Forest and Stream. 



A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 



NEW YORK, SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 1893. 



For Prospectus and Advertising Rates see Page viii. 



The Forest and Stream is put to press 

 on Tuesdays. Correspondence intended for 

 publication should reach us by Mondays and 

 as much earlier as may be practicable. 



CUP DEFENDERS FROM A BUSINESS ASPECT. 



The popular verdict as to the success or failure of the 

 new class of yachts, indefinitely spoken of as the "90- 

 footers," "85-footers" and "Cup defenders," is likely to 

 hinge solely on the one issue of the retention or loss of 

 the trophy, as decided by the coming races with the 

 British boat Valkyrie. As these boats were built solely 

 for this purpose, such a test may be the true one; but 

 there is a much broader aspect of the question, and one 

 that is worthy of serious consideration at this time, when 

 yacht racing in the larger clubs is in a very unsatisfactory 

 condition. 



The new class rej^resents a larger outlay of money than 

 has ever before been spent in any one year, in round 

 numbers upward of half a million dollars, for construc- 

 tion, alterations and running exjienses up to the end of 

 the season; and the deduction which may be made from 

 this sum for the future value of the boats will be com- 

 paratively small. Whether the difference is or is not 

 too much to pay for the probable successful defense of 

 the Cuj) is a question that each of the members of the 

 various syndicates can decide for himself after the races 

 are over; but so far as the general advancement of 

 yachting is concerned, the results thus far are so dis- 

 appointing that even the defeat of Valkj^rie can hardly 

 make the class as a whole anything but a failure. 



With the races of the present week the yachting season 

 in the large clubs is practically over, the only remaining 

 events being the trial and Cup races and one or two 

 minor club races. The racing in the standard classes, as 

 shown in the regular regattas, has been dull and lifeless 

 in the extreme, a fact due to several other causes, but in 

 part to the centering of all interest in the Cup defenders. 

 Even without these new boats the season would have been 

 a dull one, the main feature being the schooners; but 

 with the Cup defenders to absorb the entire attention of 

 yachtsmen the other racing classes have fallen very flat. 

 With such racing of the big singlestickers as was seen in 

 1886 for instance, this would be a small matter; but the 

 sad fact is that while the new boats are larger, more pre- 

 tentious and far more costly than Puritan or Volunteer, 

 they have really done no racing throughout the whole of 

 the regular season; and now that the season is over yachts- 

 men must wait for the trial races and the Cup races to 

 know exactly how good or bad they both are. 



True, the public has been regaled by stories, now proved 

 largely fabulous, of the tremendous speed of each of the 

 four boats, but it was not until Aug. 7 that any attempt 

 at racing was made by them, and in the time that has 

 since intervened there has been just one race which was 

 worth the trouble of going out to see, the other abortive 

 attempts being merely disappointing. The possibilities 

 of the trial races are hardly more promising, and it is 

 now uncertain whether two, three or four boats will 

 start, and whether any thorough and conclusive test of 

 the merits of the whole four will result. 



In contrast to the empty results of the season on this 

 side, the racing abroad stands out in bright colors. Be- 

 ginning in the latter part of May, the quartette of big 

 new racers which parallel the Cup defenders has raced 

 steadily and persistently, from the Thames around the 

 south coast to the Mersey and the Clyde, across St. George's 

 Channel, and back for a month's hard racing off the Isle 

 of Wight. True, there have been mishaps and break- 

 downs in abundance; in many cases only two of the four 

 have been able to face the line at gmi-fire, the others 

 being in the dock or at the spar yard; but taken from 

 first to last, the British racing season of lS93not onlyj)uts 

 to shame the work done here this season, but surpasses in 

 number and importance the races in all previous seasons 

 in America. 



There would be no justification for pointing out so 

 prominently such unpleasant facts if no conclusions were 

 to follow and nothing could be learned; but in our opin- 

 ion there is one important conclusion that is indisputable, 

 namely, that American yachtsmen, in the confidence be- 

 gotten by past ti-iumphs, and with the national ambition 

 to excel aU creation, have lately gone ahead far too fast. 

