6 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



A DISASTROUS TRIP TO THE PARK. 



Editor Forest and Stream: 



For the benefit of persons -who may in some future 

 June be hoodwinked into Tisiting Yellowstone Park, I 

 should like to have you print the following statement. 



We were in Portland, 3,500 miles from home, Yellow- 

 stone Park was right in our path, and after much debate 

 and counting of pennies we went to the agent of the 

 Northern Pacific. "Certainly the Park is open," said he. 

 "You will have no trouble in getting in !" On the strength 

 of this assm-ance we invested flOO in tickets and started. 



Arrived at Livingston Friday. June 3, we set out for 

 Cinnabar in a chilly wind that speedily brought snow, and 

 the landscape from Cinnabar to Mammoth Hot Springs 

 was entirely iuvi^^ible. We could see the nearest span of 

 horses, and occasionally the leaders. Y/ e had on two 

 suits of woolens, and wished we had on a third when, 

 arrived at the Mammoth Hotel, we tried to warm our- 

 selves by the machine which passed for a steam-heater 

 in our room, 



"We can take you to the Upper Geyser Basin, but the 

 roads are not open to the cailon and tlie lake," coolly ex- 

 plained the manager of the transportation company that 

 evening, when we had returned from scrambling through 

 the snow about the springs. 



"But," we exclaimed, "we have come here under 

 promise to see the whole, and the Upper Geyser Basin is 

 but fifty miles of the way. Pray, what are we to get for 

 the part we cannot see; and if the roads are unsafe to the 

 lake and the canon, are they safe to the Upper Bisin?" 



''Oh, the roads are perfectly safe. As for reliate," the 

 manager scratched his head, "well, we'll allow you $B; 

 the hotels will probably allow you something for the un- 

 used tickets." 



"But fifty miles is but one-third of the way, and we 

 lose the grandest sights. Moreover, we were promised 

 that should we be unable to itse any part of our tickets 

 the money would be refunded," we expostulated. 



At last the manager agreed to give us $5. The hotel 

 management promised to refund dollar for dollar on un- 

 used meal tickets, and on Saturday, June 4, we set out 

 for Norris's. The hotel is burned, and we were to reach 

 there for dinner, and start on as soon as possible for the 

 Lower Basin. There were two Concord coaches. Each 

 one had ten passengers. Your correspondent sat beside 

 the driver on the box. Oa my right was a lady friend: 

 on my left the iron bar separated me from the driver. 



It was bright and beautiful, but the sunshine had this 

 drawback, it speedily revealed the fact that "the per- 

 fectly safe roads" were a series of quagmires. The melt- 

 i ng snow heaps and the rivulets tricKling from the heights 

 above ns had furrowed and guttered ux every direction. 

 The coach lurched and plunged from one hole to another 

 until we were about two miles from Norris's, when we 

 went over. How the driver sprang over me I do not 

 know. I clung desperately to the back of the seat not to 

 fall upon my companion, and I contrived to drop into 

 a huge mud puddle on one foot and one knee, with no 

 worse hurts than a sprained back and wrist. As the 

 coach went over, of course, the passengers fell forward 

 and across the neck of one and along the heads of the two 

 others, the top of the coach lay pinning them to the 

 earth. Had the four spirited horses moved a foot, held as 

 they were by the weight above them and the edge of the 

 coach top, they would have been terribly lacerated, if not 

 killed. My companion had been held by the boot, and 

 unable to help herself, had fallen heavily, and when, 

 shaking like a leaf myself, I got her on her feet, one mass 

 of mud, she turned violently ill. Three of the party 

 were unable to go on to the geysers. One of the ladies in 

 the coach was a mass of frightful bruises, and my com- 

 panion and another lady suffering from nervous fever. 



On our return to the Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel the 

 manager said blandly, "How unfortunate," and he 

 stoutly refused to give more than $5 to those visitors 

 unable because of the accident to go beyond the Fountain. 



"This place isn't fit for a human being to enter until 

 after July 1," said a U. S. officer to me at the Fountain. 

 "The appropriation for the repair of the roads does not 

 take effect until about that time, and our ride yesterday 

 into the Park was the hardest, one I've had since 1 was a 

 soldier. Even the cavalry horses were mired." 



We met a party from Yosemite on the train going east 

 from Livingston. One of them was regretting .she had not 

 taken in Yellowstone Park. "You wouldn't a got in," 

 said a young fellow who till then had been silent. "A 

 hotel clerk in Portland warned me not to try it. He said 

 the com]3any were selling tickets, though the Park was 

 not all open and the roads unsafe." "That cannot be so!" 

 exclaimed the young lady. But we put an elTectual end 

 to her unbelief. 



