Aug. 20, i§9&] 
FOREST AiSTt) STREAM. 
143 
of pine. About two miles up Cache Creek the trail leads 
into a little glade in the midst of thick pine timbers. 
Even at first sight there appears to be something 
unusual and peculiar about this little opening in the 
pines; in the center is a shallow depression that is bare 
of verdure, the surface white with an encrustation that 
proved to be salt, while the converging and deeply worn 
trails leading to it, and the numerous game tracks, show 
it to be what in the hunter's vernacular is called a 
"lick." It is the dried bed of an ancient hot spring- 
that is now a shallow alkali pool in the early spring. 
Crossing this little meadow, we found the creek cutting 
its further edge, while the white slopes on the opposite 
side, and the smell of sulphur in the air, suggest at 
once to those familiar with "Gcyserland" the presence of 
hot springs. Picketing our horses where they might 
graze upon the salty grasses that grow about the "lick," 
we descended the bank to the border of the creek, and 
found its waters flowing between smooth white walls 
of polished marble, and an expansion of the stream bor- 
dered by this creamy white rock forms a natural bath 
reservoir that even the luxuriousness of ancient Rome 
could not have equaled. In the center the water is 
boiling furiously, the bubbling mass rising several inches 
above the surface of the creek; but the water is quite 
cold, the commotion being due to the copious emission 
of gas from some vent in the bed of the stream. Over 
this spring a stranded log reaches from bank to bank, 
and served as a foot bridge, which we crossed with that 
• sure-footedness born of the knowledge that our clothes 
could no longer be spoiled by a wetting should we fall 
in. 
On the further side of the creek we first notice a low 
mound of red material evidently iron ochre, and just 
beyond is a spring now depositing this substance. The 
water, clear as crystal and icy cold, issues from the 
center of a little bowl of ochre, surrounded by the 
brightest of green moss. We were curious enough to 
taste this water, and found it slightly acid, highly charged 
with gas, and tasting like our soda water. But it is the 
surface of the little basins and pools, filled by the over- 
flow of this spring, that interests us most, for the sur- 
face of the water is covered with an ever-varying irides- 
cence whose brilliant tints put to shame the hues of the 
peacock's tail, and surpass the changing fires of an opal. 
This feast of color, with its kaleidoscopic changes, fas- 
cinated us, and many minutes were spent watching it 
before ascending to the summit of a little platform over- 
looking this spring. The slope is formed of a gray 
rock, whose riffled surface at once suggests the terraces 
of travertine, the so-called "formation" of the Mammoth 
Hot Springs. It is indeed the same deposit from hot 
springs, but altered and crystalline, the material nearer 
the stream resembling a coarse moss, petrified into 
white, nearly transparent crystals. The lower layers are, 
however, nearly as dense and hard as flint, and it is this 
material that forms the marble banks of the creek, where 
its surface is polished, until it is as smooth as glass, by 
the stream itself. 
But it is neither this deposit nor the bank of sulphur 
a few yards further up the creek that distinguished this 
place from all others in the Park, though the sulphur 
contains cedar logs embedded in it that are ready for 
lighting, the wood being so impregnated with sulphur 
that a splint of it will burn like a match, while the 
black water oozing from under the bank would make a 
really "jet-black" ink. It is an innocent-looking little 
gulch that runs^down the slope at right angles to the 
creek, that makes the place worthy of this notice. This 
little ravine, scarce soft, deep, has steeply sloping sides 
of chalky white decomposed rock, as soft and loose as 
sand or clay. A little water runs down the narrow bed 
of the gulch, cold and sour, puckering the mouth with 
the peculiar astringency of alum. Turning aside to ex- 
plore this place, we ascended the ravine, finding it rather 
difficult walking in the little stream bed, and hard work 
getting up several draps where the stream forms minia- 
ture falls of 5 or 6ft. Above one of these tiny cataracts 
we first noticed a white, or rather creamy, seductive- 
looking substance in the stream bed. This was so like 
genuine country cream that it was hard to believe it a 
purely mineral substance, but such it is, and formed 
about the minute oozing springs which issue from the 
bottom and sides of the gulch. It was here too that we 
first noticed a sulphurous odor and a slight oppression 
of the lungs — the irritating effect of the fumes of a sul- 
phur match accompanied by a choking as if from lack 
of air. We paused a moment to rest, and found ourselves 
strangely fatigued for so short a climb: but several gusts 
of the fresh northwest wind filled our lungs with new 
vigor, and we continued our clamber up the gulch. 
