June II, 1898.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
463 
it is sport! Suddenly it is dark. We try to see tlie 
sights on the guns, but cannot. 
"The air is full of dark, indistinct forms rushing here 
and there. The sound of wings is like the wind sighing 
through the forest. Presently all is still. From dis- 
tant parts of the marsh occasionally a hoarse quacking 
and a great splashing and fluttering comes to our ears. 
The sport is over. We gather up the birds and row 
down the river. We are tired, but how good we feel! 
Presently the boat grates upon the shore. Twenty ducks 
is a good load for two men, but how light they are! A 
short walk along the dark road brings us in sight of the 
farm house, with its warm, welcome light gleaming 
forth into the night As we push open the door the smell 
of good things smoking on the table makes our appetite 
ravenous. Glad shouts of welcome greet us. Ah!" — 
The speaker bent forward, his eyes half closed, a look 
of peace upon his face, his mind far away. After a time 
he straightened up and glanced at his companion. His 
cigarette had gone out. His eyes rested on the trophies 
which hung from the antlers, and in them there was a 
new, strange light. Herbert L. Jillson. 
Nest-Building Fishes, 
Some time ago I read an interesting paper by Mr. G. 
F. Holder on nest-building fishes, in which he compares 
them to the birds, calling them the birds of the sea. And 
truly when their curious nest-building methods and the 
diversity and brillianc}' of their colors is considered, the 
comparison is very applicable. It occurred to me, as 
few of your readers know how easily these peculiarities 
can be observed and studied, to describe for the benefit 
of those interested a very pretty and simple experiment 
which it is possible for anyone to try. 
All that is necessary for the experiment is a glass 
jai*or fish globe to hold not less than a gallon of water, 
a bunch of aquatic weeds, and a pair of those interesting 
little fishes, the two-spined or four-spined stickleback;;. 
These may generalb^ be bought at any of the dealers in 
goldfish and aquariums, or the sticklebacks may be found 
almost anywhere near the sea coast in brackish water, 
and are easily caught with a small ring net. The fishes 
are very small, seldom exceeding 3in. in length. They 
should be obtained and placed in the aquarium early in 
the spring and should be male and female. The sexes 
being easily determined, as the male, especially near the 
breeding season, is much more brilliant in color. 
The sticklebacks are nest builders, and the process by 
which they construct the curious little nest is very inter- 
esting to watch. They gather together small pieces of 
broken plants and first form a kind of platform with 
them among the weeds; this they continue to build until 
it is as large as and about the shape of a pigeon's egg. 
They fasten the bits of material together with a m.ucous 
secretion, which exudes from a pore in their body in the 
form of a fine silken thread; this they pass in and out 
and through the material, thus holding it in a firm, com- 
pact mass. The fish then forces his way through the 
nest, turning himself round and round until a hole is 
bored large enough to suit him. Into this he drives 
the female, and the eggs, which are about the size of 
a small pin's head, are deposited. 
The male always builds the nest and takes entire 
charge of the eggs, and watches them with the greatest 
care and evident anxiety, until the little fishes appear. 
This watchful care is verj^ necessary in natural surround- 
ings, for the eggs are daintj' morsels for any other 
stickleback or other fish that can get at them. 
The little fellow is extremely pugnacious at this time, 
and will fight any living thing that attempts to approach 
the nest; even his mate is chased awaj^ if she comes 
near it. 
If another male be introduced about this time, the ac- 
tions of the owner of the nest become especially in- 
teresting. The rapidity Avith which he darts at and 
strikes his enemy is truly wonderful, as is also the re- 
markable manner in which he changes to every con- 
ceivable color; and during the excitement the metallic 
luster of his body is very beautiful. 
As they are the most voracious of cannibals, the young 
must be removed from the vessel as soon as the eggs are 
hatched, or the old ones will soon begin to devour them. 
Some of the observers of the habits of this little fish claim 
that the young ones are guarded by the parent ttntil 
large enough to care for themselves; but in every case 
where I have left them together, the young fish have al- 
ways been eaten by the parents. T. C. Shepherd. 
