Deo. 4, 1897.J 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
447 
line. The railroad bristles with guns. There is a motley 
array of heads, shoulders and arms down the ragged line. 
The deer breaks through. It sounds like an engagement. 
Guns crack and bang and roar. Some belch forth a crash 
and a cloud of smoke — black powder; then a second bang — 
more smoke. Others crack fiercely — a load of nitro. It is 
as if a battle were on. 
There are shouts and imprecations. The hot fusilade 
about the center of action spreads down the line and the 
guns are emptied bravely. It is a seething caldron of 
sportsmanship. It might seem like a war to the calm spec- 
tator, but it is only a line of sportsmen three miles long kill- 
ing a deer. The deer falls. Men swarm in, charging toward 
it. The first to arrive claims it. The next claims it. So 
does the next. The first says he shot it. The second says 
the first is a liar. The third says he will have it and hold 
it, too. The turmoil thickens. Men who were too far away 
to kill or too far away to shoot are clamorous in their claims. 
There is bullying and loud talk, and hard words and bad 
blood. But they are deer hunters. They are out for sport. 
Good fellowship is elsewhere. They are the people of the 
end of the nineteenth century. 
The killing of the deer may end in several ways. It may 
end in an ill-natured division of the deer among the most 
quarrelsome, or it may end in a fist fight, as it has done be- 
fore. Some genial claimers go so far on occasion as to 
threaten bloodshed. But shoSd one man kUl the deer, there 
18 the same swarm of motley, noisy claimants. They will 
have deer or trouble. The more gentlemanly the man, the 
less chance for anything but defiance, though he might kill a 
dozen deer. At every repetition here and there in different parts 
of the line, there is the same blaze of infantry fire, volleys of 
guns with different powders, loads, etc., the same breaking 
cover in the charge on the dead deer, the same unseemly 
rumpus, and the same common devotion to the different 
battles. It is a phase of deer hunting at high pressure, a 
kind that is without a parallel, a sport that embodies all 
sports, the greatest sport being the sport after the deer is 
killed. 
The hunt being over, a few wagons loaded with eatables 
and fiery drinkables finished up the gentle and exhilarating 
display of sportsmanship, made up of men and freaks, sid 
gemris dogs and oddly collected guns, and the day's sport 
was ended, and I had no deer. C. D. 
SIX GRAY SQUIRRELS. 
"Say, Templar, let's go shoot some squirrels." 
' 'Squirrels your grandmother 1 We can't find any squirrels 
near here." 
"Take our bikes then, and go where we can find some." 
"Have to make a century run if you do," I protested. 
But Hartford insisted that he knew where there were some 
squirrels, and I finally gave in. Immediately after dinner 
found us wheeling along a little valley leading southward 
from the village, I with my gun slung across my back like a 
cavalryman, Hartford, who is something of a trickster on a 
wheel, carrying his tucked under one arm, except when 
snatching it out by way of amusement to aim at objects along 
the way, meantime sending his wheel over the rocks and ruts 
of the rough road as recklessly as a cowboy. 
Four miles from the village we come to a logging road 
leading through pine woods out toward a high, oak-clad 
mountain. Dismounting here, we trundle our wheels a little 
distance into the woods and continue on foot, our step con- 
siderably quickened by the hoarse bellowing of a bull near 
by. 
Three minutes' brisk walking, and the ground rises toward 
the mountain in a steep slope, covered with a mixed growth 
of beech, maple and hemlock. The bull, confident that he 
is master of the field, has ceased his bellowing now, and we 
are slackening pace, when a more welcome sound from ahead 
urges us into the double quick again. It is the barking of a 
gray squirrel. We push ahead as noiselessly as possible, but 
the squirrel sees us first, and starts off threugh the trees up 
the slope. We both give chase, and come out in clear pas- 
ture land at the crest of the slope, just in time to see him 
disappear in the top of a big oak at the edge of the woods. 
"We'll nail him when he comes out," says Hartford, as we 
crouch breathlessly down within range of the oak. 
Now, some squirrels when driven into hiding will reap- 
pear after a few minutes of quiet, while others, that have 
been under fire a few times, have a way of wearing your 
patience threadbare before they venture forth again. 
f ortunately this fellow is one of the accommodating sort. 
We hardly sit ten minutes when there is a stir among the 
branches. "I see him," whispers Hartford, raising his gun. 
At the report of the gun a squirrel drops from Hartford's 
side of the tree, dead, while on my side (to my surprise) two 
other squirrels, very much alive, rush out and tear off like 
mad thiough the trees. 
