Oct. 28, 1893.] 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



868 



the birds figured, needed a plentiful admixture of thinly 

 sliced salt pork — that magmim bonuni in the seasoning 

 line— to fill the bill perfectly. 



Gorgeous swells in their way, the quail here were in- 

 deed something very fetching to the Easterner, And. it 

 was the distinguishing boon of the locality to be stocked 

 with both sorts of the representatives of the race common 

 to our middle Pacific Coast, and which as all men know, 

 head the quail roster in point of grace of contour and 

 charm of costume under the names of the mountain and 

 the valley quail. 



Of these two exquisites the former was the more plenti- 

 fully met with, the generally sub-alpine character of the 

 district suiting its idiosyncracies to a dot. But the latter 

 was no stronger in the locality, although the lead numer- 

 ically was decidedly with its rival; lower latitudes and 

 regions of the true valley stamp (as its name would imply) 

 being its special choice in the residence line. Both species 

 were emphatically birds of the cover. If they sought the 

 open it was in furtherance of some fresh scheme edible or 

 potable in its bearing, which in a way took them out of 

 themselves. It was of course while on their rounds under- 

 taken in this spirit that they took the stubble in. But in 

 doing this they kept their minds well on the alert to study 

 prudence in connection with their comestible ventm-e, 

 and so restricted their visitations to the place to one par- 

 ticular part of it where a closely contiguous thicket of 

 plum brush afforded a readily reached secure asylum 

 from inimical attack. 



As yet the bevies of either species were made up of the 

 old birds and their progeny for the year. In point of 

 growth, however, the juveniles were almost the equals of 

 their elders. It was only when their attire was studied, 

 that the yotmg fry were observed to figure in a less telling 

 way than their papas and mammas. 



The quivers of the mated pairs of either breed were 

 abundantly full m the true family fashion, the broods 

 numbei-ing at the lowest from twenty to thirty buds and 

 sprigs. Strict non intercourse was the abiding rule with 

 these tribes and on which score the blackbirds read them 

 a signally improving lesson. Sociability of the franker 

 sort, as it must be conceded, is a flower needing a trustier 

 form of gentleness to give it bu-th. The subjects of our 

 present notice had evidently a long road before them to 

 travel ere they would have done with feral oiSshness 

 and. distrust. 



Whether as rimners or flyers, there was no shortcom- 

 ing on the part of the birds of either kind, of whatever 

 age. But be the reason what it may, they preferred to 

 leg it in parting company with us as we sought to en- 

 treat them cartridgewise. This unaccommodating and 

 foxy mode of dealing with us as good as spoiled om' 

 game. What we were required to hit might be likened 

 to a lightntng streak fleeting across a few yards of the 

 earth and then suddenly breaking ofi' and vanishing 

 utterly. Is it any wonder, then, that we came out a long 

 way scond best in the tussle? Yet in spite of the fearful 

 odds against which westi'ove, we now and then succeeded 

 in making a shot count, and scored even the smallest of 

 these triumphs with not a little hullabaloo, as the eating 

 afforded by these bipeds at this particular stage of the 

 season was simply ravishing. 



Our quest usually wound up with a side stretch of about 

 half a mile in length, made from the stubble to the lake 

 shore. The hopes of getting in a little telling work 

 among the blue-winged teal was the incentive by which 

 we were moved to this proceeding. The fowl in question 

 as everybody knows, is a genuine delicacy, gastronomically 

 speaking, more particularly when its development is due 

 to fresh-water influences. 



The species is an abundant summer resident in Big 

 Klamath Lake, being seen here in all stages of its career, 

 from a smaU ball of yellowish fluff to the well known suit 

 of buff and blue. In these riper summer days the juve- 

 niles of the race were just passing out of the flapper 

 stage, which is equivalent to saying that they made a 

 first-rate dish, if not altogether as good as they would be 

 later, when they had reached their full growth and were 

 fatter. 



Our pm*suit of the creatures gave us lots of fun. The 

 scene of the chase being the body of the lake, we took 

 after them of course in a boat. The labor of rowing fell 

 to the lot of the boys, the writer putting this job on them 

 very coolly, holding it to be his special privilege to take 

 his place ma jestically at the stern and do the popping. 



We generally found the birds feeding among the lily 

 pads; abundant growths of which were distributed in 

 many parts of the lake, and constituting a singular inter- 

 esting feature thereof. As the creatures noted our 

 approach they, of course, scuttled off. The old birds 

 withdi'ew in due order on the wing, while the younger 

 fry sought to be rid of us by a natatorial scramble. 