The Boston Mountain Sheep. 
It will be recalled that there was shown at the Boston 
Sportsmen's Exposition a mountain ram which was bad- 
ly crippled, and that Dr. Heber Bishop announced his 
intention of performing upon it the operation of tenotomy. 
The result of the operation has just been communicated 
to us by Dr. Bishop, from whose letter we quote: "We 
were assisted by Dr. C. H. Foster, an ardent sportsman, 
and an orthopedic surgeon of considerable repute in 
Massachusetts, also by Drs. Tuttle and Marcey. We 
chloroformed the animal, as you know we cannot ad- 
minister ether to any animal that is unable to vomit, as 
the ether makes them sick. 
"We started in to perform the operation of 'tenotomy,' 
that is, cutting the tendons, in the hopes that if that was 
done and the leg straightened and put in splints, we 
could make a good job of it. We had previously got- 
ten the splints ready, and had a padded stall for the ram, 
and slings to suspend him. On cutting down to the ten- 
dons we found that the trouble was due to anchylosis 
of the carpal bones of the forward feet (anchylosis means 
joining together of solid bony tissues of one or more 
bones, which in the natural state should be separate and 
independent). We found anchylosis of the scaffoid, semi- 
lunar and cuneiform bones of the forward feet. These are 
the bones which join on to the radius, which is the bone 
corresponding to the one running from the elbow to the 
wrist in the human anatomy. 
"With tliis condition of affairs, of course, it was im- 
possible to produce any beneficial results, and we dis- 
continued the operation, dressed the wound that we had 
made, and left him in the care of Dr. Furguson's veterin- 
ary hospital. For some reason or other that we have 
not determined, the ram took a chiU the next morning 
and died very suddenly, probably from the shock of the 
operation, a circumstance that we did not regret very 
much, seeing that we could not improve his condition. 
Undoubtedly had the deformity been due to contracted 
tendons, the operation would have been a complete suc- 
cess, and the subsequent care of the animal would have 
prevented any unfavorable termination. - 
"The deformity was probably due to an injury re- 
ceived in jumping when the animal was young; anchylo- 
sis might have been produced in this way. 
"Heber Bishop." 
"That reminds me." 
One day last fall I was hunting up the river at a place 
called Grave's Station, and as usual captirred nothing 
but some wet feet and a hard cold. After hitcliing up I 
bade farewell to my host and set out for a long, cold 
drive home through the woods. 
The horse was a nervous one, but quite speedy, and 
we were about half way home when it began to grow 
dark. 
Suddenly a partridge, which had been feeding in the 
road ahead of the horse, flew up and lit on the rail fence 
bordering the road and stood clucking at us. I stopped 
the horse at once and promptly reached in the bottom 
for my gun, when there appeared just ahead a party of 
three young ladies out for a drive. 
Knowing that the human voice frightens wild game, 
and thus not daring to speak, I held up one hand while 
groping in the bottom of the buggy with the other. 
Finally I secured the gun, which I drew carefully 
forth, and upon the sight of which the poor girls, al- 
ready half frightened by my strange actions, thought that 
their time must have come, for two of them grew white 
and wilted, and the other, of a more daring disposition, 
grabbed the whip, shut her teeth with a snap, and with a 
crack like a dynamite firecracker came by me with a 
rush which simultaneously took away my breath and 
the rear wheel of my buggy. 
This started my horse, and if I didn't have a three- 
ring circus with one acrobat for ten minutes, no man 
ever did. I never inquired the health of the girls who 
fainted, but between corporal injuries inflicted by being 
thrown through a picket fence a mile further on and 
certain moral and pecuniary afflictions caused by the 
actions of the horse, I am in a position to state that even 
when the kinks in my backbone are unraveled, I will 
.nevermore shoot any game from a buggy. 
Frederick W. Fassett. 
0mti^ §Hg mid 
CHICAGO AND THE WEST. 
"Warden wins First Round. 
