Forest and Stream. 
A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 
Terms, $4 a Year. 10 Cts. a Copy. 
Six Months, $2. 
NEW YORK, SATURDAY, MAY 7, 1898. 
[ VOL. L.-No. 1!). 
> No. 840 Broadway, New York, 
The Forest and Stream is the recognized medium of entertain- 
ment, instruction and information between American sportsmen. 
The editors invite communications on the subjects to which its 
pages are devoted. Anonymous communications will not be re- 
garded. While it is intended to give wide latitude in discussion 
of current topics, the editors are not responsible for the views of 
correspondents. 
-Subscriptions may begin at any time. Terms: For single 
copies, $4 per year, $2 for six months. For club rates and full 
particulars respecting subscriptions, see prospectus on page iv. 
SOAf£ RECENT EXAMPLES, 
A PHYSICIAN of New York city who spent the jjionth 
of August of last year at the headwaters of the Aroos- 
took River in Maine, where excellent fishing was en- 
jo}'ed with 3j^lb. trout, found himself in a rich game 
country. He saw at least a hundred deer, two caribou 
and five moose; and was so close to one of the moose 
that he "spanked it with a paddle." But not a shot 
was fired. The excursion was for fishing; it was not 
one to kill even incidentally game in the close season. 
Commenting on this, a correspondent remarks: "It is 
refreshing to know that here was at least one sportsman 
who could resist temptation to violate the laws of the 
State of Maine." 
Unstinted credit is due such right living in the woods, 
but it would be a mistake to consider this instance unique. 
The record may rather be taken as typical of the rule 
of conduct observed by an increasing proportion of fish- 
ermen who go into the woods in summer. That rule is 
to observe the laws of the land, the laws of nature, and 
the obligations imposed by one's self-respect. We could 
match the record of the New York man with that of 
others. There was Mr. W. H. Wesson, of Springfield, 
Mass., who spent two months in the Maine woods last 
summer and refused to take firearms on the trip, inas- 
much as "there would be no game in season, and no 
use for a gun." And there was Mr. Fred Gould, of Bos- 
ton, who went moose calling in Maine on the night of 
October 14, before the opening of the season, and went 
without firearms, since the purpose of the enterprise was 
to call and see the moose, and not to shoot it. The 
calling was entirely successful; for Edgar Harlow 
brottght the bull so near that the men, being unarmed, 
were with good reason frightened. It is a pleasure to 
add that on the night of the i6th Mr. Gould got his 
moose. 
The rule of strictly and cheerfully observing the laws 
obtains in growing degree with sportsmen and guides 
in every important hunting district. Testimonies to this 
efifect come not from Maine only, but from the Adiron- 
dacks, Minnesota, North Carolina, and in fact wherever 
residents and visitors are learning for themselves by 
practical, personal observation, experience and thinking 
the homely lesson of supply and demand. We are quite 
likely to have wrong impressions on this subject, because 
we perhaps hear and read more about the law-breakers 
who are censured in print than about the multitude of 
the law-abiding, concerning whose correct conduct in 
field and camp no chronicle is made. It is thus re- 
garding sportsmen in some measure as it is with In- 
dians, for the majority of people never hear anything 
about the red man except in connection with some In- 
dian trouble, for which reason they get the notion that 
the savage is always on the rampage. There is in this 
town a daily paper whiclf makes a specialty of chronicling 
the shortcomings of clergymen, and those who get their 
notions of the clergy from reading this journal are not 
more mistaken in their estimate of the character of men 
of the cloth than one might be regarding sportsmen in 
the field, if his judgment concerning them were based 
wholly on the frequent reports of game law violations. 