With heads bent and eyes eager to note the curious 
deposits in the ravine bottom, it was not until quite 
close to him that we noticed an immense grizzly bear 
but a few yards ahead of us. Startled by so sudden and 
so close an encounter, we instinctively gave a leap up 
the steep slope, well knowing that the up-hill side is the 
safest when a bear is near and no trees handy. But while 
we scramble a second look is more assuring, and though 
the shaggy head rests as if asleep in the warm sunshine, 
something in the expression and attitude induced us to 
utter a trial shout which elicited no response from 
Brer B'ar. Instantly relieved, and laughing at our fears, 
we slid down the slope and landed beside a huge speci- 
men of the most formidable of all the wild animals of 
the Rockies — a silver-tip grizzly — whose long claws and 
sharp teeth showed evidence of having done good ser- 
vice. Fat as butter, and possessing a thick coat of fur 
1 that would have sold for a small fortune in a New York 
furrier's, he seemed ready for his long winter nap. Roll- 
ing him over, we could find no bullet holes, no mark of 
violence; the only sign of injury being a few drops of 
blood beneath his glistening black nose. That he had 
been dead but a short time was certain, for there were 
no flies, and the carcass was fresh and natural-looking. 
How had he met his death? was the question we asked 
each other, and at first it seemed an enigma. But, 
stranger still, beside him lay the decaying remains of yet 
another bear, also a grizzly, and above this, a few yards 
up the gulch, the fur and bones of other bears, five skele- 
tons being counted besides the ribs and shoulder-blades 
of an elk. While looking at this strange sight, remind- 
ing one of the death chamber of the Chinese or the 
burial place of the Parsees, we find ourselves faint and 
dizzy, and suddenly realize uur own danger. Climbing 
quickly up the slope until the fresh breeze restores our 
strength, the mystery is solved. It is carbonic acid- gas 
that had filled our lungs, and, had it overcome us, might, 
have added our skeletons to those of its victims now 
lying in the gulch. Descending again, we risk possible 
asphyxiation to test the gas with a strip of lighted paper, 
which it quickly extinguishes — confirming our belief 
as to its presence. Above the elk bones we found sev- 
eral dead birds, a rock hare, and numerous lifeless 
butterflies, besides a red squirrel — a pretty little fellow, 
suffocated, like the others, while crossing the gulch. 
The explanation is now simple enough. The hot springs 
which once flowed from these slopes are now things 
of the past, but leave their record in their deposits 
and the white slopes of decomposed rock; but they are 
succeeded by invisible emanations of gas, mainly, no 
doubt, carbonic acid. This, as is well known, is heavier 
than air, and if emitted abundantly will collect in hol- 
lows and depressions in the slope, and any animal un- 
wary enough to venture into the ravine when the air is 
still risks suffocation by the gas. It was doubtless the 
remains of some such unfortunate that tempted the 
first bear, whose remains served in turn to attract an- 
other, and he yet another, until seven in all have perished. 
The gulch is, therefore, a veritable death trap, a natural 
charnel house, whose victims are not yet numbered. 
Hastening from this .scene of desolation to the bench 
above, we are 'in thick pine timber, whose balsam odor 
is refreshing to our lungs, while the shrill chirrup of a 
squirrel, scolding at our intrusion of his estate, and the 
noisy call of a Canada jay. assure us that we are beyond 
the reach of the invisible hand of Death, and again in 
the land of the living. 
Walter H. Weed, U. S. Geological Survey. 
Owls, Mice and Moles. 
Questions in Economic Zoology. 
In their simplest form some of the questions put to 
nature by the economic zoologist of to-day are easily 
answered. Take, for instance, the status of certain insects 
popularly known as the potato bug, June bug and cut 
worm, which the veriest tyro in entomology or agricul- 
ture recognizes as an unmixed evil. But when we con- 
sider the higher types of animal life in their relations to 
man's interests, the problem becomes more complicated. 
In many instances, as that of the crow, or of certain 
species of hawks and owls, or of such quadrupeds as 
the weasel, the mole and the jumping mouse, as well as 
in some species of reptiles, there is such an intimate 
blending of what we arc pleased to call either "noxious" 
or "beneficial" that some are tempted to think it none 
of our business to interfere. Indeed, many honest people 
are convinced that our efforts to regulate economic con- 
ditions only increase the evil. 
