 



Six Monthb, $2. f 



NEW YORK, MAY 31, 1888. 



t VOL. XXX.-No. 19. 



I No. 318 Broadway, New York. 





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Forest and Stream Publishing Co. 

 No. 318 Broadway. New York City. 



CONTENTS, 



Editorial. 



The Right to Destroy Unlaw- 

 ful Nets. 



"Warren's Ledger." 



Dogs in Court. 



Snap Shots. 

 The Sportsman Toukist. 



Sam Lovel's Camps.— x. 



Through Miramichi with Rod 

 and Rifle. — nr. 



Lake Mistassini. 

 Natural History. 



The Audubon Monument. 



Some Autumn Birds of the St. 

 Mary's Lake Region.— n. 



Snake Bite and its Antidote. 

 Game Bag and Gun. 



Hun ling with a Camera. 



A Deer Drive on Flat River.La. 

 Sea and River Fishing. 



The Angling Tournament. 



New Eu gland Waters. 



Angling Notes. 



Fishcelture. 



American Fisheries Society. 

 The Kennel. 



American Kennel Register. 



Sir Colin Substitution. 



Kennel Notes. 



Kennel Management. 

 Rifle and Trap Shooting. 



Range and Gallery. 



The Trap. 



The Minneapolis Tournament 



Canadian Trap Notes. 

 Canoeing. 



"Tarpon" and his Rag Canoe. 



Springfield C. A. Cup. 

 Yachting. 



The Coming Yachting Season. 



The Deed of Gift, 



Lloyd's Yacht Register. 



Capt. Norton's System of 

 Water Ballast. 



Ytrkville Y. C. 

 Answers to Correspondents. 



DOGS IN COURT. 



THE courts are frequently called upon to determine 

 nice questions of law with respect to the rights and 

 wrongs of dogs, dog owners and the public. In all great 

 cities especially the dogs furnish constant cause for liti- 

 gation. To "let dogs delight to bark and bite" is a wise 

 enough admonition, but the barking and biting must be 

 done with due discretion, else the owner will find himself 

 summoned before the judge, to show cause why the dog 

 should not be done to death, or will perhaps be called 

 upon to defend himself in a suit for damages. 



In a recent case in New York, suit was brought by the 

 father of a little girl to recover $5,000 damages for a dog 

 bite. The dog belonged to a physician. The child had 

 been sent to his home on an errand, had been bitten by 

 the dog and confined to her bed six weeks. The doctor 

 claimed that the dog was a quiet, inoffensive, good- 

 natured pet, £ nd had never bitten any one before. It 

 has already been ruled by Chief Judge McAdam, of the 

 General Court of this city, that a dog is entitled to one 

 bite before it can be proven to be vicious. This ruling 

 was cited in the present case, and in default of proof 

 that the doctor's dog had ever bitten anybody before 

 the suit was decided in favor of the defendant. 



In another case, just settled in Brooklyn, the defend- 

 ant, Henry Rusch, was less fortunate; the verdict went 

 against him and he was ordered to pay Louis Koenig, the 

 plaintiff, $345 damages. 



Another case of interest was the one decided May 9 in 

 the Seventh District Court, of this city. It appears that 

 when Queen Kapiolani, of the Sandwich Islands, was in 

 this country, she rewarded the services of a colored car 

 porter, Lawrence Richards, by giving him a St. Bernard 

 puppy. Not long ago, the puppy having developed into 

 a big dog, Richards gave it into the charge of an Ameri- 

 can District Telegraph messenger, Tommy Gannon, to 

 lead down to the steamer Cherokee, and give over to a 

 Mr. Colley, who was a passenger on the vessel, the ulti- 

 mate destination of the dog being Jacksonville, Fla. 

 Tommy led the dog away; and that was the last heard of 

 him. Richards brought suit against the telegraph com- 

 pany to recover the value of the animal. The question 

 involved was one of proper deliverance by the company. 

 Tommy Gannon's testimony was .the ejfect Jliat he wm 



not allowed to board the steamer and so he did not deliver 

 the dog into the hands of Colley, but he gave it to one of 

 the waiters on the steamer who assured him that Mr. 

 Colley should receive it. This was held not to have been 

 an adequate fulfilling of the company's obligations, and 

 Justice Monell awarded Richards $125.87. 



