Forest and Stream 
A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 
Terms, $4 a Ybar. 10 Cts. a copy. 
Six Months, $2. 
NEW YORK, APRIL 20, 1895. 
No, 
VOL. XLIT, — NO. 16. 
318 Broadway, New Yo&it 
For Subscription and Advertising Rates see Page ix. 
PROFESSOR DANA. 
At his home in New Haven, Conn., Professor James 
Dwight Dana, died last Sunday, aged 82 years. 
By his death Yale University loses its most illustrious 
professor, America its most eminent scientific man and 
the world its first geologist. His death marks the end of a 
career which has few parallels for brilliant continuous 
scientific work, extended over a long period of time. It 
closes a ripe life, full of good done to his fellow men— a 
life appreciated by the world and fitly crowned with 
highest honors. The active brain has stopped its work, 
the pen wielded almost withoub ceasing during sixty years 
of scientific toil is forever laid aside. 
Professor Dana is the last of that group of men who 
were eminent in American science during the latter half 
of the century, among whom were the elder Agassiz, 
Guyot, Baird, Asa Gray and Loomis. He was born Feb. 
12, 1813, and entered Yale College at the age of sixteen, 
having been attracted to that institution by the fame of 
Professor Sillimau. In college he showed a marked fond- 
ness for scientific pursuits, and also took high rank in 
mathematics. 
Professor Dana graduated in 1833, and was almost at 
.once appointed instructor in mathematics in theNavy, and 
in that capacity sailed on United States men of war to 
various points in Europe and the Mediterranean. On his 
return from one of these cruises in 1835 he was appointed 
assistant to Prof. Sillimau at Yale, and soon began the 
preparation of his "System of Mineralogy," which was 
published two years later in 1837, when the author was 
but twenty-four years of age. This work has been re- 
vised from time to time, and is still the standard author- 
ity on its subject. 
In the year 1838 young Dana was appointed mineral- 
ogist and geologist to the United States exploring expedi- 
tion to the Pacific Ocean, which was then about to sail 
under the command of Captain Wilkes. During the 
voyage, which lasted four years, he visited Terra del 
Fuego, many of the South Sea islands and other points in 
the Pacific which were then wholly unknown. At the 
mouth of the Columbia River in 1841 Ms vessel was 
wrecked and he escaped, saving nothing but his manu- 
script notes. The expedition returned in 1842, and the 
next thirteen years were occupied in working up the 
|mat°rial collected, for not only the geology of the expe- 
dition, but the zoology as well had fallen under his 
charge. For two years he resided in Washington, but in 
1844 he moved to New Haven, and the same year married 
the daughter of Professor Silliman. In 1850 he wa 
elected Professor of Natural History and Geology in Yale 
College, but did not assume the chair until 1855. Since 
that time he has resided continuously in New Haven en- 
gaged in his college duties and in scientific work. In 
1893 he resigned his professorship, but at the request of 
the corporation continued his lectures until January, 
1894. Two years ago, at the age of eighty, he bpgan the 
revision of his Manual of Geology, which he entirely re- 
wrote—over 1,000 priuted pages— and which was pub- 
lished only a few months ago. 
Professor Dana's most important works are his "Sys- 
tem of Mineralogy," his reports of the Wilkes Expedition 
on "The Geology of the Pacific" on "Zoophytes," and on 
"Crustacea," illustrated by superb plates from drawings 
made by the author; his 'Coral Reefs and Islands," 
' Manual of Geology," "Text Book of Geology," and "The 
Geological Story Briefly Told." He edited the American 
Journal of Science, and contributed largely to this and 
to the other periodical literatures of science. 
The importance and value of his contributions to 
knowledge have been recognized the whole world over. 
He has received honorary degrees from universities at 
home and abroad, and scientific societies everywhere have 
honored themselves by electing him to membership. In 
1872 he received the Wollaston Medal from the Geological 
Society of London, and in 1877 the Copley gold medal 
from the Royal Society of London. 