 The material evidence of this fact is found in the many 



delays attending the new boats in construction, fitting out 

 and working up. Not only has the demand for material 

 exceeded the supply in many cases, but a very large part 

 of the work has been of an experimental nature, involv- 

 ing delay and an expense hitherto unheard of, as in the 

 case of the main boons. 



As all yachtsmen know, the mythical and nebulous 

 "90ft. class" had its excuse in the length of Genesta, the 

 challenger of 1885, necessitating the construction of a 

 defender of the same water line. Contrary to the views 

 of many experienced yachtsmen, we have from the first 

 held that the class was too large for the best interests of 

 American yachting, even from the standpoint of inter- 

 national competition, and we have repeatedly urged the 

 acceptance of the various opportunities offered for scaling 

 down the size to 80, 75 or even 70ft. Again and again 

 we have been met with the answer that the "90ft. class" 

 was the finest ever produced, and that it was destined to 

 become a permanent fixture in American yachting. 



Thus far the facts have borne out the truth of our pre- 

 dictions — the old Cup defenders have disappeared in the 

 schooner class, no new ones have been built in five suc- 

 cessive seasons; the boats built this year are produced to 

 meet a special emergency rather than to meet a legiti- 

 mate demand of yacht racing; so far from realizing the 

 long promised limit of 90ft. they are but 85ft., and even 

 at this size they have obviously overtaxed the abilities of 

 designei-s and artisans. 



Should the Cup be lost, the class must rank on all hands 

 as an utter failure, and even should it be retained by the 

 one yacht which now seems the inevitable choice of the 

 committee, it must be classed as a brilliant and partially 

 successful spurt rather than as a steady advance in design 

 and construction. 



In the estimation of those foremost in the Cup defense 

 of recent years, the larger size of yacht has always been 

 considered to give an advantage to America. We have 

 never fully agreed with this view in the past, and at the 

 present time we are convinced that if the Cup should be 

 lost it would be mainly because of the ambitious attempts 

 to do too much, to advance too rapidly. The opportunity 

 which has been so fully utilized abroad for thorough trial, 

 working up and alteration, has been entirely lost here, 

 and now, with the Cup races barely a month off, the Cup 

 defenders are hardly where they should have been by the 

 end of June. 



There is a fruitful field for thought in the enormously 

 increased expenses of yachting due to bronze bottoms, 

 built spars, steam tenders and other costly items which 

 will be essential to success in the future; and also in the 

 development of the syndicate in place of the individual 

 owner; but passing them by for the present we would 

 point out that yacht racing can never be totally disassoci- 

 ated from the plain common sense principles of ordinary 

 business, and that extravagance or unwise expenditure 

 at one time involves certain unpleasant consequences 

 sooner or later. 



While it may be presumptuous for outsiders to criticise 

 the manner in which the many owners of the present 

 boats have spent their money, with a full appreciation of 

 the spirit they have displayed, we venture the opinion 

 that the final good to national yachting, the end presum- 

 ably in view, will be by no means proportionate to the 

 unprecedented outlay. The standard of size and quahty 

 set this year, is so high that the attendant expense must 

 debar all but the wealthiest yachtsman from building in 

 the future, and must encourage the syndicate at the 

 expense of the individual owner. This is bad enough, 

 but in view of the certain disappointment which awaits 

 three out of every four boats built for Cup defense, it is 

 possible that the difficulty of making up new syndicates 

 may be materially increased, and that, especially in view 

 of the present business depression men will be unwilling 

 to repeat next year the vast outlay of this. 



At the present time it is impossible to forecast the 

 course of yachting next year, whether assuming that the 

 Cup will be kept or lost; but so far from the prospect of 

 any marked revival in yachting there are good groimds 

 for the belief that the legitimate growth and progress of 

 the next two or three years have been heavily mortgaged 

 to produce a special class of boats, several of which must 

 be classed as utter failures, and the best of which will be 

 practically worthless after the Cup races are over. 



The year has been prolific of game and fish legislation, 

 the current issue of the Garne Laics in Brief noting 

 changes in tweniy-fi.ve States, Territories and Provinces, 



AN OLD STORY IN MAINE WOODS. 