It was most generally the latter that were to be most 

 opportunely attacked by us. The closing in upon them 

 of necessity involved a deal of racing on our part, and 

 which always had its hot incidents of tm'ning the boat 

 in the space of its own length in a hurry, being stranded 

 on a snag and getting off again all in a fume, partially 

 upsetting, and so forth. When the quarry was at last 

 brought within range, as it offered a mark zig-zagging 

 in every conceivable direction, and at the best with but 

 its head in full sight, a direct crisis, as is obvious, 

 was reached, that in a small way, but decidedly for all 

 that, put the shooter on bis true nerve to make good 

 his aim. 



Now and then in the pursuit of the teal here, we came 

 across other ducks — the spoonbill and ruddy ducks among 

 them — but none in sufficient plentifulness to invest us 

 with the honor of a genuine acquaintance with them 

 either prandially or in any other guise. The lake was 

 also the summer home of other fowl not generally held in 

 esteem as a form of sustenance with civilized humanity. 

 These were gulls and terns of sundry sorts, cormorants, 

 and over and above all pelicans. These latter dignitaries 

 are worthy of an amply free notice commensurate with 

 their breadth of character and bodily bigness. But here 

 is no place for the work, and we have no option but to 

 conclude. W. L. Tiffany. 



Arkansas Promises Well. 



Little Rock, Oct. 15. — Our quail crop is unusually 

 large this year, but birds are small yet. Our fall flight of 

 ducks is on now. Also large flocks of geese are seen 

 going south. Have enjoyed some fine wood duck shoot- 

 ing, and have bagged a number of mallards, teal, sprig- 

 tail and blucbills. We have good mast this year and 

 expect good duck shooting. Jos. Ibwin. 



A VIRGINIA TURKEY HUNT. 



Sycamoke Lodge, Va.— Thinking that one of your 

 many readers might be interested and some of the uniti- 

 atad instructed in one of the sports that is so fast becom- 

 ing rare, I give a short account of a turkey hunt which 

 took place in Brunswick county near Lawrenceville, the 

 county seat, on the southern border of the State, There 

 is an abundance of large game, deer and turkey, as well 

 as quail, aU through that section. Accompanied by three 

 friends I started out one December morning, our inten- 

 tion being first to bag a buck. The weather was crisp and 

 clear (just suited for the sport), with frost to make it 

 damp enough for the dogs to scent weU. 



We foimd no trouble in starting the game, but as aU 

 deer hunters will testffy, the buck often runs the wrong 

 way — which was the case with us, the deer coming nearly 

 close enough for a shot to two of our party, and the hounds 

 taking it to the river in short order. So at 1 o'clock we 

 turned om- attention to turkeys with more success. We 

 hunt turkeys with setters or pointers, which are the best 

 because they do not open on the track, and are able to get 

 well on to a flock of turkeys without being heard, so that 

 they can the more effectually flush and scatter them, 

 which is absolutely necessary for success. 



We started out on horseback, separating in a short 

 while, and going two and two, more easily to cover the 

 ground, and giving our dogs a wider range. We had 

 proceeded a little over a mile through woods and fields 

 when we heard our friends call to "look out." We knew 

 they had found the game, and about the same time our 

 dog started a flock of five gobblers close to us in another 

 direction. Our friends had come up with about 20 hen 

 turkeys feeding in a cornfield, and as a turkey needs never 

 to be told of your presence when you are in sight, they 

 immediately rose and flew across a field about 400yd8., 

 and not scattered, coming down all together. We quickly 

 put our dogs. Bob and Topsy, after them, and they got 

 them up again in fine style, putting them up in the big 

 pines in every direction. 



It being then about 4 o'clock, and knowing the birds 

 would not call together before morning, we began pre- 

 paring for that time by making new blinds for our visit- 

 ing friends, in the direction we thought most of the flock 

 had flown. Our friends did not know the use of a call, so 

 we purposed placing them so as to get shots at turkeys 

 coming to the calls of Mr. B. and myself. After finishing 

 the new blinds we made arrangements for our meeting 

 the next morning. Just as we separated a very fine tm-- 

 key dashed out of a tree almost over our friends, but it 

 being so unexpected he got out of range of successful 

 shot, though one of us fired at it as it went off. 



The following morning we met our friends at the ap- 

 pouQted time, 6 o'clock sharp, and went to the positions 

 chosen the previous evening. I made a blind on the line 

 of a fence in a corner, stopping the cracks with dried 

 leaves and pine bark. Mr, B. went on about a quarter of 

 a mile from me on the same fence, I had not been in the 

 blind more than five minutes before, making a call, I was 

 at once answered by a young hen, which ran up in easy 

 range, and which I bagged after a little run with my dog. 

 I broke a wing, and without a dog would have had to give 

 a lively chase. 



