APEfL 28, 1887.J 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



299 



little, but only for a moment; they won't stop this morn- 

 ing. 



More sheldrakes. Flying close te the water they come 

 in, with then- necks outstretched, as if to question their 

 silent images. Bang— bang, followed by two splashes, 

 tells the story. 



Bim! Bim! came from Bob and Cib at the meadow 

 bank, and I looked around for a second, but long enough 

 to miss a very pretty shot at a broa d bill. 



Flocks of brant would go by within about 300yds., but 

 for some unknown reason would not stool. 



A few more sheldrakes came in to the stools, and then 

 the morning flight was over. 



The shooting was so poor in the battery that the Captain 

 and I decided to "take up" and go to the meadow, where 

 many guns had been fired. We did so, and in a little 

 over an hour were with Bob and Cib, who had shot seven 

 sheldrakes. We stayed at that place during the after- 

 noon, while the other fellows went to another part of the 

 meadow. Shooting was dull (as indeed it was during the 

 entire length of our stay), and we shot only three shel- 

 drakes that afternoon. About 5 o'clock clouds began to 

 gather in the northwest, and as it looked very threaten- 

 ing, we went back to the sloop, and were soon followed 

 by Cib and Bob, whose bag for the afternoon amounted 

 to one solitary sheldrake. 



The wind braced up steadily, and, as it looked as if it 

 woidd blow even harder before morning, we put out both 

 anchors, and then went down into the cabin and had 

 supper, and turned in comparatively early. 



The next morning we all went to the meadow, Bob and 

 Cib fixing at a bend in one of the "cricks" that led in 

 from the hay, where the birds would be sure to trade if 

 they flew at all. The Captain and I went further toward, 

 the beach and fixed. Cib and Bob "got the bulge on us" 

 that morning, for almost every flock of birds that came 

 along went to their stools. We lay there until I was quite 

 impatient, and, turning to the Captain, I said: "Cap, 

 don't you think we'd better take up and go a little further 

 east? There are no birds here." 



"Well, let's wait round here a little while longer, and 

 see how things is going to sashay about this rnedder, and 

 if we don't kill no birds I'll take ye to a place where you'il 

 have a shot inside o' twenty minutes." 



We waited, but things didn't "sashay" for a cent, and 

 so we "took up" and went a little further east and fixed 

 at another meadow bank, and, sure enough, in about ten 

 minutes up came an old "pied" sheldrake, gentle as a 

 chicken, and flopped over among the stools at the report 

 of my gun. 



"Didn't I tell ye so?" said the Captain. 



Although he had told me so, not another bird came in 

 to our stools that day, and soon we w T ent back to Bob and 

 Cib, to find that they had killed six more birds. We de- 

 cided to "go west," and after taking up the stools we poled 

 over to the sloop, hoisted sail, and started westward, 

 arriving off Amityville at about 5:30 in the afternoon. 

 Right at the mouth of the "crick" where we anchored we 

 found Capt. Cortright's catboat: he had been out on the 

 bay to take in his eel pots, of which he had a great 

 number, and, as he had been successful, he offered us a 

 nice mess of eels, and we accepted them with alacrity, as 

 our larder had rim pretty low. O, how good those eels 

 tasted. We thought that there was no lard, but I sud- 

 denly remembered that I had brought some down to 

 grease my gun with, and this was immediately appropri- 

 ated and served its purpose admirably. After supper 

 Capt. Cortright and Bill Birch came over to see us. and 

 we spent a very pleasant evening in the cabin, telling big 

 bird stories and other tales. 



The next morning we were up at daybreak and poled 

 across the bay to a thatch bed which had been rigged 

 there, and "fixed out," having a show of about seventy- 

 five brant stool and twenty-five or thirty shelldrakes. 

 The brant came from the east in large bunches, but would 

 not stool at all. They all settled away down to the south- 

 west and commenced feeding, and we could hear the 

 krr, krr, krr, of the trading birds, as they flew past us 

 and settled with the big flock. We stayed in the thatch 

 bed a few hours longer and shot a few sheldrake and 

 then we decided to go back and prepare to start home- 

 ward, 



"I don't see what ails them brant," said Cib, as he began 

 taking up the stools. 



"If the bed was a little further north it might be better, 

 the way they're flyin' this tnornin'," said the Captain. 

 "Steady," he continued, "I believe that sheldrake '11 come 

 near enough for a shot." 



Nearer and nearer came the unwily bird, until the 

 Captain's gun spoke, and down he came with a splash, 

 killed at a distance of fifteen rods at least. 



