July il, 188&.] 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



309 



easily to "Coahoma's" other inquiry regarding "the 

 bristle-like sting" which he observed in another "black 

 snake." The spine terminating the tail has given rise 

 to the negro stories about the "stinging tail," which have 

 prevailed ever since a snake so appendaged was first ob- 

 served by a white inhabitant of America. We scarcely 

 expected in these days of ophiological enlightenment to see 

 those old myths cropping up again, because they have 

 been repeatedly ventilated and refuted till tbey have be- 

 come newspaper sensations and nothing more. Every 

 known snake has been so thoroughly examined and 

 dissected and described by the numerous herpetologists of 

 America that any poison apparatus in the tail would have 

 been discovered and made known long ago. With all 

 deference therefore to "Coahoma's" friends of "un- 

 doubted veracity," one may be permitted to suggest that 

 scientific eyes and trained observations are essential to a 

 true comprehension of apparent facts in natural history. 

 The argument "seeing is believing" will not hold good in 

 all cases. To see is one thing, to comprehend what is 

 seen is another thing. It is quite possible that an acci- 

 dental wound may be inflicted by one of the snakes whose 

 tail terminates in'the sharp spine from the snake angrily 

 flourishing its tail about. But an intentional wound 

 must not be credited. The tail of a snake, like the tail 

 of most animals, is expressive of its emotions. You will 

 see the tail of snakes, and indeed of most reptiles, thrown 

 about sometimes angrily, sometimes exploringly and 

 sometimes to find a grasp for safety, especially when 

 the head or the rest of the body is under constraint 

 of any kind. Even those snakes that are not true 

 constrictors use their tail as a means of support, a 

 fulcrum, a balance, a mainstay. This is seen very 

 much in those small and feeble little "blind worms" 

 (Anguis fragilis) of Europe, several in Australia, 

 and the Typhlops lumbricalis of the West Indies, which 

 have the credit of two heads as well as a fearful tail. 

 They are burrowing snakes, their tail terminating in a 

 hardened point, sometimes a mere knob, but equally 

 "dangerous" m negro estimation. Just one hundred and 

 eighty-one years has the "thorn-tail" snake, which is the 

 water viper (Trigonocephalies piscivorus), enjoyed the 

 reputation of stinging persons and killing trees with its 

 spiny tail! In 1707 Lawson, in his "History of Carolina," 

 thus wrote of it: "Of the Horn Snake I never saw but 

 two that I remember. They hiss exactly like a goose 

 when anything approaches them. They strike at their 

 Enemy with their Tail, and kill whatsoever they wound 

 with it, which is armed at the End with a Horny Sub- 

 stance like a Cock's Spur. This is their Weapon. I have 

 heard it credibly reported by those who said they were 

 Eye-Witnesses that a small Locust Tree, about the Thick- 

 ness of a Man's Arm, being struck by one of these snakes 

 at Ten o'clock in the morning, then verdant and flourish- 

 ing, at Four in the Afternoon was dead, and the Leaves 

 dead and withered." This author, who set out on his 

 travels in the new world in 1700, believed not only what 

 he saw but what he heard; bat he had no scientific 

 knowledge to guide his observations. Let us hope that 

 his marvelous tales will henceforth wither like his locust 

 tree; though, to use the words of the venerated Owen, 

 "it is far harder to kill an untruth than to establish a 

 truth." Catherine C. Hoplet. 



A FEW FACTS ABOUT LOONS. 



THE loon, or great northern diver, is the first bird to 

 migrate in the spring to the feeding grounds in the 

 Rangeley Lakes, often alighting in a small open space of 

 water near an inlet or outlet, and waiting there for the 

 thawing away of the ice to give them more room. Once 

 in a small space of open water, there they must stay 

 until the ice thaws sufficient to give them a chance to 

 rise, which requires at least one- eighth of a mile; first 

 starting to fly they run on the water dipping with their 

 wings a long way, less and less, and more and more 

 taking the air, until they merely tip the end of their 

 wings in water, making a mere fine or mark as they go, 

 until entirely free and fairly on the wing, yet still going 

 horizontally and very near the surface for quite a dis- 

 tance, gradually rising from the earth until they reach 

 an altitude out of range of firearms. 



It is common for them to get up and move from one 

 lake to another just before a storm, seldom at any other 

 time, and at such times they make a peculiar noise or 

 cry which one acquainted with them can easily dis- 

 tinguish as their flying note. They fly with much force 

 and labor constantly with their wings, and when alight- 

 ing splash down heavily into the water. They cannot 

 arise from the land nor from any hard surface, only 

 from a large space of water. 