I continued calling at intervals, and in about half an 

 hour was again put on the sharp lookout by hearing a 

 well-known duck or put close at hand. Looking care- 

 fully out I discovered two turkeys coming rapidly toward 

 me, but so far apart as to make a single shot'kill both 

 impossible. Quickly deciding (as must always be done 

 in turkey shooting), I shot down the one furthest off, 

 intending to get the other on the rise; but there was so 

 much amoke that I could not see; and both turkeys got 

 off together. Knowing that the range had been all right, 

 and seeing feathers, I listened for a fall and thought I 

 heard it. I had then had two shots with nothing heard 

 from my friends; and it seemed that they "would not be 

 in it." But I did not have to wait long before a turkey 

 flew directly over one of our visitors, about 30ft. above his 

 head; but being engaged in eating his lunch he missed 

 it. After another short interval I heard a shot in the 

 dhection of Mr. B., and counted on another turkey, 

 and not in vain, as he had called up and killed the old 

 hen of the flock. After waiting patiently for half an 

 horn- I heard another call; and quickly answering laid 

 down my call and got readj^ to start, which I had to do 

 in about a couple of minutes, another hen coming up 

 directly in front, which I killed dead in her ti-acks. 



I then had two tm'rkeys in the blind, and after waiting 

 some time and hearing no more calls, we whistled our- 

 selves together and began search for the tm-key which 

 had flown off after being shot. Having gotten the com-se 

 pretty well and feehng confident that she had not 

 swerved, we went straight for about 150yds, , when one 

 of our friends a httle in advance called out: "Here she 

 is," And sure enough to my delight there she lay, liav- 

 ing fallen dead, as I thought I had heard at the time. 



After dividing spoils, having a turkey each, we made 

 our way home, well pleased with our day's sport, and 

 promising to repeat the same about Christmas. 



Some of your readers may recognize my friend Mr. B, 

 and his dog Old Bob, as their companions in some of their 

 past visits to our parts. Virginian. 



One of the Incidents that Linger in Memory. 



Forest and Stream has had many accounts of first 

 shots at game. The fond recollection of that event in 

 my own experience is as fresh in my mind to-day as if 

 it had occvirred but yesterday. 



My musket was not a celebrated one, in fact it was 

 sans tradition, sans pedigree, sans almost everything — 

 even a ramrod. This I remember distinctly; for I could 

 not load the old thing untU. I had manufactured one with 

 my old "Barlow." If that pai-ticular gun had been 

 through any celebrated battles I never heard of it; but 

 it possessed just as many attractions for me then as if it 

 ha^ been a relic of Bvmker Hfll. But this it might have 

 been for all I know, 'twas certainly old enough, 



I hved near the little town of Camden, Ohio, and was 

 about ten years of age at the time of this exploit. That 

 was many years ago — I don't just like to tell how many, 

 for fear I inight be considered an old man now, and I had 

 been brought up, as most well-regulated boys were in 

 those days, to keep my hands off firearms of all kinds. 

 But, like all boys, my memory was very short when my 

 mother's back was turned, and I lost no time in sneaking 

 that old musket and making for the woods, I loaded it 

 with great ugly slugs of my own make; and the rami'od, 



as a matter of convenience in carrying, was left inside 

 the barrel. As I went marching up the lane and feeling 

 very big and very brave, I soon spied a solitary yeUow- 

 hammer and quickly squared myself into position to fire. 

 As the musket was entirely too heavy for me, big as I 

 was, it had to be supported across a rail of the old worm 

 fence. Then I pulled. In the excitement of the moment 

 I had forgotten to remove the ramx-od, and when I pulled 

 the trigger the gun refused to go in the right direction, 

 but set up a mighty back-action sizzle that frightened 

 me nearly out of my skin, and, throwing the thing upon 

 the groimd, I went off myself, and I was not at all slow 

 in doing it either, I waited a long time to make sure 

 that it would be safe, then went back and picked up the 

 musket. But the yeUowhammer wasn't there; I never 

 saw him afterward. The ramrod was aU right, just 

 where I had left it, inside the barrel, and it requu-ed the 

 services of the village blacksmith to extract it. H. R. 



SEEN AT THE FAIR, 



Your very good Mr. Hough has much to say about the 

 Fair, but may a word not be said by some of your readers 

 about it? He says So and So has been at the Forest and 

 Stream exhibit, annexed to which is the Fisheries Build- 

 ing, but of course he cannot know what So and So has 

 been a-doing. Now, when I left home Mrs. Kennedy 

 who had already been to the Fair, said to me, "Now 

 George, keep off the Midway," And so, as soon as I goi 

 inside the grounds, I went to see what there was about 

 the Midway that made my presence there inimical to it. 