The man who sets out to be a law unto himself, and 
to kill wantonly and beyond reason, in these days is quite 
likely to find rebuke where it is little expected. They 
tell a story of a visiting angler at a well-known Maine 
camp, last summer, who, finding the fish in abundant 
supply, caught so many that there could be no possible 
utilization of them for food; and quantities were thrown 
away. When the camp proprietor expostulated with 
the guest and urged him not to kill fish for waste, the 
reply was in substance that there were plenty of trout, 
the guest paid his board, and he proposed to do as he 
pleased. The rejoinder was in the nature of an ulti- 
matum; the man was given his passports and early next 
morning took passage on the first outgoing buckboard. 
Such stand by a camp keeper is to be applauded. If 
proprietors generally would adopt the same course they 
would find the sentiment of anglers and shooters abun- 
dantly strong to sustain them. An assertion of the rights 
and obligations of decency commands respect in the 
woods as well as out of them. 
In a dif¥erent way, btit none the less effectively, did a 
Southern host curb the wanton conduct of certain North- 
ern guests, who were bent on beating the record for 
quail. There were birds galore on his territory, but when 
once he had taken the measure of the killers for count, 
he took pains to guide them to such localities as he 
knew to be barren of game, and persisted in this treat- 
ment until, disgusted at their successive failures to score, 
the deluded shooters packed off bag and baggage. 
bolize that energy, endurance and singleness of pur- 
pose which we are proud to consider characteristics of 
the true American. 
A UDUBON. 
The name of no American naturalist is so well known 
as that of John James Audubon; yet this does not mean 
much. Persons interested in science know his name well. 
Those best equipped in general literature know of it, 
but even to these last it has but little meaning. It is a 
name and little more. Most of those who hear it recog- 
nize it as familiar, and try to remember what Audubon 
did, but cannot. And yet. "the greatest monument 
erected by art to nature" — the "Birds of America" — 'was 
builded by Audubon. 
Even of those reasonably familiar with ornithology in 
America, but few realize the vastness of the work which 
Audubon accomplished, and fewer still comprehend at 
all what this accomplishment involved. When Audubon 
began — though all unconscious of the task — the labors 
which culminated in the "Birds of America," the country 
was utterly new; the War of the Revolution was not 
long past, there were no means of communication or of 
travel. Railroads and telegraphs were still far in the 
future. If one wished to go anywhere, he walked, or 
rode on horseback; if he desired to communicate with 
his friends in any part of the country, he sent a mes- 
senger. 
Traveling on foot, Audubon crossed and recrossed the 
United .States from the Mississippi River to the At- 
lantic coast, collecting with his own hands and for him- 
self the birds of his beloved country. W^ithout pecuniary 
means, yet with a family whom he tenderly loved, he was 
forced to devote much of his time to the support of his 
dear ones. In the face of difhculties which we cannot 
comprehend, with labors that are now incalculable and 
against natural dangers that are no longer known, he 
fought his way from absolute obscurity to the position 
which he longed to reach and gained the piimacle of 
fame, which was his highest ambition. 
As we turn over the great pages of his wonderful work, 
which contains 435 plates, representing 1,035 figures of 
birds, all of life size, we realize what this man accom- 
plished, and yet we wonder more and more that one 
man should have been able to do so much. Yet such 
was his unfailing energ}-^ that no sooner was one task 
completed than he turned eagerlj' to another. The fer- 
vor that animated his brush later drove the "iron pen" 
which gave us the "Ornithological Biographies" and 
the "Synopsis." Toward the close of his long life he 
worked with the same energy on the "Quadrupeds of 
North America," which he did not live to see com- 
pleted. 
The results of his work were his own and accom- 
plished by himself; he owed nothing — except kindness 
and sympathy^ — to any one outside his own family. If 
he received some species of birds collected by natural- 
ists attached to expeditions to the further West, these 
were so few as to be insignificant compared with the 
great total. How widely different his from the work of 
the naturalist of to-day, whose collecting expeditions 
scour the utmost limits of the continent and bring back 
material by the carload. 
