FOREST AND STREAM. 
[March 27, 1897. 
Docking Does. 
Some time ago a special committee was appointed hj the 
jECennel Club to inquire into the method and procedure in 
the matterof "docking" or cutting the tails of dogs, specially 
with reference to the old English sheep dog and theschip- 
perke. Of the latter it had been said that the tail was not 
docked or shortened in the fashion usual with terriers, but 
when it was born with a tail on the entire appendage was 
torn or gouged out, in order that it might appear to have 
been originally produced without a tail. TJnscrupulons 
dealers sold such dogs as naturally born tailless and led 
tbeir purchasers to" believe that all schipperkes, if 
"thorouglibred," were so born. No doubt considerable 
cruelty in this docking was practiced on the schipperke, 
although the members of the English Schipperke Club dis- 
puted the charge, to which they gave an "emphatic and 
unqualified denial," saying that "a greater calumny had 
never been uttered against a respectable body of fanciers." 
In their memorial to the sub-committee, already alluded to, 
and a meeting of which was recently held, they prayed 
that the docking as practiced in their humane manner 
should not be interfered with. 
There is no doubt that "gouging" or "carving out"_ the 
tails was in practice in Belgium, the home of the variety, 
but that if it had ever been done in this country such a 
case had not been known to tlie club; its members were, 
moreover, quite willing to fall in with any suggestion 
toward stopping the practice where it existed. The chair- 
manof the sub-committee pointed outto delegates represent- 
ing the two English schipperke clubs that their description 
of the dog stated explicitly "that the tail of the schipperke 
should be absent," and this not only induced its breeders 
to remove the whole of the tail, but such a statement was 
calculated to lead the public to believe that schipperkes 
were born without tails. Considerable discussion took 
place, and in the end the delegates of the English Schip- 
perke Club and the St. Hubert Schipperke Club adopted 
the following memorial to the Kennel Club: "The mem- 
bers of the above clubs, with a view to the settlement of 
the docking question, have agreed to the following alter- 
ation in tbeir rules and standard of points, namely, to sub- 
stitute and add to the description dealing with the tail the 
following words: 'Tail, if not naturally absent, may be 
docked, and a stump of 2in. is not objected to; but "carv- 
ing" or "gouging out" is not permissible, and shall dis- 
qualify.' " This was signed by Mr. B. W. Moore and Dr. 
Freeman, the delegates, and it will be laid before the full 
committee of the Kennel Club in due course. 
No doubt the agitation had arisen on account of what 
had been practiced on the schipperke, but as a representa- 
tive of the old English bobtailed sheep dog had been in- 
vited to the meeting in question, the club in its interests 
was represented by Mr. Parry Thomas. The chairman, 
Mr. J. W. Eoss, iwmted out that at a general meeting of 
the Kennel Club it was stated that the practice of gouging 
or carving out the tails of schipperkes and old English 
sheep dogs was common; that such a practice was obviously 
a cruel one, and that in consequence of this the sub-com- 
mittee had been appointed. The meeting was prepared to 
receive and report whatever the representatives of the clubs 
present by their delegates might wdsh to place before them, 
and in framing their views he would remind them that they 
must not lose sight of the fact that there were gentlemen in 
the club who advocated the entire abolition of docking in 
any shape; in fact, one member of the sub-committee, Mr. 
Edgar Farman, held a strong view in favor of its total dis- 
continuance. The whole matter would be laid before the 
full committee of the Kennel Club to be dealt with. Mr. 
Parry Thomas, in stating the view held by his club, em- 
phatically denied, on behalf of his colleagues, the allega- 
tion that" old English sheep dogs' tails were either carved 
or gouged out, and that to leave a stump Ijin. or 2in. long 
was an improvement rather than a detriment. He had not 
come prepared with any written statement, but was quite 
ready to reduce the substance of his remarks into writing 
for the use of the committee. His club were prepared to 
pass a rule so as to prevent the possibility of such a prac- 
tice as had been alluded to being resorted to in connection 
with the old English sheep dog. 
In a Flat. 
In the appartment house in New York where I live there 
are six flats, all occupied by small families, with in no case 
more than three adult members. Yet there are nine bicycles 
in commission at the present time, with prospects of two 
more to be added in the near future. More than 50 per cent, 
of the occupants of the house, including both sexes and 
all ages, are riderc, and practically all the able-bodied adults 
are embraced in this classification. Besides the bicycles, the 
rolling stock of the flat includes two baby carriages and 
one child's tricycle. 