Under the old regime of selfish ignorance there has 
been abundant cause for such a charge, but now, thanks 
to the persevering efforts of our scientific men, and the 
wise National and State legislation which has estab- 
lished our Departments of Economic Zoology in the 
United States, we can say most emphatically that it is 
our duty as well as our business to spend and be spent in 
this branch of research. This is evident not only from 
the utilitarian but also from the aesthetic and altruistic 
standpoints. As a result of the enlightened study of the 
food-habits of our North American hawks and owls, we 
find that many, nay, the majority, of our birds of prey, 
outlawed and persecuted since Pilgrim times, have been 
our friends in every sense of the word. It is already diffi- 
cult to believe that this verdict is largely the result 
of studies carried on in the United States during the 
last decade. 
But, as Dr. A. K. Fisher has wisely quoted in his pre- 
fatory remarks on "Hawks and Owls from the Stand- 
point of the Farmer," "a little knowledge is a dangerous 
thing." In the present paper it is my wish to call at- 
tention to some of the facts which have been overlooked 
or too greatly discounted, owing to the phenomenal 
growth of this economic movement. Before doing so, 
however, let me state emphatically that these should not 
be construed as weakening the arguments for bird protec- 
tion adduced by the United States Department of Agri- 
culture. Such an interpretation would be entirely at 
variance with the truth as well as the object of this 
essay. 
One of the most subtle delusions in our estimate of the 
good or evil done by a certain species is a tendency to 
cling to old-fashioned and often false.views of the econ- 
omy of those species upon which it. subsists. Take, as 
an instance, the barn owl, whose wonderful record as a 
mouser has suddenly set him soiiigh in the estimate of 
the up-to-date farmer and zoologist. What evidence 
have we that the commoner species of vole or meadow 
mouse (Microtis pennsylvanicus), which haunts our pas- 
tures in the Middle and New England States, and forms 
nine-tenths of the barn owl's food in that region, is, as 
universally supposed, ari unmixed evil to agriculture? 
Of course the popular verdict is dead against the mouse 
jn this instance. But it is a fact that not one per cent, 
of the study devoted to owl stomachs has yet been 
directed to the food habits of this mouse. In fact, no 
scientific investigation of the diet of the meadow mouse 
has yet been published. Its claim to a position in na- 
ture's economy, quite on a plane with many species 
which we now consider useful, or at least harmless to 
man's interests, is one which the economists would do 
well to consider. 
Independently of diet, what have we discovered as to 
the benefits derived from 1 the burrowing of mice and 
moles in the soil? Do not their myriad tunnels and run- 
ways have a place in the economy of tillage and drain- 
age of far greater significance than we are yet aware? 
Among the undigested remains of meadow mice which 
the barn owl ejects from his crop we find about ten 
per cent, of other animal material, consisting largely of 
the skulls and hair of the short-tailed shrew (Blarina 
brevicauda), the common and the star-nose moles (Scalops 
aquaticus and Condylura cristata), the white footed mouse 
Peromyscus kucopus), and the jumping mouse (Zapus 
hudsonius). All these, if given a chance, would enter a 
plea of "not guilty" before the bar of economic zoology. 
The cases of the shrew and the moles are pretty sure 
to secure a favorable verdict, but even with these, as we 
shall see further on, the evidence on both sides is as 
yet too circumstantial for a final decision. 
The jumping mouse, because of its scarcity, cuts so 
small a figure in the calculation that the economic count 
against him, even if it can be proved (and that is very 
doubtful), is fully offset by the aesthetic and scientific 
interest which it awakens in every lover and student of 
nature. 
The white-footed mouse or "deer mouse" of our wood- 
lands and clearings forms a small part of the food of 
many of our rapacious animals. It will, ere long per- 
haps, be made the subject of economic study, and it is 
safe to predict that such an omnivorous forager will set 
a good many investigators by the ears before his real 
status can be determined. From what I have seen of his 
habits, I doubt not the deer mouse, with many others 
of his ilk, will eventually line up with the American 
crow on the fence of economic controversy. 
Now and then our king of mousers, the barn owl, sets 
foot on a house mouse or a rat, and we feel sure of the 
utility of such a step, but we must not forget that one 
or two per cent, of its food consists of birds. We natur- 
ally exclaim how glad we are it is so small, on the 
principle that bird-killing (by birds, of course) is the 
unpardonable sin. But even here our standards are often 
sadly inconsistent, as many of the birds devoured by 
rapacious animals are of far less apparent value to man 
than the devourers. The question is further compli- 
cated by the frequent instances where our hawks and 
owls prey upon each other. There are other interesting- 
matters in the diet of a barn owl which must discount 
somewhat the exaggerated valuation of his services to 
agriculture, but for all that the economists have in him 
a trump card. Let us now turn to the mole ques- 
tion. 