They can be easily shot when confined in one of these 

 open spaces of water, but to shoot one in the open lake is 

 considered a big thing to do. We well remember how 

 we used to bang away at them in our Sandy River, then 

 in Kennebec county, in our boy days, with an old flint- 

 lock: and the loons seemed to consider it a pleasant ex- 

 citement to dodge our charge at the flash of our priming, 

 and we remember how our first percussion locks used to 

 deceive them and knock them over. We could some- 

 times get one by covering the lock of our old flinters with 

 our hats, so as to hide the flash. 



All frequenters of our lakes understand the vocal music 

 of the loon — sometimes rattling off their melody like the 

 small arms of infantry in a . battle, and at other times 

 uttering extremely mournful notes, making the heart of 

 the listener feel lonely and sad. 



These sounds, or noises, are generally taken up by loons 

 in different parts of the lake — all making the same kind 

 of noise — making the loneliness of a night in the forest 

 doubly lonely. One noise of the loon is very much like 

 the cry of the bear, and is the frequent scare of novices 

 and new comers in the lake country. 



The breeding of the loon is very interesting, as they 

 cannot walk on the land. Not having knee joints— only 

 one joint in their legs, which may be called the grip 

 joint— in order to approach the shore they help them- 

 selves with their wings. They sometimes lay their eggs 

 on the bare sand, in some locality where escape by water 

 is easy ; sometimes make a sort of nest of sticks and coarse 

 grasses on a hassock, sometimes on a point of land afford- 

 ing a view in different directions. They lay only two 

 eggs, one male and the other female. These are about the 

 size of a goose egg, blotched with black on a brown sur- 

 face. As soon as hatched the little ones take to the water, 

 and are capable of diving like the parent bird, but on the 

 approach of danger they jump on their mother's back 



and hang to her while she dives and swims away, remain- 

 ing a long time under water. 



The loons have the faculty of sighting the direction a 

 boat is going, then diving and going under water in an 

 opposite direction, so when they come up you are not 

 prepared for them, and they take breath and mark your 

 ocality and thus evade pursuit. They are half -amphibi- 

 ous, and can travel under water faster than on the sur- 

 face. I once drove one up a brook and followed in my 

 boat thinking I was sure of him, but near the headwater 

 he turned, dove and passed under my boat so swiftly that 

 I could only see a white streak of bubbles. I once caught 

 one in a trap set near her nest, and concluded to drown 

 her to ascertain the fact of her duration of life under 

 water. I held her under thirty minutes by my watch 

 before she stopped kicking. 



I once saw what appeared like two men rowing a boat 

 toward me as I stood on a sand beach at the end of a lake 

 in the wilderness early one morning, and being alone and 

 fifty miles, as I thought, from any human being, I 

 watched the supposed boat with intense interest. They 

 seemed to be rapidly approaching, but my eyes were 

 diverted an instant from them by something else, and 

 when I looked again the boat was not to be seen, but in 

 place of it were two loons swimming along common- 

 place enough. 



I accounted for the strange appearance as a mirage, 

 the same way that ships were seen approaching Rhode 

 Island in the time of the Revolution, but for a long time 

 I could not relieve my mind from a strange present m cut 

 of some unknown danger. 



The loons subsist entirely on fish, and are not very 

 particular in their choice of kinds. J. G. R. 



Bethel, Maine. 



FLORIDA CROCODILES AND BIRDS. 



CHICAGO, 111., June 27.— Dr. J. W. Velie, secretary 

 of the Academy of Sciences of this city, to-day 

 showed me some of the specimens collected by himself 

 in his last winter's Florida trip. Of these he values most 

 highly his crocodiles, of which he got twenty good speci- 

 mens, bringing back fifteen skins, four skeletons and one 

 five specimen. One mounted specimen, a very large 

 crocodile, measures 14ft., and the work upon it is very 

 good. Of course, every one will know that the crocodile 

 : s quite different from the alligator, and this difference 

 was very readily marked by the slightest comparison of 

 the specimens Dr. Velie has side by side. The crocodile 

 is lighter and greener in color, has an altogether differ- 

 ently shaped head and snout, and a far more vicious dis- 

 play of teeth, and is altogether uglier, if possible, than 

 the alligator. It is also more vicious, and drives the 

 alligator out of its territory. The specimens were secured 

 either with the Florida "grains" or with a harpoon in- 

 vented by Dr. Velie, which has a pivoted barb. The big 

 fellows made a long and hard fight. 



Dr. ^Velie was on this trip at the extreme southern 

 point of Florida, although he did not go off to the Keys. 

