Jan. 8, 1898. J 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
found that he had never found camp at all, but had found 
a water spot, and wisely decided not to leave it without 
good reason. 
"I scouted a bit to the west, but found unfamiliar coun- 
try, and as the sun had set we were seemingly about to 
stay by that water all night, when I turned around and 
saw a pale column of smoke rising above the crest of the 
ridge against the evening slcy. 
"At once we marched around the ridge, and as we rose 
over the divide we saw the whole hillside flaming with 
signal fires. Our dear old Anastasio had become alarmed, 
and set fire to fifteen or twenty dead mescals in different 
places to guide us home. God bless a good Indian! 
"The next day I spent the morning in washing, resting 
and cutting spikes out of my legs. Anastasio packed in 
the second small ram, and ate ribs and slept. Then, in 
the afternoon, we got the rest of the big fellow down. 
Anastasio, to make his load lighter, smashed off the 
shanks with a stone, although he carried a knife in his 
belt— a striking trick of heredity." 
Yellowstone Park Notes. 
Mammoth Hot Springs, Yellowstone National Park, 
Wyo., Dec. 19. — This morning a team and three men 
started out to bring in a soldier who froze to death be- 
tween the Lake Hotel and the Thumb. The news came 
in last night. As nearly as I can learn the story it is this: 
The soldiers stationed at Snake River and Mud Geyser 
have an arrangement to meet on the 15th and 30th of 
every month at a cabin on the West Bay or Thumb of 
Yellowstone Lake, to exchange mail, reports, etc. Two 
men started from their station at Mud Geyser, spent the 
first niglit at the Lake Hotel, starting from there on the 
morning of the 14th at about 8 o'clock with the ther- 
mometer several degrees below zero. The distance be- 
tween the hotel and cabin is nineteen miles. When out 
about ten miles one of the men found himself giving 
out, and, knowing he could not make to the cabin, started 
to return. The other soldier, Private John W. H. IDavis, 
of D Troop, Sixth Cavalry, determined to push on to 
the cabin. This was in violation of very strict orders 
issued by the commanding officer. The orders are that 
no one man shall make a snowshoe trip alone; that 
there shall never be less than two together, and that if 
one has to turn back or stop, the .other man must stay 
with him. These orders have been in force since the 
spring of '94, when the Forest and Stream Expedition 
reported the man lost between Riverside and the Lower 
Gej'ser Basin. 
The man who turned back spent the night in a cabin 
on Bridge Bay, getting back to the Lake Hotel next 
morning with his fingers, ears and toes frosted a bit, 
reporting to Fort Yellowstone by teleplione. Capt. Er- 
win, the commanding officer, ordered two men from 
another station over to investigate. The men started 
out as soon as possible, and very near the 12-mile post 
found Davis frozen stii¥, his snowshoes sticking up in 
the road. It seems almost impossible for a man to lose 
his life in such a waj'' in that country, as there is any 
quantity of dry wood and timber all along tlie road. He 
could not have been so careless as to be without matches! 
I will try to get all the particulars later. 
Capt. Erwin has had reported to him thirty-two buffalo 
as seen by his scouting parties. He was unable to get 
away on our photographing trip to Soda Butte, and had 
to give it up until next spring. 
To-day I saw in Gardiner Canyon five mountain sheep, 
not quite close enough for a picture. Quite a number 
of coyotes have been poisoned in the Park lately, and 
fresh poison is put out every few days. 
Very large bands of elk are seen by the Cooke City 
stage driver all along the road from the springs to Soda 
Butte. 
I saw about fifteen antelope on the flat across Gardi- 
ner's River as I came down. 
One of the scouts reported as having seen Saturday 
about 750 elk on the ridge in the Swan Lake country. 
Elk, antelope and mule deer are close in to Gardiner, 
south and southwest of the town. Very few of the ante- 
lope have come out of the Park lately. Only a few 
have been killed in Montana. E. Hofer. 
r 
Infertility of the Half-breed Goose. 
Providence, Ky., Dec. 20. — Editor Forest and Stream: 
I notice in a recent issue that Shaganoss would like to 
know about the infertility of eggs of hybrids from com- 
mon domestic and wild goose (B. canadensis). Having 
from experience been familiar with the raising of these 
half-breeds, I can say that they will not hatch. The male 
hybrid retains the red feet of the tame goose, while the 
female has the dark color of the wild goose. Head of 
female also darker than male. Some of the geese in this 
flock are over thirty-five years old. J, T. Rice. 