"What make is that gun, Cap?" I asked. 



"Dunno; I've had her for a good many years; she was 

 bought for a ten, but she's been shot out to about nine 

 bore, now," he replied, as he drew his ramrod from the 

 thimbles and shoved down a couple of wads on the 

 powder. 



"She knows how to kill," 



"Bet yer life!" was the laconic Teply. 



The decoys were soon in and we started across the bay 

 toward the sloop. 



When we arrived on board, we stowed away the stools 

 and packed our traps and were ready to be off. We sailed 

 up the "crick" a little distance and came to a standstill 

 beside the meadow, where we got off and walked back to 

 the road, where a team was kindly offered us and all 

 hands got in and drove down to the depot. 



The result of our three days' shoot was just twenty-two 

 sheldrake, which, although not the best of game, well re- 

 paid us for our trip. 



"Well, good-bye, fellers, said Cib," and he shook hands 

 with us, "come down again soon and we'll try and do 

 better." 



"Yes," chimed in the Captain, "them brant acted in the 

 dumdest queer way; I never see 'em do so before. Good- 

 bye," and with a clang of the bell we were off. 



J. Wendell, Jr. 



Wheee Shall They Go? A party of four amateur 

 sportsmen intend camping out for two weeks next Sep- 

 tember, and not having been out before we are somewhat 

 stuck for a place to go to. Would like to know if you 

 could tell us of a good place for fishing and hunting, as 

 our means are Hmited, and we do not care to go any 

 further than we can help. — T. T. (Fall Eiver, Mass.) 



THE BEEF ISSUE. 



[From J. £. Harrison's "Latest Studies on Indian Reservations."] 



INDIAN AGENCY. Great Sioux Reservation, July 1, 

 1886.— "It is a beautiful morning; let us go out and 

 kill something." "Oh, it's going to be a lovely day for 

 the beef issue. I'm so glad," said a young lady at the 

 breakfast table. Every one is animated and expectant. 

 For several days visitors at the agency, besides the usual 

 hospitable welcome, kave been greeted with the exclama- 

 tion: "You are just in time; you must stay to the beef 

 issue!" All through the day before and far into the 

 moonlit night long processions of Indian wagons have 

 been coming across the hills, and their occupants have 

 gone into camp on the high slopes all around. At an 

 early hour of the morning the whole landscape is full of 

 life and movement. The Indians are decked out in their 

 gayest attire, and some of their costumes are pictorial 

 enough. Most of them still wear the native dress, but 

 some have on a combination of Indian and civilized garb, 

 which is uglier than cither alone. Nearly all are bare- 

 headed and their long black hah - , parted in the middle, 

 falls back over their shoulders. Their faces are painted 

 in various bright colors and in all kinds of grotesque 

 figures. The Sioux men are very fond of wearing tails, 

 and when on foot like to have a strip of bright-colored 

 cloth dangling at their heels or dragjnng along on the 

 ground behind them. They nearly all wear blankets, 

 which at this time of the year are, most of them, sheets 

 of dirty gray looking muslin or sheeting. These they 

 wrap closely around them, often covering the head and 

 face, all but the eyes. 



As we look about us after breakfast we see the Indian 

 women and girls harnessing their horses. Carriages are 

 brought to the door for guests and we are soon all on our 

 way to the Government corral. Everybody is going; 

 residents about the agency, young ladies who are teaching 

 in the schools in the distant camps and others who are 

 visitors from Eastern cities. All are in high spirits. Ac- 

 quaintances exchange greetings. Indian wagons filled 

 with women and children are moving over the plain from 

 all directions. There are hundreds of young Indian men 

 and women on horseback. They go curveting and racing 

 about the plain. The Indians never look well on horse- 

 back, but they manage to stay on. Their ponies are 

 slight and ugly-looking, but tough and enduring. They 

 are the most useful and respectable denizens of the In- 

 dian country and are about the only creatures here who 

 earn their rations. The girls eit astride the same as the 

 men. Some of the belles aie in costly apparel, I 

 count more than fifty elk teeth on a large cape worn by a 

 rare and radiant brown maiden. As each elk has just 

 two teeth, a whole herd must have been slaughtered to 

 furnish the bravery of her attire. She reminds me of 

 New York Fifth avenue belles with dead birds on their 

 heads, but the elks were really killed for food. 



