478 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



[July 2, 1891. 



the account of his arrest and trial, but this winter, wish- 

 ing to get a continuous and accurate account, I wrote Mr. 

 Darling about it. He also called during the winter, the 

 the first time I had seen him for many years. From his 

 letter and oral statement the following account is com- 

 piled. Full references were given me for substantiating 

 the different points, and I believe the account to be 

 correct. 



"At the time Stilwell sent McNamara to Nicato wis Lake 

 to get evidence against; me," he writes, "I had a sick 

 daughter in Massachusetts. I had been there to see her, 

 and the doctors told me that she could not live but a short 

 time. The rest of my family was there with her. I felt 

 so bad that I could not bear to stay there. I went home 

 and McNamara and S wanton came to my house and 

 wanted me to take them to Nicatowis, deer hunting. I 

 took them to the lake and stopped one day. They hired 

 each of them a guide and killed three deer. I killed one 

 the day I was there. They killed two on Sunday and I 

 went home Sunday. Before I went I saw them from the 

 house at the lake kill two. I sat on the steps of my door 

 and saw them shoot them. McNamara stopped two days 

 after I came down and hunted and then went directly to 

 Bangor, etc., and swore out four warrants for me and 

 several for other parties and then went to Milbridge and 

 got a warden and seven men all told and started for Nica- 

 towis. I was at home watching the mail and the telegraph, 

 expecting any moment to hear of the death of my daugh- 

 ter, when those men came. They told me that they had a 

 warrant for me for violation of the game laws. I told them 

 all right and I wished to see it. They would not, and 

 took out handcuffs. I told them that such things were 

 uncalled for, but they told me to have them on." 



In the conversation on the subject, Mr. Darling said 

 that he wished to go to the post office to get his mail, 

 being anxious to hear from his daughter. He was for- 

 bidden to have his mail at sll. He insisted upon it, and 

 at last was permitted to go, the officer of course ac- 

 companying. Some men about the post olfice wished to 

 remove the handcuffs, but he refused. He did, however, 

 ask one of them to go up to the lake that day, which was 

 done. 



'•They put them on," the letter continues, "and started 

 me for -Bangor with one man, and the rest went to the 

 lake. Vfhen I got to Olamon I demanded the warrant to 

 read it, I declined to go further until I read it." This 

 of course was simple enough. Had he wished to do it. 

 Darling could at any time have leaped from the open 

 wagon , and the officer would have been unable to secure 

 bis prisoner again. At last the warrant was given him, 

 "I read it. It was for killing four deer, and three 

 of them was killed by them while with their guides." At 

 Olamon they stopped for dinner. Mr. Darling requested 

 to have the liandcuffs removed while he ate. The officer 

 would not do it. He refused to eat unless it was done, 

 and for the third time that day the officer yielded. Before 

 this, however, a well-known man, whose name was given 

 me, not a resident of the place, offered to cut the link 

 with a cold chisel. '*But," writes Mr. Darling, "I wanted 

 to let those men show themselves in full and I would not 

 have them taken off, only when I ate dinner. I was taken 

 to the jail in Bangor on Friday ni.d;ht and held until 

 Monday, and then taken to BucksiDort for trial, fined for 

 killing four deer and keeping dogs in my possession, etc. 

 I have forgotten the amount of the fine, costs, etc., but I 

 appealed," 



The confinement in the Bangor jail for two days was 

 the worst part of the insult. Bail was offered by differ- 

 ent men whom he named, and could have been had to 

 any amount required; but it was refused. What possible 

 excuse could there be for this? The charge was only a 

 violation of the game laws; the fine at the most less than 

 the amount of ready money which the officers knew Mr. 

 Darling had in his possession; and unexceptional bail 

 could have been obtained to any amount. The fact that 

 the State was the prosecutor did not improve the situation. 

 Instead of prosecution, some declared that this was per- 

 secution. Of the foul condition of the jail at that time, 

 the insufficient food and the wretched quality of the 

 same, and the exposure to contagious disease, Mr' Darling 

 gave a full account, which has been fully confirmed by 

 others, among them Mr. Robert Jordan, the secretary of 

 the Bangor Y. M. C. A. 



