44 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
lOuLT 17, 1897. 
floated ghostily in the deep, dark heavens. The iiearby 
monte seemed a shadowy cloud resting on the earth's sur- 
face, out of which came mysterions voices, ghouhsh croaks 
and gruntings, or chirps and mirthless whistlings. Insects, 
dazzled by the blaze, buzzed continuously about our ears 
and fell spluttering into the flames. Now and then noc- 
turnal, batlike birds flitted with noiseless wing in and out 
the circle of light. So we lay and spun yarns until late 
into the night; Hfhen each rolled himself in his blanket, 
determined to get as much sleep as possible, with myriads 
of mosquitoes singing about us. ' 
How long I had slept I cannot say, but suddenly my 
eyes opened with a snap, my heart seemed in my throat, 
and before I Avas thoroughly awake I realized that I was 
stamding erect, with rifle in hand. A deep roar, so wildly 
savage as to congeal one's veins and cause a gasping for 
breath, was filling my ears, and it came from a point out 
of the darkness not more than 20ft. away. Instinctively I 
raised my rifle and was pressing the trigger, when a stream 
of fire flashed almost in my face, and a crashing report, 
alongside my head it seemed, almost deafened me. J uan's 
old Winchester had spoken, and its report had hardly done 
echoing among the stygian arches of the monte, when we 
- heard the rapid thumpity-thumpity thumpity of a retreat- 
ing-«.nimal galloping away in the darkness. It was a close 
call, for the fire having gone completely out, we had been 
visited by an immense jaguar, the fiercest and most dreaded 
of South America's wild beasts. It is needless to say that 
there was no more sleep in camp that night. The horses 
were so frightened that we were compelled to build an- 
other large fire and tie them near us. With the exception 
of Coffee, the dog^ too, were scared half out of their wits. 
Had not Coffee l^en securely tied, however, he undoubt- 
edly would have been away on the trail of our visitor. He 
showed not the least sign of fear,butwalked back and forth 
at the end of his chain, uttering the deepest, fiercest growls 
I had ever heard issue from the throat of a canine. 
Morning finally came, and after partaking of a hasty 
breakfast we mounted and. started for the rancho. Rubio 
carried the little fawn across his horse in front of the sad- 
dle. He had bound it securely, and it must have suffered 
considerably before we reached the end of our journe5\ 
Eubio was as careful with it, however, as he possibly 
could be under the circumstances. 
When we reached the rancho we found that H. and Jim 
hadii't been idle during our absence, for almost the first 
thing that met our sight was a nice fat doe, and a huge 
string of fish hanging side by its side near tlie door of the 
house. Once more were we so completely stocked with 
meat that we were compelled to desist from hunting game 
for awhile. 
While we stopped hunting for food, we didn't let up on 
the monte cats. They were not only a nuisance and 
. afforded us coBsiderable sport, but were a source of profit, 
as the hides would readily sell in the nearest settlement 
for a fair price. We were after these animals one day 
when we heard the dogs kicking up a great fuss off' in the 
heart of the monte. We hurried forward, and were just in 
time to witness the hottest kind of a fight between all the 
dogs and a large puma. Over and over they rolled, a liv- 
ing mass of animals, and the monte resounded with barks, 
growls, howls and snarls. We tried our best to get a shot, 
but it was some time before we were able to do so. Even 
then I was compelled to shoot while Coflee was clinging 
tenaciously to the back of the animal's neck. My shot 
didn't kill; but the brute was so badly wounded, however, 
that Coflee soon finished him. 
One night, soon after the puma incident, we were visited 
by a jaguar and a couple of sheep were killed. .Tuan didn't 
seem to enjoy such visits, so Hubio volunteered to build a 
trap lor the jaguar. He and I followed the animal's trail 
to the edge of the monte where we had had the ostrich 
hunt, and- proceeded to build our traps. A lot of heavy 
stakes were cut for a circular, roofless pen about 6ft. in 
height. An opening about large enough to admit the 
jaguar was made in one side of the pen. Eubio manu- 
factured a complicated trigger, and when everything was 
arranged to Eubio's satisfaction we tied our lariats to the 
top of a young tree, which grew alongside the pen; the 
horees were then started ahead and the tree was bent 
down until its top hung directly over the enclosure. 
Eubio then told me to see that the line- was kept taut 
while he entered the enclosure with the ase and lopped 
ofl' the branches of the tree, leaving only the bare trunk. 
When he finished his work I allowed the horses to back 
and the tree assumed an upright position. Then we re- 
turn&d home. 
