Forest and Stream. 
A Weekly, Journal of the Rod and Gun. 
Copyright, 1899, by Forest and Stream Publishing Co. 
Terms, M a Year. 10 Crs. a Copy. I 
Six Months, |a. i" 
NEW YORK, SATURDAY, JULY 15, 1899. 
f VOL. LIII.— No. 3. 
jNo. 346 Broadway, New York. 
JThe 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 bt 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 flill 
particulars respecting subscriptions, see prospectus on page iv. 
Htintefs assure us, that to chuse the best dog, 
and which they purpose to keepe from out a litter 
of other young whelps, there is no better meane 
than the damme herselfe : for, if they be removed 
from out their kennell, him that she first brings 
thither againe shall alwaies prove the best ; or if 
one but encompasse her kennell with fire, looke 
which of her whelps she first seeketh to save, is 
undoubtedly the best: whereby it appeareth, they 
have a certaine use of Prognosticating, that we 
have not ; or else some hidden vertue, to judge of 
their young ones, different and more lively than 
ours, Montaigne (I580), 
THE HUMANE ALLIANCE AND ITS ILLICIT 
■ TRAFFIC. 
There is in this city a publication called the Humane 
Alliance, which its title page and the general character 
of its reading matter proclaim to be "devoted to the cause 
of humane education." It professes to be published for 
the special purpose of instilling iii the minds of young 
people kind feelings toward animals; and it is of course 
very violently opposed to the sportsman's practice of 
shooting birds. By one of those contrarieties of human 
nature which make life piquant and the study of our 
erring fellow creatures always interesting and instructive, 
the Humane Alliance, while indulging in diatribes against 
those who lawfully use the gun, is itself engaged in an 
enterprise which is one of the most shameless and brazen 
examples of defiance of the bird law that has ever come 
under our notice. It points its finger at the sportsman 
with his honest bag of game, while its own pockets are 
bulging with illicit booty. 
The Alliance advertises as premiums for new sub- 
scribers a ring-tailed monkey for so many, and for others 
caged birds of various species. If the enterprise of the 
subscription department of the Humane Alliance were 
restricted to providing homeless and presumably depraved 
ring-tailed monkeys with homes in families of assured 
respectability where the moral influences would be such 
as might be helpful to the development of the simian char- 
acter, one could have nothing but good to say of it. But 
the Alliance advertises itself to be engaged in a whole- 
sale violation of the bird protective law of New York; 
in addition to its monkey premiums, it announces, it has 
in captivity and will give to subscribers large numbers of 
indigo birds and nonpareils. It has such a stock of 
these birds on hand we are told, that "it is necessary to 
reduce the number of birds at once." We leave to others 
to reconcile the humanity piously professed by the Alli- 
ance with the inhumanity of capturing and caging wild 
birds ; much more to the point is it to direct attention 
to the fact that the Humane Alliance is violating the law 
of the land. Section 78 of Chapter 31 of the General Laws 
of New York reads: "Wild birds shall not be killed or 
caught at any time or possessed living or dead." The in- 
digo bird is a common summer resident of New York 
State. It arrives here early in May and remains until 
October. It is therefore clearly within the scope of the 
law, and the possession of each and every one of these 
indigo birds by the Humane Alliance is a clear violation of 
the statute. We commend the matter to the attention of 
the Chief Game Protector. The address of the Humane 
Alliance is 127 East Twenty-third street. New York city. 
It should be no difficult matter to run down their store- 
house of indigo birds, nor should there be any difficulty in 
bringing the managers of the concern to justice and im- 
posing upon them the prescribed penalty, which is $25 for 
each bird unlawfully in possession. Confiding subscribers 
to the Humane Alliance, who may be tempted to accept 
its seductive offer of indigo birds, would do well to re- 
member that by receiving the birds they become particeps 
criminis, and make themselves liable to arrest and fine of 
$25 for each bird had in possession. 
Other birds advertised as in possesion are cardinals, 
larks, linnets, mocking birds and nonpareils. A bird of 
the captivity of which the Alliance makes a specialty is 
the nonpareil. This is exempt from the New York 
law, as the bird ranges only far north as North 
Carolina, and cannot therefore be considered a New York 
bird. Since, however, in the States where the nonpareil 
is found there are laws to forbid its taking, we may rightly 
assume that the birds held in possesion by the Humane 
Alliance have been unlawfully taken and are therefore to 
be considered as spoils of lawlessness. While the New 
York State officials can do nothing to correct the abuse, it 
is a scandal and a shame that there should be in New 
York city such an institution as this holding out induce- 
ments to its agents in other States to violate the laws of 
those States. Now that our correspondent Didymus has 
brought to a conclusion his livelj^ discussion of the wanton 
shooting of Florida plume birds by visiting gunners, we 
recommend to him to investigate the export of Florida 
song birds to Northern dealers in humanity and illicit 
caged birds. 
THE HENWIFE AND THE SPORTSMAN. . 
Consider the way of the henwife who puts a sitting of 
duck eggs under a hen. When in due course the ducklings 
come forth, from their natal hour the henwife watches 
over the brood with a solicitude not less vigilant than that 
of the maternal hen, and superadded to this with a 
woman's tenderness which hen nature can never know. 
She extricates them from the predicaments into which 
silly ducklings fall; and if one of them happens to be 
killed, she mourns over it with genuine pity and sighs for 
its untimely taking off. She notes from day to day with 
quiet satisfaction their astonishing growth; sees to their 
safe housing at night, making all secure against encroach- 
ing vermin; doctors them for the gapes and such other 
ills as duck flesh is heir to, rubbing on lard for this and 
applying sulphur for that ; and in a thousand and one ways 
supplements with her own superior human wit the well 
meant but often mistaken mothering of the hen. 
