AND 
A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 
Terms, $4 a Year 10 Cts. a Copy, i 
Six Months, $2. ( 
NEW YORK, SATURDAY, JUNE 26, 1897. 
I VOL. XLVm— No. 26. 
■jNo. 846 Bboadway, New York. 
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People that have not he&n inoculated -with the 
true spirit may wonder at the infatuation of anglers 
— but true anglers leave them very contentedly 
to their wonderingf^ and follow their diversions 
with a keen delight. Many old men there are of 
this class that have in them a world of science — 
not science of the book, or of regular tuition, but 
the science of actual experience — science that lives, 
and will die with them; except it be dropped out 
piecemeal, and with the gravity becoming its im- 
portance, to some neophyte who has won their 
good graces by his devotion to their beloved craft. 
All the mysteries of times and seasons, of baits, 
flies of every shape and hue; worms, gentles, 
beetles, compositions, or substances found by proof 
to possess singular charms. These are a posses- 
sion which they hold with pride, and do not hold 
in vain, William Howitt. 
Cbe ?omt and %mm'$ Platform PlanR, 
"Tke sale of game should be prohibited at all seasons." 
NAILS DRIVEN IN 1897.— No. VII. 
KANSAS. 
Chap. 13'5, Iiaws 1897.— Sec. 6. It shall be unlawfal at any 
time to buy, sell, barter, sbip or offer for sale, barter or ship- 
ment, -vvithiu 4Ue State of Kansas, any bird orbirdsnamtd In 
section 1. [^ec. 1 covers all game birds.] 
BIRDS AND REPTILES IN THE AIR. 
Not long ago a staff correspondent writing from Georgia 
related that while Dr. Hodgeman, of New York, and a 
friend were quail shooting in the vicinity of Thomasville 
they saw a hawk flutter to the ground, and going to it 
found a small snake tightly wound about the bird's neck 
with lower jaw set into the bird's body. "After kiUing 
the snake in order to release the hawk, they killed the 
hawk because every hunter does." 
The incident of natural history thus reported is one of an 
extremely interesting series of like happenings, which for 
close similarity and range over a vast extent of time are 
deserving of note. The New York sportsmen in Georgia 
were witnesses of a phase of bird life of which, curiously 
enough, we have record in the earliest history of this coun- 
try. The voyagers of the sixteenth century, along with their 
chronicles of hazardous fortune by sea and land, the ex- 
ploration of new countries and the planting of settlements 
in America, found time to note many a natural phenomena 
not more marvelous than the ways of birds and serpents 
in the air. In his voyage of 1564 John Hawkins touched 
at Florida, where he found the French Huguenots under 
Laudonniere in their fort on the Eiver Mary, afterward 
the St. John's, and in his description of the country he 
tells us: 
"And seeing I have made mention of the beasts of this 
country, it shall not be from my purpose to speak also of 
the venomous beasts, as crocodiles, whereof there is great 
abundance, adders of great bigness, whereof our men 
killed some a yard and a half long. Also I heard a 
miracle of one of these adders, upon which a fialcon seiz- 
ing, the said adder did clasp her tail about her, which the 
French captain seeing came to the rescue of the falcon, 
and took her, slaying the adder, and this falcon being 
wild, he did reclaim her and kept her for the space of two 
months, at which time, for very want of meat, he was fain 
to cast her off," 
This story, since it is only three hundred and odd years 
old, is to be counted as modern when contrasted with the 
next preceding version of which we have note. For this 
we must go back to a natural history observer of twenty 
centuries ago, The Greek poet Archias, bom B. C. 120, 
and known to schoolboys even to this day by reason of a 
celebrated oration pronounced in his defense by Cicero 
0UC9 wrote a poem uelebr«itio.g thia.incident of bird lif<»-^ 
with perhaps more spirit in the original Greek than in the 
tame prose translation: 
"A crow, once moving his black wing in the all-shining 
air, saw a scorpion leaping from the earth, and grasping it> 
raised it on high; who not slowly wpunded with a sharp 
sting the claw of the bird hastening toward the ground, and 
deprived him of life. See how the wretched bird received 
from the scorpion the death which he himself had pre- 
pared for another." 
