Forest and Stream 



A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 



Terms, 84 A Yeah. 10 Cts. a Copy. 1 

 Sex. Months, 82. ( 



NEW YORK, JULY 19, 1888, 



) VOL. XXX.— No. 26. 



1 No. 318 Broadway, New ^obk. 





CORRESPONDENCE. 



The Forest and Stream is the recognized medium of entertain- 

 ment, instruction and information between American sportsmen. 

 Communications on the subject to which its pages are devoted are 

 respectfully invited. Anonymous communications will not be re- 

 garded. No name will be published except with writer's consent. 

 The Editors are not responsible for the views of correspondents. 



AD VER TISEMENTS. 

 Only advertisements of an approved character inserted. Inside 

 pages, nonpareil type, 30 cents per line. Special rates for three, six, 

 and twelve months. Seven words to the line, twelve lines to one 

 inch. Advertisements should be sent in by Satui-day previous to 

 issue in which they are to be inserted. Transient advertisements 

 must invariably be accompanied by the money or they will not be 

 Inserted. Reading notices $1.00 per line. 



SUBSCRIPTIONS 

 May begin at any time. Subscription price, 84 per year; $2 for six 

 months; to a club of three annual subscribers, three copies for 810; 

 five copies for 816. Remit by express money-order, regi ered letter, 

 money-order, or draft, payable to the Forest and Stream Publishing 

 Company. The paper may be obtained of newsdealers throughout 

 the United States, Canadas and Great Britain. For sale by Davies 

 & Co., No. 1 Finch Lane, Cornhill, London. General subscription 

 agents for Great Britain, Messrs. Davies & Co., and Messrs. Samp- 

 son Low, Marston, Seartes and Rivington, 188 Fleet street, London, 

 Eng. Brentano's, 17 Avenue de l'Opera, Paris, France, sole Paris 

 agent for sales and subscriptions. Foreign subscription price. $6 

 per year; 82.50 for six months. 

 Address all communications, 



Forest and Stream Publishing Co. 

 No. 81S Broadway. New York City. 



CONTENTS. 



Editorial. 



Ac the Newark Tournament. 



Death of Captain Coffin. 



The Largest Adirondack Trout 



Kennel Autocracy. 

 The Sportsman Tourist. 



The Valley of the Serpentine. 



Running the Brule. 

 Natural History. 



Experience with Rattlesnakes 



Bulls on the Texas Range. 

 Camp-Fire Flickerings. 

 btAMB Bag and Gun. 



Deer Hunting at Murrell's 

 Point. 



Adirondack Abomiuations. 

 Hot Weather. Stories. 

 Converted to a Wing Shot, 

 trame Prospects. 

 Yellowstone Park Petition. 

 Sea and River Fishing. 

 More About Lake Edward. 

 Sea Bass off Brigautine. 

 Camping hi Colorado. 

 The Mississippi Gulf Coast. 

 Bluefishing about Long island. 



FlSHCtJLTU R E . 



The Distribution of Fresh- 

 Water Fishes. 



FlSHCUXTURE. 



New Stork Oyster Law. 

 The Kennel. 



American Field Trials Club 

 Derby. 



Nights with the Coons. 



Manitoba Field Trials. 



Loudon Dog Show. 



The National Dog Club. 



American Gordon Setter Club. 



Dog Talk. 



Kennel Notes. 



Kennel Management. 

 Rifle and Trap shooting. 



Range and Gallery. 



The Newark Tournament. 



The Trap. 

 Canoeing. 



Transportation to Lake George 



Announcements. 



Cauoeiug Notes. 

 Yachting. 



Quadruple Expansion Yaoht 

 Engines. 



Baboon and Xara. 



Beverly Y. C. 



Seawanhaka C. Y. C. Cruise. 

 Yachting Notes. 



ANSWER8 TO CORRESPONDENTS. 



KENNELL AUTOCRACY. 



SUPPOSE that the North American continent were 

 submerged until only ten square miles remained 

 above water. Suppose that a thousand dogs should sur- 

 vive the flood. Suppose that the owners of these dogs 

 sliould form themselves into a club with an executive 

 committee or a board of control. Suppose that this exec- 

 utive committee or board of control should decree that all 

 dogs in the ten-mile strip should be subject to the club's 

 decrees. Supj>ose that some officious individual should 

 issue notice that no field trial club might be formed in 

 the southern five miles of the ten, nor any new dog club 

 of any character in the entire ten square miles. Sup- 

 pose all this ; and we have here an ideal and delightful 

 ten-mile dog-in-the-manger elysium, free from opposition 

 and antagonism. 



