290 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[April 1.5, 1899. 
storage many birds, the product of seizures, which will 
be disposed of at public vendue when it is lawful under 
the statutes for the same to be sold, at which the sates 
will be made as usual by an order from the court after 
due notice and adA^ertisement. 
"I further say that I only want the support of men who 
are honestly endeavoring to protect game in Illinois and 
to enforce the game laws, and do not expect support 
from commission merchants in Chicago and elsewhere, 
whose whole desire seems to be to violate the law. I do 
not keep tab on either judge or justice, as I do not 
consider it any of my business so to do." 
I saw Mr. Loveday this morning and asked him to 
make a statement for the Forest and Stream, and he 
replied that he had already done so. He regretted that 
I had ''gone to South Water street, and had not come to 
him."^ If he will refer to issues of the Forest and 
Stream of April i and April 8 he will find that I have 
not been to South Water street at all, and, indeed, for 
a month have been away from my office unable to see 
anyone. The matters of news printed in any paper are 
public, and must be regarded thus in spite of any per- 
sonal preference one way or another. If Mr. Loveday 
will give special heed to my story of April 8 he will see 
the suggestion that the South Water street paper should 
produce facts and not general assertions. If this paper 
will produce such facts, showing corruption in the office 
of any game Avarden, the matters will be public prop- 
erty, and will be printed as public news; but they will 
not be used in Forest and Stream until they are known 
to be facts. I would repeat that if the Produce Review, 
from its -acquaintance with the trade, can bring to light 
any of the nefarious ways of South Water street, I shall 
fall upon the news joyfully. Mr. Loveday to-day stated 
that he had no intention of following up the charges 
made in the paper above referred to. He called attention 
to the fact that he had taken game from almost every 
house on the street, and had seized more game than all 
his predecessors together. He said he thought a game 
warden ought to work out in the State as well as on 
South Water street. 
We are having a warm time here, as may be seen, but 
I imagine it will cool down after a while, the more 
especially as I hope to see section I amended through 
the action of the sportsinen's committee above named. 
la Gofcey^s Country. 
In a letter dated March 16, from our friend Gokey, of 
Dawson, N. D., he reports the appearance of the first 
northbound wild geese, and said that he was looking 
over the old gun, with the intent of going out to . s'ee 
what he could do. Mr. Gokey says that there was. very 
little snow in his section this winter and that the grouse 
wintered well. He has spent the long daj's of the past 
winter in hunting wolves, but he has a grievance against 
State Warden George E. Bowers. It seems that the lat- 
ter was out with Mr. Gokey not long ago on a wolf 
hunt, when the dogs ran into and threw a big wolf. Mr, 
Bowers got out with a club and undertook to kill the 
wolf, but "landed good and square" on one of the dogs 
They took the dog home in the sleigh, and at last ac- 
counts they thought he would live. From all accounts 
life in Dakota is not without its incidents. 
Speaking of the northbound wild geese rfeminds me 
that I heard the familiar honk this morning myself for 
the tirst time this season. A good flock of geese passed 
over the city near where I live, and through the open 
window I could hear the wild music. There is a certain 
thrilling quality to the note of the wild goose in the 
spring which I imagine has been acknowledged by every 
one who has heard it, whether he be sportsman or not. 
When the geese go streaming over, men and women 
alike look up and listen. 
Getting Ready for Spring Trade. 
Jack Monroe, out on the Blackfoot reservation, seems 
to be getting ready for the spring trade in bear. He 
writes me that he has about thirty carcasses of horses 
which have been killed by the railway trains, besides bulls 
that died in the Government bull herd, all of which he 
says can be favorably placed with little trouble, so that 
he thinks he could take care of a number of spring bear 
hunters. Jack has been away down in New Mexico with 
Mr. Pinchot, of New York, after bear. They found 
quail, deer and antelope, but no bear. I shottld think the 
latter were probably holed up. 
More Spring Trade. 
