Forest and Stream 
A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 
Terms, $4 a Year. 10 Cts. a Copt. I 
Sis Months, $2. ) 
NEW YORK, SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 29, 1894. 
j VOL. XLni.— No. 13. 
| No. 818 Broadway, New York. 
For Prospectus and Advertising Rates see Page iii. 
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. 
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Jacksnipe Coming In. 
Vigilant and Valkyrie. 
'He's Got Tnem" (Quail Shooting). 
Bass Fisning at Block Island. 
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VII. — THE DOCTOR. 
Out at all hours of day and night, pelted by storms of 
rain and storms of snow, chilled by bitter cold of winter 
and scorched by downright beams of the summer sun, 
our country doctor leads a hard and wearing life. He 
rides over roads now heavy with mire, now blocked with 
snow, now choking with dust. 
With body so overworked and mind perplexed by diffi- 
cult cases and the worry of unreasoning and exacting 
patients, it is a wonder how he preserves health and 
strength without his own physic, or maintains a cheerful 
spirit, yet he does both. 
In an obscure corner of his office you may discover a 
gun, a rod and a box of fishing tackle, none too carefully 
kept, yet all serviceable and ready for use in their season; 
and these constitute his private medicine chest, with 
judicious draughts wherefrom he preserves the health 
and vigor of body and mind. 
Sometimes when you meet him on his way to visit a 
distant patient of the continually but never dangerously 
ailing sort, the gun shares with him the narrow seat of 
the sulky, unskillfully masked under a blanket, or the 
red case rests between his knees, and you guess his inten- 
tion of stealing an hour's shooting in some patch of road- 
side woods, or as much fishing in the stream that intersects 
his route. The entire days of such recreation that fall to 
his lot, lie far apart in the year. 
It often happens when a day of freedom has appar- 
ently come, it slips away from him into the uncertainties 
of the future. Shells are loaded over night, the gun 
cleaned and oiled, or the rod put in order, tackle over- 
hauled, flies arranged or bait secured. He falls asleep 
with a prayer for an auspicious morrow, to dream pleas- 
ant dreams of frost-painted woodlands or waters rippled 
by the south wind's breath and shadowless beneath a 
clouded sky. 
The slow dawn brings an answer to his prayer, and his 
dreams seem about to materialize into tangible realities 
His horse is at the door, his gun or rod in hand, his heart 
is light with the thought of throwing physic to the dogs 
for a day, when in rushes a messenger with an urgent 
call to some serious case. 
In an instant the promised day of recreation is changed 
to one of wearing toil and anxiety, but he meets the 
disappointment with a cheerful face and takes up the 
scarcely dropped burden of care without a murmur. 
Indeed he has grown so accustomed to such miscarriage 
of his plans that he is least disappointed when most so, 
and hope deferred does not make his stout heart sick. 
He comes home weary and worn at night, but drops in 
at the shoemaker's and refreshes himself with a half 
hour's chat of reminiscent or prospective shooting or fish- 
ing. He finds the musty atmosphere of the cobbler's den 
more congenial than the finer air of the Ma jor's neat 
hop, and his visits are so frequent that the neighbors 
have ceased to ask him if the shoemaker is ailing. 
The mending of bodies and the mending of soles, not. 
withstanding their dissimilarity, seems to bring the prac- 
titioners of the two arts into an affinity which leads both 
to field sports and scientific pursuits more than any other 
professors and craftsmen. 
When at last a day arrives that leaves him free to prac- 
tice the lighter arts of recreation, with what zest for them 
and entire abandonment of weightier duties he enters 
upon them. 
The faculties sharpened in his regular profession are 
keen in the pursuit of these, and sensitive to every touch 
of nature. He en joys to the utmost her beauties, dis- 
covers her seci ets, and acquaints himself with the lives 
of her children, the wood folk and water folk whom he 
loves, that have grown dearer through continual longing 
and rare opportunity. 
Far apart in the years of his professional life he breaks 
the links of the lengthening chain, and escapes into the 
great woods beyond the recall by night-bell, messenger 
or telegram. 
His comrades tell how he revels in his brief season of 
liberty, when he is the life of the party, the ready deviser 
of expedients, the inventor of camp conveniences, the 
closest observer of nature, the keenest and yet the 
gentlest of sportsmen. 
He is the better doctor for being a good sportsman, and 
his patients have no cause to blame him for deserting 
them, for he brings back to their service a clearer brain, 
firmer nerves and a stronger body. 
NETTING BASS IN LAKE ONTARIO. 
Complaint is made by anglers residing in the western 
part of this State that the fishing on the Niagara River 
and on Lake Ontario has been greatly injured by the 
taking of black bass in nets set in the lake. It is alleged 
that during one week a single net owner, whose opera- 
tions were conducted near Four Mile Pond, caught 1,700 
black bass in his nets. General complaint is made of 
poor fishing, which is attributed altogether to the nets. 
The statement has been made that such nets may be set 
within one mile of the shore in the lake, and anglers 
there make the same complaint that those on the Jersey 
coast do against the pound nets. 
A reference, however, to Chapter 627 of the laws of 
New York for 1894 shows in Section 9 an amendment to 
an earlier law, which reads in part: "No fish shall be 
fished for, caught or killed in any manner or by any 
device except angling * * * in Lake Ontario within 
one mile of fiie shore." It would appear, therefore, that 
any nets set within one mile of the shore are put there in 
violation of the statutes and should be removed by the 
local game protector. 