There is no gainsaying that on a ten-mile island such a 

 system of kennel autocracy would flourish to the satisfac- 

 tion and advantage of all concerned. But it is an equally 

 impregnable proposition that in a continent of eight and 

 one-half millions of square miles it cannot be made to 

 work; and the man or set of men who may try to create 

 and enforce it, by so doing simply make a display of their 

 foolishness. It is not a whit less foolish to see in every 

 movement to establish new kennel clubs of various kinds 

 something which shall work disastrously to the interest 

 of existing clubs. Thus we have lately heard the Southern 

 Field Trials Club denounced, on the puerile pretext that 

 it was gotten up to "pull down" the American Field Trials 

 Club; and now we have attacks on the new National Dog 

 Club of America, which are based on a like dog-in-the- 

 manger apprehension. 



This notion, that where one club exists in a great 

 country like ours no other club has any justification for 

 its being, is not by any means new doctrine, but it is not 

 a doctrine shared by the general public. There is recog- 

 nized room for more than one kennel club in this coun- 

 try; it was, in fact, the recognition of the demand for 

 these two new clubs that led to their formation. The 



demand still holds good, and so long as there remains 

 room for the Southern Field Trial Club, and for the 

 American Field Trials Club, and for the National Dog 

 Club of America, and for the American Kennel Club, 

 they will all flourish. "We believe in the old adage which 

 exhorts to live and let live; and we repeat our friendly 

 suggestion to those who stand aloof, that it would be in 

 better taste to join in the feast and partake of the good 

 things with their fellows in harmony and good will. 



AT THE NEWARK TOURNAMENT. 

 r pHE recent gathering at the opening fest of the Inter- 

 national Sharpshooters' Union was a notable one. It 

 was the largest congress of off-hand marksmen which 

 has been held in this country, and the work done under 

 the untoward weather conditions which prevailed such 

 as to show that in respect to accuracy there is little left 

 t6 be accomplished by the artisan in the rifle-making 

 craft. 



A visit to the shooting shed of the Newark Park would 

 have been a revelation to some who are not familiar with 

 what peculiar sorts of devices are provided to secure good 

 targets under the general condition of off-hand shooting. 

 There were hundreds of rifles on the racks which would 

 be barred off of any open range run under the Creed- 

 moor rules. To be sure, the heavy weapons of precision 

 which go under the head of rifles at the old style muzzle- 

 loader tests were wanting, but between that class and the 

 less than lOlbs. weight class required under N. R. A. 

 rules there is a wide field in which the Newark rifles 

 were found. 



Custom has made the rest for the left hand a recognized 

 part of the weapon at these shoots. By it the rifleman is 

 enabled to get a steady hip rest to such an extent that 

 off-hand shoulder shooting is reduced to a sort of off -hip 

 shooting, and a mid-barrel support of the most pro- 

 nounced sort is secured. At present any sort of a 

 position where the body is not leaning up against a fixed 

 support is called an off-hand one, but there are many 

 differences, and the two extremes are to be found in the 

 military position with left arm fully or nearly extended 

 at one end, and the cramped up body twist which the ex- 

 pert German point target shooter under Schuetzen fest 

 rules knows so well how to assume at the other. In 

 reading the scores, and in noting the results of this or an- 

 other shoot, these conditions and these extra appliances 

 and adventitious aids to aim-taking must be regarded. 



The objections to all these devices are that instead of 

 simplifying the art of shooting they tend to complicate it. 

 What is wanted is the simplest sort of a weapon to be 

 used in the readiest sort of a way. The rifle in the sol- 

 dier's or the hunter's hands is the type of what such an 

 arm should be. Everything which departs from this 

 simple standard is to be avoided. A cartridge with its 

 patch and its need of extra lubrication, a sight which 

 does not admit of the readiest possible sort of adjustment, 

 and a rifle which is so heavy that its weight must be 

 transmitted via a hand-rest down to the hips, all come 

 under the category of unnecessary and unwise complica- 

 tions. 



Granted that each and every one of these assist veiy 

 materially in pushing the score up to the highest possible 

 notch, but when it has reached that point all that has 

 been proven is that the gun maker has produced a perfect 

 piece of mechanicsm. What is then needed is to find 

 out just what the shooter can do under conditions as near 

 as may be to those which he will meet in actual practice 

 on the field of battle or after game in the open. Imagine 

 for a moment a company of soldiers trained only in 

 ball practice with the class of rifles seen so largely at 

 this recent fest, and compare their training with that of 

 a squad using only the service weapon under service con- 

 ditions, with open sights and the sharp, quick methods 

 of sighting and firing in use at a garrison range. 



