182 
FOREST AND StREAM. 
> [Sept. 8, 1900. 
In the Philippines. 
Mindanao, P. I., June 25. — Editor Forest and Stream: 
1 send you by this mail a box containing the skin of a 
bird killed in a marsh near this station about a month 
ago. As it may be lost or injured in its journey of 
10,000 miles or more to New York, I will describe it. 
A curved and jagged scarlet colored beak, black head, 
tawny crest and neck, black body and wings, white spread- 
ing tail of ten feathers (like a white-headed eagle), with 
black tips, black legs and talons. 
A chief of Duganob sent me a bolo, and said that he 
would try to obtain a Moros Lantaca from the Moros 
of the hiils, who, I am informed, still have in their pos- 
session two or three iron helmets and a chain armor 
taken from the Spaniards in early days. 
The town of Dapitan was settled in 1531 by a Baloano 
named Pagbaya, who held the title of Prima of Dapitan, 
and established the Fort Ilihan with 800 families. Later, - 
on the arrival of the Spaniards in 1564, they received them 
cordially and established the Church of Dapitan. 
There is a tradition that there was once a very beauti- 
ful woman here whom the Sultan of Zolo wanted very 
much. He sent for her, but she refused his advances. 
Thereupon the Sultan sent sixty ships and there was a 
fierce fight in the bay, which left the Sultan ten ships 
and much disappointment. 
When the natives went on board of the first Spanish 
ships, they were naturally astonished to see the sailors 
eating stones (sea biscuit) and fire (cigars), and letting 
loose thunder and lightning. 
In 1717 this Province was established, and a civil force 
of natives organized and maintained until the Spaniards 
left in December, 1898. 
According to the records, this Province contains 13,000 
native Christians and 20,000 Supanos, or unbelievers. 
These are the fellows that the Spaniards used to fir.e 
square bullets at. To hold these people in check, to 
maintain order and see that the civil laws are properly 
administered, one company of U. S. Volunteer Infantry 
is stationed here. 
The climate is delightful and dry. with cool nights. 
Prior to April i there was no rain for several months. 
Since that time we have had about 10 inches. The country 
is hilly and mountainous, covered with forests. Monkeys 
abound. It may be said that we have monkeys to burn. 
It is as common to see the soldiers leading their monkeys 
down to the beach to catch sand crabs as it is to see (in 
the States) a lady with her lap dog. 
Cocoanuts are plentiful. The soil is sandy and affords 
good natural drainage. The products are: Hemp, 8,000 
picos ; rice, 50,000 cavanes ; corn, 10,000 cavanes ; copra, 
S.ooo picos ; sweet potatoes, 1,000 picos ; gave, 1,000 picos ; 
ube, 1,000 picos; lumbia, 100 cavanes; buri, 50 cavanes. A 
good quality of tobacco is raised. Schools are the great 
institutions here, and much attention is paid to them. 
The boys form in company line and go through the 
setting up exercisers. They are learning English rapidly, 
and are polite and neat. The women weave from hemp 
the_ banana and pineapple fiber, a beautiful fabric of 
varigated pattern, as filmy and soft as lace, which they 
make up into waists and blouses. 
Life is easy here, with fruit in abundance, fish in the 
sea and hogs and chickens running at large, conse- 
quently there is not much ambition to work, but I think 
they do very well considering the climate and condi- 
tions. Though there is no priest here, the people seem 
devoted to their church, and there is a constant clanging 
of bells and succession of services and feast days. 
_ There is a fruit here that grows on a tree of good 
size, that tastes like a mixture of mango and muskmelon, 
as large as two cocoanuts, with a green rind, rough like a 
hubbard sqiiash. The bananas are the finest I have seen 
anywhere, and supplied almost at nature's price. Good 
cigars are obtainable at $2 (Mexican) x^er hundred. 
In the hills a small species of deer is found. On the 
island of Mindaro is found a wild buffalo, so-called — 
small, _ fierce, with curving horns. The soldiers had in 
captivity here a small dark-furred animal, with large 
brilliant dark eyes, rarely surviving captivity. The cap- 
tain oi the Manila told me the name of it the other day, 
but it has slipped my memor>'. To our great regret, it 
died. A noisy bird, like our meadow lark, has been 
noticed. .Snipe are plentiful. * 
[The bird above described, which came duly to hand, 
is one of the hornbills (Cranarrhimis Icucocephalus) , a 
species found only in the Islands of Mindanao and Cami- 
guin, in the Philippines. The species is evidently not 
common, for the Smithsonian Institution in Washington 
had none until this one presented to it. 