Algona, la., Dec. 29. — I notice an inquiry by Shaga- 
noss in regard to the hatching of the eggs of the half- 
breed geese. My experience has been that such eggs will 
not hatch. I have tried the experiment many times and 
the result has always been the same. I do not think that 
the Canada goose should be classed with the goose tribe, 
as the bird is more like a swan. If the "tame goose" was 
crossed with the white-fronted or snow goose I have no 
doubt that the eggs from the birds of that cross would 
hatch. John G. Smith. 
In reply to Shaganoss in Forest and Stream of Dec. 
25, 1897, I would say: In 1869 I was in Sullivan county. 
Mo., and I became acquainted with a family named Dell, 
Passing their place one day on my return home from 
Scottsville, I saw a flock of the biggest geese I ever 
saw anywhere. They were peculiar in color, too, being 
much darker than the ordinary domestic goose. I called 
to one of the Dell boys and asked him wftether or not 
he would sell me some eggs of those geese. He said he 
would, but that they would not hatch. I told him then 
I did not want them. 
When I got home I told my uncle about the geese, 
and that young Dell said the eggs were sterile. He said: 
"You are not the first person taken in by the Dells' 
mule geese. They are a cross between the tarne goose 
and the wild goose. One of the older Dell boys wounded 
two wild geese, one a gander, the other a goose, and 
they kept these with their tame flock and raised geese 
by crossing both ways. The two old wild geese either 
died or were killed, and those big geese stay by them- 
selves, as you notice. They do not go with the tame 
geese, and are a great curiosity. Their eggs will not 
hatch. The boys used to disbelieve this, but old man Dell 
gave me some of the eggs, and I tried them. Those 
crossed geese are mules — the eggs are sterile." I don't 
know whether or not the wild geese above were Branta 
canadensis or not, but I often heard people speak of 
"Dell's big mule geese." amateur. 
The Linnean Society. 
Regular meetings of the Society will be held Jan. 11 
and 25, and public lectures will be delivered in the lecture 
hall of the Amei'ican Museum of Natural History, Sev- 
enty-seventh street and Eighth avenue, New York, as fol- 
lows : 
Jan. 6, public lecture. Daniel Giraud Elliot, "Cats 
and the Lands they Inhabit;" illustrated by lantern 
slides. 
Jan. II, Ernest Seton Thompson, "The Summer 
Birds of the Yellowstone National Park," continued 
from meeting of Dec. 14, 
Jan. 25, W. K. Parmelee, "Notes on , the Habits of 
Turtles, with Particular Reference to those Species found 
within Fifty Miles of New York City;" illustrated by 
specimens. 
Feb. 3, "From Vera Cruz to Mexico City," by Frank 
M. Chapman. 
March 17, "The Mammals of North America/' by Ern- 
est Seton Thompson; illustrated by views from nature 
and from original drawings by the lecuirer. 
April 7, "Protective and Directive Coloration of Ani- 
mals," by C. Hart Merriam. 
Walter W. Granger, Sec'y. 
American Museum of Natural History. 
Trapping^ an Eagfle. 
The capture of an eagle three miles from Brownstown, 
W. Va., by Geo. Handley, Will Walker, Ed Smith and 
Jas. Bullington was elfected in quite an unusual way, 
and it was not a less peculiar habit of the eagle that oc- 
casioned his capture. The above-named men while 
searching for maple trees observed for several days an 
eagle fly to a lofty poplar, alighting every time perhaps 
not over loft. from the ground and then disappearing 
from sight. The curiosity of the men was awakened. 
Accordingly they went to the tree, and one of the men 
climbed to the roosting place of the feathered king, which 
to his surprise was a hollow place about ift. deep. Thex 
then conceived the idea of trapping him. A common rat 
trap was put into the hole, secured by a chain. A man 
by the name of Ross, living near, was trusted to keep 
daily watch of the eagle, and was soon rewarded by dis- 
covering that his majesty had been trapped. After a 
fierce struggle the bird was firmly secured and borne tri- 
umphantly away. He measured 7ft. from tip to tip of 
wings. As the men did not care to keep the carnivorous 
pet they sold him to a circus proprietor for $ri. 