Chicago, 111., June 3. — As duly- mentioned at the time 
in these columns, Warden Loveday, of Chicago, _ last 
January seized seven barrels of grouse and quail in 
transit from H. Clay Merritt. of Kewanee, 111., to New 
York market. Warden Loveday sold these birds at auc- 
tion, and placed 700 plunks of the realm in his pocket by 
that transaction. Not content with that, he brought 
suit against Merritt for $50,000. The latter retaliated by 
suing Warden Loveday to recover the proceeds of this 
confiscated game. This suit was brought before Judge 
Chetlain, of Chicago. Warden Loveday refused to sur- 
render any part of the money. The case was dismissed. 
On May 19 a motion to reinstate the case came up and 
was overruled. Day before yesterday a motion to set 
aside the order of May 19 was oiJered and again over- 
ruled. This means a victory for Warden Loveday in 
the first trial court. Meantime he is going right along 
with the prosecution of the big case at Kewanee. He 
charges Merritt with violating the law 13,054 times. 
Should the latter be fined even the lowest amount for 
each of the offenses charges, the old offender Avould be 
forced to go out of the business in which he lias grown 
wealthy. Warden Loveday brings his suit through 
State's Attorney Graves, and this time the suit will be 
prosecuted criminally, as it should have been in the first 
place, instead of maldng an imsuccessful attempt to seize 
the game. 
. Trapping Illinois Song Birds. 
A couple of weeks ago, as a party of us were out on a 
bicycle ride, in the suburbs of the city, we came across 
a boy who was engaged in trapping the Avild canaries, 
"yellow birds" or hemp birds, which at that place were 
numerous. He had a little wooden bird cage with a 
swinging trap door on top, and in the cage was a decoy 
bird, which he said he had owned and used for three 
years in his trapping work. At the time when we saw 
him he had four wild birds, which he had just taken in 
this trap, and these poor creatures were beating their 
wings and thrusting their heads out through the bars of 
the cage. We ofl'ered to buy all the birds of this boy, 
intending to set them free, but he refused to 'part with 
his decoy bird, without which his operations would not 
be successful. Final^^ suspecting our intention, he 
moved away, but not until he had given us the address 
of 4719 South Hal stead street. Whether this address is 
correct or not I cannot say, but it is worth while for our 
game warden to look it up. The boy's name we could not 
learn. In the course of our trip about the edge of the 
city we saw several of these j'^oung tranpers out around 
the groves and hedges. It seems that they have the best 
luck in the early hours of the morning-. 
At the time of noting this instance of trauping song 
birds I did not know that there was a regular business 
made of this sort of thing, and that a regular market 
for these birds stimulated the trappers in their efforts. 
It seems, however, that the Audubon Society, of this 
city, has fallowed up investigations on this head, and 
has discovered a regular industry of startling propor- 
tions. Acting on the initiatory of this society, Warden 
Harry W. Loveday last Friday arrested Louis Grebasch, 
of 123 Dearborn avenue. Here he seized a great number 
of birds: robins, larks, yellow birds, goldfinches, bobo- 
links, etc. It was the intention of the holder of these 
birds to prepare them for millinery purposes, but Justice 
Underwood thwarted this commercial design by ordering 
the birds all set free. This was on yesterday, and to- 
day the city of Chicago is richer by some scores of 
melod3'-creating innocents. One of the results of this 
trial has been to bring to light the extent of the opera- 
tions of the above dealer and others in the same business. 
It is to be hoped that the vocation will receive such a 
blow as to render it impossible. I would like to state 
for Warden Loveday's benefit that we saw our young 
bird trappers near the intersection of Garfield boulevard 
and Western avenue^ at the southwestern edge of 
Chicago, and near what is known as the old Gage farm. 
Baby Bears in the Blacfcfoot Country. 
Mr. Sam Somers, of Kipp, Mont, writes me to make 
the following commercial proposition: 
"A friend of mine," he says, "captured two cubs, sil- 
ver tips, and also killed two large silver tip bears, and 
I thought I would drop you a line to see if you should 
wish to buy any of them, especially the cubs. Kindly 
let me know if you will want them and your price." 
