Jan. 18, 1896.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
asked whenever I came out with the head of a moose was, 
"Did you get the meat out all right?" 
Such a question would prove rather a facer for some of 
the hunting parties to answer who go to the Maine woods. 
C. M. Stark. 
CURRITUCK DUCKS. 
New York, Jan. 1,— Perhaps the few notes following 
about Currituck may interest your readers, especially 
those to whom the whistling of the wings of wildfowl 
forms the sweetest music. 
We have been to the Old Currituck Inlet Gunning 
Club, kept by Leon White, for the purpose of winding up 
the old year in a blaze of — shotguns, and we certainly 
have had the finest kind of shooting. Currituck Inlet is 
on the east side of Currituck Sound, and I think it is the 
finest shooting ground in the South. The sound is about 
forty-five miles long by twelve miles wide, the water 
shallow, averaging 3ft. , with plenty of wild celery and 
"widgeon grass," so called by the natives. It runs into 
Albemarle Sound, but the birds trade mostly in Curri- 
tuck. 
Canvasbacks have just come in and are in good num- 
bers. The geese have been very plenty and swans in fair 
quantity, and as for ducks, you could not look anywhere 
without seeing ducks, and the variety is large. We shot 
mallards, canvasbacks, redheads, widgeon, black ducks, 
sprigs, ruddy ducks and teal, besides brant, Canada geese 
and swans. Also English snipe are found on their marshes 
now. 
The law allows four days in a week for shooting, which 
gives the fowl some chance to rest and feed. The season 
commences on Oct. 20 and ends March 20. 
My first morning out it blew great guns and it was bit- 
terly cold. We started at sunrise and were soon located 
on a point, the boat being drawn out of sight in the reeds. 
Our shots were mostly long ones, and I tell you it takes a 
good gun and some pointing ahead to induce a duck to 
stay over to be introduced to Mrs. White. I laughed 
more than once over Mr. Robinson's account of Uncle 
Lisha and the teal; and I wished I had some of my snap 
shot brush shooting friends with me so they could at least 
see how "sudden" a bunch of teal or canvasbacks with 
the wind back of them can be. 
Leon White has a number of live decoys of all kinds 
— swan, geese, brant and duck. In particular, I want to 
mention an old gander who must be possessed of at least 
seven devils; I have often wondered why he is so revenge- 
ful against his own tribe. May be he was jilted in his 
younger days and is now getting even; but the fact 
remains that he will call a bunch of geese to him, and 
when the guns go off and a number are killed or wounded 
the old fellow will sit right down and laugh, and get gay 
and kittenish; but if the shots are not successful he will 
turn right round and sulk. May he live long and pros- 
per. He is the best linguist in the goose family I have 
ever heard. 
Besides the "old reliable" 10-gauge, I took down with 
me a 12, as past experiences have taught me to have two 
guns in the blind, and oftentimes when shooting the 
small gun I was able to get three or four shots into a 
bunch of ducks, while for cripples it was the right thing. 
The best way to get to Currituck is to go from Norfolk 
to "Virginia Beach and then drive to White's. It will take 
about five hours, but while a little more expensive it is 
quicker and surer than by boat through the canal, 
especially in the fall. I am now looking forward to my 
trip there in August after the bay birds. Idaho. 
AN OTTER FUR HAT. 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
I have read with interest Mr. Hough's articles on "How 
Fur is Caught," but none was more entertaining than No. 
6, in which he described the manner of setting an otter 
trap. It carried me back to my boyhood days, nearly 
half a century ago. Now, don't for a moment think that 
I ever caught an otter, nor that I ever set a trap for one, as 
described by Mr. Hough. But what it reminded me of 
was an incident in connection with that beautiful ani- 
mal. 