It was within half an hour of sunset when all hands set 
out on a Ijrisk gallop for the trap. Rubio had a bag slung 
across his horse, in which there was a young pig. He also 
had two heavy pieces of rawhide, which were as tough 
and hard as iron. We reached the trap just as the sun 
was setting. Rubio first fastened his pig to the trigger of 
the trap in such a manner that it was impossible for it to 
do a great deal of struggling. It could squeal, however, 
and squeal it did with a vengeance. Under Rubio's in- 
.structions, I climbed the tree and fastened a couple of 
lassos to its top; two horses then bent it down, and Rubio 
fastened one of the heavy pieces of rawhide to the treetop, 
the other end he made fast to the trigger. He ordered us 
to ^ack up carefullj' on the lassos, and the powerful 
spring-pole stayed bent, and the trap was nearly ready. 
Taking the remaining piece of rawhide, Rubio formed it 
into a slip-noose and fastened it to the top of the spring- 
pole, allowing it to hang in such a manner that the body 
of any animal entering the pen would be surrounded by 
the noose, while its feet would be on the treddle that 
would spring the trap. Woe to any animal entering here; 
it would be sure to find itself swaying between the earth 
and sky, and gradually its breath would be squeezed out 
of its body by ar^ever-tightening band as hard as iron. A 
couple of stakes W'ere now pulled up, and Rubio came out 
of the pen; the stakes were then replaced, and we returned 
to the ranch filled with expectations of the morrow. 
Davlight was fully an hour away when we were astir 
and saddling for our visit to the trap. While some of the 
dogs were yet stiff and sore from their fight with the 
13uma, still, with the exception of the otter hound, we took 
them all. We set out on a brisk gallop to reach the trap 
about daylight. The east was beginning to show gray, and 
we were within half a mile of the trap when we halted 
and listened intently^ but heard no sound. We called in 
^he dogs, and Rubio made Coffee fast to the end of his 
Jasso. We then silently resumed the advance. 
We were probably within a (quarter of ^ mile of the spot 
and were moving along very cautiously, when we were 
brought to an abrupt standstill by hearing a hoarse, furious 
yell break out on the morning air; it filled the depths of 
the monte with a hundred echoes. "AVe have him, sure 
enough," said Rubio. "Now we must be very careful and 
shoot sure. If we don't kill him he'll get away and kill 
some of us, so take sure aim when we see him and let the 
guns do good work. Shoot for the head." 
The horses had no sooner heard the yell than they com- 
menced to tremble violently. They were so frightened 
that it was with the greatest difficulty we managed to urge 
them forward. With the single exception of Coffee, all 
the dogs were as much frightened as the horses were. 
Pretty soon we could hear sounds of a terrific struggling 
and scrambling, and deep growling and fierce snarling. 
Emerging from a thick copse of underbrush, we came 
within sight of him. There, fast in the raw-hide noose 
and suspended in the air by the spring-pole, was a mag- 
nificent spotted jaguar. The noose had him fast around 
the loins and was so tightly drawn that it seemed he must 
surely be cut in two if he kept up his fierce struggles much 
longer. When he saw ua he made tremendous efibrts to 
get loose. His wild strugglings made the pole spring up 
and down, so that he could touch the ground with his 
forepaws. As he clawed wildly at the ground he scattered 
a shower of dirt in all directions, and the monte echoed 
and re-echoed with his frightful roars. Before our arrival 
he had demoHshed the pen and scattered the stakes in all 
directions. Whatever^ became of the .Kttle pig we never 
knew. 
The horses were now nearly unmanageable with fright, 
so we decided to ride a short distance back, tie the horses 
securely, then to walk back to Mr. Jaguar and give him 
his quietus. After riding a quarter of a mile we found a 
good spot, and leaving them, returned to the jaguar and 
found him as ugly as ever. We approached to within 
15yds. of him and the look he bestowed upon us from out 
his flashing, greenish eyes, as he roared in our faces, was 
enough to make the blood run cold. 
The dogs had now gained a little courage and were 
jumping around and barking, but they took good care to 
keep out of reach of the powerful claws. Coffee, however, 
was kept tied to a tree, or he would have sailed into the 
jaguar and been killed. 
The jaguar was bouncing about at such a lively rate that 
it was extremely difficult to get a good aim at his head. 
WeA\ atched our chance, however, and when the oppor- 
tunity offered blazed away at him with three rifles. After 
a few" swings with his paws he hung limp and motionless. 
Our three bullets had gone clean through his head. We 
cut him down and measured him, and found him just 8ft. 
3in. from the end of nose to the tip of tail. He was a 
magnificent specimen and hia hide was beautifully 
marked. We skinned him and returned to the ranch. 
As H.'s vacation was now drawing to an end, we decided 
to continue on up the Salado a short distance, then to re- 
turn to Juan Companion's and spend another week, and, 
as Juan and Rubio Antonio were anxious to buy, to sell 
our outfit to them and end the trip for that year. 