^ N. D. Elting. 
Muskrat in a Store. 
A FEW days ago my dog, that, by the way, is fond of 
rats as game, got scent of something in Brinker Brothers' 
•store, in Central City, W. Va., which proved a flat-tail 
rodent instead of the kind of rat so much inclined toward 
the habitat of man. It was about half-grown. It puzzles 
us to know how and why he got there. He probably came 
from a ditch running along Railroad avenue, about half 
a square from the store; but that a muskrat had his resi- 
dence in the heart of the city was a thing hardly dreamed 
of. Maybe he was a little truant, and fell into the bad 
company of his predatory cousins and got into trouble, 
as did dog Tray for the same reason. N. D. E. 
idni^ 
Blackbuck in Muzzleloader Days. 
At the -latter end of the 60s I was living at a station 
in central India, the country around which was well 
stocked with small game. There were also a few ante- 
lopes (A. besoartica) and gazelles (G. bennetti), but these 
had been so incessantly hunted during the preceding two 
years by the ofiicers and men of a Highland regiment 
that there was much difficulty in approaching within 
200 or 300yds. of them. By hard work I had succeeded, 
during the cool season, in bagging twenty, besides a 
couple of four-horned antelope. 
The hot weather was commencing. Most of the ducks, 
snipe and quail had migrated to northern regions, and 
the partridges and hares were breeding. Sportsmen 
therefore had given up small game shooting for that 
season. After a few weeks of quiet life the monotony 
began to be insupportable to myself and a friend named 
B., in the battery of artillery to which we belonged. We 
therefore applied for a week's leave of absence and 
arranged to go to a Government rest-house for travelers 
(called Dawk Bungalow), thirty-three miles distant, 
where we heard there were, antelope which had not been 
much worried by hunters. , 
I hired two camels, loaded them with my tent, cook- 
ing utensils, some tins of preserved soup, a few bottles 
of beer, etc., and sent them forW'ard to await our arrival 
ajt the bungalow. - 
In order to avoid a long, slow ride in the heat, we each 
borrowed some horses and distributed them along the 
road so as to have a fresh mount about every eight miles. 
Before daylight next morning we liad some tea, and 
started. The road was kept in good order for the Gov- 
ernment mail-carts to travel over, but on each side of it 
there was a narrow belt of ground rather less hard, along 
which we rode at a steady, hard gallop, only stopping 
to transfer the saddles on to the fresh horses. We thus 
finished the thirty-three miles without fatigue in rather 
less than three hours, arriving at the Dawk Bungalow 
before the sun became too scorching. . The country 
through which we had passed was cultivated in places, 
the intervening parts being covered for iniies together 
with low bush jungle of acacia and cornel thorn, or 
witli tall p^rass bleached by the sun to a light yellow tint. 
After breakfast we went out to look for game. B. was 
a first-rate performer with his 12-bore muzzle-loading 
shotgun, but was unaccustomed to a rifle. 
I lent ,hira _ a Westley Richards carbine, ,45-bore, 
taking a. cartridge of thin, tough paper containing 55 
grains of powder and 400 of lead. The bullet lay, for the 
greater part of its length, in the grooving, and the rifle 
was the most accurate breech-loader of that time (es' 
pecially at long ranges), with the exception of the Ameri- 
can Maynard, which was superior in calm weather up to 
150yds. 
For myself I had a double, muzzle-loading, two- 
grooved rifle carrying round-belted balls of 17 to the 
pound, with 55 grains of powder. The barrels, like those 
of most of the old rifles in England, had been put to- 
gether for light powder charges, and I could not use 
more without throwing the bullets 5 or 6in. apart at 
looyds. With 55 grains it was very accurate, but of 
course the trajectory was high, being nearly 6in. for the 
first looyds., up to which distance it carried with the 
fixed rear sight. There were folding leaf sights for j^o 
and 200yds, • • • 
Many of your younger readers who have used only 
improved modern rifles, such as the .40-60 or .45-70 re- 
peaters, may think that a large proportion of shots must 
have been wasted with bullets making such high curves 
in_ their flight. With men who hunted at long intervals 
this was the case, but those who were in constant prac- 
tice with their rifles were nearly as certain of hitting 
their mark at ranges up to about iioyds. as they would 
be with the modern weapons. The very necessity of 
aiming higher or lower, to allow for the curve of the 
bullet, at all objects beyond 30yds., made hunters much 
better judges of distance than they now are, so that, even 
when firing at running game, the requisite allowance was 
made almost instinctively. 