My father was a country doctor, and to eke out a living 
he dabbled a little in politics, and for many years was 
justice of the peace, supervisor and postmaster. In 1846 
(or to impress the time more vividly on the minds of some 
of your older readers, I might say it was the first year of 
the Mexican war) he was elected Member of Assembly for 
Jefferson county. He always wore a high, light-colored 
fur hat, and of course to go to Albany as Assemblyman 
he must have a new one. After the returns were all in 
he began to think of a new hat, which he always 
had made to order in Ucica. One Saturday morn- 
ing at breakfast he said, "Lester, this afternoon 
get on to your skates and go down the river to Mr. Chees- 
man's and get the two otter skins that he has; he said that 
I could have them for $5 each." As I had intended going 
skating I was pleased to be commissioned to combine 
business with pleasure. It was only three miles to where 
the otter skins were, but that distance did not satisfy me, 
as the skating was good, and I kept on down to Red Lake, 
six miles from the village. As the wind was in my favor 
it was easy getting there, but returning was a different 
matter, and when I got back to where I was to get the 
otter skins I was quite willing to stop and warm myself 
while the man was getting the skins and tieing them 
together at the nose; but as soon as I was on my skates 
again I cut them apart, and putting my hands and arms 
in each there were no cold fingers going home. The otter 
skins were forwarded to the hatter in Utica and in due 
season came back in the shape of a light brown high hat, 
which father wore for at least ten years, and I would give 
all the old hats I have to have it now. 
Twelve years after the above incident I saw two otter 
that were killed at one shot, but that is another story. 
J. L, Davison. 
Lockpokt, Jan. 2. 
A Christmas in Texas. 
OUR old friend Charles Hallock writes entertainingly in 
Forest and Stream of "A Christmas in the Rio Grande." 
It recalls a Christmas the writer passed not many miles 
from that river, in Texas, in antebellum days. There 
was not a mile of railroad in the State and no bridges 
west of San Antonio. We were returning from a paying 
rip to Fort Davis and intermediate garrisons with an 
ambulance and two baggage wagons drawn by mules, 
and had expected to join in the Christmas festivities at 
San Antonio. Arriving at Castroville Dec. 24 in a pour- 
ing rain we found the river bank- full and of course un- 
fordable. There was nothing to do but to go into camp 
until the water subsided, with San Antonio less than 
thirty miles away. It was not a merry Christmas. — • 
diaries A. Pilsbury in Belfast Journal. 
Ducks by the Square Mile. 
Rockledge, Fla., Dac. 31. — Editor Forest and Stream; 
As you invite contributions to your valuable paper, I ven- 
ture to send the following facts with which I am fully 
conversant. The place of which I speak might well be 
called the sportsman's paradise— it is the east coast of 
Florida to which I refer — because of its attractive features, 
lying as it does adjacent to the conjunction of the Banana 
and the Indian rivers. The rock bound point of Merritt's 
Island and that of the peninsula opposite mark the min- 
gling of the waters of both rivers, where oysters thrive 
and fish of great variety abound. 
To say that ducks are plentiful would be but a mild as- 
sertion. As I arose a little after daybreak, I heard what 
I thought to be the wind roaring in the tree tops sur- 
rounding my cottage, but on looking out I saw no motion 
in the foliage. Upon walking to the bank of the river I 
saw myraids of ducks alighting and as they struck the 
water they produced the noise which I had thought to be 
wind; while the water was black the space of a square 
mile with the ducks, the air directly above them and 
as far as the eye could reach was filled with them. They 
were not permitted to remain, however, for when the 
approaching daylight enabled the marksman to draw a 
bead a fusillade of shot laid a few of them low and the 
immense flock again took wing,alighting at a safe distance 
from either shore. Should this account be discredited, I 
will prove its truth by the man who took the shot. 
Aqur Wheeler. 
Florida Quail. 
Escambia, Fla., Jan. 4. — I shoot a few quail now and 
then; big bags are an impossibility here because birds 
drive into the densest thickets imaginable, but I go 
after them; and nailing three or four as they tower over 
a wall of trees or dodge around one is the nicest kind of 
sport — makes you feel like patting yourself on the back — 
and is far greater satisfaction than twenty-five birds 
killed by easy shots in the open. These quail are certainly 
wild and wary; they do not lie well to the dog while in the 
covey, but when once scattered in good cover they work 
all right. While I was up in the big woods last week we 
tried for deer and turkeys. Both are there, as we found 
tracks of them, but the hunt had no further results. I 