For the next version we pass to a period more distant 
still, a time not less remote than that of ancient Troy, to 
scenes not less stirring than those of the Trojan war, and 
to a chronicler not less renowned than old Homer himself. 
The Trojans under Hector, assaulting the defenses of the 
Greeks, are stayed by this apparition in the air— the 
translation is Chapman's: 
A high-flown eagle soared 
O'er their hosts' left Land, and sustained a dragon, all engored. 
In her strong seres, of woDdrous size, and yet had no such check 
In life and spirit, but still she fought, and turning back her neck. 
So stung the eagle's gorge, that down she cast her fervent prey 
Ansongst the multitude, and took upon the winds her way, 
Crying with anguish. When they saw a branded serpent sprawl 
So full amongst them from above, and from Jove's fowl let fall, 
They took it as an ostent from him. 
If these ways of birds and reptiles in the air are thus 
shown by the records of thousands of years to be old, old 
ways, of equally long standing is the proclivity of man to 
interfere, as did the sportsman in Georgia and the French 
captain in Florida; and to constitute himself a knight- 
errant to relieve birds or frogs or mice or flies in distress; 
probably Adam began it in Eden. And now that our 
Georgia hawk and snake have led us back to the ancient 
Greeks, here is a pretty bit from one of the old poets, as 
Englished by Wrangham: 
Her web with subtle feet a spider wrought. 
And in its toils a poor cicada caught. 
Hearing It lowly wail its flimsy chain, 
I left not the young songster to complain, 
But burst its bonds, and let it loose, and said : 
"For thy sweet music, freedom be thy meed." 
THE SEASON AND THE BIRDS. 
The general weather conditions of the past spring have 
been notably distinct from the like conditions of preceding 
spring seasons. The temperature has been extremely 
cool, lower than that of any other spring of which there is 
any record. Cold rain storms have been numerous. In 
the West there have been a number of severe local storms 
of the violently destructive kind, doing much damage to 
property within their area. As a secondary result of the 
storm season in certain sections, large tracts of country 
have suffered great loss of life and property from inunda- 
tion. In the overflowed districts most of the birds were 
driven out or destroyed, and while the waters in them 
receded early enough to afford opportunity for the game 
birds to nest, it is difficult to determine whether a suffi- 
cient number of the escaped birds returned to their old 
haunts to breed, or whether other birds, immigrating from 
the districts outlying the overflowed area, contributed 
toward replenishing the losses to the disturbed local game 
supply. 
On the whole, the weather conditions of the past spring 
are such as would evoke a most unfavorable forecast rela- 
tive to the breeding of the game birds everywhere in the 
States and the consequent unfavorable prospect for sport; 
nevertheless, the reports concerning the matter are grati- 
fyingly encouraging, those from the chicken country par- 
ticularly so. 
As the game birds nest on the ground and consequently 
their eggs and young are exposed, to a destructive degree, 
to the effects of heavy rains and cold, either from over- 
flowing the nest or chilling the eggs and chicks, it is mar- 
velous that the numbers of the game birds are so well 
maintained, the more so when we consider their enor- 
mous additional destruction by man, particularly by the 
market-hunter, as denoted by the enormous supply on 
hand in the markets in season, and in cold storage out of 
season. 
From the great quail sections the game reports are favor- 
able also, although it is yet too early in the season for 
definite information. 
The prospects are favorable for excellent sport with the 
dog and gun when the season opens, wherein there is 
much for pleasure in the present and in anticipation. 
SNAP SHOTS. 