• Of course I give chase. There is a wall with a barb-wire 
attachment in my front. I tumble over it somehow, right 
myself and listen. Great Scott, how they go! One is snap- 
ping the branches ten rods to my left, the other fully as far, 
but in sight, dead ahead. I take for the one in sight, tear- 
ing my way through brush and undergrowth, and tumbling 
and pitching over stumps, hummocks and hollows; now 
catching a ghmpse for a moment of a gray blotch streaking 
it through the branches, stdl far ahead ; now losing sight of 
everything in a thicket dense as a tropical jungle. 
It takes but a few minutes to decide the race. I suddenly 
realize, as I pause to look and listen, that nothing in the 
shape of a squirrel is to be seen or heard. I am thrown 
fairly off the trail. Crestfallen, I return to Hartford, whom 
I find where I left him. "Another squirrel came out of the 
same tree while you were gone," says he; "but he went so 
I couldn't draw bead on him." 
"They can go a little," I say, dryly. 
While I am relating my experience to Hartford, a par- 
tridge comes puttering along on the further side of the wall, 
but the undergrowth is so thick she gets away without a 
shot, 
After this we move slowly up along the edge of the woods, 
atiU keeping in the clear. Soon a gray comes along through 
the trees, running right up to Hartford, who brings him 
down with a shot. Then we climb over a wall into an 
old road running along the base of the mountain. On the 
upper side of the road there is a thick fringe of small maples 
and birches, and beyond this a heavy growth of oak sweep- 
ing up to the very summit of the mountain. 
As we work along the road, a little distance apart, I fire 
at a squirrel through thick branches; but miss, to judge by 
the manner he scurries away. There Is a barb-wire fence 
between us, and it is useless to chase him. A little further 
on I miss again. But soon after, by firing two shots, score 
my first kill. 
Meantime Hartford has fired two shots, and they seem to 
be getting scarce here, so we climb up the mountain a piece, 
among the oaks. Generally, the most squirrels are to be 
found where the oaks are thickest; but now, to our surprise, 
we sit nearly an hour without seeing a squirrel. On looking 
around we find the explanation — there is not an acorn on 
tree or ground. This is why all the grays are on lower 
ground. They have had to resort to the same diet as their red 
cousins. 
Regretting the time wasted here, we move back the way 
we came. As we climb back into the pasture we see a 
squirrel in a big maple quite alone, and by a sharp run make 
him prisoner. I undertake to shoot him while Hartford 
stands guard at the foot of the tree, but the moment I see 
him and raise my gun the shy little fellow springs around 
the tree, and by shifting as fast as I try to steal around to 
him, keeps himself safely covered. It is when Hartford 
takes a position opposite me that I am able to bring him 
down. 
Next we move down near the top of the slope, up which 
we ran the first squirrel, and seat ourselves by the big oak 
which proved such a Klondike before. 1 soon shoot my 
third squirrel here, on the ground. A little later two come 
into the favored oak. Remembering my previous experi- 
ence here, I suggest waiting until we can both shoot at once. 
They seem to suspect our presence, however, and keep on 
the further side of the tree, playing among the branches, 
and meantime a third squirrel appears in the top of a tall 
maple at the crest of the slope. Night is now coming on 
and, something must be done, so Hartford tries to get a shot 
at the new comer, while I look after those in the oak. But 
the wary fellow thwarts him by the same old trick of keep- 
ing behind the tree until I finally go to his aid, when he soon 
brings him down. 
Thinking he is done for, I shout "Now for the others," 
and start back toward the oak. But the moment he strikes 
the ground he springs to his feet and darts down the slope 
like a fox, and with a muttered imprecation Hartford takes 
after him 
I shudder as I watch him go! For 100yds. the ground 
falls away steep as the roof of a house, broken and strewn 
with stumps, brush and boulders. But without slackening 
pace a bit, Hartford makes smooth work of it all. In three 
seconds he is lost to view, in a wake of flying leaves and 
lashing bushes; but I can still hear him pounding and crash- 
ing along, twisting and turning among the. tree trunks, on 
and on, like a rock down a mountain, until finally the 
climax comes in a terrific crash in a brush heap and all is 
quiet. 
Is he stove into kindling wood, I wonder. No, now he is 
up and at it again. I begin to laugh now, and presently I 
hear Hartford coming back up the slope. But I don't dare 
to let him see me laughing until I find he has the squirrel. 
Of course, the grays in the oak have taken their departure, 
and as darkness is now falling we hurry down to our wheels 
and start for home And by the way, brother sportsman, 
you who know nothing about the bicycle, but think it's 
something that doesn't amount to much, anyway— if you 
could realize half the comfort of having one waiting for you 
after an afternoon's hunt, with four long miles of road be- 
tween you and home, some dealer would have a customer in 
you forthwith. 