The hornbills are an interesting group of old-world 
birds, not very distinctly related to the todies and king- 
fishers. They are of great size, unwieldy, slow of flight 
and have enormous beaks, ornamented with a huge horny 
crest or casque. The bones are large, but very light, their 
walls being very thin, and they are much permeated by 
air. The hornbills are thought to be the survivors of a 
very large family, which is now for the most part extinct. 
Of some of their habits of life. Dr. Alfred Russell 
Wallace writes as follows: "They have powerful wings, 
but their heavy bodies oblige them to use much exertion 
in flight, which is -therefore not very rapid, though often 
extended to considerable distances. They are (in the 
-Indian Archipelago at least) entirely frugivorous, and it 
is curious to observe how their structure modifies their 
mode of feeding. They are far too heavy to dart after the 
fruit in the manner of the trogons; they cannot even fly 
quickly from branch to branch, picking a fruit here .and 
there; neither have they strength nor agility enough to 
venture on the more slender branches, with the pigions " 
and barbets; bxit they alight heavily on a branch of 
considerable thickness, and then. looking cautiously 
round them, pick off any fnu'ts that may be within their 
reach, _ and jerk them down their broad throats by a mo- 
tion similar to that used by the toucans, and which ha.s 
been erroneously described as throwing the fruit up in 
the air before swallowing it. When they have gathered 
all within their reach, th'ey move sideways along the 
•firapcJii lljy s^ort jumps, oj- rfjtlier ^ Vin4 of ^\\vMt, nnd 
the smaller species even hop across to other branches, 
when they again gather what is within their reach. When 
in this way they have progressed as far as the bough 
will safely carry them, they take a flight to another part 
of the tree, where they pursue the same course. It thus 
happens that they soon exhaust all the fruit within their 
reach, and long after they have left a tree the barbets 
and Enrylaimi find abundance of food en the slender 
biranches and extreme twigs." 
The breeding habits of the hornbills are extraordinary. 
The eggs are laid in holes in the trees, and after the 
female has entered to sit upon her eggs, the male walls up 
the hole, leaving an aperture large enough only for his 
mate's bill to pass through. Through this narrow open- 
ing she receives her food, which usually consists of fruit 
of one kind and another, often of figs. The hole &s de- 
scribed by Mr,. Horne is finally but little wider than a 
man's finger. A great deal has been written about these 
birds, whose curious habits have attracted the attention 
of many observers.] 
BiU. 
Bill was Hogarth's eldest son. As I have had occa- 
sion to remark before, he was a big, red-haired, red- 
bearded giant, slow of speech and bashful to a painful 
degree. He was a simple child of nature — a big, over- 
grown boy — the kind ot a man that never grows old. 
Sooner was the same kind of a dog. 
Bill's age was anywhere from thirty to thirty-five. No 
one seemed to be very well posted on this subject. Old 
Hogarth's information was rather vague and indefinite. 
"Don't know," said he, "jest how old Bill is. He's 
somewhar 'round thirty, more or less. Can't say which. 
Y' sec, they was one or two what come afore him an' 
died. An' they come so fast in them days, me an' the 
old woman sort o' lost track on 'em, an' never could 
zactly place Bill, nohow. Can't see as how it makes 
nmch difrunce, 'cause he won't live no longer from 
knowin'." 
Bill was the least concerned of any regarding the date 
of his advent into this world of misery. He was a 
stoic, in a w^ay, and took everything for granted. I had 
known him for some time, and had hunted with him 
several seasons before I discovered that he possessed 
ideas outside the ordinary routine of his daily existence 
— in fact, that he was a true "backwoods philosopher." 
I doubt if he had anything that might be called a re- 
ligion. Such things were apt to be overlooked in the 
education of Hogarth's children. But Bill had theories 
of his own that served him very well, in lieu of some- 
thing more definite — more orthodox — and so he fretted 
not his soul. 
It was a pleasure to watch him in whatever occupation 
he was engaged for the time being. He never went at 
a thing in a half-hearted way, but always with a great 
rush, and he threw his whole soul into anything he 
undertook, and worked himself up into a state of wild 
excitement. He always had "buck fever" when he saw 
a deer — always. This seems almost incredible when you 
consider that he had been born and bred in the woods. 
Some of his deeds while under this spell are almost past 
belief. 
We would start out early of a morning with the dogs 
—Sooner and "the old gal" — running on ahead. We all 
knew that Sooner was liable to err at times, and our 
mterest was never greatly aroused until "the old gal" 
added her treble to Sooner's deeper bass. But this 
knowledge made not the slightest difference to Bill. 
Let either dog give tongue, and away he went with wild 
yells, covering the ground with great strides, and clear- 
ing logs, and other impediihents in his path, with 
mighty bounds. 