Not only should the nets themselves be placed at the 
distance of at least one mile from the shore, but if 
long wings or fences are built from the nets toward the 
shore with the purpose of leading the fish into the nets, 
these also are set in violation of the spirit, if not of the letter, 
of the statute. It is altogether probable that the courts 
would hold that such fences are a part of the nets and 
that their erection and maintenance is illegal. 
Anglers allege that as a result of the nets and of the 
fences which are built leading to them, practically very 
few bass pass by these traps and that the destruction is so 
great as to threaten the absolute ruin of the fishing. It is 
urged that the law be so amended as to absolutely forbid 
any taking of bass with nets, on the ground that bass are 
game fish and that they afford about all the sport that is 
to be had in these waters. 
It would seem worth the while of the local anglers' as- 
sociations to investigate the facts in this matter, and to 
make public the results, calling to the attention of the 
local game protectors any violation of the law. 
The opinion has lately been expressed in our hearing 
that kennel matters in this country were at a low ebb 
and that the fondness for dogs which for some years has 
been so general, is a fad which has run its course. This 
opinion is scarcely borne out by the condition of our 
kennel columns, which last week reported three important 
dog shows and one field trial, besides a great deal of 
other interesting kennel news. In addition, two or three 
pages of news were left over for want of space to print 
them. It may safely be Baid that no matter how the 
fashions shall change, there will always be left plenty of 
people who lovo a good dog and who will want to read 
about man's oldest and best friend. 
SNAP SHOTS. 
The law-abiding citizen may well feel discouraged 
when those who are appointed to enforce the law are 
themselves guilty of violating it. Unfortunately this 
occurs not very infrequently, and often when public at- 
tention is called to it, the offending official avers that he 
sinned through ignorance, and that he is willing to pay 
his fine. This is all very well so far as it goes, but it goes 
only a very little way, for the mere payment of a fine 
counts for nothing in the matter of repairing the harm 
done to the cause of game protection by a prominent per- 
son who violates the game law — and is caught at it. In 
another column we reprint an item printed in the Toledo 
Blade of Sept. 19, which states that the Chief of Police 
of that city left there on Saturday, the 15th inst., for the 
State of Illinois and there shot quail in violation of the 
Illinois statute. Not only this, but — if we may judge 
from the account — he boasted of it on his return. At all 
events, the reporter who wrote the item evidently thought 
that the Chief of Police had done quite a smart thing. 
While perhaps nothing better than this is to be expected 
from a newspaper reporter whose main object is to make 
space and not to preach the observance of the law, what 
shall.be said of a Chief of Police — an individual whose 
whole business is to enforce respect for and observance of 
the law — who leaves his own State and deliberately, with 
his eyes open, breaks the law of a neighboring State. To 
every question there are usually two sides, and we should 
be glad to learn that there has been any misstatement of 
facts in this case or that there is any explanation which 
will make the act of the Toledo Chief of Police seem a 
less grievous offense against law and morals than it now 
appears, 
Before the next issue of Forest and Stream is put to 
press, the shooting season will have opened in Connecti- 
cut, where only a few years ago reasonably good bags 
were the rule, and at the end of a day's tramp the gunner 
who worked hard might hope, when he came in at night, 
to turn out of his pockets from fifteen to twenty birds- 
quail, partridges and woodcock. Nowadays, however, he 
who follows his dog all day long, over hill, through 
swamp and^ along swale, must be content with a much 
more moderate recompense for his toil. If he gets eight 
or ten birds he feels that he has done well. Quail seem to 
have absolutely disappeared along the shores of Long 
Island Sound, woodcock are not, and ruffed grouse — 
though holding their own much better than the other 
birds— exist only in diminished numbers. Unless some 
action is soon taken either to restock the State or to put a 
stop to the shooting, the prospects are that before very 
long there will be absolutely no shooting. On the other 
hand, there are localities where the unprofitable tillage 
of the soil has been abandoned and the farms deserted, in 
which it is said that the birds have increased, and that 
both quail and ruffed grouse still are found in something 
like their old-time abundance. Connecticut is so near 
New York that a few years ago it was a favorite shooting 
ground for New York sportsmen; but many of these have 
given up their autumnal journeys thither, discouraged by 
the scarcity of the birds. 
The name Gordon-Cumming is one well known in the 
annals of big-game hunting, though chiefly under the 
equator and among the beasts of the tropic. Recently, 
however, one of this name has started for the far north 
in an endeavor to penetrate to the land of the musk-ox. 
The travel is by canoe, and the expedition numbers only 
four men who carry provisions for six months. To 
reach the musk-ox country they must first pass through 
that of the barren ground caribou, which they will meet 
on the southern migration, and on the flesh of which 
they must largely depend for food. A most interesting 
account of life in this desolate northern land may be 
found by any one who is interested in this subject, in Mr. 
Warburton Pike's fascinating volume, "The Barren 
Grounds of North Canada." 
The Mongolian pheasant has entered Massachusetts 
under State patronage. The last Legislature appropri- 
ated $150 for the importation and breeding of the birds; 
and the work is in charge of Fish and Game Commis- 
sioner Brackett. The appropriation does not provide for 
more than an humble beginning; but if the pheasants shall 
do as well in the East as they have in the Northwest, the 
few birds already received will insure an abundant stock 
for the future, provided they are protected, 
