244 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



[Oct. SO, 1887. 



we had a couple of miles to descend to the lake. Reaching are found, viz. : General-Hooker, brown-hen, yellow- 

 the shore and leaving their heavy loads, the Siwashes took May, ginger-palmer, jungle-cock, jungle- Abbey, jungle- 



up the trail of the deer they had started in the morning; 

 they followed the faint trail with great skill, much like 

 setters following a bevy of quail and with the rapidity 

 and stealthiness of a cat. After going perhaps a mile, I 

 was startled by seeing a big blacktail deer jump up from 

 the tall ferns and start off "on a smart trot directly away. 

 I threw up the Winchester and blazed away. On it went, 

 turning into some thick bushes. I fired again, much as I 

 would at a bird, aiming about a foot in front, and was 

 gladdened by hearing the big beast go down with a crash. 

 With a yell of triumph we dashed after it and my big 

 hunting knife was plunged to the hilt in its throat; and 

 I had killed mv fust blacktail. 



While two of the Indians skin and break up the deer, 

 the chief and I make a fire, and he lights a cigarette. 

 My pipe and tobacco are in my coat pocket in the boat 

 and I long for a smoke, so I make signs to indicate that I 

 would like a cigarette also. The big chief nods his head 

 and grunts, which I take to mean all right, and proceeds 

 to roll one in the most approved manner. I am rather 

 taken aback though, when, with what he considered a 

 great compliment", he puts it in his mouth and lights it 

 before handing it to me. I accept with the best grace 

 possible, and, while I enjoy the smoke, make up my mind 

 not to ask a Si wash again for a cigarette. 



It was a wild and picturesque scene; the great dark for- 

 est with its big trees, the wdd, bareheaded Indians, with 

 sleeves rolled up and long hunting knives, cutting up the 

 deer, while the big six-foot chief, with his long black 

 braids hanging down each side of his face, squatted com- 

 placently before the fire enjoying his smoke. There was 

 no doubt but that I was in the West. It was late in he 

 afternoon before we reached camp, where I received the 

 congratulations of the party; and a good supply of fine 

 venison was assured for ome days to come. 



It is impossible in a short article to describe all the in- 

 cidents or give all the particulars of our three weeks' stay 

 on this beautiful lake. I can only state in a general way 

 that we had superb weather and an abundance of trout 

 and venison, varied occasionally by a few ruffed and 

 spruce grouse. We had venison three times and trout 

 twice a day while in camp. Some sportsmen think that 

 the blacktail are not as good eating as the whitetail 

 deer, but we could not find much difference. I want 

 nothing better than roast saddle of blacktail deer and 

 currant jelley. 



The Indians, of whom we had five, belonging to the 

 Kalespell tribe, were splendid hunters though indifferent 

 shots, and we found them in every way trustworthy, 

 truthful and reliable. Personally I prefer them to the 

 majority of white professional hunters. They never bed 

 about a miss nor indulged in profanity, and never spoke 

 unless we asked them a question. I found them per- 

 fectly honest, which is more than we could say of some 

 of the white gold hunters who hung about our camp. I 

 was surprised to find the Indians so clean. They used 

 soap and water freely, and brag about their superiority 

 in that respect to the white man. The sweat-house is 

 quite an institution with them, and they indulge very 

 freely in this wild substitute of the Russian bath. 



The only trouble we had on the whole trip was with 

 one of our white guides; who got drunk one night, broke 

 into our storehouse and opened fire on us with his Win- 

 chester. The Siwashes took to the woods and did not 

 appear until the nest morning. They dislike to get into 

 a row with the whites or "Boston men" as they call them, 

 for no matter how Httle they are to blame, they have to 

 shoulder it all. 



We were disappointed in one particular, we expected 

 to find this region un visited by white men, but the report 

 had got abroad that there was gold in the land, and we 

 found the country already overrun with prospectors. As 

 these men live on the game, to say nothing of the blasting 

 going on with giant powder, naturally the big game had 

 left the lake shore and gone back into the mountains, 

 making the hunting exceedingly difficult and packing the 

 venison into camp a very serious matter. Only one of 

 our party succeeded in killing a caribou, a fine fat cow 

 with the horns still in the velvet. Our score for the trip 

 was 23 blacktail and two whitetail deer and 1 caribou, 

 besides grouse of three varieties, hares, ducks, beaver, 

 coyotes and trout. We did not waste any game or fish; 

 every bit killed was eaten or given away. 