He would "keep a-goin' " until he struck a runway, 
then he would sit down and wait for the rest of us to 
come up, occasionally giving a loud halloo to let us 
know his whereabouts. We would place ourselves at 
our respective stands, and Bill would generally make 
for the shore of the lake, to be on hand in case the deer 
should take to water. If this happened, there was sure 
to be much excitement in his neighborhood for the time 
being. I remember one incident that is apropos. 
A big buck broke cover near Bill's stand, and dashed 
out into the water. Bill fired and succeeded in wound- 
ing the animal, but not seriously, and it struck out for 
the other side of the lake. Bill was immediately "pos- 
sessed," and with a yell that brought us all forward on 
the run, he hurled his rifle at the deer, and then plunged 
m the lake in pursuit of the game. 
He was a powerful swimmer, and gained rapidly on 
the wounded buck. He reached his side just as the dogs 
dashed out of the woods, and just as Jim appeared on the 
dhore some distance below. This was Jim's first deer 
hunt, so we forgave him after it was all over, but it was 
excitmg while it lasted. Bill had seized the buck's 
antlers m his powerful grasp, and a mighty battle was 
on. The dogs were drawing near, to lend a hand in the 
fight, when Jim opened up with his repeater and com- 
menced blazing away indiscriminately. In vain did we 
shout. He kept it up until he had emptied his rifle, and 
then he "came to" and sat down in a state of collapse. 
Fortunately the bullets went wide of the mark. That 
is the greatest sensation Jim ever created in his whole 
life. 
Bill was oblivious t© his surroundings. Let thunder 
crash and mountains fall — what mattered it to him so 
long as he had a deer in hand? In spite of his great 
strength, unarmed as he was, he had all and more than 
he bargained for, and it was an even match between 
him and the buck, when Sooner arrived on the field of 
battle. That ever-ready dog sailed into the fight with 
the confidence born of blissful ignorance, and they made 
an. end- of the buck just as Jack and I arrived "on the 
scene. We hauled the exhausted but triumphant Bill 
aboard, and likewise the much-disfigured Sooner, 
But apart from these outbursts. Bill was, a, silent,' easy- 
going, good-natured giant. You could not 'impose upon 
him, for the simple reason that he was so far above an}' 
thought of self that imposition was entirely out of the 
question. It was second nature for him to. sacrifice hib 
own for some one's else comfort. I first got. an insight 
jnjo his fruf rli;|r:irter f-nu fall when hf rijitj T wer- alone 
in the woods for three or four weeks. Jack and Jinl 
had each "married a wife," and therefore they could 
not come. Foolish men. 
, Sitting about the camp-fire of an evening. Bill's 
tongue would become unloosed, and at first bashfully 
and then gradually gaining confidence in himself as I 
proved an appreciative, sympathetic listener, would he 
unbosom himself of his strange thoughts and fancies. 
All that was needed was a little maneuvering on my part, 
a little gentle coaxing, and when once under way his 
shyness wore off, and he sailed along— if I may use the 
expression— like a ship without a helmsman, blown in 
whatever direction the varying current of his thoughts 
might direct. 
Civilization as embodied in myself — the civilization of 
a big city — was one of the problems of life he could not 
grasp. 
"Hit's a dern funny thing," he said to me in his slow, 
easy drawl, one night as we were sitting at the camp- 
fire, "how you folks come way up here huntin'. Seems 
's ef haff the fun was in jest sprawlin' 'round in yer old 
clothes. Can't see why y' don't wear 'em to hum. Don't 
seem 's ef 'twould be much what y' might call sport, bav- 
in' to go 'round all togged out an' oncomf'table, 's ef 
y' was goin' to a fun'ral, the hull blessed time. Hit beats 
me why y' do it, I sh'd think a man what likes the 
woods the way you do would jest naterly live in 'em 
where he could be comf'table, 
"Now, all I wear most the year, when 'tain't cold, is a 
flannel shirt an' a pair o' blue jeans, an' a pair o' shoes 
— sometimes. The shoes is jest as it happens. I'd ruther 
go barefoot any day. Barefoot 's a heap more com- 
f'table 'n shoes, an' more naterl like. Dad's old woman's 
great on style — sometimes. She'd have a feller wear 
shoes the hull blessed time when they's strangers 'bout. 
The^old woman's got consid'ble what y' might call pride. 
"Clothes is funny things t' me. Y'ou city folks think 
a heap more of 'em than y' orter — clothes an' money, too. 
Guess y' ain't no happier 'n I be, nuther. Guess y' ain't 
no more what dad calls edefied, seein' the tall houses 
an' the cars an' all them other contrapshuns y' have to 
hum in a b'iled shirt than I be in my old flannel one 
here, a-seein' all they as t' see in the woods an' a-smellin' 
the pines an' the hemlocks an' the s.pruce, an' all them 
things all day long. 
