Forest and Stream. 
A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 
Copyright, 1899, by Forest and Stream Publkhing Co. 
Terms, $4 a Year. 10 Cts. a Copy. * 
Six Months, $-2. ( 
NEW YORK, SATURDAY, JULY 8, 1899. 
f VOL. LIII.-No. S. 
(No. 846 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 bs 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 
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particulars respecting subscriptions, see prospectus on page iv. 
SIZE IN YACHTING. ■ 
Up to the present time international honors are even 
between the two yachts just built to contest the posses- 
sion of the America Cup; while the American craft has 
spent a day of delay and inglorious rest in the mud of 
Bristol Harbor, fast beyond the help of a powerful tug, 
her British— or so-called Irish — sister has fared no better, 
having been aground for a whole tide ofjf Southampton. 
As each of these untoward mishaps occurred within a very 
short time after the first launching of the vessel, they are 
the first ; but it is by no means likely that they will be the 
last. Even though both yachts escaped the danger of a 
fatal grounding, and it is by no means a small one, they 
are certain to have frequent violent and disagreeable 
collisions with the bottom. 
The draft of water in racing triin, at least 20 feet, is 
more than can be carried with either safety or convenience 
in the waters habitually frequented by yachts ; such as the 
Thames, the Solent and Long Island Sound. There are 
channels in plenty where the draft is ample ; but they are 
channels and nothing more, mere narrow paths to Avhich 
the great lead bulbs must confine themselves at any cost. 
A lower tide than usual, a little crowding by another 
vessel on the edge of the bank, a slight error of judg- 
ment or lapse of vigilance on the part of the helmsman, 
and the yacht is aground to staj^ until a new tide at 
least. 
For the next three months this constant nrenace of 
grounding will be most carefully guarded against; each 
yacht will have her guardian steamer in close attendance, 
to tow her at all times when not actually racing, and when 
racing it will only be in such a locality as the open sea 
off Sandy Hook, or between Block Island and Martha's 
Vineyard. When the conditions so change that it costs 
more than it is worth to race a 3racht in this manner, with 
a special tender and all the heavy expenses of docking, 
the two new boats will be tied up to rust, like Defender 
and Valkyrie III. 
It is amusing now to look back to the time, not so many 
years distant, when the Forest and Stream was generally 
abused and decried for its advocacy of such a draft as 
was necessary to make a yacht safe beyond the possibility 
of capsize; a matter of 12 to 13 feet in a cutter of 90 feet 
waterline. To-day this amount of draft is given to the 
centerboard model, while the keel boat goes to 20 feet 
and over. *j 
The only reason that such a figure is necessary in a 
yacht of 90 feet waterline is that less would not give her 
the power to carry an enormous sail plan that is thus pos- 
sible in a keel boat of good model. The only reason why 
the length of 90-foot waterline is adhered to is that so 
large a yacht is actually faster than a smaller one. This 
limit is purely arbitrary, and based neither on reason nor 
common sense ; if there is any good reason for building a 
cutter of 90-foot waterline instead of one of 70 feet, there 
is just as much reason for abandoning the 90-footer for 
one of 100 or even 120 feet. 
So far as the interests of yachting are concerned, they 
are no longer benefited, and actually suffer with the re- 
tention of the 90-footer. The cost of construction and 
running places them beyond the reach of even the 
wealthiest patrons of j^achting as a sport, apart from busi- 
ness ends. The history of Defender and Valkyrie III. 
shows the folly of such craft, built for half a dozen races 
and then left for years to rust and decay; while the very 
fact that they have been built and may again be resurrected 
at any time serves as a menace to prevent the building of 
smaller and more useful yachts. 
There is nothing to be gained now by studying the 
causes which led to the great enlargement in size—that is 
a fact that cannot be gainsaid ; but one of the vital ques- 
tions in modern yachting is that of the abolition of the 
90-foot class and the establishment of one of sttch size and 
rise as to enlist the support of the wealthier yachtsmen as 
individual owners. 