Twenty minutes after mounting Hartford and I are back 
in the village, well satisfied with our string of six fine squir- 
rels. Templar, 
Cornish, Me. 
NOTES FROM NEW BRUNSWICK. 
Now that an occasional flurry of snow gives promise of 
revealing the hidden haunts of the wary buct and the 
evanescent doe, the deer-stalker is abroad in the woods. 
The dead leaves and the low-lying brush are covered with 
a mantle of immaculate white that seems to intensify the 
natural stillness of the forest, and yet speaks eloquent- 
ly of the game that seeks seclusion there. In places 
where, during the months of summer and early fall, only 
the eye of the practiced hunter could detect the presence 
of game, the hardwood ridges and the frost-bound brdoks 
tell a tale of many chapters punctuated with the comely 
tracks of moose, deer and caribou. Three years ago the 
shooting of a deer in the vicinity of Fredericton was a 
feat which the local press made haste to chronicle at 
length; now it is a matter of daily occurrence, and is 
dished up in the same perfunctory style as the runaw^, 
the market report, the muffin struggle and bazaar. Tjx 
December last the writer hunted for a week in one of the 
best deer districts in Maine, and he believes that in the 
river counties of York, Sunbury and Queens the red deer 
are now as plentiful as they are even in the Megantic and 
Moose River regions of that State. Perhaps the largest 
buck shot in New Brunswick this fall fell to my lot on the 
1.3th inst. After being bled and brought into town he 
was carefully weighed and tipped the beam at 2601b8. 
Before his last fatal illness he must have aggregated 
2751bs. On the 24th I dragged in another buck, which 
weighed, after all his interior economy had been re- 
moved, 1661bs. I should think he must have been good 
for about 2151bs. when he undertook to run a race with 
the portable lead mine which I unloosed in his locality. 
Now, here is a nut for the knowing ones to crack. It took 
just one shot from a .45-90 Marlin to double up the big 
buck, while the smaller candidate for tasidermistic honors 
failed to succumb until he had been hit six times — the 
same rifle being used! Did I condemn the rifle and nego- 
tiate a trade with the junkman? No; I concluded that 
both the deer and the shooter were playing in hard luck. 
Don't blame the rifle; try and put your shot in the right 
place. 
Yet I am moved by the very excellent letter of Mr. E. 
M. Stark in your last issue to make one or two remarks on 
the subject of hunting rifles. It is my opinion, after hav- 
ing given a great deal of consideration to the matter, that 
none of the popular makes of American hunting rifles are 
just what is required for game like the moose or the grizzly 
bear. I have had no personal experience with the latter 
animal, but I should certainly make for the nearest tree if 
I were called upon to face him with any rifle now made 
upon this continent known to me. I believe I could kill 
the bear, but I would not take the chances. It is undoubt- 
edly the fact that hundreds of moose (which animal has a 
marvelous tenacit. of life in the autumn months) are an- 
nually slain in New Brunswick, Maine and Nova Scotia 
with these rifles, but what about the many that are 
wounded and get away only to die a lingering death and 
make food for the bear, the lynx and the fox? It is hard 
enough to defend, upon logical grounds, the position of the 
man who kills game for sport— it seems to be human nature, 
that is all, but that position becomes absolutely indefen- 
sible when it involves the wounding and maiming of these 
noble animals, and in many cases the leaving of their car- 
casses to rot in the woods. Within a space of a little over 
a year I have come upon no less than three such car- 
■ casses in the woods of this Province — where the moose, 
having been wounded, could not be overtaken, and 
finally died of his injuries. Mr. Gordon Parker, whose 
exceedingly modest and entirely unvarnished tale of his 
experience in New Brunswick this fall appeared in your 
issue of the 20th inst., frankly relates the deep regret he 
felt at the escape of a monster moose after the animal had 
received, at short range, four .45-70-500 bullets. The fault 
was not with Mr. Parker, who is a skillful marksman; it 
was with his gun, which was not sufficiently powerful for 
the work it was called upon to do. Mr. W. H. Allen re- 
cently informed me that in the rump of one of the moose 
shot by his party on Little River, last September, they 
found a .44cal. bullet, which had evidently been placed 
there some time before by one of the disciples of Col. 
Clay. The bullet had penetrated the flesh to a depth of 
about 4in. and then become encysted. One of the most 
intelligent guides of Maine stated to me that he believed 
that in the early autumn months hundreds of deer were 
annually killed by sportsmen in that State, which ran off 
and either died where ■ they could not be found or else 
suffered for many weeks until they had recovered from 
their injuries. In the November number of Ouiing is an 
account of a moose hunt in Quebec, by Dr. Parker Syms, 
in which occurs the following instructive paragraph: 
"His tenacity of life was something wonderfol. He did 
not succumb till he had received nine wounds through the 
chest, any one of which would have proved fatal eventu- 
ally. After shooting him several times at very close 
range in the hope of dispatching him, Jabotte said it was 
no use; that he would not die while we were in sight be- 
cause he was 'mad'; so we withdrew behind a clump of 
bushes. After awhile the moose ceased to struggle." 