Before separating our party wrote a letter to Secretary 

 Noble calling his attention to the fact that the Yellow- 

 stone Association were selling tickets which they knew 

 could not be used in whole, and in part only at risk of 

 life and limb, and begging that in future the comjaany 

 shall be restrained from permitting tickets to be sold 

 when to peril from cold is added risk to bones; that in 

 fact since the Park is National property, its lessee's 

 rapacity be held in check by the National Government. 



For reply we have just received an assurance that "the 

 roads are being rapidly put in good condition." How 

 consoling this would be to the friend?, had one or more 

 of our party been killed! As the snow makes the roads 

 impassable each year, how safe will travelers be the first 

 of next June? 



"I'm a pretty good sleeper," said an old gentleman, 

 who, with his daughter, daughter-in-law and two grand- 

 chilcii-en traversed the road the day after we did, and re- 

 turned to the Mammoth Hot Springs at the same time. 

 "But," here he shook a slim fore-finger in the red face of 

 the manager, "I laid awake all night at the Fountain 

 House, thinking how glad I'd be to walk the forty miles 

 back if I could see you hung! Yes, sir, hung! A man 

 who will permit women and children to enter the Park 

 with the roads in their present condition, is an old 

 scoundrel!" 



We were thankful some one was able to find words ex- 

 pressive of our feelings, and we sincerely trust that so 

 long as the present greedy management continues, all 

 persons reading this letter will remember that they enter 

 the reservation June 1, with the j)08sibilities we have set 

 forth. Mountain roads will always be mountain roads, 

 and Mammoth Hot Springs lie high up on the eastern 

 slopes of the Rookies, Elizabeth Cumings. 



Tbbhb Hautb, Incl„ June 88, 



BONASA UMBELLUS, REX. 



KiKU by courtesy of all game birds and subject to no 

 authority whatsoever is the proud ruffed grouse of our 

 North American forest. 



Named by LinrsaBus after the wild ox, honasus, for his 

 roaring, and specified as umbellus hf^cause of the arrange- 

 ment of neck ornaments, he has received down through 

 cyclefulsof generations asti'ength and beauty un degener- 

 ate. From the pines and hemlocks of the ravine he in- 

 hales the spirit and the energy of his moods. The win- 

 tergreens and birches furnishing provender give spicy 

 life to his nerves and muscles. From the crags he adopts 

 the suggestion of ruggedness, and from the winter gale 

 cons music for his symj^hony by wings. The crash of the 

 falling dead tree involves an idea of death, and by oppo- 

 sites he rushes upward with startling roar to liberty and 

 life when found by the hunter. 



The Romance of a Grouse Family. 



Through a small south-facing valley in western New 

 York there runs a spring trout brook. Several years ago 

 the choppers cleared off the arm of woodland that ex- 

 tended from the main forest up along the stream, and 

 then the swale was quite barren except for the crooked 

 alders that had not been worth cutting, and for the fire- 

 weeds that always come to the temporary assistance of 

 newly cleared land. 



Gradually the sheep and cattle began to find pasturage 

 there, and two or three years later clumps of beech and 

 poplar saplings sprang up. Patches of briers then crowded 

 out the sparse grass, and here and there a thrifty green 

 hemlock arose near the stump of its deposed ancf stor, so 

 that the barren ground that had become pasture land was 

 tra.nsformed into a brush lot. 



One Sunday morning in May the sun shone warmly in 

 upon the budding saplings of the swale. The naiads of 

 the brook murmured with hushed voices and the trailing 

 arbutus which overhung the bank gave out a rarer frag- 

 rance than it would have done on any rude week day. 

 Hardly a sound was heard save the wandering tones of 

 the church bell in the far-off village, and the only appre- 

 ciable motion of the air was in the gentle breaths that 

 rise almost imperceptibly from the warming soil of quiet 

 glades. 



With almost noiseless footsteps a demure hen grouse 

 walked from the edge of the thick moist woods and 

 stopped for a moment a little way out in the brush lot. 

 Again she went on and again paused, looked about her 

 and listened, with one foot daintily lifted from the 

 ground. So by degrees she advanced out among the 

 saplings, her head gracefully moving back and forth in 

 unison with her footsteps and the pretty brown neck 

 feathers gliding so softly over each other that they 

 seemed like one warp and woof of silk. Stepping upon the 

 gnarled root of a rough lichen-covered stump she glanced 

 over her own smooth outlines and the bright hazel eye 

 looked the satisfaction of the comparison, but yet she 

 could not resist the feminine impulse to rearrange several 

 feathers that were already perfectly in place. 