It is at ranges between 120 and 200yds. that modern 
rifles show their superiority in the most marked manner. 
With the .above-mentioned two-groove I had killed sev- 
eral antelope and gazelles at distances up to 200yds., but 
had lost many through the bullets going over or imder 
their chests. When the distance was correctly judged, I 
never used any rifle at game shooting which excelled it 
in accuracy. W. Greener, the father of the present gun- 
maker of that name, and Chapman, in his book on "The 
Improved American Rifle," both write very disparag- 
ingly against two-grooved rifles, but every sportsman 
who has hunted with them, or whose narratives I have 
read, has spoken of them in the highest terms. 
The country all round the Dawk Bungalow was a wide 
plain, intersected with shallow, dried-up water-courses, 
and with a range of low, rocky hills in tTie distance. It 
was cultivated in patches, from which the crops had been 
reaped, and the intervening ground Avas covered with 
low prickly bushes, tufts of dry grass and a few wild 
date palms. 
B. and I started, each with two coolies from a neigh- 
boring village, in order that they might carry back any 
game that we killed. We separated so as not to spoil 
each other's sport, and after walking some distance I 
noticed a gazelle in a clump of bushes 70yds. away. I 
always made it a rule to kih something at the earliest 
opportunity on every shooting excursion, for the purpose 
' of supplying the native servants with flesh food. If was 
a pleasant change for them, and made them more cheer- 
ful when living only upon their ordinary diet of flour, 
pulse and clarified butter (called ghee). I therefore 
dropped the gazelle in his track's with a shot through the 
shoulders, and, after the little animal was cleaned, one of 
the coolies carried it on his head to the bungalow. 
The most convenient mode of preparing a small deer 
or antelope to. be carried in this way is to slit open the 
space between the tendon and bone above each hock, 
push each fore leg from the opposite side through the 
hole, and prevent the uppermost leg from slipping back 
by passing a sharp-pointed stick like a skewer through 
the arm close above the knee. A piece of string tied 
round all the legs where they cross will fix. them still 
more firmly, and sometimes it is advisable to fasten an 
animal's head to them, thus preventing it from swaying 
about. Most coolies prefer carrying a weight on their 
heads if it can be made compact enough. 
After walking about two miles more I saw a fine 
blackbuck with splendid horns, and managed to stalk 
■to within lOOyds., when he began to move preparatory 
to breaking into a gallop. The bullet struck: in the shoul- 
der rather too high, probably grazing the under part 
of the spine. The buck dropped on the spot, but as he 
continued struggling while on his side I feared Tie might 
get on his legs, so ran forward and out the bullet of the 
second barrel through his brain. The sun was, by that 
time, so hot that after cleaning the buck and helping the 
coolie to carry the carcass to the bungalow I took a 
cold bath and enjoyed a few hours' rest. 
Late in the afternoon. B. and I went out again in sepa- 
rate directions. I found another blackbuck, and ap- 
proached within 90 or lOoyds.. when he moved away in 
an oblique direction, but stopped for an instant to look 
back at me. I made a bad yet very successful shot, aim- 
ing at the root of the left ear. 
On returning to the burtgalow I found that B. had 
been unlucky. He had seen some antelope, but cnuld 
not approach within fair range, which was not surprising, 
considering that he was inexperienced in stalking. He 
was too good a sportsman to fire at game several hun- 
dreds of 5^ards distant, for the mere chance of killing, or 
more likely, uselessly wounding an animal. 
The blackbuck is usually found in places where there 
is little cover, but if not made too wary by having been 
frequently shot at he can generally be stalked to within 
100 of 150yds. by a hunter who does not mind walking on 
-hands and kiiees, or dragging himself along with - liis 
elbows and toes in the dry beds of streams and behind 
low bushes. This is, of course., hard work under a blazing 
sun, and trying to a man's temper when, as is often the 
case, the ground is strewn w"itli dead thorns. 
They are sometimes in places where the cover is better 
