Forest and Stream 
A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 
Terms, 
54 A Teab. 10 Cts. a Copy. 
Six Months, $3. 
NEW YORK, SATURDAY, MARCH 13, 18 9 7. 
i VOL. XLVIII.-No 11. 
I No. 346 Broadway, Nkv York 
For Prospectus and Advertising Rates see Page x. 
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Forest and Stream^Water Colors 
We have prepared as premiums a series of four artistic 
and beautiful reproductions of original water colors, 
painted expressly for the Forest and Stream. The 
subjects are outdoor scenes: 
Jacksnipe Coming In. 
VigUant and Valkyrie. 
"He's Got Them" (Quail Shooting). 
Bass Fishing at Block Island. 
The plates are for frames 14 x 19 in. They are done in 
twelve colors, and are rich in effect. They are furnished 
to ola^or new subscribers on the following terms: 
Forest and Stream one year and ike set of four pictures, $S. 
Forest and Stream 6 months and any two of the pictures, $3. 
Price oftbe pletores alone, $1.S0 each ; $6 for the aet. 
Remit by express money order or postal money order. 
Make orders payable to 
FOREST AND STREAM PUB. CO., New York. 
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FOREST AND STREAM OFFICE 
346 Broadway 
NEW YORK LIFE BUILDING 
Present Entrance on Leonard Street 
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He who follows game with a camera, and who 
feels the satisfaction of matching his faculties 
against those of his game, will, however, derive 
a keen sporting enjoyment from his failures; and 
if he meets with success, great will be his pride and 
contentment. He will learn much about the 
habits of game which has escaped him before; and, 
not needing to use his rifle, his opportunities for 
observation will be more frequent and satisfactory. 
For myself, the few pictures that comprise the 
results of my hunting with the camera have 
brought me a keener enjoyment and a greater 
sense of satisfaction than the finest heads in my 
collection, possibly on the ground that we are dis- 
posed to value most that which has cost us most. 
W* B, Devereux. 
CONCERNING RIGHTS AND PRIVILEGES. 
A coEBESPONDENT who writes from Pennsylvania, where 
a proposition is before the Legislature to forbid the sale of 
game, bases an objection to the proposed law upon the miscon- 
ception that it will take away from citizens "the same equal 
rights and privileges that they enjoy under the Constitu- 
tion." No valid objection to the law forbidding the sale of 
game can reasonably be based upon constitutional grounds, 
for the courts have repeatedly upheld the right of the 
^ State to control the disposition and use of game 
after its reduction to possession, and the constitution- 
ality of such statutes has been fully upheld. The latest 
of these 'instances, and the most important because the 
) most decisive and far-reaching, was the Connecticut case 
recently determined by the United States Supreme Court, 
in which it was held that the State might extend its 
authority over its game so far as to prescribe the purposes 
for which the game might be killed and to prohibit its ex- 
portation to another State. Indeed, the whole fabric of 
game legislation may be said to be built upon the principle 
I that the State confers upon the individual only a qualified 
right to take game and only a qualified possession in 
game after it shall have been taken. Nothing is more 
firmly established in game legislation than this constitu- 
tional right of the State even to game which has been 
killed and reduced to possession. The law not only pre- 
scribes seasons for killing, but seasons for selling, transpor- 
tation and having in possession. 
When we consider the purpose of such restrictive limita- 
tions and reflect how absolutely essential they are to any 
efficient system of game conservation, we shall not rebel 
sA the principle involved, nor denounce it as a violation of 
our individual rights. Our "natural rights" are hedged 
about, restricted and abrogated in countless ways. Depriva- 
tion of full individual liberty with respect to game is by 
no means a peculiar hardship difi"ering in principle 
from other deprivations and restrictions in various fields. 
If we cannot all do as we would with our game alive 
or dead, no more are we free from the law's control with 
respect to our cattle alive or dead. If the farmer's 
cows are afliicted with certain diseases the law steps in 
and destroys them; if he would market his veal before a 
certain age, the law seizes it; if he would convert his po- 
tatoes or corn or rye into whisky, the law prescribes cer- 
tain rules with which he must comply; if he would build a 
house on his city lot, the law prescribes what he may build 
and what he may not. In short, in the control of his live 
stock, his crop, his lands and his houses, the citizen is sub- 
ject to restrictions about which he might just as vocifer- 
ously and just as reasonably complain on constitutional 
grounds as about the game and fish laws. 
These restrictions are among the characteristics of soci- 
ety which distinguish the civilized man from the savage. 
All men may have been created free, but when the human 
animal comes to live in communities, the individual with 
his fellows, the common interest requires such a cui'bing 
of the pristine freedom as shall make society bearable and 
advantageous. The rule of the greatest good to the great- 
est number holds sway, and if the greatest good is found 
to require it, even the small boy who wants to snare a 
partridge for market must forego that particular one of his 
'equal rights and privileges under the Constitution." 
All of which has been said before, and all of which will 
be said again. For while the game laws do not diff'er in 
principle from other laws, no other statutes are more often 
denounced as unconstitutional; and of no others are viola- 
tions so frequently excused as being assertions of constitu- 
tional privileges. 
ADIRONDACK FOREST INTERESTS. 
The committee of the New York Legislature known as 
the WagstaS" committee, which was appointed last year to 
investigate the condition of the Adirondack forests, has 
made a report recommending that for the preservation of 
the water supply for the Erie Canal, the Champlain Canal, 
and the Hudson and Mohawk rivers the State should act 
at once in the acquisition of lands covering these water- 
sheds. 