We went only thirty miles beyond Juan's place, and 
spent two weeks in a perfect paradise for ail sorts of game, 
and managed to kill six cervo while we were there. Then . 
we packed our belongings on the spare horses and returned 
to Juan's. Juan and Rubio bought from us everything 
that we didn't give them. One day Juan drove us to the 
Santa Fe and Recon Questa Railway, and from here we 
went to Eosario. 
There we separated. H. returned to his business in Los 
Cardos. Jim accepted a good position on the ranch of an 
old friend. I was filled with such a strong desire to look 
upon the faces of relatives and friends once more, that I 
drifted down to Buenos Ayres, where I accepted a position 
as second in charge of a load of cattle for Liverpool. From 
Liverpool I returned to my native land, on whose soil I 
had not set foot for more than eleven years. Here I found 
many friends who had looked upon "Bill" Kingsbury as 
being dead years ago. 
BUCK RANCH. 
Am. through the bleak winter we "dreamed of an Apiil 
sunrise, of gentle calls and gaflatit gobblers," looking forward 
to the turkey bunt which the captain had promised us, long- 
ing for Buck Ranch, with its great silent forests and its holly 
groves. 
The April sunrise came, but on what other scenes fell the 
lurid light than on the peaceful solitudes of Buck Ranch. 
Long days and nights — long, anxious weeks, we had 
guarded our ramparts against the foe, and now, when we 
have all but won, he presses to a weak point in our lines — 
rusbes through, sweeping resistance before him! 
Is it the resigning of arms and humiliation of defeat that 
bear us down with heaviness? Look at our sunny land, 
where the note of the mockingbiid rings and the breeze was 
hut now laden with the fragrance of the magnolia and the 
heliotrope; our homes are a sea of tioubled waters. Can 
you then ask? We had worked tirelessly, but to bridle the 
waters was more than men could do with the means at hand, 
and we were overpowered. 
Captain Bradford went to the ranch alone, for when the 
appointed time came I, like Friend Bartlett, had "a weighty 
matter" that would not be put aside. A week after the cre- 
vasse occurred he passed, bound homeward. 
"I had poor luck, Tripod. They seemed completely de- 
moralized by the water and to have changed their habits en- 
tirely. Oh! there are a world of them, and there wfll be 
fine shooting next fall. But they stay in the tall trees and 
are hard to find. They won't gobble or come to a call. I 
had very poor luck, Tripod." 
******** 
There were two kinds of "flood-sufferers": 
A community of plantation negroes were camped on the 
levee after their cabins had been flooded. Their camp was 
passed daily by high water forces, with whom they had a 
standing offer of remunerative work. But what did they 
care for work, when the planter was feeding them and the 
"Gov'meut boat" was expected? And they didn't work 
until the boat had passed by another way and their landlord 
forced them to the issue. 
Contrasting scenes are these: A covey of quail scattered 
among the trees and coming to the levee (the only land for 
several miles) to seek the scant pickings upon which they 
must now rely. Coahoma picked one up during a hard rain, 
its feet and wings so clogged with mud that it lay helpless, 
weary — bewildered— starving. 
inhuman hunter approachf4 ^ povey of feathered 
refugees. He was warned of the law and the birds put to 
wing. 
A rabbit floated on a chunk in the river, and a poor, 
starved turkey, seeking food, would not fly untill hAd rid- 
den very near. 
Reader of Forest akd Stream, to which class of suf- 
ferers do your sympathies go out? 
Man, the-refined brute— God's masterpiece— finds a deer on 
a small mound surrounded by water. With an oar he mur- 
ders it for its skin. He paddles homeward, gloating of his 
prowess, and is hailed by a relief boat, "Come, poor flood 
suffererl Here is food and raiment sent you by a sympa- 
thizing sister State. Eat, and welcome!" And he does, and 
is prouder that he has prowess to merit for him the compas- 
sion of a sister State, while Higgins over yonder has done 
nothing noble and ought not to have any. 
■» * * « * «.* * 
The April morning : You have toiled in combat with the 
water all night in a pouring rain. All of yesterday you 
worked under a gloomy sky. The day before, night before, 
and day before that you worked. The sky was dark and 
lowering, and occasionally rain came in deluges; but now 
has come the hour when rain means disaster, for if it rains 
men will not work, and those that will can accomplish little. 
Dawn is coming out of the eastern sky, and with it is a 
faint, clear streak across the horizon which grows — widens 
— changes from an uncertain gray to pale blue, and then, as 
the clouds continue to part and raindrops cease to fall, darts 
o'er the eastern treetops a bright beam of morning sunlight 
that brings warmth and hope into the hearts of weary men, 
who turn their faces heavenward and thank God for that 
He hath, in the long ago, said: "Let there be light." 