 He says that the plumage birds which were formerly so 

 plentiful in all that country are now practically exter- 

 minated, and he had the greatest difficulty in getting 

 even a few miserable specimens. The reddish egret is 

 now almost impossible to obtain there, and where he 

 once knew thousands of pelicans he now saw not one. 

 Mr. Batty and his sixty hired gunners for the feather 

 market, and the others of the same ilk, have done their 

 work well. E. Hough. 



Frogs' Food. — Westerly, R. I., July 1. — While out for 

 a day's fishing for bass June 30 the weather became so 

 unbearably hot and the fishing so poor that I turned my 

 attention to some frogs whose sonorous calls suggested 

 the prospects of an inviting breakfast at their expense. 

 Several large ones were secured, and while dressing 

 them I noticed the stomach of one considerably dis- 

 tended; upon opening it I uncoiled a striped snake meas- 

 uring 17in. in length. The snake was divided in the 

 middle and showed no signs of digestive action. — Edwin" 



R. Lewis, M.D H. P. U. writes from Lake Charles, 



La.: "I can add another stone to the cairn of testimony 

 as to the omnivorous appetite of the bullfrog. I shot one 

 the other day, and picking him up, saw something worm- 

 like hanging out of his mouth. Pulled it out, and found 

 it to be the remains of a young moccasin snake, eight 

 inches long. The head and neck were partially digested. 

 Body about the size of an ordinary lead-pencil. It 

 struck me that this was rather a reversal of the ordinary 

 law of nature. I have often seen snakes eat frogs, but 

 never expected to see the tables turned in this way." 



fame j§ag mtd 



PATTERN AND PENETRATION TESTS. 



Editor Forest and Stream: 



I am more than glad to see that my old and trusty 

 Forest and Stream is to take hold of the shotgun ques- 

 faon in its usual thorough fashion. You will prove much 

 and little. You will knock to flinders the pet theories of 

 many an old shotgun user, and you will not reach any 

 fixed and definite conclusions as to load and weight of 

 arm. Shotguns are much like human beings. What is 

 one man's food is another man's poison. A charge which 

 is in every way satisfactory in one gun is entirely out of 

 place in another arm of the same caliber and perhaps of 

 the same make. Why it is no arm maker can explain, 

 and all that a buyer has to do is to try a gun, try another, 

 and. another, until he gets. one out of which he can get 

 good work, and then hold on to the weapon. He may 

 use his fancy and his purse in getting this or that finish, 

 but the shooting qualities can only be determined by 

 trial, and it is this sort of trial which, I understand, 

 Forest and Si ream has started on in this series of tests. 

 1 am glad you did not make it a tournament, with a set 

 list of entries, a set time for starting and finishing, and a 

 boiled down report with a bare backbone of facts. 

 You give all the details and now it is in order for the 

 friends of this or that gun to take up the facts as given 

 and prove their preconceived notions, whfle such of us 

 as have no favorite among the guns on the market will 

 look over your series of reports, see the performances and 

 the records as given, and pick out a proper weapon. In 

 this way you are doing a great service for every gun 

 holder and prospective gun holder. I am glad you are 



doing all your work in the open. I would not give a 

 snap tor those pretty targets sent out with new guns 

 when the trials have been carried out in a garret range 

 or in a long shed where queer conditions prevail. 



I am glad that you have not allowed your judgment of 

 a gun to be founded on a single shot and that the charges 

 used are not given merely as stated by the gun man, but 

 that the labor of analysis has been undertaken to com- 

 plete the record. Permit me to suggest that you make 

 at some time a more distinct trial of charges by taking a 

 good standard gun and then going through the various 

 charges of powder — black, wood and Schultze — and of 

 the various brands, also with various weights and sizes 

 of shot. No doubt to some of the gunmakers your tests 

 will have a flavor of antiquity. They have been tried in 

 private for the benefit of the makers, and they have too 

 frequentlv good reason for keeping them private; but 

 yours is the first public trial taken on a scheme broad 

 enough to make your results standard for all time. 



Nick. 



New York, July 6. 



Editor Forest and Stream: 



The Forest and Stream is a welcome visitor and grows 

 better every week. The pattern and penetration tests 

 will be appreciated by all lovers of the gun, and will be 

 of great value in selecting a gun, as regards weight, bore, 

 length of barrel, etc. However, I think that all the pat- 

 terns should be made with the same make of shot, and, 

 if possible, wads and powder of same kind. Unless this 

 is done it wil l be hard to decide which is the best in pene- 

 tration, as while the charges of shot can be easily counted, 

 yet different makes of soft shot vary quite a little as to 

 hardness, and would, therefore, vary in penetration. S. 



Watertown, N. Y. . 



HOLDING ON AND AHEAD. 