Out flat is not one of those "go-as-you-please"' apartment 
houses. It is conducted on the principle that wheeled 
vehicles, like dogs and cats, must be subject to carefully 
drawn up rules The legislation in this particular instance 
requires that they shall be left in charge of the janitor when 
under the communal roof, and under no circumstances shall 
they be taken to the individual apartments of their owners 
to imperil wall paper and track up the halls. 
This rule, while not especially obnoxious to the tenantsj 
has given the janitor in question some sleepless nights. Last 
year he only had four bicyles to look after, and found ample 
room for them in the patsage to the coal bins, but with nine 
and the prospect of two more in a few days things are dif- 
ferent. 
To accommodate the nine he has fitted up with racks a 
storeroom that fonnerly came in very conveniently for gome 
of his own personal needs; but as it is, the place is over, 
crowded and there is not room for a single additional wheel 
on the floor. 
Fortunately the room has a high ceiling, and the janitor 
hopes to solve this riddle of domestic economy by persuad- 
ing some of the wheeling contingent to suspend their bicy- 
cles from above. The two newcomers are to have drop-frame 
. wheels, and as he couldn't ask a lady to take the less desira- 
ble position, he is using considerable diplomacy to make 
some of the original male preemptors of desirable spaces see 
the desirability of moving higher. To help out his scheme 
he says he will call those who elevate their wheels the 
''athletes," as distinguished from the "cripples," who use 
tfee grPHad tier. 
He will also throw in one free clean up for every one of 
the upper story wheels, and guarantees that the tires will last 
longer, as they are relieved from the weight of the wheel for 
the time being. 
With us the cycling season began Feb. 21, and wheels that 
had not been ridden since Thanksgiving came out that day. 
Only two bicycles were in commission all winter, but there 
was remarkable unanimity in bringing the others out for 
Washington's Birthday. Dan Daly. 
Ran into a Deer. 
A TOOTG woodsman had a curious adventure the other 
night in the wild woods of Morehouseville, up in the Adiron- 
dacks. He was riding along the road on a bicycle. His 
lamp was lit, and the light it threw was powerful. 
Suddenly in the road ahead, half way down a hill, a form 
loomed up in the light thrown by the lamp. Two turns of 
the pedals sliowed that it was a deer, which, hearing no 
sound and seeing nothing hut the light, had been literally 
jacked, as much as ever a deer was jacked from a boat 
along a backwoods stream. The sight flabbergasted the 
young man, and then, before he thought to jump off, hs hit 
the deer fair in the side and doubled it up in a heap. 
Of what followed the young woodsman has no distinct 
recollection. He got mixed up some way with something. 
For a brief instant he ft It deer hide under lis hands, then 
something hit him in the side and he went over into a ditch 
among the briers. 
By and by he got up and examined his wheel. The 
handle bars were bent and some spokes needed straightening. 
The lamp was dented in several places, but would still show 
a light, the glass having been untouched. When he got 
things somewhat straightened out he b' gao to examine the 
road. There was a place thai looked like a deer's rolling 
place, with the imprints of a man's hand in the middle. A 
long mark showed where the deer's hoofs had slipped in the 
dirt. The deer was not to be seen. 
Only once before in that part of the Adirondacks has a 
man succeeded in laying hands on a deer while the ground 
was bare, and that man was young Frank French, of More- 
houseville. A d^er was watching Henry Cook one day up 
on the Indian river, and French, who had no gun, sneaked 
up behind the deer, and grabbing it around the throat 
choked it to death. — i\^ei€ York Sun. 
THE BUFFALO AT VAN CORTLANDT. 
New York, March 8.— Editor Forest and Stream: The 
other day I took a spin on ray wheel out to Van Cortlandt 
Park to see the butSalo which have been loaned the city 
through the courtesy of the Cortain estate. 
The route followed was Seventh avenue to the Harlem 
River, Sedgwick avenue, Kiagsbridge road and Broadway 
to Mosholu avenue, and then a short turn east on the latter 
to the north end of the game inclosure. The distance from 
155th street is about six miles. 
Mosholu avenue has lately been macadamized and the 
wheeling on it was the best encountered after crossing the 
Harlem. This is not saying much, however, for the other 
roadswere in vile condition, owing to heavy travel; and in 
places where the frost was still in the ground it was much 
easier to ride over the grass at the side than on the roadway 
proper. 
Mosholu avenue is all that could be desired, from the 
wheelman's .standpoint, even at this the worst possible time 
of year, and it was a comfort to get upon its smooth, firm 
surafce and feel the bicycle run easily once more. 