 I found nothing, I mean that I found nothing that I 

 could harm or destroy, I was put out at about 12 o'clock 

 that night, and before seeking my cot (N. B. — Eecent visit- 

 ors to the Fair wiU understand this is no poetic allusion), 

 I snatched time to write a postal home to assure my family 

 that I was off the Midway. I also observed that as I was 

 only to remain a week I hoped to finish that department 

 of the Columbian celebration in time to devote the last 

 day of my stay to what was on the other side of the 

 track. 



I believe I have never yet put my awkward pen to pa- 

 per in the interest of anybody's firearms, and I never will, 

 because I have nothing against any of them. But wan- 

 dering through the gun precincts my eye fell on one of the 

 repeating shotgims, the merits of which you devote 

 some space to in your paper, possibly for hire, and I feel 

 called upon to warn all your "gentlemen of the hunt" 

 against them. You can put one up to your shoulder and 

 pull a httle on the pistol grip after you have pulled the 

 trigger and the miserable thing gets itself loaded and 

 cocked again and you never get off your aim a fraction of 

 a second. All a person (I say a person) would have to do 

 would be to wave the muzzle around a Httle while he was 

 a working it and it would cover all the territory in range 

 of his vision. You could turn an organ-grinder's bald-faced 

 monkey loose with an arm like that and he would be kill- 

 ing jacksnipe and green- wing teal with it in two days' 

 practice, I can't see why some real intelligent man don't 

 patent a wood duck twine binder that can be driven along 

 the township roads and harvest aU the wood ducks on 

 either side for two miles back and do them up in family 

 and restaurant bunches. Separate gear wheels for total 

 quail or chicken extermination. Fellow Foresters (and 

 oh, the alchemy of the name of our national patron saint 

 of the gentlemen of the hunt), I speak in seeming jest, 

 and yet I leave it to each of you to decide how much fool- 

 ishness there is in my thought. You have in a few short 

 years killed the destructive 10-gauge as dead as though 

 you had used an ounce and a quarter of shot and five 

 drams of powder. Kill the magazine shotgun. 



Hunting rabbits with ferrets; chasing deer into lakes 

 with hounds and then shooting them while the guide holds 

 them by their tails; making glue out of eggs stolen from 

 mother wild ducks; shooting prairie chickens in July — are 

 all characteristic methods of slaughter by that vandal 

 called by the more truly distinctive title of game hog. 

 He needs two things more — an electric motor to hurry him 

 from one holocaust to another and a shotgun mitrailleuse. 

 It is not my province to speak for the Forest and Stream, 

 nor its to apologize for me. It advertises guns. It caters 

 to sportsmen. But it is not to its advertisements it owes 

 its prestige, nor yet to its catering to sportsmen. It owes 

 it to its adherence to certain principles; and it will not let 

 go of them if it knows it. One's principles are the essence 

 of one's vitality. But if we are to have a perpetual class 

 of American sportsmen to keep alive the blessed gospel of 

 rest, we must try and enable the general public to prop- 

 erly categorize the game hog and his weapons. Some- 

 times he is a foreigner to our aoil, in bis fatherland 

 accounted too low caste to be intrusted with a gun, whose 

 swelling New World freedom finds vent in prowling the 

 suburbs with a fowling piece and killing a rabbit in sea- 

 son and all things else out of season. Sometime he is a 

 titled and gentlemanly -appearing foreigner who leaves elk 

 to rot in Colorado canons or a bai'relful of grouse on the 

 platform of a Northern Pacific station. 



Sometimes it is a pure and free-born American who 

 says in his heart, "There is no law, or at least nobody 

 obeys it." And about as often as not he is of high degree. 

 I recant that. He is as often as not a rich man. But 

 whether the ignorant emigrant, the enhghtened aristocrat 

 from Europe or the misguided son of our own beloved 

 country, he is of earth earthy, and his name is game hog. 

 You cannot poison him, as you do the wolves that pursue 

 the timid deer. You cannot trap him, as the weasel that 

 steals the eggs of the grouse and woodcock. You can 

 fine him, but you cannot refine him. You can only scorn 

 him and his methods and his means, until he understands 

 that the world is looking at his deeds with disgust and 

 aversion. I have no fight with the proprietors of these new 

 guns, only I don't care anything about them one way or 

 the other. If it is as good as I think it is as a repeating 

 arm, and if they confijie it to the legitimate and reputa- 

 ble field of magazine arms — the military and hunting 

 rifle — they will sell them as fast as they make them. If 

 they are, on the other hand, in the business of manufac- 

 turing exterminating fowling pieces, then God help the 

 fowl, unless we can give their exterminator a bad name 

 in decent communities, George Kjennedy. 



Long Island Ducks. 



Duck Shooting has been the order of the day in the 

 Great South Bay, and parties from SayviUe have made 

 some great strings. 