The corral is a large stockade in the middle of a plain, 

 which slopes upward to low hill all around. Here are 

 many hundreds of cattle awaiting slaughter to furnish 

 rations for the noble red men, then- wives and children, 

 ' 1 the wards of the nation. " There are about two thousand 

 Indians present. A large proportion of the men are 

 armed with carbines or improved rifles. There is an 

 army officer here from the nearest fort, to represent the 

 Government on the occasion. A brass band has come out 

 from some some railroad town to compliment the ladies 

 and frighten the already distracted cattle with the blare 

 of their music. The entertainment opens with a popular 

 air. The ladies applaud delicately, and the musicians 

 bow their acknowledgments. Mounted cowboys enter 

 the corral, spur their horses among the cattle, and drive 

 groups of them, with shouts, yells and blows, toward the 

 chute leading to the scales, where they are weighed, a 

 dozen at a time. After leaving the scales, in a narrow 

 part of the chute, each animal is branded with a hot iron 

 and passes on into another division or apartment of the 

 corral. This first brand shows that the animal has been 

 received from the contractor. After all passed through 

 this experience they are again driven into the chute, with 

 the same accompaniment of yells and blows, and receive 

 another brand. This is to identify the hide after it has 

 been taken off. 



All this is but overture and prelude, but the curtain 

 will soon rise and the play begin. Ladies and visitors are 

 assigned the best points of view for the coming spectacle. 

 The Indian wagons with the women and children, and 

 the dusky equestriennes, press close together around the 

 walls of the corral. The Indian horsemen are drawn up 

 in two long fines, forming a lane from the gate of egress, 

 far out on the plain. Their carbines gleam in the sun- 

 light. I turn and note the sweetness of the June morn- 

 ing, the beauty of the circling hills, the flag of our country 

 floating above the Government buildings, and in the mo- 

 mentary hush, the gushing song of a meadow lark, far 

 off across the grass. Hundreds of Indian dogs troop 

 about, hungry, watchful and expectant. A tall Indian, 

 with a voice like that of an exhorcer at an Arkansas 

 camp meeting, climbs up to the top of the gate and shouts 

 the names of the men who are to receive the cattle, as, 

 one after another, they are released to their doom. The 

 gate opens, and a gigantic steer leaps out, frightened and 

 wild-eyed. He trots uncertainly dowm the lane of horse- 

 men. The dogs fly at him and he sets off in a gallop. 

 Two Indians gallop after him, and everybody looks that 

 way. But by this time another is out*, and soon half a 

 dozen are racing away in different directions, each 

 closely followed by two or three mounted Indians. 

 Soon a shot is heard, and then another, and the ladies 

 strain their eyes to see, but the steer gallops on. 

 The ladies look a little disappointed. "They are 

 going out of sight. Is this all it's going to be?" 

 But wait. More shots, and more; and now they come 

 faster, like the ominous, irregular but increasing skir- 

 mish firing before a battle. Five or six of the cattle go 

 off together, with a dozen men pressing behind and at 

 the side of the fleeing group. A horseman fires and a 

 steer drops, so sudddnly, head first, that he turns a com- 

 plete somerset, and the pony just behind, unable to stop, 

 repeats the movement, tumbling over the prostrate beast, 

 and dismounts his rider. Some of the cattle are, at first, 

 only slightly wounded, others are crippled so that they 

 cannot run, but several shots are required to dispatch 

 them. Now and then one turns in fury upon his pur- 

 suers, and the ponies swerve aside to avoid his charge. 

 The ladies turn quickly from side to side, to note the 

 most interesting occurrences. The dying animals lie all 

 about the plain. Some struggle long, getting up and fall- 



ing again, and the Indians wait warily till it seems safe 

 to approach, for a mortally wounded beast will some- 

 times make a plunge at his tormentor. 



Now a hunted brute dashes madly among the crowd 

 around the corral, the horses start and rear and the biown 

 maidens scramble hastily on to the wagons. A large 

 cow, shot through and through, comes staggering up to 

 the very walls of "the grand stand." The Indians try to 

 drive her away, but she no longer heeds their yells and 

 blows. She reels, braces herself, turns her great beseech- 

 ing eyes up to the women above her, and falls at their 

 very feet. The Indian butcher appears, throws off Lis 

 leggings, and bestrides her with naked brown legs and 

 thighs. He opens her throat with a short knife and cuts 

 out the tongue. He pierces no artery or large vein, and 

 the poor, tongueless beast dies slowly. She lifts up her 

 head, stares around again, and tosses about wearily in 

 mute agony. The hall -naked slaughterer goes on with 

 Ms work, and the cow is partly skinned before she dies. 

 It is all so near that the ladies have an excellont oppor- 

 tunity to see every step of the process. 