They call the spruce grouse fool-hens, and right well 

 do they deserve the name, for then stupid tameness is 

 bevond belief. The sharptail grouse, which they call 

 prairie chickens, are said to be common near the beaver 

 meadows, but we did not happen to see them. Of the 

 famous Dolly Varden trout, which somewhat resembles 

 our lake trout, we took very few, as they were -spawning. 

 The largest killed weighed 9ib . We tried them with all 

 sorts of lures, but the mottled pearl bait seemed decidedly 

 the favorite. The black spotted trout before described 

 would tyke a ything; spoons, phantom and fairy min- 

 nows, grassho pers, venison and artificial flies, nothing 

 came amiss. I was surprised to find these fish so very shy. 

 The water of the lake was as clear as crystal, and one 

 cotdd see the big fellows cruising around in schools, but 

 at the slightest movement of the boat, or motion of the 

 rod, they were off like a flash. As they had never been 

 fished for, '. attribute their shyness to the fish-hawk 

 (ospreys), which were daily seen fishing in the lake. 

 They • would drop into the water like a stone, often 

 reappearing with a big trout struggling in their talons. 

 Toward, evening, just at sundown, fuperb sport could 

 be had with the trout, when they came to the shallows to 

 feed. I would let my boat drift along shore, and, when 

 they rose with n casting distance, dropped my flies over 

 them, and rarely failed to hook one. When fast they 

 seemed crazy with fright and rage. As the water was 

 too shallow for them to dive or sulk, they would tear off 

 with the line like a race horse, making it hiss as it cut 

 through the water, while the reel buzzed like a rattle- 

 snake. Several times I had trout that only weighed a 

 couple of pounds (on the scale, not estimated) run off my 

 bne until I could see the spool, and I carried 40yds. on the 

 reel. The rod I used on this trip was an eight-section 

 bamboo, w ighing 5oz., and about 9ft, Sin. long. So the 

 angler can imagine the sport I had. I have killed hun- 

 dreds of black bass and thousands of speckled trout on a 

 fly-rod, but I never had fish to fight so hard- or so long 

 as these young salmon did. I suppose they could hardly 

 be called grilse. 



We found the following the best flies, and the list is a 

 good one for any locality where the black spotted trout 



Montreal, jungle-ibis, jungle-professor, royal-coachman, 

 great-dun, dusty-miller, beauty, grizzly-iking and black- 

 gnat. Hooks, t> to 8 Spr^ at, excepting in the small streams 

 where a No. 10 is better. The fluttering fly, properly 

 manipulated on the still surf ace of the lake, I found to be 

 very deadly, and those that used it had a big advantage. 

 Sometimes, in the lake, these fish would rise to a bright- 

 colored salmon fly. 



These trout had the peculiar habit of almost always 

 taking the upper or hand fly, and if they missed it once 

 or twice, would get very much excited and jumping 

 clean out of water, take the fly a,s they went down head 

 first. The reader can imagine what a* beautiful picture 

 this made to the angler's e e, as they showed their bright 

 colors and glistening sides for a moment in the air. Dur- 

 ing an evening's fishing, it was indeed rare to kill a fish 

 under 1^1 bs. and the chances were that many of them 

 would t urn the scales at 21bs. and over. 



A species of chub called the squaw fish was frequently 

 caught on both fly and spoon; very good eating, though 

 rather bony, and averaging about 21bs. in weight. 



We noticed the usual variety of wildfowl on the lake, 

 but not in any great quantity. I saw no swans, and only 

 one sandhill crane. The magpie, Idaho jay and raven 

 were new birds to me. The pine squirrel, resembling in 

 size and color our red squirrel, but much darker and with 

 a tail almost black, was very common and rather a nuis- 

 ance about the camp. They would climb the great pines 

 and throw down the big solid cones by the dozen. These 

 cones were full of nuts and weighed about a quarter of a 

 pound each. It would have been no joke to be hit by 

 one coming from that height. Bears we sometimes 

 started, but owing to the dense underbrush we could not 

 get a shot at them. Wolves, though quite common and 

 often heard at night, are rarely seen. 



Our head guide was quite a character, a New York 

 gentleman by birth and education, who, after a romantic 

 career, married a Kalespell squaw and settled down in 

 Washington Territory, where he has a fine ranch and 

 plenty of hunting. 