Until lately we have known very little of scientific 
fact about the diet of our common mole {Scalops 
aquaticus). Under the direction of the Pennsylvania 
State Board of Agriculture, an expert examination of 
about forty stomachs of the common mole shows that 
only one had intentionally devoured vegetable food, and 
that all had largely depended on earthworms, June bugs, 
click beetles and other "injurious" insects, earthworms 
forming the bulk of their diet.* 'There are more than 
two ways of judging these facts from the standpoint of 
economic zoology. Mr. Harry Wilson, the gentleman 
who conducted the inquiry, decides to his own satisfac- 
tion that any animal, if proved to be insectivorous, and 
not herbivorous or granivorous, is beneficial to the 
farmer. On these grounds he is content to rest his 
case, acquit the mole of wilful trespass, and commend 
him to the tender mercies of the husbandman. But the 
market gardener and the florist and the owner of a level 
lawn exclaim: "Not so; we will grant that he does not 
eat our seeds, vegetables, bulbs and grass roots, but he 
uproots and undermines them, and makes a thousand 
passageways in which noxious mice and shrews may 
forage and destroy." 
One observer, Mr. E. H. Darlington, of West Chester, 
Pennsylvania, voices the opinion of another and a sur- 
prisingly small class. In answer to the questions: "Do 
you consider the mole injurious to growing crops? In 
what way?" tabulated in the bulletin referred to, he 
answers: "By the destruction of earthworms." Mr. 
Darlington is the only one of forty correspondents who 
suggests that the earthworm diet of the mole is an 
injury to crops. Probably a much smaller proportion of 
people than one in forty ever considered that phase of 
the question. We have become accustomed to watching 
the robins doing yeoman service above ground in this 
line, and unconsciously have got to thinking that the 
earthworm was made solely for dietary purposes. Dar- 
win, however, has beautifully demonstratedf the hidden 
economy of the earthworm, and how its value as a con- 
verter of decay into food is only exceeded by its agency 
in tillage and the manufacture of arable soils. 
In the light of this evidence, the fact, now fully recog- 
nized by zoologists, that the mole is not a vegetable 
feeder marks but one step in our investigations of its 
economic status. A second step in the right direction 
is the important discovery that it destroys a large num- 
ber of insects. But the burden of proof, strictly speak- 
ing, yet rests upon the admirers of the mole. To these 
we would put three significant questions: (i) In its 
widest acceptation, is the mechanical action of moles on 
the soil more beneficial than injurious to vegetation? 
(2) Is the insect food of moles chiefly composed of 
species classed as injurious by recognized authorities? 
(3) Is the destruction of earthworms by moles an in- 
direct injury to agriculture or a beneficial check to the 
excessive increase of the earthworm? The writer be- 
lieves that the mole will eventually triumph in this con- 
troversy. The mole has been cleared of many unfair 
accusations of ignorant and short-sighted people, and no 
doubt can satisfy the anxious inquiries of would-be 
friends. We have good reason to predict that our 
humble and industrious Scalops is unwittingly pursuing 
a wise economy in its varied relations to soils, drainage, 
forestry, agriculture and animal life, maintaining that 
wonderful balance of nature which man, above all other 
creatures, has conspired to disturb. 
As we take up, one by one, the. instances of so- 
called "noxious" and "beneficial" animals, placing our- 
selves in that unselfish attitude to creation which seeks 
the greatest good for the greatest number, and as far as 
in us lies searching out with diviner insight the end 
from the beginning, how strong the coirviction comes 
that the wisest verdicts of economic zoology may fall 
short of the truth, and are often fraught with disaster. 
The dire results of exterminating, in some cases by de- 
cree, in others by neglect, the so-called noxious ani- 
mals and many of the insectivorous birds, in certain parts 
of Europe, is an object lesson for America. From the 
tvranny of the game-keeper and his titled master we may 
* "The Economic Status of the Mole," Bulletin No. 31, Penna. Dept. of 
Agric , 1898. 
t "The F^-mation of Vegetable Mould through the Action of Worms," 
Charles l> irw.n. New York, 1882. 