In the Neivs of Bangor the other day was printed the 

 diaiy of a man who had made a canoe trip from that city 

 to the Northwest Carry, and in the eleven days of the trip 

 claimed to have seen no less than twenty dead deer and 

 one dead moose which had been killed by August 

 butchers. We have been at some pains to learn the 

 authenticity of the diary, which is printed in another 

 column, and as a result of our inquiries we are disposed 

 to accept the report as a truthful picture of what may be 

 found in summer in some parts of the Maine woods. The 

 author of the diary, we have ascertained, was Benj. 

 Atwood, a game warden, of Winterport, and in addition 

 to the details given in the Netvs, we are told that he dis- 

 covered the identity of some of the butchers and has war- 

 rants for their arrest. 



Such a report as this of the midsummer destruction of 

 game in Maine, of moose and deer shot down in pure 

 wantonness, and of carcasses abandoned to rot at the 

 water's edge, has come to be an old story. It has been 

 told by a host of witnesses summer after summer for 

 years; and recently, as the supply of deer has increased, 

 as greater provocation has been offered, and as it has be- 

 come easy to commit such outrages, they have increased 

 in number and flagrance. There are more of them to-day 

 than ever before. The game commissioners have not 

 begun effectively to cope with the evil. 



SNAP SHOTS. 

 In old times the gunners who followed the shore for 

 bay-birds used to look about the last of August for an 

 easterly storm, which should bring along the flight, and 

 usually they were not disappointed. Sometimes an east 

 erly wind with a dense fog and heavy spatters of rain 

 would visit the coasts of New England and New York 

 and land on those shores many thousands of dough birds, 

 golden plover and dowitchers and other shore birds, 

 and for two or three days the shooting would be wonder- 

 fully good. Often at the end of a few mild still days the 

 wind would shift to the northwest and blow hard, and 

 then the birds would disappear, but from that time on 

 they would be found scattered along the coast from Long 

 Island to Virginia, in such numbers as to make the shoot- 

 ing good. Within the last two weeks we have had two 

 easterly storms of great violence, causing many wrecks 

 and great loss of life at sea and much damage on the 

 land. Such storms in old times would have been thought 

 likely to bring great flights of shore birds, but in these 

 two cases we know that the storms, instead of coming 

 from the northeast where the birds have been summer- 

 ing, were tropical cyclones which came from the south- 

 east, and thus we should not expect to find beach birds 

 coming with the storms, or following in their wakes. It 

 would be interesting to learn from gunners who have 

 been out since August 24 whether they have found any 

 considerable number of shore birds, what their bags have 

 been and what kinds of birds were most plenty. We 

 hope that our readers will report to us on these points. 



Salmon fishermen the world over owe a debt of grati' 

 tude to ]\Ir, J. Parker Whitney for his extremely interest* 

 ing accounts of sea fishing for salmon on the Pacific coast. 

 Though that fishing has been known for years to a 

 limited number of anglers, and though the Forest and 

 Stream has in past years given mention of the taking of 

 salmon by trolling in the Pacific, Mr. Whitney, as the 

 first one to exploit the sport in an adequate description 

 for the benefit of the guild, may fairly lay claim to its 

 discovery. Others may have known of it as the Norse- 

 men knew of America; Mr, Whitney has been the 

 Columbus to proclaim his discovery to the world, and to 

 command for it the attention it deserves. Another sea' 

 son will see a host of salmon anglers at Santa Cruz and 

 other points; and in time the Pacific coast devotees of 

 salt-water fishing for salmon may outnumber the neces^ 

 sarily restricted company of those Avho have opportunity 

 to seek the fish in the fresh waters of the East. 



The congress of fishculturists, fishermen and anglerS) 

 which is to convene in Chicago next month, gives prom- 

 ise of bringing together a notable assembly of men from 

 aU parts of the world. The scope of the discussionsj as 

 planned, is wide and comprehensive; leaders in the re- 

 spective fields have been invited to participate; and it is 

 probable that the conference wiU give a decided impulse 

 to tishculture in this country and abroad. 