Our return to Sand Point was better arranged than our 

 trip out had been. We kept three or four pack horses 

 and the cook right with us, so that at night we had our 

 tents pitched and a comfortable time generally; besides, 

 we were in much better trim and enjoyed roughing it. 



At Sand Point we found large delegations from the 

 Kalespell and Kootenai Indians, the latter a lach tribe 

 from British Columbia. They were pruchasing their 

 winter supplies of flour, sugar, coffee, etc. They were a 

 fine-looking lot of Indians, with long, black hair hanging 

 in braids, gay-colored blankets and beeds, and faces col- 

 ored with vermillion, and made a lasting impression on 

 us "Boston men." It is to be regretted that Uncle Sam 

 does not make it more difficult for them to obtain fire- 

 water. Their great weakness, however, is gambling. 

 They spend days at their favorite game of "chelalak," 

 not even stopping to sleep, and make night hideous with 

 their monotonous tapping and howls. They stake any- 

 thing and everything, even the clothing on their backs. 

 I saw one buck in the street at Sand Point who had noth- 

 ing on but an old black frock coat; a comical and startling 

 object he was. 



We tried the trout once more with good success in 

 beautiful Pend d'Oreille, and then bade farewell to our 

 wild tent life, reluctantly put away the comfortable gar- 

 ments of the woods, and returned to the stiff "boiled 

 shirts" and hideous clothing of civilization. 



W. HOLBERTON. 



Of it, Professor Flower has said, "Only one species of 

 this genus is known, It. stelleri, the Northern Sea-cow, by 

 far the largest animal of the order, attaining the length 

 of 20 to 25ft. It was formerly an inhabitant of the 

 shores of two small islands in the north Pacific, Behringa 

 and the adjacent Copper Island, on the former of which it 

 was discovered by the ill-fated navigator whose name the 

 island bears, when, with his accomplished companion, the 

 German naturalist Steller, he was wrecked upon it in 1741. 

 Twenty-seven years afterward (17ii8), as is commonly sup- 

 posed, the last of the race was killed, and its very exist- 

 ence would have been unknown to science but for the in- 

 teresting account of its anatomy and habits left by Steller. 

 and the few more or less perfect skeletons which have 

 recently rewarded the researches carried on in the frozen 

 soil of the islands around which it dwelt. There is no 

 evidence at present of its having inhabited any other 

 coasts than those of the islands just named, though it can 

 hardly be supposed that its range was always so restricted. 

 When first discovered it was extremely numerous in the 

 shallow bays round Behring's Island, finding abundant 

 nutriment in the large laminariae growing in the sea. Its 

 extirpation is entirely due to the Russian hunters and 

 traders who followed upon the tract of the explorers, and 

 who, upon Steller's suggestion, lived upon the flesh of the 

 great Sea-cows. Its restricted distribution, large size, 

 inactive habits, fearlessness of man , and even its affec- 

 tionate disposition toward its own kind when Wounded or 

 in distress, all contributed to accelerate its final extinc- 

 tion." 



Professor Nordenskjold has claimed and in the writer's 

 opinion upon too insufficient evidence, that hving speci- 

 mens of this sirenian were known to exist in the locality 

 above referred to as late as the year 1854. This matter 

 has been more r-arefully examined into by Dr. Stejneger, 

 who it would seem has ve y successfully refuted this 

 erroneous notion. 



We now pass to the existing types of these interesting 

 animals, and find that there are but two genera of them, 

 viz.: Halicore and Manatus, the first contains the famous 

 Dugongs, sirenians very distinct in their structure from 

 our Manatees, but as they are denizens of "the shallow 

 bays and creeks of the Red Sea, east coast of Africa, 

 Ceylon, islands of the bay of Bengal and the Indo-Malayan 



Address aR com muni cations to the Forest and Stream Pub. Co. 



THE MANATEES. 



BY R. W. SHUFELDT, M.D., O.M.Z.S., TJ. S. ARMY. 

 Corresponding Member of the Academy of Sciences of Chicago, etc. 



HAVING dealt with the Armadilloes in m - last con- 

 tribution, they being the representatives, as we re- 

 member, of the Suborder Loricata of the Order Edentata, 

 we now arrive in this Provisional List of the Mammals, as 

 authoritatively arranged by the U. S. National Museum, 

 t another very distinct order of animals, known to zo- 

 ologists as the 



Order STRENIA. Sea-cows. 