As the carcasses all about the plain are opened the v o k 

 of the Indian women begins. They attend to the "fLih 

 quarter" of the beef, the entrails. They remind me of 

 the witches in "Macbeth." As we chive out homeward, 

 threading our way between the bloody groups around the 

 flayed and dismembered beasts, many Indians are already 

 beginning their feast. They are seated on the ground, 

 eating the raw, blood-hot liver. Our host stops and buys 

 a piece of liver from an Indian for our next morning's 

 breakfast. As we go on again, a young lady to whom I 

 had been introduced at the grand stand asks me, "How 

 did you enjoy the beef issue?" The next day, at the 

 great Government boarding school, the principal told us 

 that his boys and girls had behaved so well all through 

 the term that he meant to take them out in a body to see 

 the next beef issue as a reward for their good conduct. 



It is a brutal and brutalizing spectacle. 



HUNTING RIFLE SIGHTS. 



r |^HE question has often been asked, what is the best 

 -L sight for a hunting rifle? The answers to this, from 

 the continuing inquiries, seem to b9 unsatisfactory, and 

 it probably never will be answered to every person's satis- 

 faction. 



It may be of interest to the general reader to briefly 

 discuss the various kinds of sights now in use, briefly 

 pointing out the merits and defects of the different pat- 

 terns. 



The factory sights sent, out with the rifles by the differ- 

 ent gun dealers (who probably have never shot at moving 

 game), sold to the novice as just the thing, are to the 

 practical hunter confusing and bungling pieces of metal 

 that are at once thrown aside as useless. 



If these factory sights are of so little value, what is the 

 best sight for general use? 



The best sight for ahmiting rifle is one that enables the 

 hunter to catch aim in the shortest possible space of time; 

 that shows as much of the animal, whether standing or 

 running, as will assist in locating the spot aimed at wii h 

 reference to the rest of the body of the object; that aids 

 in firing shots at running game iu rapid succession; that 

 shows plainly in the sun, in the shade, or in both com- 

 bined, and that is clearly discernible at night. 



There are three distinct kinds of rear sights now in 

 use. 



First is the old-fashioned deep-notched sight known, 

 among other names, as the clover leaf, prong-horn, etc. 

 This sight has all the faults that a sight can very well 

 have and still bo called a sight, viz., it takes up time in 

 catching aim, it covers all the object aimed at except the 

 space between the prongs, it retards catching aim in run- 

 ning shooting, and is confusing in dull and hazy weather 

 and useless at night. 



Second is the Lyman sight, which overcomes the objec- 

 tions of the first in that it shows the greater part of the 

 object aimed at, aids in running shooting if the range of 

 the sights is kept by the hunter. The objections to it are 

 that it is confusing in catching the range of the sights, 

 i. e., the front through the rear sight. This is owing to 

 the position of the sight on the stock of the gun, leaving 

 too great a distance between the front end rear sights. 

 Then, too, its folding down on to the stock is a serious ob- 

 jection. In crawding through tangled brush it is very 

 often knocked down, and if game comes in view at such 

 a time a shot is lost or a miss made because the precious 

 second is lost in readjusting the sight. This has t een my 

 practical experience with the Lyman sight, and the same 

 is true of several persons who were previously advocates 

 of that sight. 



Third is the sight given us by T. S. Van Dyke in his 

 chapter on the subject in his admirable work the "Still 

 Hunter." For two years I used the sights recommended 

 by him and found them suitable except in two respects: 

 the eye will not always catch the true center of the 

 barrel; this is due oftentimes to the haste in which the 

 gun is thrown to the shoulder, and it fails for night shoot- 

 ing. 



The sight that answers every purpose is one which has 

 been extensively used by some South African hunters. It 

 is slightly beveled on the top (one sixteenth of an inch), 

 as shown in the accompanying cut. 



It slopes at an angle of 45cleg. from the top to the base 

 of the sight, and is beveled on the side toward the butt 

 to correspond to that of the top. In addition to this 

 there is a fine German silver line through the center of 

 the sight at the intersection of the two places on the 

 beveled surface, which is especially serviceable at night. 

 This answers every one of the requirements above men- 

 tioned, and so far as my experience goes, it has no disad- 

 vantage. 



For a front sight the plain ivory sight as described by 

 Van Dyke, is certainly the best. 



If this short discussion will be of value to only one of 

 the many who are seeking for the best sight for a hunt- 

 ing rifle, it will have fulfilled its mission. 



MtLNSTJNGtrN. 



