Jan. 4, 1896. 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
and has a good supply of small-mouth bass, also large- 
mouth bass and some wall-eyed pike. Minnows are hard 
to keep alive. Frogs are fairly good for bait. Crawfish, 
the spoon and the fly have been found killing. 
Ski Wax. 
Montana, of Helena, Mont, asks what is the best 
wax to use on skis. Billy Hofer knows more about this 
than anybody, but tastes differ as to the question. In the 
mountains we used white wax or paraffine a great deal, 
but mixed it preferably with lard oil when we could get 
it. A wax candle makes a very good wax, and we car- 
ried them as the handiest form of ski grease. A little 
beeswax adds polish to the skis, but one should not use 
too much, as you can get skis too slippery to go well in 
practice. A plain, unvarnished tallow candle will do if 
one has nothing better. Perhaps the best wax for all 
purposes could be made by using two or three paraffine 
candles or the equivalent in white wax, with one tallow 
candle or the equivalent in lard oil or some such animal 
grease, and about loz. or less of beeswax, or not more 
than one-fourth beeswax for the total mixture. This 
should be heated very hot. The ski should also be heated 
hot over an open fire — it will not hurt to scorch the sur- 
face, though it should not be charred— then the wax 
should be smeared on with a rag while hot. Lastly a hot 
iron— preferably a smooth fiat-iron— should be run over 
the surface of the ski, to heat the grease in. The idea is 
to get the wood saturated, and it takes some time to get 
a new pair full. After several treatments the grease 
makes a glassy coating on the surface of the ski, which 
should be put out in the cold to get it well chilled before 
use. This coating gradually wears off, according to the 
condition of the snow, but after skis have been well 
treated in this way they get easier and easier to keep in 
order. The use of the hot iron lays the grain and makes 
the ski slippery. Some ski men use pine resin and some 
use tar, and these may do if the weather is cold, but the 
wax above mentioned is safer to stick to. 
About Christmas Trees. 
To-day Fay Buck, of Mercer, Wis., with whom I took 
the trapping trip last winter, came into the Forest and 
Stream office here, looking as big and husky as ever, only 
he had on store clothes. Fay tells me that he brought 
down 7,500 Christmas trees for the Chicago market. This 
is an industry of which I had never thought before and I 
did not know it was such a big one. It was rather start- 
ling to learn that he only gets about 5 cents apiece for 
Christmas trees of a fine quality. I wish some man who 
has to buy Christmas trees for his own private consump- 
tion would let us know what he has to pay for them after 
they have passed through the hands of the middleman. I 
should guess over a dollar anyhow. This isn't treating 
Fay right. He is bringing joy into too many little hearts 
to get only 5 cents a Christmas tree. 
Fay Buck reports a great many deer up his way this sea- 
son and not so many hunters as we have heard from else- 
where. He says he heard of three men being shot acci- 
dentally, taken for deer, up near Hurley— perhaps not all 
new cases besides those already reported in Forest and 
Stream, He says Frank Brandis is well and happy and 
is out now trapping mink and rat. They caught in all 
seven otter and eight beaver last season. Fay brought 
down to me the skull of the big lynx we caught and tried 
to photograph last winter. He reports a good season of 
muscallonge fishing and says the Buck Hotel on Turtle 
Lake is in good shape for visitors for next season. 
Arkansas not Encouraging. 
From Mr. Jos. Irwin, at Little Eock, comes word that 
news of the Arkansas game crop for this year is not en- 
couraging on the whole. Mr. Irwin says the duck shoot- 
ing in his part of the State was a failure, though the clubs 
in the eastern part of the State reported good sport. He 
says that along the Arkansas Valley covers he has had 
good quail shooting, but that the general report says quail 
are very scarce where the snow lay so long last winter. 
Still, the State has more grain than ever planted before, 
and the birds this fall are in good condition. 
Wild Beasts for Sale. 
The commissioners of Lincoln Park, Chicago, have 
authorized Superintendent Alexander to go East and offer 
for sale or exchange ten buffalo, six elk, and five lions. 
The park has now seventeen buffalo in its herd, and more 
elk and lions than will stay in the boxes. The lions are 
all guaranteed to eat peanuts, and I don't see why there 
isn't a bargain in this for some Eastern man who wants 
household pets. This is a good big game country mere. 
From Texas. 