The day I had chosen for my trip was not by any means an 
ideal wheeling day. It had rained only the day before, and 
a mist hung over the landscape indicating that Old Proba- 
bilities still had something up his sleeve in the way of moist- 
ure. There was, however, a compensation for the poor roads 
and sloppy riding in the prospect. To my mind no view is 
80 charming as when it is given the imaginative cast that 
comes from a misty atmosphere, which blots out parts of the 
distance and makes others more suggestive while throwing 
into relief the foreground and middle distance. A clear at- 
mosphere means death to perspective on any but a vast 
scale, but with mist the most commonplace landscape as- 
sumes unexpected beauties. In England, photographs, 
owing to the moist, i-ain-laden atmosphere, and also the ap- 
preciation of its possibilities by the photographers, frequently 
have the quality of paintings and stand in a class by them- 
selves. The main features of the picture are properly ac- 
centuated, while the great art of leaving out irrelevant de- 
tails has due recognition. 
I had been keeping a sharp lookout for the buffalo while 
pedaling along the avenue, which at first passes through a 
piece of woodland; but not till the open land toward the 
eastern edge of the paddock was reached did I get a sight of 
them. 
The entire herd, numbering twenty-five great animals, was 
grouped on a point of the hillside 200yds. away, some stand- 
ing, some lying down. 
As it happened, when I first saw them all were motionless; 
but presently one old bull, whose herculean proportions were 
not lessened by the luminous medium through which I saw 
him, began fighting a small tree with lazy thrusts of his pon- 
derous head. Nearer at hand was a herd of a dozeu European 
roe deer lying close together in a little weedy depression in 
the open hillside, looking like weather-worn rocks, and sug- 
gesting by their clustering proclivities a covey of quail. 
A few hundred yards east of where these deer lay was a 
thick copse, swampy in its lower portions, through which 
runs Tibbitt's Brook. If the deer had been of our native 
Virginia stock they would undoubtedly have been found in 
this cover, and not out in the open within a stone's throw 
of a traveled road. But the European deer come from a long 
ancestry of park-bred animals and are used to being looked 
at. They are well adapted for parks, but in October afoot 
in the woods I should want diflrerent game. 
The buffalo and deer are in charge of a Scotchman, who is 
known as Billy Morrison. He has been bred in talcing care 
of animals in parks, and his charges and he are on the very 
best of terms. The bufl'alo cluster about him, and even the 
monarch McKinley eats from his hand. In America we do 
not breed gamekeepers any more than we do park deer, con- 
sequently we have to import them. 
Morrison is afraid that the buffalo will get mired in the 
bottom down by Tibbitt's Brook next summer. Buffalo, it 
seems, need a lot of watching in parks, and are constantly in 
mischief. 
Perhaps if we go on with our parks and our buffalo, the 
descendants of these animals several hundred years hence 
may be more tractable and more amenable to their environ- 
ment. It is hard to make park animals in one generation 
from the stock that roamed the plains and knew no limit to 
their wanderings beyond the climatic one imposed at the be- 
ginning of the world. 
With the advance of spring and the coming of better roads 
the avenues of the northern part of the city will soon be black 
with wheelmen. , , . 
The buffalo inclosure can easily he reached either from 
Jerome avenue on the east or Broadway on the west, and a 
sight of the game wiU well repay any one who has the sports- 
man's instinct. 
How the buffalo will enjoy the opening of the cycung sea- 
Bon. remains to he seen. J . 
The Cycle in the Army. 
Ajr'officer in the XJ. S. Army, and one who has evidently 
given much thought to the subject, writes the following: 
"It seems to me that the War Department has, in its road 
maps and the continued scouring of the country by cyclists, 
a means of acquiring a knowledge of roads and of the 
country such as has never before existed in the history of 
nations. Many of the oflBcers are most desirous of using the 
bicycle officially, but its adoption requires the creation of a 
special body of men and a special appropriation. These can 
only come through Congress, and Congress should he made 
to see the necessity. Army officers cannot advise, solicit or 
attempt legislation — it is against the regulations. The mat- 
ter shouldhe worked up in all papers. In one trip I covered 
780 miles in eight days, examining roads between New York 
city and Washington, D. C, and the neighborhood of several 
cities. Returning, I went from Washington to New York in 
twenty-five hours' actual riding, about thirty-two hours on 
the road — a distance of 250 miles, or longer than most of the 
lines crossing the campaign grounds in many great wars. 
"There is no question as to the desire to use the bicycle, hut 
our army is small, and all these things come through appro- 
priations. I believe that such a collection of information 
should be gathered and stored, and that it would prove in- 
valuable in war. All road book information is just what is 
wanted by troops— kind of road, hills and grades, streams 
and bridges, taverns, towns and villages, etc. Add to this a 
very slight description of the country, and one has a mounted 
reconnoissance map. Much of this information may reach 
the Government through General Stone, but it would be 
well to have it reach the army also. 