"WARRENS LEDGER." 

 \\I E have received from a number of correspondents, 

 ^ ' scattered from New Hampshire to Georgia, copies 

 of a circular called "Warren's Ledger." It purports to 

 be sent out by one '•W.W.Warren,." from No. 1227 

 Fulton street, Brooklyn. Its publisher advertises for 

 dead birds, birds' nests and white mice. The munificent 

 price of one cent apiece is offered for sparrows, finches 

 and warblers; five cents for bluebirds, redstarts, swallows, 

 wrens, mockingbirds and others; seven cents for Balti- 

 more orioles, bluejays, field larks; and so on up to $25 for 

 a pied duck. No birds will be accepted- unless preserved 

 with a special "preserving cotton," which the "Ledger' 

 man will supply in packages at fifty cents each. Birds' 

 nests will bring the enticing reward of one dollar per 

 hundred. 



Mr. "Warren" is long on white mice, he offers to sell 

 them at seventy-five cents a pair; and as a seductive bait 

 avers that "during the next few years" he will want to 

 buy 10,000 pairs at fifteen cents a pair. The "Ledger" 

 also heralds the wares of one "Frank B. Churchill," of 

 No. 1237 Bedford avenue, Brooklyn, who has steel traps, 

 jack-knives and police revolvers to dispose of. 



The correspondents who have sent us this circular ex- 

 press indignation at the inducements here held out for 

 infractions of the laws protecting song birds. They per- 

 haps picture to themselves a store at 1227 Fulton street 

 into which are brought great numbers of slain songsters. 

 As a matter of fact, however, there is no store there. No. 

 1227 is an apartment house; no one of the name of "W. 

 W. Warren" lives there. The individual who sends out 

 the "Ledger" presumably does so under a false name. 

 No. 1237 Bedford avenue is a cigar shop. A representa- 

 tive of the Forest and Stream, who called there to dis- 

 cover "Frank B. Churchill," was told that "Churchill" 

 received his mail there, but the individual himself 

 could not be found, and the cigar man refused to divulge 

 his residence. 



Messrs. "Warren" and "Churchill" may do an honest 

 business, but their methods are those adopted by sawdust 

 swindlers and others who perpetrate frauds through the 

 mails. Their operations are less likely to diminish the 

 song bird supply than to lessen the cash supply in the 

 pockets of those who send for the "preserving cotton." 



THE RIGHT TO DESTROY UNLAWFUL NETS. 



IT has been the practice of game constables and the 

 State Fish and Game Protectors to destroy, without 

 process of law, nets found in waters where their use is 

 forbidden. This practice has been in conformity with 

 the statute, which expressly directs them to confiscate 

 the illegal nets, Section 2, Chap. 317, Laws of 1883: 



Any net, pound or other means or device for taking or captur- 

 ing fish, or wherehy they may he taken or captured, set, put, 

 floated, had, found or maintained in or upon any of the waters of 

 this State, or upon the shores of or island in any of the waters of 

 this State, in violation of any existing or hereafter enacted stat- 

 utes or laws for the protection of fish, is hereby declared to he 

 and is a public nuisance, and may be ahated and summarily 

 destroyed by any person, and it shall he the duty of each and 

 every game constable, to seize and remove and forthwith destroy 

 the same; * * * and no action for damages shall lie or be 

 maintained against any person for or on account of any such 

 seizure or destruction. 



Under this statute it is quite within bounds to say that 

 tens of thousands of dollars' worth of nets have been 

 destroyed by officials and private individuals. But a 

 case has just been decided at Watertown, which will in 

 all probability put a stop to such summary proceedings. 

 Certain fishermen living on Black River Bay, whose nets 

 had been confiscated by State Fish and Game Protector 

 Wm. N. Steele, brought suit against Steele; and also 

 against Gen. R. U. Sherman, of the Fish Commission, 

 and Dr. E. L. Sargent, President of the Fish and Game 

 Association of Southern Jefferson County, under whose 

 direction Steele had acted. 