Mr. E. S. Rice, agent for the Du Pont powders in the 
West, and Mr. W. L. Sbepard, also of this city, and presi- 
dent of our State sportsmen's association, are j ust back 
from Texas. They visited Galveston, Rockport and others 
of the Texas Coast cities, though too hurried to get much 
duck shooting. At Waco they were met by Mr. O. W. 
Lippincott, son of Mr. Lippincott, of Fox Lake hotel fame, 
and at Waco they had good quail shooting. They enjoyed 
very much their sojourn in tne Lone Star State. 
In Europe. 
Mr, John Carse, of the boat department of the big firm 
of Thos. Kane & Co., this city, is absent in Europe on 
business for his firm and will be gone for some weeks. Mr. 
Carse can well represent the sort of young business men 
there are in this country. 
But it Was. 
Mr. Roth, of the John Wilkinson Co., Chicago, who was 
mentioned earlier as a sufferer from an operation for 
appendicitis, is now well and about again, looking better 
than one would think. He says he didn't know it was 
loaded. 
The Horrors of War. 
I should, for certain reasons — mainly sympathy for 
England — regret to see the United States and England 
plunged into the bloody struggle which it now seems we 
are going to have about next week; yet if this thing has 
got to happen. I wish to serve notice on Mr. Noel Money, of 
Oakland, N. J., that immediately upon the declaration of 
hostilities I shall move upon his works and endeavor to 
secure as my personal loot the very excellent pair of 
leather riding breeches he wore on his late Southern trip. 
Of course I wish to be courteous and diplomatic, but 
there is no use disguising the fact that this country and 
all of us patriots must stand firm, and if it comes to war 
I am going to have them pants. 
The Possum Club. 
The Possum Club has slumbered duly since last winter, 
but is about to wake up for its winter season. The grand 
annual dinner by Bill Werner will occur Wednesday, 
Jan. 8. There will be a very pleasant meeting of a dozen 
or two optimistic possumistics. I wish to suggest to Mr. 
Werner that the fin de sidcle possum must have a big 
baked apple in its mouth when it is served on the table — 
the head being left on the fowl. This I have recently 
learned in the South. A possum is not a legal tender in 
the South unless it is served with an apple in its mouth. 
Albino Quail. 
Dr. W. D. Taylor, of Brownsville, Tenn., with whom I 
have just had the pleasantest quail hunt I ever did have 
in my life, has, since my return, killed on our shooting 
grounds there and sent up to me for mounting one of the 
most peculiar and by far the handsomest albino quail I 
ever saw. The bird is of a very snowy white where the 
albinoism has taken effect, but there is none of the slati- 
ness of plumage one sometimes sees, The dark-brown 
feathers stand out in a few spots in perfect contrast, and 
there is one wing quill which is quite black. The back is 
dotted with a few dark feathers which show well against 
the pure white of the main plumage. This handsome 
specimen Dr. Taylor kindly presented to the Forest and 
Stream offiae, where I am sure it will be prized very 
much. 
National Association. 
A meeting of the executive committee of the National 
Game Bird and Fish Protective Association was held at 
the office of the president, Mr. M. R. Bortree, Friday 
evening. Present: Messrs. F. S. Baird, F. E. Pond and 
E. Hough, of the committee. The main business was the 
postponement of the annual meeting, which is set now 
for the second Wednesday in February next, thirty days 
later than the adjournment date. This brings it on Feb. 
12. Mr. Baird will draft a bill which the Association 
hopes to have presented to Congress, advocating an 
amendment to the interstate commerce laws now exist- 
ing, so that it shall be unlawful under those laws also to 
ship game or fish contrary to any State law. It is likely 
that the National Association will incorporate at its next 
meeting. From now on there will be frequent meetings 
of all the standing committes (executive, finance and law) 
in the evening on Fridays, and those present will eat din- 
ner together down town and discuss Association affairs 
at table and after. This will save time from business 
hours, when it is hard to get a committee together. 
Good Shoeing. 
The snowshoeing was good last week along the Des 
Plaines River, just west of the city. The snow was a foot 
and a half deep or more then, but rain has taken it all off 
now. 
There has been received at this office advance notices 
of an important new work on Norwegian Immigration. 
E, Hough. 
909 Security Building, Chicago. 
Quail in North Dakota. 