All at once she. gave a start, and with upsiretched neck 

 and elevated crest assumed an attitude of strictest atten- 

 tion, for from a distant point in the forest there had come 

 to her ears a low sound like mulfled drum beats, the 

 strokes first slow, then faster and ending finally in a 

 long tattoo. 



Poised upon the root with partly opened wings, she 

 seemed almost ready to fly in the direction from which 

 the sound came, but suddenly remembering herself the 

 wings were closed again and her head dropped bashfully 

 until the echoless drum beat once more sounded through 

 the woods. It was the love call of Old Ironsides, a noble 

 cock grouse that we had so named because of his seeming 

 impenetrability to the shot that had been fired at him 

 time and again in the lower ravine where he chose to 

 spend most of his time. E»ay after day the hen grouse 

 had listened for that call knowing that Old Ironsides 

 would come iii the spring time to find her, and now 

 should she fly impetuously to him and let him know her 

 impatience at his delay? Oh no! The annals of feminine 

 nature contain no history of such rash action, so taking 

 an easy running jump into the air she flew very quietly 

 among the trunks of the big trees of the woods and then 

 on curving wings mailed slowly near the ground to a 

 point somewhere in his vicinity, and alighting waited for 

 further summons. The roll call sounded again, and she 

 the only musterer walked half hesitatingly in the direc- 

 tion from which it came, sliding quietly as a mouse be- 

 hind boulders and thick kalmia bushes, and looking as 

 unconcerned as you please. 



At last he was in sight. High upon the prostrate trunk 

 of a huge storm-riven pine he was pacing slowly to and 

 fro with martial bearing, his proud prest raised, his 

 broad tail partially spread, and all his feathers glinting 

 in the lights of the woods. 



The hen grouse was not many rods away, gliding 

 stealthily from one hiding place to another, hoping that 

 he would discover her and yet nor daring to lose any of 

 her reserve. How she did want to pull his black ruffs 

 though, and strike him petulantly with her bill and pre- 

 tend to be real angry at nim for rough play ! 



For a moment Old Ironsides stopped his incessant 

 pacing, glanced into the thicket on one side and on the 

 other, and then drawing his feathers tightly together and 

 standing perfectly erect upon the log, his sturdy wings 

 were struck repeatedly against his sides, sending forth 

 the long vibrations of a tone so low that it seemed to roll 

 along the ground rather than penetrate the upper air, but 

 with such initial velocity, nevertheless, that it rolled half 

 a mile out of the woods before losing itself in the grassy 

 fields. How grand the old warrior looked to the hen 

 grouse. But what if he should become impatient and fly 

 elsewhere to seek her and not return for a long week? 

 No one will ever know whether she xjurpoaely stepped 

 upon the small dead stick that snapped and revealed her 

 presence just then, but who is prepared to deny a motive 

 for the seemingly accidental movement of a dumb ani- 

 mal on such an occasion, the wished for result being ob- 

 tained? 



She was discovered and he was by her side. Coyly she 

 stepped away from him, and then to gain further ad- 

 miration, which was all unnecessary, he spread his great 



barred tail widely over his back, unfolded the iridescent 

 black ruffs until they concealed his shoulders, dropped 

 his curved wing tips to the ground, elevated his pointed 

 crest, and with curved neck circled and pirciietted about 

 her, nodding his head, fixing his strong, bold eye upon 

 her modest one, and stepping in front of her to head off 

 retreat, in such an exasperating way that it seemed as 

 though she certainly would scream. 



He would not have made any such pretentious move- 

 ments if other ccck grouse had been about to criticise him, 

 and how the other hen grouse would have been amu-ed 

 at her assumption of simplicity and gentleness. She who 

 was the boldest of all when associating with others of 

 her own sex, and who could roar as loudly with her 

 wings as any cock grouse when trying to unnerve an 

 enemy. 



But who could doubt that all of this display on his part 

 meant that he was assuring her that he would be. oh! so 

 true and loyal forever and forever? She believed in him 

 most sincerely, and loving and respecting tried hard to 

 avoid being annoyed at his overplus of attention. 



It was not long afterward, however, that he acted in a 

 rather independent manner and took little interest in 

 family affairs, so that when in June there was a nest of 

 ten eggs by the side of a clematis-covered stump out at 

 the edge of the brush lot, Old Ironsides was either drum- 

 ming again in another woods altogether, or he was asso- 

 ciating with two or three chummy reprobates of his own 

 sex during the livelong day. 