On Monday Mr. Darling was taken to Bucksport, in 

 Hancock county, for trial before a trial justice. Why 

 this particular man was chosen, whether he was there at 

 the time or not, I cannot say, but he was not a trial 

 justice. He had been one formerly, but had lost his 

 commission by moving out of the county, from Bucks- 

 port to Bangor. There is no doubt of this, as it was to 

 have been one of the fundamental i)Dints of cases to be 

 brought against Darling in the Supreme Court. The 

 quality of the j ustice rendered can be seen from the fines 

 imposed for deer which Darling did not kill, but saw the 

 officers themselves kill on Sunday, which being close 

 time in this State, made them liable to the fine. The 

 fines and the costs, I am told, were made to amount to 

 over $f)Ou. In addition, as has already been said, the 

 warrants on which this was done were worthless. - Mc- 

 Namara was not a warden, and no one but a warden has 

 the right to prosecute in a game case until fourteen days 

 after the offense; according to section 18 (not quoted in 

 the Book of the Game Laws): "After fourteen days from 

 the commission of any offense hereinbefore named any 

 person may prosecute by action, complaint or indictment, 

 unless such warden or deputy has prosecuted therefor."' 

 Yet, McNamara swore out his warrants within a week of 

 the time that he first reached Nicatowis. 



At the Supreme Court at Ellsworth fom- complaints 

 were brought against Darling, one for using dogs and 

 three for killing deer. The latter were not McNamara's 

 original cases but others substituted for them. None of 

 these were tried, two being nol prosed and one quashed 

 as defective. The dog case was tried and the verdict given 

 in favor of the State. Now comes the much vexed question 

 whether Darling was fined or not. He paid $100, which is 

 the sum set as the maximum fine for keeping or using 

 dogs, but he paid no costs. The case was concluded on a 

 Saturday, the other cases were to be brought up the next 

 week. Whether they would have gone in favor of Dar- 

 ling or against him, whether he would have begun action 

 against his accusers for grounds which were certainly 

 good, cannot be told; for the judge and the counsel on 

 both sides after conference agreed to settle this case and 

 dismiss the others on payment of $100 without costs. Mr. 

 Darling rather reluctantly consented. He had two drives 

 of logs which needed his attention, as this was in April, 



and though he wished to bring the matter to a decisive 

 issue the lo?s would be more than the satisfaction to be 

 derived. Mr. Darling himself claims, and all those not 

 personally hostile to him grant, there was a settlement, 

 not a fine proper. "It may be entered on the docket at 

 Ellsworth as a fine," said his counsel, "I do not know: 

 but it satisfied all the cases and did not include costs." 



No game case that we have had, on which so much 

 depended, ever was so indecisive as this. It did nothing. 

 It is even a little uncertain whether Darling actually was 

 fined. He was found guilty of using dogs which no one 

 denied, but the possible effect of even this was neutralized 

 by the part which ]\IcNamara jilayed. He was to appear 

 before tlie April term of the Supreme Court as the princi- 

 pal witness against Darling; but at that time there was 

 some little doubt as to the value of his testimony. In 

 February, 1890. he was tried at Ellsworth on the charge 

 of perjury. "In summing up the evidence he [Judge 

 Eedman] charged that McNamara was an unprincipled 

 man working for money only, and unless he were 

 unished the life and property of any citizen was in 

 anger. Judge Clark held that there was probable cause 

 and ordered the defendant to furnish bonds in the sum of 

 |800 for his appearance at the April term of the Supreme 

 Court." But if he were convicted, Darling could not be; 

 if he were acquitted, unless by the fullest proof, his testi- 

 mony, whether true or untrue, would fail to affect the 

 public at large. Without entering into the details, it is 

 enough to say that by a disagreement of the jury Mc- 

 Namara was qualified to be sworn as witness in the 

 Darling case. 



We need not review the various points already given, 

 which combine to make this case unique among those 

 that are monumental for their injustices. The effect 

 upon a people who love to see fair play does not need to 

 be described; but more than anything else, what affected 

 those who had any interest in game matters, was that 

 the same might be tried at any time upon any one, 

 whether innocent or guilty. It was not Jonathan Dar- 

 ling who was ill treated, but every man against whom 

 there was ill will or from whom there could be any profit 

 derived. Had it been a matter of interpretation, this 

 would not have been so; the first case would be the last, 

 and no one need fear; but this case was a precedent of the 

 sort to be dreaded, a menace that the same might at any 

 time be repeated. Fannie Peaeson Hardy. 



Ottawa, Kansas, June 12. — A farmer in the next 

 county east of here was plowing in a field by the side of 

 a brush patch, and becoming tired he sat down on a 

 stump close to the brush to rest. In a few moments he 

 saw a fox slip out of the brush and catch a mole close by, 

 and it was soon followed by another fox, which tried to 

 take the prey from its mate. Finding that quarreling 

 over the prey was useless, the first fox, which was a 

 female, ran off and disappeared in the brush. Watching 

 carefully, the man saw where the fox went into the 

 brush, and on going to the spot found her lair. He re- 

 turned next day with some help and dug down to the 

 npst which contained eight young. As foxes are rare in 

 this part of the country he took them to town and dis- 

 posed of them very easily.— F. B. 