Entirely apart from these points of criticism, there is 

 much to be said in favor of the work done and to be 

 done by the enthusiasts of the Sharpshooters' Union. In 

 their endeavor to get the best results they may go be- 

 yond the line of practical field weapons into that of mere 

 score-producing machines. At the same time they are 

 working out in a practical fashion many of the problems 

 of small arm work. In loading, the most exact shooter 

 passes his bullet down from the muzzle and plants it at an 

 exact spot above the cartridge chamber with a measured 

 rod. Then he turns the rifle about and inserts the pow- 

 der-charged shell, In this way he gets an accurately 



centered bullet which he could not get or at least which 

 he so far failed to get from the metallic cartridge loaded 

 in the usual fashion. Here is a hint to the makers of 

 both rifles and cartridges. The question of the cleaning 

 of the barrel or at least the leaving of it with exactly 

 simi'ar conditions after each shot is another point of 

 practical gunnery which these men are working up and 

 have about settled. 



The long-range military rifle, which is a very recent 

 product, was made possible because of the small-bore 

 enthusists who fought out the Elcho Shield competitions 

 each year with improving weapons until the interna- 

 tional matches came on to give this branch of marksman- 

 ship a grand lift. The off hand military weapon of to-day 

 is not entirely satisfactory. Its improvement is to come 

 from the data which Farrow and the scores of men who 

 shot from the same shed with him at Newark are so 

 earnestly heaping up. To the rifle maker the fest can be 

 studied with profit, but it must not be taken as an exhi- 

 bition of off hand shooting as our soldier and hunter 

 readers would understand the term. 



DEATH OF CAPTAIN COFFIN. 



CAPT. POLAND FOLGER COFFIN , for many years 

 yachting editor of the New York World and the 

 Spirit of the Times, died of heart disease, last Tuesday. 

 He was with the Atlantic Yacht Club at Shelter Island, 

 and was engaged in writing a report of the cruise for the 

 World when he fell back in his chair dead. Capt. Coffin 

 entered the merchant marine at an early age, was for 

 years a master of sailing vessels, served in the navy dur- 

 ing the war, and in 1869, giving up sea life, entered upon 

 newspaper work. In the intervals of leisure on long 

 voyages he had mastered the art of short-hand writ- 

 ing, and in the odd change from sea captain 

 to reporter he soon demonstrated his versatility. 

 The wide and varied experience and information in 

 nautical affairs gave him peculiar fitness for reporting 

 such matters, and his worth found prompt recognition. 

 He had stored up a vast fund of sea lore and sea stories, 

 which he turned to good account; ,his "Sea Yarns" con- 

 tributed to the World and to various magazines were 

 republished in book form and have had wide popularity. 

 He was also the author of a history of the America's Cup, 

 published by the Scribners. 



Capt. Coffin was a charming conversationalist; his 

 cheerful disposition and good fellowship always won 

 friends; and he enjoyed the esteem of a host of acquaint- 

 ances. 



THE LARGEST ADIRONDACK TROUT. 



WE have received from Mr. A. Ames Howlettof Syra- 

 cuse, N. Y., who is now at Cranberry Lake in the 

 Adirondacks, a portion of a window shade, on which is 

 drawn the outline of the largest recorded brook tiout 

 caught by an angler in Adirondack waters. The fish was 

 taken by Mr. Howlett on the inlet of the lake, on July 10. 

 It was weighed and measured in the presence of Mr. 

 Chester S. Lord, managing editor of the New York Sun, 

 Mr. J. Earl Knox, of New York, and guides A. C. 

 Thompson and Geo. Bancroft ; and the signatures of all 

 these persons are added to Mr. Howlett's to attest the 

 correctness of the data given. The fish weighed, when 

 taken from the water, and weighed on three different 

 scales, 51bs. 14oz. Five hours after it weighed 51bs. 8£oz. 

 Its length was 21f in. ; depth, 6in. ; thickness, 3iin. 



In the Forest and Stream of June 23, 1887, Mr. A. N. 

 Cheney reported a trout of 6|lbs. which had been picked 

 up dead on Loon Lake; and reference was made to two 

 other large fish, one 5 Jibs, and the other 5 Jib?., caught in 

 St. Regis Lake. In our issue of July 7, 1887, Mr. Howlett 

 recorded the taking of a 51bs. 13oz. trout in the Oswe- 

 gatchie River, by Mr. Mills, keeper of the State dam at 

 Cranberry Lake. According to the record, then, Mr. How- 

 lett with his 51bs. 14oz. fish is ahead. He has promised 

 to send us a detailed account of his experience with the 

 Cranberry giant 1 _ _ . 



Elwood R. Naeny, Fish Commissioner for Delaware, 

 died at his farm near Odessa, Monday, July 9, of 

 paralysis. He was one of the most active members of 

 the Legislature in 1867 ani the father of the "Bona Fide 

 Citizen" bill, designed to protect Delaware oyt-ter beds 

 against Jeseymen, who claimed citizenship there for 

 revenue only, 