However much of a success she may prove, Columbia 
teaches nothing that was not learned from Defender, and 
if any real progress is to be made in designing, it must 
be by the construction of half a dozen yachts in a year, and 
not of one yacht every four or five years. 
Outside of the two principals, probably no one knows 
just how much money will be spent on the series of five 
races between Columbia and Shamrock this year, but it 
will be a very large sum. Suppo.se that at the outset Sir 
Thomas Lipton had set aside the same amount for the 
construction of a fleet of 6s-footers, such as Tutly, Senta, 
Astrild and Betty; yachts about as large as Queen Mab, 
placing his orders with the different British designers, 
having the yachts ready early in the season, and sailing a 
series of races open to the 65-foot class. Such a course 
of preparation would have given him in the end a yacht in 
perfect form, with the pick of skipper and crew, instead of 
a craft that comes to America virtually without trial. On 
the part of the defense, the cost of Columbia would have 
built a similar fleet, of probably three or four 65-footers, 
with others added by different individual yachtsmen; the 
wliole fleet being raced through June, July, August and 
September. Instead of being confined to one boat by one 
firm, every prominent American designer might have been 
represented; and, what is of the most importance, the 
foundation of permanent class racing would have been laid 
permanently. The two leading characteristics of the 
America Cup races of to-day, size and secrecy, are both at 
variance with that advancement of yachting which the 
Cup was originally designed to promote; and as long as 
the present conditions exist, the interests of the sport aJ 
large are h^irt by the continuance of international racing. 
SNAP SHOTS. 
The Ohio sportsman of to-day finds himself on the 
stage of action at a day too late for certain phases of hunt- 
ing he might have enjoyed at an earlier period ; he is thou- 
sands of years behind time, in fact, for bear hunting once 
available within Ohio's confines. The National Museum 
has recently acquired the skull of an extinct bear found 
on a farm near Hamilton, in Butler county. The man who 
found it was digging a well and came upon the skull 
twenty-three feet below the surface, lying on what ap- 
peared a nest of petrified sticks. As described by Mr. 
Garrett F. Miller, Jr., this old-time bear was probably 
somewhat smaller than our black bear of to-day, and the 
skull, marked by a deeply concave forehead and small 
brain case, would indicate that it was wanting in the bear 
sense which has given Bruin so high a place for shrewd- 
ness among the brutes. In those ancient times perhaps 
a bear did not find it necessary to exercise so much cun- 
nmg as in these later days of more aggressive enemies. 
This Ohio species Mr. Miller has named ¥r^ws procerus, 
which we take to mean slim or spindling, or as might be 
said of a human being, spindle-shanked. Now that a well 
digger has dug up a bear skull near the station, we may 
expect to find Overpeak figuring in the railway books as 
a point affording bear hunting attractions for sportsmen; 
that would come at least as near to the truth as many 
an advertisement of other pkces said to abound in game, 
and which indeed may have done so at the time, say, when 
this Ohio bear was perambulating the earth. 
The complications in the New Jersey Fish and Game 
Commission have found solution in the voluntary resigna- 
tion of Protector Shriner. His letter to the Commis- 
sioners, printed in another column, gives his reasons for 
the step. Mr. Shriner has acted in a way which does 
credit to him as an official and as a public spirited citizen. 
The Commissioners had been harassed for months, and 
probably would have been harried continually by the im- 
portunities of Gov. Voorhees to dismiss an official who 
was distasteful to him. Sensible of the value of Mr. 
Shriner as their executive agent, and having regard to 
their oaths of office and their desire to give the State a 
good service, the Commissioners were convinced that the 
public interest demanded Mr. Shriner's retention ; indeed 
this was the conviction of all persons who were cognizant 
of the facts in the case. We do not know how long the 
struggle might have been prolonged; perhaps it would 
have gone on until some of the Commissioners would 
have resigned rather than to be bullied into serving as 
agents of Gov. Voorhees' personal spite. Now that Mr. 