There were two minor contentions by the plaintiffs, 

 both of which were decided against them, first, that the 

 waters in which the nets had been seized were not in- 

 cluded in the law, and second, that the act forbidding 

 fishing in partfif the w&texs of Jefjfersqn jdounty was un- 



constitutional, inasmuch as it prohibited what had 

 hitherto been a lawful occupation for the benefit of a 

 special class, sportsmen, and not for the public good. 



Their third and chief contention, however, was that the 

 statute, which directed the protector to confiscate the 

 nets, was in violation of that provision of the Constitution 

 which forbids the taking of property without due process 

 of law. 



On this Judge Williams found for the plaintiffs, hold- 

 ing that the statute is unconstitutional and affords no 

 protection for Steele in making the seizure;, and he 

 holds the defendant for the value of the net, $216, and 

 costs of action. His rulings were : 



(1.) That fishing with nets in Black River Bay or any 

 waters mentioned in Chapter 114 of the Laws of 1886 is 

 illegal, and those who violate the law may be indicted 

 and also compelled to pay a penalty of $50 for each 

 offense. 



(2.) That no fish or game protector or other persons 

 may summarily seize or destroy nets set in violation of 

 this or any other law, and all statutes directing such 

 seizure and destruction, without hearing ortrial in court, 

 are unconstitutional, as directing the taking of property 

 without due process of law. 



It the decision of this case shall be sustained, it will 

 prove a serious blow to fish protection in this State. The 

 only practicable way to break up netting in certain law- 

 less communities is to seize and destroy the nets then 

 and there, without waiting for "due process of law." 

 This may not be constitutional, but it is effective, and it 

 saves the fish. If another and less efficient mode of pro- 

 cedure must be followed, the work of the protectors will 

 be impeded, and justice to poachers and pirates will be 

 meted out with slower hand. 



No candid man can hesitate, however, when the choice 

 is between speedy punishment of fish netters on the one 

 hand, and on the other the guaranteeing to every man of 

 his constitutional rights. We have always held that 

 there are abundant means of protecting game and fish 

 without violating any principle of law, or infringing on 

 the rights of the humblest member of society. 



SNAP SHOTS. 

 A MONG the personals of a New York daily newspaper 

 recently appeared an advertisement asking the 

 whereabouts of Mr. Geo. H. Sheldon, the Fire Marshal 

 of this city, and prompted by this the reporters at once 

 set to work to unravel another "mysterious disappear- 

 ance." It was soon discovered, however, that after a 

 term of fifteen years of arduous service as Fire Marshal 

 Mr. Sheldon had sent in his resignation, and to celebrate 

 his release from office had gone off to Nova Scotia on a 

 fishing excursion. It is hard luck if one may not go 

 fishing without being adxertised for in the daily papers; 

 but it is not so bad as to be accused of having gone fish- 

 ing with improper motives. That is what happened Col. 

 Chas. A. Bouton, of this city, against whose property 

 Judge Lawrence granted an attachment the other day 

 on an allegation that he had gone "fishing to avoid his 

 creditors." Col. Bouton promptly explained that he had 

 not gone fishing at all, but had been absent under a sub- 

 poena to testify in another case. If incidents of this 

 nature multiply, business men, city officers, plaintiffs, 

 defendants, lawyers and judges will find it to their ad- 

 vantage to establish a public fishing register of some sort 

 in a central point, like the Forest and Stream office, 

 where all individuals recently gone fishing or contem- 

 plating going fishing shall be compelled by law to record 

 the fact, to the end that the public mind may be at rest 

 until they turn up again. 



The account printed elsewhere of hunting game with a 

 camera in the Yellowstone Park is an exceedingly inter- 

 esting record of novel experience. If it be a gratification 

 to the hunter after long and arduous pursuit at length to 

 bring down his prize and secure the trophy of skin or 

 antlers, no less satisfaction is that which the amateur 

 photographer experiences when after equally crafty 

 stalking he "shoots" his game and prints on the plate 

 the magic connterfeit of wild life. It is not every sports- 

 man photographer to whom are given such opportunities 

 as those enjoyed by Mr. Hofer, nor is it every one who 

 would have the pluck and perseverance to follow up the 

 game. The man with a gun will walk a week, or a fort- 

 night for that matter, provided there be something to shoot 

 at the end of the trail, but how far the man with a camera 

 ^will go on the same trail remains to be demonstrated. 