Professor Dana's contributions to science are sufficiently 
well known. Not so widely known perhaps, but not less 
worthy of record and remark was the winning person- 
ality of the man — a personality which for nearly forty 
years has made its impress on a hundred or more young 
men every year. He made science attractive to them by 
the stimulus of his own freshness and enthusiasm, his 
clear insight into the secrets of nature, his industry and 
earnestness of purpose. The number and importance of 
his achievements in science will overshadow in public 
recognition this unrecorded personal work yet the value 
of such influences can surely not be overestimated. 
Professor Dana's personal acquaintance with the stu- 
dents who were brought in contact with him was close, 
and his popularity very great. Up to within a few years 
it was his practice each spring and summer to take his 
class in geology off with him on long tramps into the 
country, and to show them in the rocks the problems 
about which they recited in the class room. His expla- 
nations were simple and clear, and awakened in the 
minds of those who listened to them an interes t in the 
subject that could never have been had from ^mere 
books. His lectures were the one college exercise that no 
one wished to escape; thev were looked forward to with 
pleasure by all. ■■■j | j 
In all relations of life, Professor Dana was most simple 
and kindly. Although by his achievements and his 
honors he stood so high, yet he' was accessible to every 
one. His ready kindness at once put the student at his 
ease while his lucid explanations made plain things that 
had been dark and difficult. Thus, much of his life was 
devoted to pointing the way to thousan Is of young men, 
and all over the land those who received such aid from 
him will feel keen a sense of personal bereavement at the 
news of his death. 
THE YACHT RACING UNION. 
The idea of a union of the coast yacht clubs of a greater 
or less extent, either embracing all the large clubs, all 
clubs large and small, or t'le club3 of some special local- 
ity, as Boston or New York, is one long familiar to 
yachtsmen. What is equally familiar is the fact that all 
the attempts in the past have failed, the New England Y. 
R. A. has been for some years a thing of the past, and 
though one organization has existed for some six years 
about New York, it has of its own volition restricted 
itself to so narrow a field that its influence is hardly felt 
in New York yachting. The present season has wit- 
nessed two new attempts at the organization of local 
unions, one about Boston and the other to the eastward 
of New York, on that magnificent yachting playground, 
Long Island Sound. The opportunities about Boston far 
exceed those in any other part of the country^; ,there be- 
ing a very large contingent of active yachtsmen, while 
the various stations about Massachusetts Bay are within 
convenient reach of each other, or at least the extremes 
can readily reach some common racing ground about 
Marblehead or Nahant. With more able management 
and a stronger community of interests than the eastern 
yachtsmen have yet shown, they may build up a mag- 
nificent system of yacht racing in the classes up to forty 
feet. 
About New York the situation is complicated by the 
nature of the waters, Hell Gate and the East River form- 
ing a serious barrier between the clubs of the bay and 
river and those of the south. As long as the bay and 
river interests predominated in local yachting, no at- 
tempts at a union were possible; the very large clubs, 
with a racing fleet ol* schooners, had nothing in common 
with the very small clubs that raced the old sawn-oft* 
boats with sandbags; each of the clubs was wedded to 
some ancient rule, which it had believed in for years, 
and tbe bay was at best a poor place for racing. 
The movement to the Sound, begun by the organiza- 
tion of the Larchmont Y. C. in 1880, has wrought great 
changes m yachting. While the bay has been virtually 
abandoned by nearly all the larger clubs, the shores of 
the Sound have been closely dotted with flourishing clubs 
from Hell Gate to New Haven. The majority of these 
clubs.being of recent origin,have had to deal with yachts 
of comparatively modem type, and as they organized, 
they have one by one adopted the one rule used by the 
large clubs. In this way there has come about quietly 
and insensibly, a community of interests and an absence 
of conflicting rules, directly opposite to the conditions 
which have defeated the earlier attempts at union about 
New York Bay. The class of yachts, too, that form the 
fleets of the Sound clubs, are different from the old-time 
fleets; tbey are mainly cabin boats of from twenty-five 
to forty-five feet hull, boats which can and do go regu- 
larly from port to port for the various races. While 
there are still the schooners and the larger single-stickers, 
with the open boats, the great body of the racing fleet 
will be included between the limits indicated. 