The members of Kinne Creek Trout Club, or more 
properly the Flint and Pere Marquette Club, are begin- 
ning to think about their spring opening. A party of 
them will start to-day from Saginaw and go up to the 
club preserves. The annual meeting will be held at the 
club house, or on the special car "W. B. Mershon," 
which carries the party. Then the nursery ponds will 
be drained and the yearlings will be transported over to 
the proper streams. There will be about a dozen in the 
party, including Messrs. Keena and Avery, of Detroit, 
who were at Saginaw yesterday, guests of Mr. Humphrey. 
I can imagine it will be a very happy_ and energetic 
party that will superintend the early spring opening of 
Kinne Creek millinery. This is a wonderfully fortunate 
and well equipped trout club, and its personnel cannot 
be duplicated. 
Nets in Fox River. 
It is cbeering to learn that at the present writing the 
Illinois River is full of nets at the mouth, of the Fox 
River. The mouth of the latter stream is cut off by a 
series of wing nets and fykes, which will no doubt stop 
the bulk of the spring run which would naturally go -ip 
that stream. E. Hough. 
1200 BoYCE Building, Chicago. 
The Illinois Game Bill. 
Chicago, April i. — Editor Forest and Stream: An arti- 
cle which appeared in the Forest and Stream of this 
date (p. 246), signed E. Hough, seems to have been 
written by some one who was misinformed. For in- 
stance, it says: "The first and great objection to the 
measure (Senate bill 43) is that it sweeps away entirely 
our old game law. In this old game law we have taken 
sections 2 and 6 to the Supreme Court," etc. 
Now the fact is patent, from a casual glance- at bill 4.5 
and "the old game law," that but two words have been 
added to section 2 of the old law, and two words changed, 
and the changes in section 6 are so trifling, and yet so 
pertinent, that if Mr. Hough will read sections 2 and 6 01 
bill 43 and sections 2 and 6 of the old law he will wonder 
why he wrote the article. 
Section 6 of bill 43 and of "the old law," in so far as 
they relate to the sale of game, are identical, and Mr, 
Hough is unnecessarily perturbed when he says prairie 
chickens can be sold the year round. 
If the Packer and National Produce Review was less 
obscure it might call for vigorous action, but it does not 
seem to have emerged sufficientlj' far from the shadow 
of egg cases (frequently fillerl with contraband birds) to 
have become reallj' visible. 
The South Water street law-breaker knows full well 
that there has been no favoritism shown in the matter 
of seizures of game which had been illegally shipped, and 
the thorough organization which they haA'C against bill 
43 is the best evidence thst they are not in sympathy 
either with the game warden, with bill 43, or any other 
stature which restrains or prohil)its the sale of game. 
Mr. F. S. Baird, recently a judicial candidate, and Mr. 
M. R. Bortree, an ex-game warden, are men who clamor 
for the retention of sections 2 and 6 of the old game law, 
HEAD OF VERMONT MOOSE. 
Killed in 1899. 
which are identical with sections 2 and 6 of bill 43, with 
the exception of a few words added in bill 43, which 
serve to make said sections practically operative for the 
protection of game. 
Mr. F. S. Baird was repeatedly invited to assist in the 
framing of bill 43, but excused himself on account of 
press of business; nevertheless he was interested enough 
to request me not to change sections 2 and 6, because 
we had obtained a Supreme Court decision, also adding 
that he was the party that framed those sections. In 
spite of this, Mr. F. S. Baird's letters have appeared in 
the Senate at Springfield, claiming that bill 43 (a copy of 
his own bill) is a South Water street bill. Just such 
work as this has kept Illinois back from advancing in the 
protection of game for the last sixteen years. It is sim- 
ply a dog-in-the-manger case, and it is full time now the 
real lovers of game and bird protection should take oft 
their blinders and see the facts. 
I , H. W. Loveday, 
State Game Warden. 
[The date of this letter shows that it was written before 
the meeting of April — reported above by Mr. Hough.] 