Fort Ransom, North Dakota, Dae. 21.— Editor 
Forest and Stream: While reading E. Hough's story of 
"How Fur is Caught," page 509, I read: "Who would 
look for quail in North Dakota? Yet E. Bowers, of 
Fargo, in the Red River valley, killed one in a plumb 
thicket, a few years ago, south of Fargo, the only one 
ever seen in that country." 
Now I would say we have quite a few quail on the 
Cheyenne River, at Fort Ransom, about seventy-five miles 
southwest of Fargo. I saw them the first year I came 
here, fifteen years ago, and every year since. 
They do not seem to increase or decrease. Last winter 
I saw one boy with nine and another with sixteen birds. 
They are not shot at as far as I know, but I suspect that 
the cats and mink keep them down when they come 
around the farm buildings in the winter. Four years ago 
I saw seven birds in my garden (this was I think in the 
month of May); where they came from I am at a loss to 
know. My home is three miles from the river; they came 
from the south; but there is no timber or brush for hun- 
dreds of miles south of us. 
Cottontail and jack rabbits are thick and we have fine 
sport through the winter, hunting them with the ,22cal. 
rifle. Chickens and other grouse are fast disappearing. 
It will be some time before they get so thick again after 
such fearful hailstorms as we have had this past season. 
I killed my five deer this last November, four bucks and 
a doe. It was the first deer hunt I have had in fifteen 
years, and I enjoyed it very much. One of the heads is 
a beauty, and I am having it mounted to hang up with a 
blacktail buck's head, the only one I ever shot. 
J. F. H. 
About a. Name. 
Walton, N. Y., Dec. 2, — Editor Forest and Stream: I 
have been a reader of Forest and Stream two years, and 
expect to read it as long as I am able to purchase it. I 
call it a converter of pot and all other illegal hunters if 
they read it a while, for no man can follow its columns, 
if he be a pot or market-hunter or fisher, and not be con- 
verted if he has any conscience at all. But it is not of 
this I mean to speak. What I would like to say is this: 
I have followed Mr. E. Hough all through the Yellow- 
stone Park on his winter trip, his good work in Mr. Blow's 
defeat, his trips South — all his work for the past two 
years — and find them interesting and wish they could have 
lasted longer. In his Southern trip, in his visit to Mr. 
Bobo, I see he calls the negro a colored man; but when he 
gets as far as Quarantine he says his "nigger" talks 
French; and he has a great deal of "nigger" until the 
cooks, Jim and George, tickle his palate with, nitro coffee 
and mullet and Bhelltish, then "the two colored servants." 
Now don't you think it sounds odd? "Negro" is one letter 
less to write, and sounds better to me; for I am a descend- 
ant of that race myself, and there are several of us who 
take Forest and Stream and like to peruse its columns, 
and even to the ads. I read it all. I am a believer in it. 
I often sit and think, since those boys wrecked the passen- 
ger train, that if boys could be convinced that a paper of 
this kind would be of more benefit to them than blood 
and thunder novels, and followed the teachings of it, 
there would have been no train wreck, and thty would 
be free to-day to roam the woods or follow the brooks the 
coming spring. If you want to read adventure and good, 
sound reading, try Forest and Stream a while. I was 
persuaded to do the same, and here I am in the same old 
rut and don't want to get out of it. Geo. Bruce. 
Mrs. Giles does for a Bear. 
Mr. and Mrs. F. S. Giles, of New York, who are vis- 
iting at Mr. J. H. Hunter's, Havelock, went out on a bear 
hunt Monday morning early, and Mrs. Giles had the rare 
good fortune for a lady of killing one that weighed 
2551bs. She used buckshot and killed him stone dead at 
the first fire. They were only about 20yds. apart when 
she shot him. They were about three miles from Have- 
lock station. 
The bear was bping run by Mr. Hunter's dogs. We 
imagine the hide of that bear will be kept a long time as a 
memento of the event. — New Berne (N. C.) Journal, Dee, 
25. 
RED SALMON. 