The new organization is likely to meet with many diffi- 
culties, but it has a good field to work in among the 
many clubs between New York and New London, and 
it may be certain of the support of many able, enthusi- 
astic and intelligent yachtsmen. We wish it that suc- 
cess which it merits, and we hope that it may be able to 
show very important results within the next five years. s ' 
WABBL Y UNDERPINNINGS. 
, The plea of drunkenness is often urged in extenuation 
of an offense, but is not commonly accepted as a wholly 
sufficient excuse for omission or commission. To have 
put a gross affront upon a friend when one is drunk is 
considered less heinous than for one to have done so de- 
liberately when sober. The wife beater, who pleads in- 
toxication in mitigation of his crime, is classed as a brute 
one degree less degraded at least than the wife-beater 
who mauls and pummels and kicks when sober. Only in 
extremely infrequent instances, however, do judge, at- 
torneys and court spectators listen to the plea of 'drunk 
and didn't know it," with unalloyed satisfaction. Such 
a reception may well enough have been given the other 
day to a pleading of this character in a Newburgh, N. Y., 
court, when a duck-shooting case was tried before Judge 
Cullen. 
) The defendant was William C. DeGraw, a foolish hotel 
proprietor of Greenwood Lake. We take the liberty of 
calling Mr. DeGraw foolish because, while as a hotel 
proprietor, he depends for patronage largely upon sports- 
men, he yet makes war on game and fish out of reason or 
by illicit means. If he and other hotel proprietors at 
such a resort had the faintest glimmer of common sense, 
they would be first among those who give cheerful 
obedience to the game laws, to the end that game and 
fish might abound, visiting sportsmen wax in multitude, 
and the hotel till be distended thereby. Another consid- 
eration, which might well enough put sense into an 
empty noddle, even though the thought be not a high 
and ennobling one, is this, that in the game district set 
apart and given over to the watch and ward of Protector 
Willett Kidd, the silly wight who breaks the game laws 
will nine times out of ten find himself in trouble, if not in 
jail. If men like DeGraw just naturally have no sense, 
Schoolmaster Kidd feels called upon to give them some. 
When DeGraw shot the Greenwood Lake ducks from a 
launch, that mode of duck hunting being forbidden by 
the game law, Dr. Kidd promptly set about his reproof, 
correction and chastisement. The case came up for trial- 
last week. 
^It must not be inferred from anything that we have 
said that DeGraw is not full of resources when occasion 
demands. He is nobody's fool; and had prepared for 
himself what was thought to be a most excellent defense. 
With him in the boat at the time of the shooting were, 
besides certain of his employees, two men from New 
York and Brooklyn, Messrs. Craig Pennington and Arthur 
Bellows. These two bobbed up at the Newburgh trial; 
and Prosecuting Attorney Headley was advised that- 
they were on hand to extricate DeGraw from his predica- 
ment. The plan was that they should go on the stand 
for the defense, and testify that they themselves and not 
DeGraw had fired the shots at the ducks. Apprised of 
this scheme, Protector Kidd had the necessary papers 
prepared so that immediately after giving their incrimi- 
nating evidence these smart witnesses should themselves 
be prosecuted for the penalty. When Messrs. Penning- 
ton and Bellows became cognizant of Protector Kidd's 
trap so nicely laid for them, they resolved to save them- 
selves even at the expense of the confiding DeGraw. 
Called to the stand to tell his little story— how hi him- 
self had done the shooting— Mr. Bellows astonished the 
counsel for the defense by testifying that on the occasion 
of the shooting he had been so drunk that he really had 
not known what was going on. When Mr. Pennington 
took the stand and was asked by the attorney, "And 
your condition? Was it like that of the last witness?" 
he made the laconic response, "Worse." Thus at one full 
swoop were the nicely adjusted props knocked out 
from under the defense so ingeniously constructed for the 
luckless DeGraw, and the j,' jury; promptly found him in 
$50 for the two dead docks. The incident deserves to go 
on record as one case where the plea of "drunk and 
didn't know" actually served the ends of justice. 
^DeGraw, by the way, was the boatman on the occa- 
sion, wnen Judge Dixon and otners of New Jersey were 
charged with unlawful duck shooting on Greenwood 
Lake. The Justices, it will be remembered, have carried 
tneir case up on a legal tecnnicality, to be decided in 
June. 
