July 21, 1900.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
49 
vent the sale of game shipped into the State from being used as a 
cloak for the sale of game killed within the State in violation of 
local laws." Section 5 of the act is intended ^to meet this diffi- 
culty by subjecting imported animals, birds or game, whether in- 
troduced in original packages or otherwise, to the laws pf the 
Slate in wliich imported. 
Pfeseivation and > Importation of Birds in Charge of the 
Biological Survey, 
The Division of Biological Survey is hereby placed in charge of 
all matters relating to the preservation and importation of animals 
or birds under this act, and until further notice the Assistant 
(,'hief of that Division will have immediate charge of the issue of 
])ermits for the importation of animals and birds from foreign 
countries. All inqviiries regarding bird protection and all re- 
quests for publications on the uses or preservation of birds should 
be addressed to the Chief of the Biological Survey. 
James Wilson, Secretary. 
Butcheringf Meadow Hens, 
East Rockaway,, L. I,, Jttly 14. — The awkward meadow 
hen is having a hard time of it. So-called sportsmen from 
the city make the open season for bay birds an excuse to 
roam over the meadows in every direction, shooting 
everything in sight. About the only birds they find are 
meadow hens, and it is said that in a number of in- 
stances the}' have deliberately shot the birds while they 
were sitting on nests full of eggs. The open season for 
meadow hens does not begin tintil Aug. 16, but they are 
shot now by almost every gunner who is after bay 
birds. If this is continued, there will be very few meadow 
hens left when the season opens. 
Gens des Bois. 
Carthage, O., July i. — Editor Forest md- Stream: 
Among the many good things appearing from the pen of 
Robinson, the lamenter Mather. Grinnell and others, the 
series of "Gens des Bois," by Burnham, are especially in- 
teresting to those who, like myself, have toured, hunted, 
fished and camped all over the Adirondack region and 
met incidentally the "j\Ien of the Woods" in their capacity 
of guides and proprietors of sportsmen's hostelries in days 
gone by. ^ Mr. Burnham is to be congratulated. His 
articles bring up old memories, and are very enjoyable. 
E. S. Whitaker. 
Fixtures, 
July 18, 19, 20.— Meeting of the American Fisheries Society at 
Woods Holl, Mass. 
Canadian Fishing Licenses. 
Boston, July I4', — There are many lovers of the rod 
and reel in Boston and vicinity, whom time and other 
circumstances will not permit to make long trips to dis- 
tant waters. These sportsmen have to be Satisfied with 
what nearer waters afford. OeGasionally they surprise 
even those who go ^to distant waters with what they 
cateh neafet home. Such was the case when, on Monday 
morning, Mr. W. F. Palmer showed his friends in 
Faneuil Hall Market three bass. They lay in a shoe 
box. and nearly coA^ered the material they rested upon. 
Their united wei,ght was over 12 pounds. They were 
caught by Mr. Palmer on Saturday, and came to "Boston 
m fine order. It turns out that the Sudbury River 
furnished the fish, although the fishermen ate not 
pfttLicular about giving away the locality. Mt; I. H. 
Young has also been having some great luck in the same 
rivet; he brought back a black bass weighings pounds — 
a monster for those waters. Several Boston sportsmen 
are at Belgrade ponds tor bass fishing. A letter from 
one of them says that the weather has been verj^ hot, 
with poor bass fishing, except at night and in the early 
morning, 
There i-S always tfouble aboUt hiinting and fishing 
licen§e& for those who attempt to enjoy the sport in 
Canada. There has for some time beeir considerable 
doubt as to whether sportsmen from the States, owning 
camps and fishing, rights on Canadian waters, are sub- 
ject to the usual fishing license, Mr. John Tottler, Jr., 
an excellent authority on matters pertaining to Canadian 
fishing, says that camp and fishing rights owners are sub- 
ject to the usual fishing license fee, unless their preserves 
are incorporated. In this Avay members of Canadian 
fishing clubs are exempt from the usual license exactions 
A Couple of Boston camp owners in Nova Scotia have 
both been fishing at their preserves for several years, 
and have always supposed that owning their camps and 
fishing rights and emplojang Canadian guides and boat- 
men exempted them from paying for fishing licenses. 
But this year, as one of them stepped of? the Yarmouth 
steamer, on his return from his spring trip, an officer 
stepped up and inquired if he was Mr. So and So. 
Answered in the affirmative, the officer quietly says, "I 
want you." "What for?" our friend very naturally asked. 