 Family Tricheohidje. The Manatees. 

 Trichechus manatus, Linne. South American Manatee. 

 Triehechus latirostris (Harlan), True. Florida Manatee. 



My personal knowledge of the Manatees is principally 

 based upon having carefully studied the skeletons and 

 other material afforded by the Museums, and having seen 

 a live one once on the west coast of Florida, and another, 

 some twenty-seven or eight year . ago, about half a mile 

 up the Coatzacoalcos River on the Isthmus of Tehuante- 

 pec, southern Mexico. This last one I saw from the deck 

 of a steamer, and I remember very well that it was in 

 shallow water, and that is had drawn itself partly out on 

 the muddy ooze of the bank, so that its form was very 

 fairly exposed to my view. 



Nevertheless I am quite familiar with this Order of 

 mammals, and it will be my aim in the present article to 

 review some of the more important parts of the history 

 of them so far as it is at present known to naturalists. 



Geology goe=* to show that the early Pliocene and 

 Miocene seas of Europe swarmed with several species of 

 animals, which zoologists have good reason to believe were 

 the latter extinct ancestors of existing Sirenians (Hali- 

 iherium). But the intermediate forms which connected 

 our living types, such as the Manatee, with the ancient 

 ones, to which 1 refer, have not as yet been discovered. 

 Zoologists have also held, and 1 think it is very probable 

 too, that the Manatees and their kind are in some way 

 related links, remotely affined to the Cetaceans on the 

 one hand, and the Ungulata on the other; but even of 

 this kinship the evidence is as yet not satisfactorily de- 

 monstrated. "Various other extinct sirenian species have 

 received different names at the hands of paleontologists, 

 but it is not our object to further pursue this part of the 

 subject here; one form, however, recently exterminated, 

 fully deserves a word of passing notice, and I have refer- 

 ence of course to the Northern Sea-cow (Rhytina stelleri). 



Fig-. A.— Skull of African Manatee (Manatus scnegalensis), xl-5. 

 (After Flower). 



Fig. H.— The from view of the head of the American Manatee, 

 showing the eyes, nostrils and mouth, and with the lohes or 

 the njmer lip divaricated. 



Fig. < .—The same, with the lip contracted. (After Flower, from 

 Murie.) These figures all copied by the present writer. 



Archipelago, ranging from Barrow Reefs on the west to 

 Moreton Bay on the east," they cannot properly claim 

 our time and space here, as interesting as they are in 

 many particulars. Even our own Manatee has a closely 

 related African cousin (31. senegalensis), and of which 

 form I have given a view of the skull in the present 

 paper (A), as I had not one of the American ones at my 

 hand. 



As will be seen by the classification in my leading para- 

 graph above, there are two species of American Mana- 

 tees, but only one of these belong to our United States 

 fauna, the Florida Manatee, a form that so far as this 

 country is concerned, is now confined to the coasts of the 

 peninsula from which it takesits name. Owingto the fact 

 that most of the specimens of Manatees that have reached 

 Europe are the South American animals, and further, as 

 it was very natural that they should figure that form in 

 the "Transactions," this will account for my presenting 

 here a group of those animals in lieu of our own species; 

 however, when reduced to this small size they would be 

 hardly distinguishable in the drawing which illustrates 

 the present paper. 



Manatees are enabled to use the paddles formed by 

 their forearms with considerable facility, and this is un- 

 doubtedly the way in which they originally came by 

 their name, it being derived from the Latin word for 

 hand. Manatus, moreover, is the technical name applied 

 by some zoologists to the genus that has been created to 

 contain them. According to True, Mr. W. A. Conklin, 

 director of the Central Park menagerie, in New York 

 city, gives the following dimensions of a specimen kept 

 alive in that establishment in 1873, these being the only 

 reliable measurements of a Florida Manatee, under its 

 proper name, on record: "Length, 6 ft. 9£in ; circum- 

 ference around the body, 4ft. 9 in.: length of flip er, 1 

 ft, ; width of same, 4f in. ; width of tail joining body, 1 

 ft. 6f in.; greatest width of tail, 1ft. 8£in.; weight, 450 

 lbs." It is very bkely, however, that the animal may at- 

 tain to a length of at least 8 or 9 ft., as trustworthy au- 

 thorities so state, in which case they would come to weigh 

 something between five and six hundred pounds. 