Just at present, I regret to say, I have about all the 
live stock I can take care of, although I should like very 
much to have a grizzly or two about the house. If Mr. 
Somers will write to Mr. Blackburn, superintendent of 
the National Zoological Gardens at Washington D. C, 
he may be able to find a home for his young grizzlies. 
They have more room for bears there than I have, and 
can take care of them better. I should not want to 
take a bear for bringing up unless I felt that I could 
devote the proper attention to his education, and the time 
of a newspaper man is necessarily limited. 
These same bears, by the way, are mentioned at greater 
length by another friend who lives in the Blackfoot 
country, Mr. J. W. Schultz, also of Kipp. The latter 
writes concerning them: 
"When the stage rolled in from St. Mary's the other 
day, the way bill read, in part: 'One box of bears; one 
sack of bear skins,' and sure enough there were two 
little grizzlies confined in an old beer case, and the sack 
contained the skin of their mother, a beautiful silver 
tip, but not large, as it measures but 6ft. The little 
bears are blackish brown in color, and one has a rutf of 
white almost encircling the neck; the other has a little 
white at the fore point of the shoulders only. Both are 
males, and both are quite savage, bawling and striking 
at every one who comes near them. Their mother was 
killed, and they were captured by a prospector at the 
Narrows, upper St. Mary's Lake. The .30-30 Winchester 
did it, and the bear never knew what struck her. 
"A foolish bull elk strolled down from the mountains 
the otlaer day, and was grazing around near the agency 
stockade, when the Indians spied him and promptly ex- 
terminated the poor brute by means of the lariat and a 
butcher knife." 
Sportsmen at the Front. 
Among others of my friends who have been called out 
to go to the front with militia regiments are Mr. O. C. 
Guessaz, of San Antonio, Texas, and Mr. C. S. McChes- 
ney, of Troy, N. Y., both of whom are now in camp 
with their respective regiments. Mr. Guessaz goes as 
quartermaster, and I am sure he will take care of his 
family, if thei'e are any supplies obtainable by fair means 
or foul. Mr. McChesney promised to write me a sheep 
story about his trip in Montana last winter, but I reckon 
I shall have to wait now until after we have annexed 
Spain. 
Colorado without Game Law. 
On May 28 Judge Harris, of Colorado Springs, Colo., 
handed down an opinion which knocks out the Colo- 
rado game law. Judge Harris declares this law null and 
void, on the ground that three subject matters are treated 
in the law, whereas the Colorado constitution provides 
that but one subject can be treated in a statute. This, 
then, is progress. What would the early settlers of 
Colorado have said if objection had been made to their 
hanging a horse thief on the ground that they had not 
got him classified correctly? The law to-day is a great 
and wonderous science, which should be approached with 
reverence. -~ 
A number of sportsmen in Colorado are inaugurating 
a movement to place the fish commission on a strictly 
non-partisan basis. They will ask for three commis- 
sioners, to be appointed from different political parties, 
and to serve two, four and six years respectively, with- 
out remuneration. It is stated by the Denver press that 
such a movement niaj^ take definite form in the framing 
of a bill for the Legislature. 
Kansas Game. 
In many Kansas counties local protective associa- 
tions have been formed this season which oft'er rewards 
of $25 or more for information leading to the conviction 
of any person violating the game laws. This work, if 
followed up in everjr county containing game, would 
double the shooting for the sportsmen of that State. 
They Cry to Go. 
The despatches of to-day state that when Rear-Admiral 
Sampson called for a dozen volunteers to sail the Merri- 
mac in and sink her across the narrow channel of 
Santiago, "more than 4,000 men volunteered." They an 
wanted to go. This seems to be a habit in the United 
States army and navy. I recall that when I was out m 
the Yellowstone Park in the winter of 1895 Capt. Ander- 
son was about to send a small detail of men on snowshoes 
down to the lower end of the park, to bring in the 
heads of the buffalo that had been slaughtered by a 
poacher who had just been captured. Late at night there 