What with the sugar schedule and the wool schedule 
and Hawaiian annexation and Cuban belligerency, there 
is small hope of action at this session on Senator Proctor*s 
bills for the better protection of fish and game in the Dis- 
trict bf Columbia. Said Mr. Vest, in a tariff debate the 
other day, referring to Mr. Frye: "My friend from Maine, 
with a strong disposition to piscatorial exercises, is com- 
pelled to stay here to wrestle with financial and economic 
questions." That describes the plight of numerous Sena- 
tors and Congressmen, and there is little likelihood that 
subjects considered of such minor importance as fish and 
game protection will be permitted to prolong the session 
for an hour when adjournment is in sight. But the adop- 
tion of Mr. Proctor's measures should involve considerably 
less than an hour's time in each House, and if the anglers 
in the Senate would go into caucus they could assure the 
passage of the bills. We sincerely trust that S. 1487, *'for 
the protection of fish in the District of Columbia," and S. 
1488, "for the preservation of game and the prevention of 
the sale during certain closed periods," may become laws. 
The customary complaint is that game is scarce, but we 
have the recurrent wjails from Long Island that the deer 
are destroying the gardens and eating the cabbages. We 
observe, too, that Farmer Jones, of Wells, , Vt., js to the 
fore with an application to the authorities for protection 
against the wild deer which are trespassing upon his lands 
and destroying his crops. Mr. Jones argues that if tl;ie 
State has protected deer for ten long years until they h^ve 
become a pest, he has a valid claim to be made secure 
against them in his cabbages a»d parsnips. The likeli- 
hood is that relief is at hand for such deer-plagued Ver- 
mont farnjers as can manage to hold out until October, for 
that month will this year be an open season oji deer^ an4 
if the New Hampshire Bear Brook scej^es described else- 
where shall repeat themselves in the Green Mountains 
with the deer opening, there will then and there be ma,(fle 
an end of complaints from deer-infested farming districts. 
The story told in another column of the opening ojf 
Bear Brook in New Hampshire, after a close perjod of threse 
years., demonstrates by the actual circu^]^stances much 
more effectively than could be done by theori;zing the u^i- 
wisdom of long-term close times. Simijlar conditions hay,e 
prevailed in repeated instances of such terms Wiith respectto 
fish and game. An extended close time, however e^ceil. 
lent it may be in purpose and theory, js taken advantage 
of by the unprincipled fisherman or shooter, who manages 
to get the .cream .and leave the skim milk for other folks. 
If it happens that protection does actually protect ^a stream 
until the opening day, there is then such aji enthusi?istic 
and lively fishing bee that the waters are straightway 
reduced to a condition where they are ;fit for nothing .else 
than another close time. 
We prijit a suggestive paper from the pen of Dr. G. A- 
MaoCaILuin,^]^^id6nt of theiOntario Fish and Game Com- 
ioission, describing the public parks set apart by tlie 
Province of ^Ontario. The Algonquin and Bondeau parks 
are, in effect, just such -Government game reserves as Mr. 
Van Name has suggested for the United States. Comment- 
ing upon the Van Name plan, Dr. MacCallum writes: 
"Of course, one cannot help indorsing the idea if it can be 
done, and I presume it can, for here in Ontario the Gov^ 
ernment has already done so; and besides this, many large 
game clubs have done the same thing. For instance, the 
Long Point Company has one of the best, if not the best, 
shooting areas in the world; it is twenty-five miles by five 
miles, and no shooting, other than a little goose shooting 
in the spring, is allowed, except from Oct. 1 to Dec. 15 in 
each year, and consequently the water fowl congregate 
there in myriads. The same may be said of St. Clair 
Flats reserves." 
Audubon's portrait of the Redhead Duck, reproduced 
in half-tone, will be given as a full-page illustration in our 
isiiae of Jul/ 10, 
James Gayler, first assistant postmas jr of this city, died 
on Friday of last week, aged seventy y .ars. He had been 
connected with the Post Office for forty- two years; and 
among valuable services rendered the public, he devised 
and perfected the present registered mail system. For 
recreation Mr. Gayler was devoted to the study of astron- 
omy and was an enthusiastic fisherman, having been an 
occasional contributor to Foebst and Steeam over the sig- 
nature of Truthful James. He was a man of high charac- 
ter, adorning alike official life and the brotherhood of 
Wiglers. 