Take inventory of the good things in this issue of 
Forest and Stream. Recall what a fund was given 
last week. Count on what is to come next week 
Was there ever in all the world a more abundant 
weekly store of sportsmen's reading? 
The Forest and Stream is put to press each week on Tuesday. 
Correspondence intended for publication should reach us at the 
latest hj Monday mi 8s much e%dm prgcticgble. 
Adirondack Wolves and Deer. 
Chief Protector Pond writes to the Saratogian: 
"I am very much surprised that the old guide (Forten, 
better known as Old Chauncey Hathorn), claiming to 
have so much knowledge of the condition of the woods 
generally, would admit, as he did, that a few wolves now 
exist over in the Moose River country, which statement 
is anything but the truth. I am ready to forfeit $100 for 
every wolf or sign of one that can be found to-day in 
the Adirondacks. 
"The statement that I made, which appears in the 
Malone paper, that deer are unusually plenty near the out- 
skirts of the woods is true, and it is not a fact that deer 
must seek the center of the Adirondacks in order to 
winter, as there can be readily found within a mile or 
two of the border of the woods plenty of large swamus 
with evergreen thickets that furnish the best of shelter 
and protection from the storm for deer, and gives them 
an opportunity to' take advantage of the early vegeta- 
tion about the outskirts of the woods, which starts two 
or more weeks earlier than it does in the more dense for- 
ests. From this statement I do not wish to be imder- 
stood that deer cannot be found in the more dense for- 
ests, but wish to convey the idea that they have increased 
so rapidly in the past two years that they must have larger 
fields to roam in." 
He also writes to the Malone Farmer: "I note that 
you made some comments on a statement which the ex- 
change claimed was made by me, to the effect that wolves 
inhabit the Adirondacks at the present time. Your crit- 
icism of this statement was perfectly just, as I have been 
misquoted. Some time since, when appearing before the 
Committer gn Fhk and Game of the Assembly^ I made 
a statement which cannot be justly denied: That in the 
past two years under the anti-hounding law, deer have 
increased So per cent, or more, and that deer were more 
plenty to-day than they have been in the lifetime of the 
oldest inhabitant residing about the Adirondacks. This 
statement was questioned somewhat, and when asked for 
an explanation, which I gave, was at the time the ques- 
tion of the wolves came up. I explained to the commit- 
tee that from 1850 to 1870 wolves had been very numer- 
ous and had so exterminated yard after yard of deer win- 
ters, when there came a deep snow with crust, that they 
did not commence to increase until the wolves had been 
so exterminated for the sake of the large bounti^ the 
State and counties paid, which did not fully occur until 
late in the eighties, and in fact one wolf was caught in 
a trap at Brandreth's Lake, in Hamilton county, gix 
j'ears ago, which is believed to be the last wolf left in the 
Adirondacks. As the wolves began to the scarce about 
1870; the deer began increasing, but from that time till 
T_88o, when an act was passed prohibiting the transporta- 
tion of venison, hundreds of deer were killed about the 
Adirondacks and shipped to market. One would see 
not only carloads of venison along the different roads 
that circle the Adirondacks, and only for the prohibition 
by the law of 1888 of .shipping venison, it would have 
been only a matter of a short time as to their extermina- 
tion. 
"After 1888 deer began to increase quite rapidly, bul, 
as the advantages for getting into the woods became so 
much greater by the addition of railroads, and the great 
increase in the number of people who were becoming 
fond of the sport of hunting with dogs, together witli 
the improved firearms, the statistics of 1895 and iSg6 
.showed such a wholesale slaughter — over 10,000 deer be- 
ing killed in the two years — that people who had always 
favored hounding, myself not excepted, who had an inter- 
est in the Adirondack's and objected to seeing the deer 
become exterminated as have the buffalo on the prairies, 
were willing to deny themselves the pleasure of hound- 
ing, urged the present law, which prohibited hounding. 