J Tkipod. 
MiSilSSIPPI. " 
A NEW FUR SEAL. 
In the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washing- 
ton, Vol. XI., Dr. C. Hart Merriam describes a new fur 
seal, or seal bear {Arctoceplialus townmidi), from Guadalupe 
Island, off Lower California. 
It has long been known that colonies of fur seals inhabited 
parts of Guadalupe and the San Benito Islands, off the coast 
of Lower California, and these have usually been thought to 
be of the same species that breed in such numbers on the 
seal islands of the Bshring Sea. Dr. Merriam, however, did 
not believe this to be the case, thinking it very unhkely that 
a species adapted to the Arctic climate and cold waters of 
Behring Sea— and even there requiring constant fogs to pro- 
tect them from the rays of the sun — should be able to breed 
under the clear skies of the sub-tropical islands, Guadalupe 
and San Benito. He therefore concluded, and in 1892 ex- 
pressed the belief, that the fur seals which bred on those 
islands would prove to be not the Northern species belonging 
to the genus Oallorhimts, but a Southern species belonging 
to the genus Arciocephalus. 
Specimens were not then accessible, but through the coop- 
eration of the State Department and Fish Commission, it be- 
came possible for Dr. Merriam to send a small boat in charge 
of Mr. C. H. Townsend to Guadalupe Island, in the hope 
of procuring specimens. The trip was made in May, loo 
early to find seals on shore. Seven were seen in the water 
and one shot, which sank before it could be recovered. 
However, four skulls killed a few years previously were ob- 
tained and proved to belong to the genus Aixtocephalus. 
In his report on the Guadalupe trip, Mr. Townsend says: 
"Guadalupe Island is thoroughly volcanic and there are 
caves by the dczen along every mile of the shoreline, which 
were once the retreats of thousands of fur seals. On the 
afternoon of May 19 we saw four seals swimming some dis- 
tance off shore. Two of these we believed to be lur seals, but 
could not get within shooting distance, although we tried for 
an hour. The other two, seen later-, were undoubtedly Zalo- 
phus (sea lions). No seals whatever were found on the rocks. 
* * * On May 22 we examined S. W. Point and the three 
islands or rocks south of it. On the most southerly reck we 
found a band of Zalophus, about thirty in number, hauled out. 
There were no fur seals among them. Passing the point, we 
continued, pulling in the dory, the schconer lying-to off 
shore, up the west side of the island about eight 
miles, where we anchored. In the evening we visited the 
spot where Borges and Sisson had killed 200 or 300 fur seals 
about ten years before. Only a few weather-worn skulls 
were found, which we gathered for shipment to Washington. 
The next day, May 23, we hunted along .shore, in the boat as 
usual, as far as the next point south of JST. W. Point, about 
six miles, the schooner keeping well off shore. At 10 A. M , 
near the outlying rocks off this point, we found what seemed 
to be a male fur seal, perhaps about four years old, asleep on 
the water, with his tins held aloft in the manner so charac- 
teristic of these animals. 1 got a pretty fair shot with the 
rifle, but missed. Half an hour later I shot a female fur seal, 
killing it instantly. Before we could get the hook on it, it sank 
below our reach, although only three boat lengths away 
when shot. The water was perfectly clear, and we could 
see the animal sinking when we reached the bloody spot on 
the water. It began to sink immediately when shot. With 
an extra long hook we might have rea<;hed it. We re- 
mained in the neighborhood for an hour, but no more seals 
were seen. While lying-to, with the vessel ahout two miles 
off this point, the captain saw two fur seals from the vessel, 
but was powerless to try getting them. It was on the rocks 
at this point that Capt. Hunt had killed a pup fur seal the 
year before (1891)." 
The facta given below show how rapidly this species la 
being exterminated. There are probably but few individ- 
uals of it now living, and so far as known no museum m 
the world has a single specimen. This is the story of the 
destruction since 1880. 
"In 1880 Capt. Gao. W. Chase, of San Diego, made 
several trips to Guadalupe for fur seals, which he found 
'tightly packed in the caves and holes (in the roc s).' He 
generally fired at their eyes in the darkness of these places, 
but sometimes used candles. His skins sold for |lo each, 
from which he made $3,a00 in 1880. The same man (Capt. 
Chase) stated that about a year earlier a Mr. Eorges sold his 
calch of Guadalupe sealskins at San Francisco for over 
$20,000 (the rate being $10 to $15 per skin). 
"In 1883 Capt. Geo. E. Wentworth killed about 2,000 fur 
seals on Guadalupe. Capt Wentworth states that several 
other vessels were there at the same time, aad that the Guad- 
alupe fur seal was piactically (commercially) e?terminate4 
that year— 1883. 