In the life of Audubon — as indeed in the lives -of most 
great men — there is a lesson that may well be laid to 
heart. The example of industry, cheerfulness, and never 
failing tenacity of purpose, which marked his long career, 
is worthy of emulation, and the name of John James 
Audubon may fitly be cited as an example for every 
young American, 
As among naturalists to-day the name Audubon stands 
for American ornithology, so for us all it may well sym- 
SNAP SHOTS. 
Compared with the prices which have been paid at 
former sales the sums paid for the early edi- 
tions of Walton's Compleat Angler sold in this 
city last week were low. The first edition, London, 
1653, brought $240; second edition, 1655, $67.50; third 
edition, 1661, $37.50; fourth edition, 1668, $50; fifth edi- 
tion, 1676, $25, This Walton set illustrates the ways of 
book collecting; for having been gathered, after long 
and patient searching and waiting and watching, into the 
possession of one individual, they are now dispersed 
again to different collectors. Making a library of an- 
gling books is like angling itself: the satisfaction in pos- 
session comes only after the uncertainty and protracted 
effort of the pursuit. There have been angling libraries 
sold in bulk, when one could on the instant possess 
himself of what it had taken years and years to bring 
together; but such a cold check-book transaction gives 
one neither the interest of pursuit nor the zest of cap- 
ture, to say nothing of the thousand and one diversions 
in the gentle art of angling. 
One of the best ducking marshes on the James River 
in Virginia is owned by New York sportsmen, who visit 
it annually in their yachts. x\s the time they spend 
there is inconsiderable, and as the preserve is prolific of 
game all through the season, it is further utilized for 
market hunting, being leased to professional shooters 
who ship their game to market. The rent exacted is 
$300 a year, and it is recorded that on. one occasion 
with two shots the hunters gathered in ducks which 
netted them $120 toward paying the rent for the season. 
The industry is remunerative and the arrangement profit- 
able to all concerned. The sportsmanship of hiring out 
the preserve for market shooting is not conspicuously 
in evid,ence at first glance, yet it does not differ so 
greatly from the practice pursued at some Atlantic coast 
ducking clubs whose members market their game by 
the barrelful. In each instance it appears to be a con- 
sideration of $300 more or less. 
There are some astonishing figures in recent returns 
presented to the Dominion Parliament, showing the 
amount of Indian earnings for the last year. According 
to these statistics the Indians of Canada received as pro- 
ceeds of the fisheries $450,270.85; and as earned by hunt- 
ing $408,318.83. The statement "earned by hunting," as 
our 'long-time Quebec correspondent, Mr. J. U. Gregory, 
tells us, is to be understood as including all furs, wher- 
ever sold, to the Hudson's Bay Company or others. In 
these days, when we are all talking about the oblitera- 
tion of wild creatures, this annual fur catch of more than 
$400,000 for Canada is significant of an enormous native 
supply, all the more remarkable since the fur industry 
has been carried on for so many decades. 
It was not generalljr understood last season that the 
close term of five years for deer in Greene, Sullivan, 
Ulster and Delaware counties in this State had expired, 
and knowledge of the fact was kept very close by all 
interested in giving the game a chance to establish itself. 
The district game protectors were instructed not to 
advertise the open season, and in every way pains were 
taken to discourage hunting. Some deer were killed, 
but the number was small, and probably the supply was 
not materially lessened. In the last session a measure 
to extend the close time for another five years was 
adopted, and this has just been signed by Governor 
Black. 
The red deer put out by M. Menier, the French choco- 
late manufacturer, on the island of Anticosti, in the Gulf 
of St. Lawrence, have apparently multiplied, although 
at the time the last advices from the island were re- 
ceived at Quebec so much of the territory had not been 
visited that an approximate calculation could be made. 
More moose will be taken to Anticosti. The availability 
of the island for a great game preserve is yet to be 
demonstrated. 
The largest tarpon taken on the West Coast this sea- 
son fell to Mr. W. Ashby Jones, of Richmond, who cap- 
tured on April 19 at Fort Myers a fish of 7ft, 3in,, weigh= 
ing i85lbs. _ , 