And all this for what? That when the fowl shall have 
attained a due stage of plumpness, tenderness, juiciness 
and avoirdupois, she may wring their necks or chop their 
heads off to make of them the piece de resistance of the 
summer boarders' Sunday dinner or to sell their car- 
casses at so much a pound in the poultry market. 
From the very moment the eggs were put to hatch, this 
final doom was her purpose. All the feeding, cherishing, 
protecting, nursing of these ducklings was to preserve 
their lives and fatten them for killing. From before their 
birth they were predestined and. foreordained by her to be 
brought into the world, to puddle and guzzle their fleeting 
hour, to distend their little crops with mush and corn and 
kitchen scraps, and at the appointed hour to die. 
Consider how the silly things vie one with another in 
growth; how they scramble at meal times, the stronger 
pushing the weaker to one side and gulping more than 
their own share of the food ; and consider how those who 
thus snatch the most to eat grow the faster and the sooner 
bring their heads to the block, their bodies to the cook, 
and the legend "roast duck" to the bill of fare. For in a 
brood of ducks it is not the fittest which survive; the 
fittest go first to execution at the hands of the henwife. 
And consider moreover how vain and foolish are the 
weaker ones^left behind, who quack with joy to find 
themselves freed from the competition of their stronger 
brothers, and forthwith fatuously gorge themselves in 
peace and plenty, which means for them only that thus 
making up for lost time and putting on flesh they too 
must the sooner come to their undoing. For though they 
know it not, in their comings and their goings, their eating 
and drinking and making merry, ever over them stands 
the henwife, who is to them as the Three Fates— Clotho 
who spins the thread of life, Lachesis who twists it, and 
Atropos who cuts it. 
Now, this henwife who puts duck eggs to hatch that 
she may have ducks to kill, shall we account her cruel? 
Most certainly not, though the final end of the entire 
operation is the death wrought by her own hand. Was the 
solicitude she showed for the infant fowl ©nly feigned 
solicitude, her compassion for ducklings in distress in- 
sincere? There was none ever more genuine, though the 
heart that pitied and the hand that helped them were in 
the end tlie heart and the hand that destroyed. In fact— 
and this is the point of our consideration — the henwife 
who raises tame birds to kill may be accounted as humane 
— and only as humane, no more, no less — as her brother 
who hunts with wild birds to kill ; and conversely, her bro- 
ther who hunts wild birds to Idll with a gun may be 
accounted as humane — no more, no less — ^as the henwife 
wh® raises tame birds to kill. 
SNAP SHOTS. 
Our correspondent Pine Tree sends us a report which 
he surmises must be allied to the wonderful frog farm 
stories which intermittently go the rounds. It is of a 
Morgan county, Missouri, genius who has built up a large 
business in breeding quail for market, selling them at $4 
per dozen for meat, or $5 a pair for pets. "The care and 
food are much like those for chickens, and the birds prove 
very hardy and free from disease." If this young Mis- 
sourian has discovered a way to breed quail he has 
done something which many have long attempted in vain. 
The only successful quail breeder we ever heard of was a 
New Jersey man, who refused to impart his secret to 
others, and it died with him. We have known of many 
quail breeding enterprises which were partially successful ; 
the birds Jived just long enough to induce the experi- 
menter to fancy that he had hit on the right method, and 
just at that point the birds died or escaped. Quail raising 
is in general like pheasant raising. The eggs may be 
hatched under the domestic hen, and chicks are at first fed 
on chopped egg and insects, and when about three weeks 
old may be given Indian meal, with an abundant supply of 
insect food. But though it is possible to bring the birds 
perhaps to maturity, their wild nature asserts itself, and 
they must be given their liberty. This is the teaching of 
such experiences as we are informed of. 
From all we can learn 'the depredations of the Rock 
Springs Lumber Company, at Rock Springs, Wyoming, 
are continued. The matter has repeatedly been brought to 
the attention of the Interior Department, and a show of 
investigation has been made, but at least one of the De- 
partment's agents, Mr. Abbott, of Cheyenne, who was 
sent to look into the aft'air, turned back, for some reason, 
before reaching the ground ; and it is the opinion of those 
who are best informed that the company has sufficient in- 
fluence to block investigation. The Department may 
readily enough dissipate the belief by sending to Rock 
Springs an agent who will actually go where he is sent, 
will see with his own eyes what is to be seen, and will 
truthfully and fearlessly report on what he sees. 
Much indignation has been epcpressed over the recent 
order of the Quebec Department of Lands, Forests and 
Fisheries, requiring the American guests and honorary 
members of fishing and hunting clubs to take out non-resi- 
dent licenses. Formerly they were exempt. The reason 
given for the new rule was that under the old system 
there had been many abuses, though just what these 
abuses were was not explained. A general impression pre- 
vails that the true motive of the new rule lies in a 
desire to make the American visitors pay more money, 
and that the allegation of abuses was only a pretext. The 
required licenses call for a fee of $10 for fishing and of 
$25 for hunting, or for short terms at the rate of $1 a 
day for fishing and $1.50 a day for hunting. 
The late John Bell, known to New York sportsmen for 
many years as a taxidermist, had been a companion of 
•Audubon, and was given to relating incidents of their ex- 
perience in the West. One of his favorite anecdotes was 
of an Indian of the party who was a successful deer 
hunter, but could get no wild turkeys ; and taken to task 
by Audubon, he explained: "When deer see me he say 
mebbe Injun, mebbe wolf; but v/hen turkey see me,' he 
say Injun right off." 
Progress is making with the project of establishing a 
national forestry reserve in northern Minnesota. A meet- 
ing of those who are interested will be held in Chicago 
this month, and an association will be organized to work 
for the accomplishment of the scheme. Details of the 
proposed reserve were given in our issue of May 6. 