Deer could be found at any time this last fall in small 
pieces of wood remote from the main wilderness, where 
they hadn't been known to exist in very many years. 
They could also be found in the heart of the woods, 
where thirty years ago they were scarce on account of a 
slaughter by wolves. 
"By having alluded to the wolves in the remarks I 
made to the committee, about on the hne of this com- 
munication, is how the matter came up, and regarding 
which I was wrongly quoted. It is a pleasure to knoiv 
that where hundreds of hoimds could be found two year.'* 
ago in back settlements, lumber camps and little ham- 
lets which had sprung up by reason of the large lumber 
interests that have been established in many localities, 
that scarcely any can be found at the present time, and 
the people interested in the welfare of the deer need not 
fear that when deer have yarded on the outskirts of the 
woods they will be chased to their death when in the 
weak condition they are always found in the spring of 
the year, by a hungry pack of hounds, whose owners do 
not think it worth while to keep them in chains." 
One of *'The Best Books of 1898/' 
From the list of 4,332 books published in 1898, 500 were 
selected by the New York State Librarian ; and of these 
500 the librarians of public libraries in cities and villages 
throughout the State were asked by the State Librarian 
to vote for the fifty books considered best for the uses of 
a village library. Among the fifty chosen is the "Book 
of the Boone and Crockett Club, Trail and Camp-Fire," 
edited by Geo. Bird Grinnell and Theodore Roosevelt, 
and published by the Forest and Stream Publishing Com- 
pany. 
Of "Trail and Camp-Fire," the University of Toronto 
Review of Historical Publications relating to Canada, 
says : 
"The chief contribution to the volume, from a Can- 
adian standpoint, is Mr. Low's paper on Labrador. He 
begins with an historical sketch of the various expedi- 
tions of discovery and exploration that have traversed 
the countr}-. The Norsemen and John Cabot are boldly 
claimed as the earliest European visitors. In the geo- 
graphical description of the peninsula that follows, the 
author gives an agreeable summary of information which 
is contained in greater fulness of detail in his official 
reports communicated to the Director of the Geological 
Survey of Canada, and printed in the reports of the latter 
for the years 1896-97. The bulk of the article is. howcArer, 
devoted to a description of the various animals and fish 
that are the object of the sportsman, and in this con- 
nection some valuable information is given as to means of 
travel and necessary equipment. He relates a curious 
instance of nature's vengeance, in explaining that great 
slaughter of caribou by the Indians in one year means the 
disappearance of the animal from those regions the next, 
with the consequence that the Indians die of starvation in 
large numbers. Another cause of temporary scarcity of 
game is the destructive forest fires, which sweep away 
the coverts and food of the woodland caribou. There 
appears to be great fluctuation in the size of the herds of 
deer, but they increase very fast under favorable condi- 
tions, and there should be no danger of extermination 
with such vast tracts of unknown wilderness to roam 
over. The main attraction of Labrador for the sports- 
man is its fishing. The rivers flowing into the Atlantic 
and Hudson Bay are breeding grounds for salmon no less 
than the rivers flowing into the Gulf of St. Lawrence, but 
no adequate protection has ever been given to the salmon 
in the region under jurisdiction of Newfoundland, and the 
cod fishermen have ruined the salmon fishing by 'trapping" 
them. The ouananiche, which Mr. Low considers to be 
the original salmon, of which the sea-going salmon is a 
'sport,' is found in many of the Labrador lakes and 
rivers, and brook trout of appetizing size are also men- 
tioned. Travel is evidently very arduous^ work in the 
peninsula; canoeing in summer and walking in winter 
are the only means of traversing the country, and the 
difficulty of keeping an expedition supplied with food is 
very strongly emphasized. 
The Forest and Stream is put to press each week on Tuesday. 
Correspondence intended for publication should rngch us st the 
latjS^jt'by Monday an4 m mx\ch earlier as ptacti^able. 