The Ideal Manufacturing Co. publish a very 

 useful handbook of their numerous loading tools, among 

 the new articles described being tools for loading rifle 

 cartridges, and adjustable moulds for patched bullets, a 

 bullet sizer and a loading flask. The flask holds fibs, 

 powder, and measures out the powder in any required 

 number of grains from 3 to 135; it is also graduated in 

 drams, from ^dr. to 5dr. The flask has many merits 

 which must insure its general adoption and use. The 

 handbook supplies a convenipnt table of dimensions of 

 round and grooved bullets as made by the several manu- 

 facturers for different arms; and there are useful hints 

 about loading and caring for firearms which every user 

 of a gun or rifle will do well to read. 



The Lefeter Arms Co., of Syracuse, N. Y., are out 

 with a handsome catalogue of their excellent guns. It 

 gives full list and descriptions of all the styles of the 

 Lefever guns, with many hints which will be valued by 

 gun users. Here is a way to load buckshot: "First put 

 in powder and wad as above, then procure shot of size 

 wanted, beina: careful to see that they chamber a little 

 loose in muzzle. Put in one layer of shot and fill cavities 

 with light, fine substance, like bone dust or fine sawdust, 

 and repeat till three layers are placed in shell. This pre- 

 vents the shot from swedging or getting out of shape 

 when leaving muzzle of gun and gives best results." 



Which is the Oldest New York Olxtb?— Oswego, 

 N. Y.— Some of the enthusiastic members of the Leather- 

 stocking Club of this city claim theirs was the first club 

 organized in this State for the protection of flsh and 

 game. This club .was organized March 20, 1860, with 

 these officers: Hon. David P, Brewster, President; Fred- 

 erick T, Carrington, First Vice-President; John Steven- 

 son, Second Vice-President; Dudley Forling, Secretary. 

 Will you kindly ask members of game clubs of the State 

 to forward to you the date of their organization, that it 

 may be determined whether this claim of seniority is well 

 founded ? — Osweg©. 



A New Hampshire Deer Case.— Berlin Falls, N. H., 

 June 15,— Frank Lang, Jr., and Spurgeon Lockhart, of 

 Milan, were arrested to-day, on complaint of Fish Com- 

 missioner Hodge, and brought before Judge Chamberlain. 

 Both pleaded guilty to killing one deer last March. Fines 

 and cost, $65, — Coos. 



J. F. Ives, formerly of Meriden, Conn., and well known 

 to Connecticut shooters, has accepted a position with Mr. 

 H, C, Squires, to take charge of his bicycle department. 



Northampton Quail. — If the writer who sent note on 

 quail served out of season in Northampton will supply 

 his name (not for print) the note will be published. 



Sunday Train to MomenCE. -The Chicago & Eastera Illinois 

 Railroad nlaced in service June 14 a Sunday train between Chicago 

 and Momenoe, leaving Chicago at 8:32 A. M., and returning: leave 

 Momenc© at S:45 P. M.. t,hu8 affording anglers a fine opportunity 

 to spend a day on the Kankakee River.— ^dv. 



m mjd ^iv^t Sashing. 



ThD full texts of the game flsh laws of all the States, 

 Territories and British Provinces are given in the ^ooTc of 

 the Game Laws. 



THE TROUT'S APPEAL. 



Don't visit the commonplace Winnepesauke, 

 Or the rivulet Onoqiiinapasekesasanognog, 

 Nor climb the summit of bare Moosilauke, 

 And look eastward toward the clear Umbagog. 



But come into Maine to the Welokenuebacook, 

 Or to the saucy little river Essiqualsagook, 

 Or still smaller stream of Ghlnquassabunticook, 

 Then visit me last on the great Anassgunticook. 



—Bangor Neivs. 



CASTALIA REVERIES. 



Eddtor Forest and Stream: 



I have not for a long time read so interesting a series 

 of articles as those of Mr, Hough, describing the most re- 

 markable trout preserve in the country, if not in the 

 world. It reads like a reverie of an active and gifted 

 mind. I had last season intended visiting this celebrated 

 preserTe with a view to the securing of immistakable 

 evidence of the success of one of my long-time pet ideas, 

 of the preservation of this matchless game and food fish. 