"Seems to me they's more fun lyin' with yer back up 
'gainst a mossy log, watchin' the red squirrels fightin' 
an' jawin' each other 'bout nuthin*. jest like the old 
woman gits at dad 'casionally. an' listenin' to Sooner 
makin' a fool of hisself on a trail of his own make up 
an' all the time knowin' 'tain't nuthin'; or ef y' feel sort 
o' like doin' somethin', jest cuttin' yerself a pole an' 
goin' down to the stream an' yankin' out a few leettle 
speckled cusses fer supper, or else in jest sittin' 'round 
the fire, same 's we be now, chinnin'. Seems to me all 
that's a heap more fun an' more edefyin' — as dad says— 
than sweatin' in a big city, with a b'iled shirt on an' a 
collar, jest tryin' to make more money 'n some other 
feller, an' never gittin' anuff at that, an' ef y' want a 
breath of good, fresh air havin' t' come way up here to 
git it, as y' say y' do; I say hit beats me why on airth y' 
live like that when the woods is so much better. I know 
the feelin', 'cause when I go up to Peshtigo fer fun or 
anythin' else I'm allers alfired glad t' git back to the 
woods again. Hit beats me how you kin stand it." 
It beat me also, and so I changed the subject. 
"Bill," said I, "you ought to get married and have a 
home of your own.' Have you never thought about it?" 
Bill blushed like a school hoy. 
"Onct I did," he replied, grinning sheepishly. "I got 
all I wanted that onct, an' I reck'n me an' no gal ain't 
goin' to jine hands right away in a hurry. As dad sez, 
"Wimmin's queer.' He's bin married a long time, an' 
had a hull lot o' kids an' sperience, an' ef he ain't 
f'milyer with their trail by this time 'tain't likely I sh'd 
know much 'bout the bizness. 'Tain't my line, nohow, 
m.arryin' ain't. I only tried onct, an' that was more'n 
nuff fer me. 
"I sez to myself, as you was jest sayin': 
" 'Bill,' sez I, 'hit's 'bout time you was a-hitchin' up 
with some gal an' gittin' married,' sez L 
"'Twas in the spring o' the year, when a feller gits 
kind o' restless like, an' I'd bin doin' some loggin' in 
the winter, an' had a leettle money saved up — mebbe 
sixty or seventy dollars — so I thought 'twas as good a 
time 's any fer huntin' up a gal, as they was no tellin' 
how long my pile would last, an' I hitched up an' druv 
to Peshtigo. 
"They was a hull lot o' loggers in Peshtigo. spendin* 
their money an' gittin' drunk, an' raisin the devil gen- 
er'ly. I put up at a hotel an' begun lookin' 'round fer 
a likely gal to sot up to. Seein' 's I was a-courtin', I 
thought I'd put on a leettle style, so I bought a bran' 
new pair o' shoes an' a pair o' red socks. My! but 
them socks was red— redder'n my hair, b'gosh, an' that's 
some red. 
"Waal, 'twarn't till next day I 'spied the gal. I went 
into a eatin' house to git some grub, an' thar I seed her. 
She was waitin' on the men what was eatin', an' a-sassin' 
of ' em plenty. She had the reddest hair I ever seed 
barrin' my own, an' was freckled as a turkey egg. She 
was a right smart size fer a gal, an' had a deep voice. I 
sot over in a corner an' watched her, waitin' fer the men 
to git out so's I could have a clear ti-ail to work on. 
W^iile I was sittin' thar a-waitin an' a-wonderin' how to ' 
begin my courtin' them new shoes begun hurtin' an' 
burnin' like fire. I stood it 's long 's I could, an' tlien 
I jest naterly pulled 'em off an' sot thar with them red 
socks more'n loomin' up. They certainly was red an' 
no mistake. 
"Bimeby most the rnen left, an' the ones what stayed 
was too drunk to notice much, an' the gal come over 
to me. 
" 'Waal,' sez she, sort o' snappy like, Vhat kin I do fer 
you?' sez she. 
"Thinks I, 'I'll have t' say somethin' perlite,' so I up 
an' sez, 'That's purty hair o' yourn.' sez I. 
" 'None o' yer lip,' sez she, 'or I'll have you thrown 
out. People what lives in' glass houses shouldn't throw 
IK") stones,' sez she. 
"*I ain't throwin' no stones,' vsez I; T meant what I 
said, an' I reck'n I orter be 4. gcio4 jedge,, 'cawse my 
tjwn hair sort o reqdish. 
I 