Editor Forest and Stream: 



"Ancient," in his interesting article on "Cross Shots," 

 has, I believe, made a mistake regarding the velocity of 

 shot. A duck flying 60 miles an honr is at the rate of 

 88ft. per second, and a cross shot fired at 40yds. distant, 

 to hit that duck by aiming only 2yds.— 6ft.— ahead, would 

 need a velocity of 1.620ft. per second, 100ft. greater 

 velocity per second than the .45-70 U. S. Gov. rifle car- 

 tridge has on a dry day. 



With 4drs. ducking powder and Hoz, No. 6 shot, fired 

 from a No. 10 chokebore gun the shot— so a chronograph 

 says— will hardly attain a velocity of 900ft. a second, 

 which would take it -ft" of a second to go 40yds., which 

 would require the aim to kill that duck to be nearly 12ft. 

 ahead. 



Of course most of your readers who are wing shots 

 know that a moist barrel gives a greater velocity to the 

 projectile than a dry one, consequently the 3hot have 

 a greater velocity in a damp atmosphere than in a dry 

 one. Stanstead. 



["Ancient" does not assert that shot from an ordinary 

 weapon has an initial velocity of 1,620ft. per second. He 

 only assumed a rate of speed for illustration of the con- 

 dition of cross shooting and in opposition to those who 

 contend for centrifugal as well as projectile force as a 

 factor in determining the line of the charge. ';Stan- 

 stead" is approximately correct as to the rate of initial 

 velocity.] 



BEAR AND DEER IN NORTH CAROLINA. 



BELVIDERE, N. C, July 4.— The boys have "opened 

 the ball" by putting the brakes on one big old he 

 bear. For several weeks the bears have been preying 

 upon the farmers' pigs, and have been having it all their 

 own way, owing to the fact that the boys were very 

 busily engaged with farm work, and the swamps were 

 very wet: but about a week since bruin became a little 

 too high-toned, and thought he'd change his diet of pork 

 for one of juicy beefsteak, so he killed a fine yearling, 

 which, in the struggle, raised such a hullabaloo that the 

 boys concluded to investigate. They hastily got together 

 a crowd of dogs and went for the old "ragfoot." He 

 was too independent to run very much, and they soon 

 came upon him. But now came the trouble. The reeds 

 and bushes were fully 10ft. high and as thick as wheat 

 in a field, while the rain, which was falling at the time, 

 made everything dripping wet, and as most of the crowd 

 were armed with percussion guns (muzzleloaders), they 

 found, upon attempting to shoot the bear, that their guns 

 were as useless as so many sticks. Four of them at- 

 tempted to shoot at once, but only one Bred. This only 

 wounded the old chap, and he moved off again with dogs 

 and boys in pursuit. One daring fellow, John W., 

 rushed up to the bear after following him nearly a mile 

 and shoved his gun against the head of the ugly brute, 

 I pulled both triggers, and both barrels snapped. John 

 was alone at the time, with the exception of the dogs, 

 but he succeeded in turning the course of the game and 

 drove him back, when he passed near a young man who 

 carried a breechloader, which, when leveled, put a 

 couple of loads of "buck and ball" through Mr. Bruin's 

 corporosity, and forever quieted his longing for beef and 

 pork. He weighed about SOOlbs. 



The asininity of our legislative Solons in removing 

 the protecting law from our deer was fully demonstrated 

 a few weeks since, when some dogs chased a fine doe into 

 the river within gunshot of the town of Hertford, and a 

 party of men ivent out with boats and deliberately 

 knocked her on the head— "a la the Adirondack sports- 

 man." A few days later a large buck went the same 

 way and fared likewise. The doe was heavy with fawn. 

 Had the law been on I could have given the "hunters" 

 (God save the mark) a gentle reminder of the fact, by 

 way of a heavy fine. But since there is no protection for 

 deer east of the W. & W. Railroad they, like the "heathen 

 Chinee," must go. The same Legislature tried hard to 

 repeal the quail law, but I am happy to say there were 

 enough sportsmen interested in the subject to stop the 

 movement. 



I am afraid that the present wet season will have a 

 bad effect on the bird shooting next fall, as they are now 

 nesting, but lots of old birds went over from last fall, 

 and if no voting ones are raised we will still have some 

 shooting. * A. F. R. 



Forest and Stream, Bos 2,832, N. Y. city, has descriptive illus- 

 trated circulars of W. B. Leffln<weirs book, "Wild Fowl Shoot- 

 iDg," which will be mailed irec on. request. The book is pro- 

 nounced by "Nanit," "Gloan," "Dick Swiveller," "Sybillene" and 

 other competent authorities to be the best treatise on the subject 

 extant. 