Shriner has resigned, it is to be hoped that a successor 
may be found who will not be a cause of friction between 
Commission and Executive. For in Gov. Voorhees' 
antagonism to game and fish protection, on general prin- 
ciples, the Commission will find all the handicap it can 
carry, without any further opposition from a Governor 
who allows his personal spite to control his official actions. 
As for the new protector, if the Commissioners shall 
find another one as discreet, energetic and efficient as Mr. 
Shriner, they may count themselves extremely fortunate. 
We are so accustomed to consider the usefulness of 
birds in their capacity of insect destroyers that the ser- 
vice they render as consitmers of the seeds of weeds is 
for the most part lost sight of. The report of Mr. 
Sylvester D. Judd, of the Biological Survey, brings to- 
gether a mass of evidence on this subject; and its publica- 
tmi should go far to increase popular appreciation of the 
feathered allies of agriculture. This report and that of 
Is/lr. Palmer, on the introduction of noxious species, well 
show the practical work the Survey is accomplishing. 
The fact is that there is necessity of a complete readjust- 
ment of the popular attitude toward many of the wild 
creatures of the earth; and such papers as these two 
which we have taken from the work of the Survey have 
high educational value. 
As an addendum to Mr. Cheney's notes on eels, which 
were printed last week, we may cite the letter of a corre- 
spondent in an English exchange, who makes a plea in 
behalf of the otter as in reality an ally of the angler 
instead of a foe, as has commonly been maintained. For 
while the otter is a fish eater, says his champion, it has a 
preference for eels above all other inhabitants of the 
water; and because it destroys eels, and destroys them on 
the spawning beds of trout, to which the eels resort for 
trout eggs, it should be protected as a useful species, in- 
stead of being hunted and destroyed as vermin. 
If a penny saved is a penny gained, the rescue of fishes 
from drying sloughs and pools from which the water 
has receded is a very practical, cheap and profitable form 
of fishculture. In numerous sections of the West the 
fish commissioners have long recognized this rescue work 
as one of the best paying branches of their public ser- 
vice. The new Utah game law makes it the duty of county 
fish wardens to take from such receding waters the im- 
ported trout, bass and herring and to transfer them to 
other streams. 
A Norwegian company has been formed to engage in 
raising reindeer for marketing the meat. They have 
control of sixty square miles of wild mountain land, now 
stocked with a herd of 2,400 deer, which it is proposed to 
increase to 4,000; and the prospectus calls for an annupl 
killing of a thousand deer a year, worth something over 
seven dollars each in the market. A canning plant will be 
established to. can reindeer venison, red char and ptarmi- 
gan. They will probably can the ptarmigan out of ex- 
istence ; but reindeer in Norway are domestic animals, 
rather than wild game ; and the chief difficulty of the en- 
terprise may be to find a market for canned reindeer. 
We may supplement the note Mr. Ames sends about 
heath hens on Martha's Vineyard by recalling that so 
late as the spring of 1898 a number of prairie chickens, 
pinnated grouse, from the West were liberated on the 
island. Mr. Frank Golant, who reported this at the 
time, suggested that the extermination of the heath hen, if 
it was exterminated, had been caused in part by the 
disastrous fires which had swept through their breeding 
grounds. The finding of the young this year indicates 
that the establishing of the Western birds has promise 
of success. 
At the meeting of the American Fisheries Society, at 
Niagara Falls, last week, Mr. John W. Titcomb, of Ver- 
mont, was elected President, and Mr. Seymour Bower, of 
Michigan, Secretary. The next meeting will be held at 
the Woods Holl United States Fish Commission Station, 
We have a notiqm that the new executive will recognize 
the advantage of publicity and will cause it to be made 
known to the world that there is such a society in ex- 
istence. 