The hen grouse took great comfort with her eggs 

 though. Six of them were plain buff colored, and four 

 of them were marked with light brown spots, and all 

 were smooth and snug-fitting in the nest. Around about 

 the nest she scratched some dry, loose beech leaves which 

 could be whisked over the eggs in an instant with one 

 movement of her wings in event of surprise by a ma- 

 rauder, and then being almost of the color of dead leaves 

 herself, she could hardly be seen when she snuggled 

 cosily down o^er the eggs and drew her head in closely. 

 It seems too bad to think that after all this pains the 

 mother bird might be discovered in her hiding place, 

 alone and unprotected as she was. One evening a red 

 fox trotted past, and when near the nest he stopped and 

 sniffed the air, twisting the sharp tip of his nose from one 

 side to the other, and alternately spreading and closing 

 his whiskers, but he could not quite locate the gentle 

 prey, and his attention was finally attracted elsewhere 

 by a little squeaking evening mouse that had fallen 

 from the soft cedar bark nest in the wild grapevine 

 near by. 



The noiseless swoop of a great ogre-eyed horned owl 

 gave the mother grouse a cruel heart thumping one moon- 

 light night just as she had almost dared to take a little 

 nap; but the owl had dived for a gray rabbit, and did not 

 suspect that a grouse was within easy reach, Why it was 

 that the minks and skunks and weasels and raccoons 

 and box turtles and blacksnakes did not find the nest is a 

 mystery; but there is some strange protection afforded ly 

 nature for ground-nesting birds. Perhaps there is a cer- 

 tain sense of honor among predaceous animals. Hounds 

 are disinclined to chase a nursing she-fox, and it may be 

 that minks know better than to destroy the eggs that 

 make the golden geese, although we do know that they 

 are sometimes absent-minded in their morals. The only 

 enemy that found the nest after all was a farmer's boy, 

 and he did it quite accidentally by stepping so near the 

 old bird on his way home from the trout brook that she 

 was forced to fly out. The boy's first impulse was to 

 leave the eggs undisturbed except for the turning that 

 was absolutely necessary for an accurate count, btit sud- 

 denly remembering that there was a "settin' hen" under 

 the old wagon in the woodshed at home, he smiled a 

 salute of thanks to his memory, and with well-meaning 

 but rather thick- fingered caution that would have made 

 most of us a little nervous if they had been our eggs, he 

 rolled up two of the precious oval treasures in a youthful 

 fisherman's Saturday afternoon handerchief, and tucking 

 them carefully away in a side pocket trudged rather un- 

 steadily over the stones as his mind became occupied with 

 the thought of having two live grouse at home that would 

 respond to his kindly eiforts to tame them. At intervals 

 he regretted that he had not taken two more of the eggs; 

 but his conscience was quieter at knowing that the mother 

 bird could bear two pangs more easily than four when 

 she returned to the nest again. 



For sixteen long days the mother grouse had been sit- 

 ting, and she anxiously awaited the welcome sound of a 

 little one tapping at the shell for release. While she 

 had been waiting the blood roots and dog-tooth violets 

 had dropped their petals, the white cornel flowers had 

 turned to a feeble fading pink, the hepaticas and 

 anemones become dingy, and in their places the azaleas 

 and trilliums came out in full spousal array. The ferns, 

 which fought their way through the resisting cold 

 ground with clenched fiats, had now unfolded a gener- 

 ous wealth of fronds under the influence of a spring- 

 time sun which brought harmony for all nature with its 

 presence. 



The patient bird had seen the hosts of warblers proceed 

 bush by bush and tree by tree from the southland toward 

 the northland, and it was time for her brood to appear. 

 When at last she heard a faint tip -tapping and saw a 

 movement through a long crack in one egg, it was not 

 long before the gentle aid of her bill had released a cun- 

 ning little yellow and brown head. Then a small strug- 

 gling wing appeared, and out tumbled a dear downy 

 chick of a grouse. One after another the eight young 

 birds escaped, and one of them in his hurry to be in the 

 world with us ran around as soon as his legs protruded ; 

 and comical enough he looked with the broken shell 

 clinging to his back. 



At about this time the old hen over at the farmhouse 

 found under her feathers two chickeris that were smaller 

 than any that she had ever seen before, and they were 

 ahead of any calculations that she may liave made as to 

 time; but she felt fully responsible for them, never- 

 theless, and was disturbed because they ran away 

 from her sheltering wings and only returned to her 

 most persistent clucking. The boy, who had been 

 attracted by the solicitous calls of the hen, caught 

 one of the agile scampering balls of down in his 

 hand and held it up to admire the bright eyes and tiny 

 bill that were thrust through between his fingers; but the 

 little feet clutched his fingers so tightly, and the small 

 heart throbbed so fast, that in pity he put the grouse 

 chicken quickly down by the old hen again. What trans- 

 formation a little warmth had wrought in the cold sepse- 