The lands now included in the Forest Preserve are in 
disjointed tracts, with other lands lying between, and so 
separating them as to render difficult their due protection 
and seriously impairing the eflfectiveness of their purpose 
as a water reservoir. In accordance with the recommen- 
dations of the Wagstafi" committee, a bill was introduced on 
March 1 by Senator Ellsworth "to provide for the acquisi- 
tion of lands in the Forest Preserve," a defective title, by 
the way; for all the "land in the Forest Preserve" was 
acquired before it could be in the Forest Preserve; the 
meaning is, as set forth further on, to acquire land "in the 
territory embracing the Forest Preserve." The measure 
provides that the Governor shall appoint from the Com- 
missioners of Fisheries, Game and Forests and the Commis- 
sioners of the Land Ofiice, to be confirmed by the Senate, 
three persons to constitute a Forest Preserve Board, who 
shall serve without pay, and whose duty it shall be to 
"take such measures as may be necessary to acquire for the 
State land, structures or waters, or such portions thereof 
in the territory embracing the Forest Preserve, as defined 
and limited by the fisheries, game and forest law, as it 
may deem advisable for the interests of the State." 
The board may take possession of any land, structures 
or waters, the appropriation of which it shall deem neces- 
sary for the purposes of the forest preservation law. The 
owner of such property is to be notified that his lands or 
waters or structures have so been appropriated; and there- 
after, upon such notification, the property shall be deemed 
the property of the State. Claims for the value of property 
taken may be adjusted by the board if an agreement can- 
be reached with the owner; otherwise they will be deter- 
mined by the Court of Claims. The act appropriates for 
the purpose one million dollars. 
The seizure of land is an heroic measure; in it the State- 
has resort to the right of eminent domain. The justifica- 
tion of the step is declared to be found in the facts sub- 
mitted by the Wagstafi" committee, showing the necessity 
of immediate action. Gov. Black is understood to be im 
favor of the bill. 
AN ENTHUSIAST. 
As A rule all sportsmen have a supreme faith that the 
particular sport they themselves pursue and cherish is the 
most wholesome, spirited and difficult of all sports to 
master in its full compass and refinement. To them the 
dullness of appreciation of others by no means afiects the 
worth of their sport, though it may win a sympathetic 
feeling for nature's omission— that is to say, the lack of 
capacity to appreciate the beneficent and the recreative at 
their best. 
The quail shooter extols the merits of broad fields, with 
stubbles, hedges, brush, ditches, fences and woods with 
glades and thickets, in which dwell his favorite bird, all of 
which furnish the setting for the galloping dogs, the find, 
the flush and the miss or kill. The ruffied grouse wins the 
praise of its devotees for its rare cunning and swiftness, the 
density of its habitat and the consequent high attributes in 
the way of woodcraft and skill required by man and dog. 
The woodcock, mystic bird of darkness and secluded 
haunts, has a following of enthusiasts who paint their sport 
in the delicate coloring of devout faith in the transcen- 
dental excellence of their sport above all others. And so it 
is with the fishermen as compared with the followers of 
the gun, and each class of fishermen against other classes. 
And this supreme faith is a most admirable trait, for it is 
the true index of genuine enthusiasm and honest sincerity. 
To each, as his own peculiar choice of wholesome sport 
affords him the highest degree of satisfaction, it is the 
best, for however the manner of it may be, it is all sport. 
But each kind of sport seems to evoke a different kind 
and degree of enthusiasm from its followers. The quail 
shooter will admit that there is much of good in ruffed 
grouse, duck, snipe, woodcock and chicken shooting, and 
mce versa; though the knight of the gun is often loth to ad- 
mit any merit in the knight of the rod, and the latter 
has a pity for the coarseness of the work with the 
gun when compared with the gentleness and bloodlessness 
of his more refined pastirhe. And this is all good up to 
the time when the fisherman catches a ouananiche. His 
nature then changes; henceforth it is measured and bound- 
ed by things ouananiche. Others may describe the merits 
of other fish, or the thrill of pursuing birds with dog and 
gun. Their efforts are crude and inefficient. They are 
weak in details and lack persistence in the theme as a 
whole and in its parts. The true ouananiche fisherman is 
fired with his subject the moment it seizes him. He not 
only describes his battles in words — he lives them over as a 
reality. His being is changed, for no longer is the past 
sport a pleasant memory. It becomes on the instant a 
present reality. His ardor at the start of a reminis- 
cence is greater than all other followers could work 
up as a climax. Each detail is a sweet morsel to 
be enjoyed bit by bit, for does the ouananiche 
leap out of the water ninety and nine times he describes 
each one of the times specially, showing how the rod bent 
and the line cut the water in that direction, and the butt 
of the rod was held in this direction, all at the same time, 
and how each moment had its peculiar emotional thrill; 
and at last the beauty was landed, its panting sides glisten- 
ing in the light. And now follow in rapid succession the 
attempts to lure the next fish, each detail, each incident 
with the proper side notes appertaining; and then the glo- 
ries of the ensemble — a store of ecstacy too great to be 
measured by hours or space. The apex of the pyramid of 
sport is the ouananiche. It is fine gold as compared to 
boulders. No fish or bird affords the afflatus for high 
■color and sweet sound that it does. A ouananiche enthu- 
siast is the most enthusiastically enthusiastic enthusiast in 
the whole realm of enthusiasm. 
THE SPORTSMEN'S EXPOSITION. 
The Sportsmen's Exposition, which will open in Madison 
Square Garden in this city on Saturday of this week, gives 
■every promise of supplying abundant interest and enter- 
tainment. In some respects — particularly in the collection 
of trophies and prizes — the display will excel anything 
before shown in this country. There will be revolver and 
rifle competitions for prizes, and fly-casting under condi- 
tions peculiarly favorable for record making. The pro- 
jected bench show of field trial winning dogs has been 
abandoned. 
The Forest and Stream will welcome its friends at Space 
■73, where all to whom these presents may come are invited 
to call. 