"For fishing without a license," was the reply. Our 
friend made no resistance. There was none to make. 
He admitted that he should have to plead guilty; had 
always supposed that owning his camps and fishing 
rights, and employing Canadian guides and boatmen, 
exempted him from being obliged to obtain licenses. He 
even cited the ofticer the clause in the Canadian game and 
fish laws that especially prodives that "foreigners tem- 
porarily domiciled in Canada and employing Canadian 
guides and boatmen are exempt from obtaining permits." 
But the ofiicer was inexorable. There was nothing for it 
but for our friend to take out a permit and pay the cost 
of arrest, etc., in which case the ofticer agreed to let him 
depart without any fine. Our other friend, from Boston, 
also a camp owner, as well as the owner of one or two 
fishing rivers, was aware of the arrest of the other gen- 
tleman, and expected to be arrested himself, as he has 
fished, with his wife and boys, for several years at his 
camp in Nova Scotia and had never obtained a license. 
He was not arrested, however, but on reaching home he 
finds in a Canadian paper that a warrant is out for his 
arrest. Both he and our other friend, who was arrested, 
propose to carry the matter up to Ottawa, and have the 
uuestion settled finally and fully. I learn also that other 
parties from Boston this spring have been followed by 
"spies" — ^that is, oflScers in disguise — ^but that they have 
been advised, and the "spotters" told in a most emphatic 
manner not to trouble the fishermen from the States who , 
were "temporarily domiciled in Canada and employing 
Canadian guides and boatmen." This matter will be 
watched with much interest by a host of sportsmen who 
go to Canadian waters. 
Mr. W. J. Follett, of Boston, with Mrs. Follett and 
their son, have been on a bass fishing trip to Belgrade 
Mills. They were very handsomely quartered at a hotel 
at $3 a day each. This, with a guide at $3 a day, and a 
charge for bait and every other item, makes pretty dear 
bass fishing. But Mr^ Follett thinks that it was "pretty- 
tony." He sat leisurely in the -boat and landed four or 
five bass on a fly. His boy "beat him all hollow." Baited 
with a vile frog, he landed about fifty bass to his father's 
four or five. The next day Mr. Follett was out with 
frogs for bait, and took all the bass he cared for. But he 
says, "I have had enough bass fishing, and have caught 
enough. I am a trout fisherman. Give me a day of 
roughing it, with old clothes and a camp." 
A few trout caught in that way are worth a hundred 
bass with a stylish hotel and a dress suit every evening 
at dinner. 
Mr. Harold Dunlop Motter, with a party of friends, is 
off for Nova Scotia waters salmon fishing. They go 
first to Yarmouth, Special. 
CHICAGO AND THE WEST. 
Chicago, 111., July 12.— We are in the middle of the 
dull season in this part of the world, and it will prob- 
ably be some weeks before we find the full zest of the on- 
coming fall season. There have been not very large 
catches of fish made by our Chicago anglers during the 
past week, the hot weather having put a stop to the best 
of the .sport. The frog-casters who have diligently fol- 
lowed their art in the diflferent waters of the Fox Lake 
chain have been turning up about the usual number of 
big-mouths, though the growing abundance of the natural 
food of the fish, with the tepid quality of the water, has 
brought on the time when the bass "strike short/' and 
every one who fishes bass knows what that means. The 
fish do not show the vim in the strike or the perseverance 
in the fight which they do in the prime of the season. 
The angler misses the fun of seeing the bass boil up the 
instant the frog strikes the water, and must only too 
often content himself with a lazy strike and a long 
wait, perhaps only to retrieve his frog a trifle mutilated 
about his waist band. The trout fishing, of course, has 
lost its edge, and July is notoriously the bad month for 
muscalunge. So far as I can learn this has not been a 
very good muscalunge year. The weight of 38^^ pounds 
set at Sand Lake the first two weeks of the season still re- 
mains the record so far as known. 
One of the most important parties to leave Chicago 
this week for a fishing excursion is that which starts for 
the Nepigon River. Prof. Judson, of the Chicago Uni- 
versity, is of this party, and anticipates a delightful ex- 
perience. Ex-Comptroller of the Treasury G. M. Eckles 
also goes to the Nepigon, after some of the famous big 
tfotit of that section. Yet another member of the Nepigon 
excursion is Mr. F. I. Carpenter, also of Chicago. August 
is a good time to strike the Nepigon, and these gentlemen 
should have the good sport that is customary on that 
stream. 