 Painful physical disability has thus far prevented the 

 much desired visit. My only opportunity of viewing the 

 celebrated stream has been from a train of cars. For 

 nearly forty years I have heard of these waters in con- 

 nection with trout, although Mr. Hough, jor perhaps more 

 properly some of the Castalia club members, ajipear to 

 think I am mistaken. In 1854 I became intimately ac- 

 quainted with Wm. J. May, at that time, I believe, city 

 editor of the Cleveland Herald. Late one afternoon he 

 came into my office and told me if 1 wished to see a nice 

 lot of my pet fish to visit a certain drug store fronting 

 the public square. I soon went to the store, and there 

 saw in a tray-shaped dish mixed with broken ice, some 

 fifteen or twenty (according to my present recollection) 

 brook trout that would average fibs. each. Dr. Ackley, 

 of the Cleveland Medical College, was present and show- 

 ing them to visitors, he having caught part of them. I 

 asked him where they were taken, and he replied that 

 Dr. Garlick and himself caught them in Cold Stream, 

 near Sandusky, and that they were in the habit of going 

 there every season, and always with success. This inci- 

 dent is as vividly impressed on my memory now as if it 

 occurred but yesterday, and with good reason, too, for 

 these two gentlemen were at that very time engaged in 

 the first successful effort in this country for the artificial 

 propagation of flsh (trout). And it was from that I re- 

 ceived my first practical lessons in the fascinating pur- 

 suit which I have ever since endeavored to keep fairly 

 abreast of. There is no possibility of my being mistaken 

 in this matter of the Dr. Ackley episode. 



And now I wish to say that Cold Stream and the Cas- 

 talia Stream are one and the same. And I will further 

 say, that I saw in Columbus last season some old men, 

 interested in the lake fisheries (as T subsequently learned), 

 and heard them say that there had been trout in that 

 stream as far back as they could remember, and that it 

 was no unusual thing to take them in nets off Sandusky. 

 I asked the member of the Legislature from that district 

 about it, and he told me that he was born and brought up 

 in that region, that there had been trout there from his 

 earliest i-ecollection, and that he had heard old people say 

 they were always there. Mr. Hough raised a query as to 

 my age. Well, I am on the shady side of sixty- five, and 

 I was only a student in "fishculture" when in Cleveland. 

 I lived in Ashtabula county in my bayhood days for sev- 

 eral years, some four miles from Lake Erie. On the 

 farm where I lived there were two pronounced ridges, 

 the lowest depression between being perhaps twenty feet 

 below the highest ridge and nearly half a mile from it. 

 In the edge of the mighty virgin forest then standing 

 there a large spring of the purest soft cold water bm-st 

 from the head of a shallow ravine, and passing along the 

 depression nearly due west, received accessions from 

 some smaller springs. The little stream thus formed 

 contained some wide places of perhaps eight or ten feet, 

 but in most places one could jump across it. It was 

 shaded by bushes most of its length after it left the forest, 

 and it emptied into Ashtabula Creek not more than a 

 mile from its source. This little stream contained brook 

 trout when I lived there fifty-five years ago. On a farm 

 adjoining this there lived at that time an old man named 

 Hill, the most remarkable hunter and fisherman in all the 

 region and a pioneer settler there. He sat by our fireside 

 many a long winter evening and told of his hunting and 

 fishing triumphs in the region about. I heard him say 

 that many of the small streams contained trout, but that 

 the clearing of the land was also clearing the streams of 

 trout; so it seems that fifty or more years ago, these 

 matchless students of nature, the old woodsmen, under- 

 stood the most prolific cause of depletion of trout streams. 

 W^hat was true then is true now, and to an increased ex- 

 tent, for the streams are not only raised in temperatm'e 

 to an extent fatal to trout, but they are also polluted in a 

 multitude of ways too numerous to mention here. 



How can we restore them ? By restoring the streams 

 to their primitive condition, and in no other manner. 

 This is the gospel that I have been preaching for fully fif- 

 teen years past and I have, in consequence, been denomi- 

 nated a crank on that subject. I still endure, however, 

 and have lived to see my oft-stated plans practically car- 

 ried out and with phenomenal success. Of course, there 

 are not many such locations, with accompanying condi- 

 tions existing, in ihis country as Castalia, but there are 

 numerous locations which approximate thereto and many 

 of them will some time be occupied by angling associa- 

 tions. I have in several instances been consulted by par- 

 ties who wished to organize movements of this kind and 

 I think Mr. Hough's valuable articles will be likely to 

 awaken an interest in this entirely practicable matter of 

 establishing trout preserves in accordance with nature's 

 matchless methods in many parts of the country, now 

 almost entirely depleted of trout and where hundreds of 

 thousands of dollars have been totally wasted by fish 

 commission methods. And I wish to again repeat here, 

 that artificial hatching, with all the attending trouble 

 and expense, is entirely unnecessary. 



I am writing this with physical discomfort, between in- 

 tervals of couch-rest. In conclusion, I wish to say, that 