I think it has been remarked by some of your corre- 
spondents — Judge Greene, Mr. Cheney and others — that it 
wouldn't do just yet to close the salmon book with the idea 
that the information concerning the species and habits of 
this noble fish had been completely harvested. I never took 
very much interest in the subject uatil I came recently to 
the coast, for I had never had opportunity to play or study 
with the fish, but being thrown among them quite fre- 
quently of late my curiosity, interest and enthusiasm have 
been aroused, and from the day I speared my first salmon 
with a stick as it was swimming up the creek until I 
played him to the gaff with rod and reel for 'n hour 'n 
half, or such a matter, I have been trying to learn some- 
thing about him or them. I am just in the primer yet, 
but I have learned some things, and one is that there are 
red salmon as well as Chinook, silver, dog, blueback, 
Tyce, steelhead, calico, and for aught I know, gros-grain, 
mohair and worsted; for a paper lately stated — I think 
San Francisco or Seattle — that there were, if I remember 
correctly, twenty-seven kinds of salmon on this coast, but 
we'll make it twenty-five— I'm not particular about two. 
Bat about this red variety. He has been running in 
Hood's Canal since September last. Whether he comes 
at other seasons I know not, but I first noticed him jump- 
ing among the silver — a common sight among the resi- 
dents along the canal in the fall. Later I found him run- 
ning up the creeks among the dog, and it has been my 
impression, I admit, that he was a sport from some other 
variety caused by some peculiar environment, length of 
time from the ocean, or in fresh water, or some other 
cause, yet he might be a distinct variety. He is handsome 
enough at all events to deserve a beautiful name all to 
himself, and I suggest that we call him the cardinal. I 
say "he," for though I have opened several I have found 
no female; but I have made no exhaustive search, for the 
fish have not been very plentiful, only now and then 
among the hundreds of dog have I observed the red. In 
size they have run from 15in., maybe, to 30 or more, I 
do not think I have noticed any smaller than I5in. , though 
there may have been some more than 30in. I have no 
doubt there were. 
Let me describe one which I shot for the purpose of ex- 
amination while after ducks one dav. It is not all of 
ducking to duck, you will observe. This is a country of 
surprises and wide possibilities. The specimen was 27in. 
long and 5£in. deep, back to belly, and very symmetrical; 
a male; weight 5|lbs.; a very pronounced hook-nose, 
with regular dog salmon teeth; tail small just forward 
the caudal fin, not truncated; color a deep rich cardinal 
on sides and belly, shading into a rich brown, black 
spotted, within 2in. of the back; a strip of red 2in. wide 
extended laterally across the gills and face, narrowing to 
within a ^in. of the eye; other parts of head brownish 
black; fins dark, tinged with red. 
In some respects this fish was different from others I 
observed, which were not so rich or solid in color, and 
which were as perfect specimens of salmom as ever swam, 
having neither hook-nose nor prominent teeth. These 
red salmon running with the silver in salt water took the 
spoon well. I have seen them white, pink and red 
meated. Fishermen attribute this difference to more or 
less protracted stay in fresh water. The meat of the above 
described specimen was pale flesh color, with here and 
there spots of light red. A resident tells me that these red 
salmon have been long known on the canal, but more 
numerous this year than ever noticed. When they leap 
into the air and the sun's rays strike them right, they are 
a "thing of beauty" indeed. Their leap is similar to that 
of the silver, straight up or very nearly so, whereas the 
leap of the dog is not far above the surface, at an acute 
angle therewith, and it leaves the water on its side. I 
have seen the silver leap ten consecutive times, good high 
jumps too. This is unusual, but it is by no means unusual 
to see them leap from four to seven times in rapid succes- 
sion. When there is a big run on and the fish are feeling 
pretty frisky, the sight of hundreds of silvery beauties 
flashing in the air amid the spray is a most inspiriting 
one, and calculated eenamost to cause the spirit of Uncle 
Izaak to rise up and whoop. 
If this ruby subject is of interest I will try and gather 
other facts relative thereto. O. O. S. 
Washington, December. 
Southern Massachusetts Fish and Game League. 
REPORT OF THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE FOR THE TEAR 
ENDING NOV. 12, 1895. 
During the past year very little has been attempted in the 
way of fish legislation. 
Mr. Kelley again urged the passage of a bill which would 
permit him to use nets in Buzzards Bay for the purpose of 
supplying his vessels with bait. This was opposed by this 
Association, together with the Old Colony Club and the 
Boatman's Association. It could not be shown why such 
permission should be given to him without establishing a 
precedent for any and all others who should apply for it, 
and the committee of the Legislature reported adversely 
upon it, as they did also upon the petition of Mr. Hoxie for 
legislation against seines, nets and pounds in the waters of 
the Commonwealth other than Buzzards Bay. 
We are of the opinion that no further legislation is neces- 
sary to protect the fisheries of Buzzards. Bay, but we have 