"A light battery marched from Fort Hamilton to a point 
well up in New York State. Had they then possessed the 
New York Division maps they would have been very useful, 
and, in fact, much information was obtained from a district 
bicycle map on the return march. When I arrived at a post 
a few years ago, not one of the officers save myself rode the 
wheel. When I left every one had a bicycle. General Miles 
takes a §reat interest in the bicycle, and I know that if it is 
possibe it will be regularly issued soon." 
Out of Date. 
Thk other day an Irish youth appeared on the Boulevard 
astride of a machine of the old "houby horse" type, designed 
to be propelled by thrusting the feet against the ground. 
He had probably resurrected it from some forgotten scrap 
pile, but the fact that it was antiquated and ridiculous did 
not for a moment seem to enter his head. 
The notoriety which he at once achieved, for it was Sunday 
and the street crowded with a gay throng of cyclists of both 
sexes, did not feaze him in the slightest degree, and he held 
his head as high as if he had been riding a wheel enameled 
with diamonds and rubies instead of mud and rust — the ob- 
ject of envy instead of derision. 
The wheels in his machine were a good, longdistance apart, 
connected by a flat, springy backbone, and this he utilized 
for carrying passengers. 
Piloting his machine to a place where there was a sulB- 
cient incline for coasting, he took aboard four small boys, 
three behind hugging each other closely to keep from falling 
oil, and one in front riding on a sort of bowsprit projection 
that stuck out a foot or more. 
One boy ran behind and gave the thing a start, but in his 
enthusia.sm he nearly brought about a catastrophe, for at 
the last moment he tried to jump aboard himself, and only 
the most skillful steering of the captain and most desperate 
clutching and hanging on of the crew prevented a spill. 
Later in the day machine and rider took a long run down 
the Boulevard in "tow of boy mounted on one of the old high 
frame "ordinaries," and seeing the two together it was hard 
to say which of the prototypes of the modern bicycle looked 
the most out of date. 
A Bicycle Fox Chase. 
Rathek a novel experience was enjoyed by two cyclists 
lately. When out for a spin they espied a fox and gave 
chase. After a rough ride across country, they ran the fox 
down, killed him, and triumphantly carried home the brush. 
This incident, which is enough to lift the hair of all sports- 
women with horror^ was not after all so terrible as it sounds 
— because it happened at Serpentine, Australia. — The Lon- 
don {Eng.) Wheelman. 
As the yachting journal of America, the Forest and Strkam is the 
recognized viediuni of communication betwem the maker of yachts- 
me?i's supplies and the yachting public. Its value for advertising 
has been demonstrated by patrons who have employed its columns 
continuously for years. 
By the recent final decision in the Conqueror case, yachts 
which sail to this country on their own bottoms are not, up 
to the present time, dutiable under the tariff laws. 'This- 
larger class of vessel has recently been specially dealt with 
by the new Payne bill, which pretends to prohibit their use 
in American waters when owned by American citizens. 
'There has been thus far, we believe, no specific provision 
in any American tariff law for a duty on yachts, but those 
imported in large vessels have been classed as manufactures 
of wood, or wood and metal. In the new tariff bill now be- 
fore the House, a specific duty of 35 per cent, is proposed for 
"Yachts," but it is not stated whether this is to apply solely 
to small craft or to all sizes. It makes Uttle difference, how- 
ever, as after the American yachtsman had paid his 35 per 
cent, duty he would still have to answer to the new Payne 
law, under which he could not .sail her without incurring 
fresh penalties every day. 
YACHT DESIGNING.— XVI. 
BY Vr, p. STEPHENS. 
[Continued from page ^15.] 
The; drawing board, whether a fixed table top or a mov- 
able board, should above all things be perfectly flat or a 
trifle convex on top. The former is the better, but a certain 
amount of warping can hardly be prevented, and a slight 
convexity is of little account; a concave board, on the other 
hand, is something to be rigidly avoided, as the straight- 
edges and triangles will not lie flat upon it. The best mate- 
rial for a drawing board is white pine, as it is known accord- 
ing to American usage, the same wood being known as yeJ- 
low pine in England, It is no longer an easy matter to ob- 
tain this wood of the quality required, for yacht's decks, 
models and drawing boards— clear, sound, soft, cutting^ 
freely — the wood that the tradi'ional Yankee of a generation 
back delighted to "whittle." What is found to-day in most 
lumber yards is hard, streaky and more or less filled with 
gummy sap. Tbia latter defect h of itself enough to con» 