Dr. Robert M. Hawes, of Chicago, left this week for 
Mackinac, Mich., and will spend some time fishing in 
the neighborhood of that cool and delightful locality. 
Mr. R. A. Cox, of Chicago, leaves this week for an 
extended trip in the famous Muskoka Lake district, on the 
Grand Trunk Railway, in Canada. 
Mr. H. M. Best, of this city, leaves this week for a 
few days' bass fishing in the neighborhood of Lake Villa,, 
111. 
Mr. A. W. Roth, of this city, leaves this week for a few 
weeks' fishing trip in the Wabassee Lake country, where 
he should share in the very fair average of bass fishing 
which has been going on there. 
Mr. C. H. Fitzhugh, of this city, has left for a few 
days at Channel Lake. This lake has also been producing 
fully its share of bass this season. 
Mr. Graham H. Harris and his friend. Dr. Bodine, of 
this city, will start at the close of the week for a try at the 
acrobatic small-mouths of the Mississippi River above La 
Crosse. 
Mr. H. H. Rountree, of Chicago, is still absent on 
what is for him a verj' long vacation trip. He is at Lake 
Harbor, Mich., and has been gone for nearly three 
weeks, accumulating wisdom in regard to black bass and 
pickerel. 
Minnesota Matters. 
Lake Minnetonka, Minn., July 15.— The long drought 
in this section was broken a few weeks ago by heavy 
rains, and for some mysterious reason the rains seemed 
to have improved the bass fishing. For some days very 
good catches of black bass have been m.ade by bait- 
casters in different parts of the upper lake. Minnetonka 
is almost an inland sea, having about 150 miles of shore 
line, so that the fisherman has his choice of a considerable 
scope of territory. All such big waters are more 
capricious in their bass fishing than the smaller lakes 
where the feeding grounds are more restricted. At this 
time of the year the bass resort to a certain extent to the 
reefs which lie out in the wider water, and it requires an 
expert acquaintance with the lake to know where even a 
portion of these lying grounds are. Of course, the ordi- 
nary method of the bait-caster is to keep pretty well in 
shore, and to tap the edges of the bars where the bul- 
rushes grow. The bass feed in this shallow water more 
especially in the early summer, and by this time of year 
are not customarily to be found there in very great num- 
bers. This year, however, is a verjr good frog year, and 
where the frogs are, there the big-mouths are gathered 
together. Most of the bass which have been taken by the 
cottagers and sumnter resort people have been caught at 
the edges of the bulrush patches, and by casting frogs. 
There was taken in Black Lake, which is near Spring 
Park, on Lake Minnetonka. a big-mouth bass which 
weighed 6% pounds, and this is the largest Minnetonka 
bass of which I have had word. Black Lake is nearly 
always good for two or three nice bass of an evening. At 
the mouth of the cut-off leading into this lake from 
Minnetonka I once raised a bass which nearly jumped 
over the boat in his effort to get at my frog. He was a 
4-pounder, and I am going back after him one of these 
times. 
Mr. Harrison Kechtner, a St. Louis gentleman who has 
been stopping at Spring Park, has been having very uni- 
form luck with the bass during the past few weeks. He 
has not been fishing very hard, but has usually managed 
to bring in a half dozen nice bass each evening. He 
,ran across one nice pike which girthed li inches, and 
weighed something over 8 pounds. 
I hear of another gentleman who caught thirty bass 
in one day near Spring Park, but I do not learn the name 
of this fisherman. 
It is now nearly time for the big Minnetonka pickerel 
to begin their fall campaign. No one knows just how big 
these pike grow in these waters, but one was taken 
Aveighing 22K pounds last year. As I mentioned once 
upon a time in these columns, my friend Mr. Phelps and 
I caught a couple of fine pike in the deep pool just below 
the draw bridge which leads to Enchanted Island. We 
are of the belief that there are some more in that same 
hole, and are minded to catch us some perch for bait and. 
go over there after them some of these days. 
B}^ the way, Mr. Phelps, who has lived on this beauti- 
ful tract of land on the upper lake for something like 
twenty years, is pretty well posted on the fishing points. 
He says that in Halstead's Bay, at the western end of 
the lake,, there is a good long bass reef whose location 
is not known to very many. He tells me that on this 
reef, using large perch for bait, he has somtimes had 
firie bass fishing as late as 10 130 at night. 