Facts like these can be multiplied ad libitum. They 
show that it is the duty of the sportsman who does not 
wish to stand as a criminal at the bar of nature and 
humanity to provide himself with weapons by which such 
needless suffering and destruction may at least be reduced 
to a minimum. 
Briefly, my idea of a gun for big game, especially for 
moose, is one that would combine the excellent repeating 
mechanism of the standard American rifles with the deep 
grooves, quick twist, heavy patched bullet and ample 
powder charge of the typical English express rifle. Such 
a weapon would have a very flat trajectory, immense 
penetration and shattering force, and would admit of rapid 
firing. This is an age of improvement, and it is a mistake 
to suppose that any one individual or combination of indi- 
viduals knows all there is to know. Let our good friends, 
the Marlin or Winchester people, give us a .45cal. repeater 
with the Henri rifling, say with 85 or 90grs. of black pow- 
der and 450 or SOOgrs. soft lead bullet (with either paper 
patch or hardened base), and we will not hear of so many 
moose getting "mad" or dying of peritonitis. 
One of the finest caribou heads that has come into 
Fredericton this fall is the property of one of the youngest 
of our local sportsmen — Charlie Randolph. Charlie went 
into the Cains River district a week ago to-day for a three 
days' hunt, Arthur Evans, of Zionville, acting as guide. 
They came upon the track of a caribou, followed it four 
or five miles to the Bantalorum barrens, where Charlie 
secured a raking shot at a range of about 50yds. The 
weapon used was a .45-85-480 Martini rifle. The bullet 
struck the caribou slightly in advance of the right hip, 
passed through and pulverized the left shoulder, and went 
on its way rejoicing. The horns were very high and sym- 
metrical, and had twenty-six points. 
Mr. Stark is quite correct in saying that the best caribou 
heads to be found anywhere come from Newfoundland. 
Just north of New Brunswick, though, is a portion of the 
Province of Quebec known as the Gaspe Peninsula, 
where sportsmen are seldom seen, and where caribou, 
little if any inferior to those of Newfoundland, can be 
found in countless numbers. The range they inhabit is 
known as the Shikshauk Mountains, which are easily ac- 
' eessible from Campbellton. 
Frank Bartlett, an excellent guide, who resides at Doak- 
town, is in town to-day with three unusually good speci- 
mens of caribou, two of which he shot a few days ago. 
The finest pau- has twenty-six points. He reports that 
caribou are now very plentiful on the barrens; he saw 
last week a herd of fully fifty individuals, none of which, 
however, had horns of any magnitude. The male caribou 
sheds his horns earlier than the moose or deer; by the 
first of December they have all been shed except those 
worn by females and young bulls. The sportsman who 
wishes to hunt caribou on the snow can hardly do better 
than locate at Mr. Bartlett's ranch, where he can hunt on 
the barrens every day and return to the house at night. 
Mr. Albert Massie, one of the keenest rifle shots in the 
Province, and most popular of Canadian commercial men, 
has just returned from the Nepisiguit region, where he 
brought down a big moose on Tuesday last. The antlers 
measured o3in. and bore the unusual number of twenty- 
nine points. 
Jordan Prosser, of Windsor, the local papers state, shot 
a large moose last week on the Nashwaak, back of Hart- 
land, the horns measuring 49in . and being perfect in their 
form. The head was purchased by George Saunders, of 
Woodstock. 
Mr. Carnall, the St. John taxidermist, has this fall re- 
ceived for mounting twenty-three moose heads, nearly all 
of which were shot in this Province. The widest head 
measured 54in. The best caribou head came from Milton 
Dayton, of Edmundston, county warden of Madawaska. 
Mr. Dayton will this winter have eight or ten special war- 
dens patrolling his district to prevent the killing of moose 
in the deep snows. 
John Fullarton, a lumber cruiser, has just returned from 
the head waters of Rocky Brook, where he has been for 
the last month, locating parties for the winter's operations. 
He reports 18in. of snow now at that place. John had a 
lively encountei- the other day with a bull moose. He 
was going through a thick clump of bushes which were 
loaded down with snow, and came in contact with the 
moose, which was in there for shelter from the storm then 
raging. John, when he saw the moose standing his 
ground, backed up, with the moose closely following him 
and had to climb a tree and remain there for nearly 