Mr. W. L. Wells, head artist of the Chicago Tribtine, is 
at present taking his summer vacation with his family, in 
their cottage at Inter laken. on the Narrows of Lake 
Minnetonka. There are a great many men spending their 
summer vacations here on Minnetonka at this writing, but 
of them all I fancy there is not one who is not having 
the pleasure and the good of it that Mr. Wells is ex- 
periencing. A daily newspaper man is a pretty busy in- 
dividual, and I happen to know that for the last three 
years Mr. Wells has been averaging more than twelve 
hours of work a day, with no vacation at all. The bright, 
glad smile with which he welcomed the blue waters of 
Minnetonka was something worth witnessing. Here he is 
resting, golfing, wheeling and fishing, and so much pleased 
is he with the prospects that he avows his purpose of 
chucking up work jiltogether and devoting the rest of his 
life to an elegant leisure. 
Mr. Wells tells me that he was out fishing a little while 
the other evening and succeeded in raising three nice 
bass, though he failed to fasten any one of the three. He 
is coming up to Spring Park to-morrow morning, and with 
Mr.Phelps for guide we are going to see what we can 
do in the way of getting a few bass. 
E. Hough. 
Hartford Building, Chicago, 111. 
Pleasant Chester. 
The recent purchase of Big Fish Island in Chester 
Basin, N. S., for the wife- of Admiral Dewey recalls that 
years ago Chester was one of the pleasant fishing re- 
sorts celebrated by Mr. Charles Hallock in his "Fishing 
Tourist." We quote these paragraphs as happily de- 
scriptive of one of the pleasant places of the earth, and also 
as a happy instance of Mr. Hallock's having spied out the 
land long before it came to popular appreciation: 
"And now Ave come to Chester Basin, island-gemmed 
and indented with many a little cove; and far out to sea, 
looming up in solitary grandeur, is Aspotogon, a moun- 
tain headland, said to be the highest land in Nova Scotia. 
The road follows the shore for many a mile, and then 
turns abruptly up the beautiful valley of Gold River, the 
finest of all the salmon streams of this grand locality. 
In it there are eleven glorious pools, all within two miles 
of each other, and others for several miles above at 
longer intervals. Above the first series a canoe should 
be used. The lower stream affords a succession of un- 
obstructed casts, suci) as I have never seen for elbow 
room and sweep of line on any other stream. We halt 
for a moment where the stage road crosses the bridge, 
and look wistfully into the vista above, where the black 
waters come whirling down, cool and delicious, flecked 
with foam. Just below us there is a splendid pool, and 
we can see Indian John and his boys beside a boulder 
at the tail of it, dipping. Upon the grassy bank behind 
are four dilapidated wigwams of hemlock bark, with 
quilts suspended across the entrances, serving for doors. 
It is evident the salmon are rimning lively, or the In- 
dians would not be here. 
"Three pleasant seasons have I spent at Chester. I 
idolize its very name. Just below my window a lawn 
slopes down to a little bay with a jetty, where an occa- 
sional sloop lands some stores. There is a large tree, 
under which I have placed some seats; and off the end 
of the pier the ladies can catch flounders, tomcods and 
cunners in any quantity. There are beautiful drives in 
the vicinity, and innumerable islands in the bay, where 
one can bathe and picnic to heart's content. There are 
saiHng boats for lobster spearing and deep-sea fishing, 
and rowboats too. From the top of a neighboring hill is 
a wonderful panorama of forest, stream and cultivated 
shore, of bays and distant sea, filled with islands of every 
size and shape. Near by is a marsh, where I flushed 
fourteen brace of English snipe one day in July. And 
if one will go to Gold River, he may perchance see, as I 
have done, caribou quietly feeding on the natural mead- 
dows along the upper stream. Beyond Beech Hill is a 
trackless forest filled with moose, with which two old 
hunters living near oft hold familiar intercourse. _ They 
trapped a wildcat last summer, and his stuffed skin is at 
Chester now." 
An Eel on a Bass Line* 
Mr. J. J. Hopper, of the New York Life Insurance 
Company, this city, Avas fishing for bass off Little Marsh 
Island, in Greenwood Lake, the other day, casting with a 
live frog bait, w^hen he hooked, played and landed a 4-foot 
eel of 9 pounds. The eel took the frog at the surface, and 
considerably surprised Mr. Hopper. The incident was 
declared by old GreenAvood Lakers to be without a 
parallel in their experience. 
