Forest and Stream. 
A Weekly Journal of. the Rod and Gun. 
Copyright, 1901, by Forest and Stream Publishing Co. 
Terms, f4 a Year. 10 Cts. a Copy. I 
Six Months, $2. j 
NEW YORK, SATURDAY, JUNE 22, 1901. 
J ' VOL. LVI,— No. 25. 
} No. 346 Broadway, New York 
A PROPOSED AFRICAN GAME RESERVE. 
The vast herd.s of wild animals which formerly in- 
habited South Africa have been swept away by the pitiless 
rifles of the so-called sportsman and the hide and head 
hunter. Last year in London a convention was called to 
take steps to induce the Government to establish game 
refuges in what was formerly the greatest game country 
in the world. The horse having been stolen, it is now in 
order to lock the stable door. We may hope that it is 
not too late, and that protective regulations may be prop- 
erly enforced, to the end that some of the species now 
pitifully reduced in numbers may re-establish themselves. 
Africa is a vast continent, and as yet it has not all 
been run over by the exploring white man. What its 
possibilities still are is suggested l>y an interview ascribed 
to Sir Harry Hamilton Johnston, British Commissioner 
for Uganda, who has just returned to London after an ab- 
sence of two years. Much of this time has been devoted 
to exploring portions of British East Africa, and espe- 
cially the Uganda district and the great region roughly 
bounded on the east by Lake Rudolph and its tributaries, 
on the south by the Victoria and Edward Nyanza, on 
the west by the Albert Nyanza and the River Nile, and 
on the north by the fifth parallel of north latitude. Here 
is a territory more than four hundred miles from north to 
south by three hundred from east to west, over much of 
which, owing to the tribal wars of years ago, there are 
no inhabitants. Its depopulation either by the slaughter of 
its people by their foes or by their being driven out 
through fear of attack is complete. Throughout this 
region uninhabited by man, large animals are marvelously 
numerous, and have been so long unmolested that they 
are wholly without fear of man. Here too are found strange 
animals, one of them reported to be a species whose fossil 
bcnes have been found in the later Miocene or earlj^ 
Pliocene deposits of southern Europe, but which was 
thought to be long extinct. 
The exploring party passed through a beautiful coun- 
try, abounding in animal life, constantly meeting herds 
of elephants, of zebras and of antelopes, which looked 
at them curiously as thej' passed along, but showed no 
fear. Rhinoceroses were frequently met, as were also 
lions, but these last were so well fed on the antelopes, 
hartbeests and zebras that they, showed no disposition to 
attack the caravan nor any interest in it. 
The game was so abundant and so tame that no hunt- 
ing was done. The expedition was a scientific one, and it 
was necessary to obtain specimens of all the animlas seen 
for the British Museum collections, but aside from this 
the members of the party refrained from shooting game. 
It said that they found more pleasure in wandering 
through this beautiful natural zoological garden and in 
watching the tame and half-tame creatures than in killing 
them — a matter so easy as to be butchery. 
It is reported that Sir Harry Johnston intends to advise 
the Government to maintain the district as a national 
park and game preserve; something which it is earnestly 
to be hoped will be done. The region appears to be wholly 
within British territory, it is amply stocked, and imme- 
diate action as advised by its explorer — the man who of 
all the world knows most about it — will maintain a state 
of nature here for all time. This action, however, must 
be prompt. The report brought back by Sir Harry John- 
ston is certain to start out into this region a horde of 
hunters who in very short time may do an amount of 
damage there which years of careful protection will hardly 
be able to undo. Britons, like Americans, have had so 
many object lessons in this matter of game destruction 
that it may he hoped that the Government will act 
promptly. It is an easy matter to take life. A species may 
readily be exterminated, but to re-establish one greatly 
reduced in numbers takes time, or the attempt may fail. 
Yet among those who are bent on killing, such pro- 
tective enactments may be very unpopular. Each in- 
dividual who wishes to indulge in slaughter feels that to 
him full privileges should be granted, but that other peo- 
ple should be restrained; and regards restrictions of all 
kinds as a great hardship — when they apply to himself. 
The time has come — and this fact is coming to be more 
and more generally appreciated — that all sorts of barriers 
must be erected by law and by public opinion in the way 
of the civilized man who uses firearms in pursuit of wild 
creatures. Short seasons, a limit to the bag, shooting 
license?, gun taxes — all these things have come or are in 
sight in most civilized regions. But by far the most 
efficient means of protecting our large game is the estab- 
lishment of refuges such as we have in the Yellowstone 
National Park, where protection shall be absolute. It 
would be a fine thing if Sir Harry Johnston's reported 
recommendation to the British Government should be 
carried out. 
THE MICHIGAN GRAYLING. 
We alluded the other day to the eifort making in Michi- 
gan to secure a respite for the grayling — a fish dear to the 
angler and threatened with early extinction. There is 
but one stream in the State — the Manistee River — -where 
the specfes is now known to breed. If the Manistee could 
be protected by the prohibition of fishing in its waters for 
a term of years, there is every reason to believe that they 
would increase in such numbers that the stock might be 
regarded as permanentlj^ established. Without such pro- 
tection the species is doomed. To convert the Manistee 
into a refuge for the fish has been the task undertaken 
by Mr. W. B. Mershon, of East Saginaw; the project has 
been with him a labor of love, and to it he has devoted 
unstinted time and effort. At his instigation a bill pro- 
tecting grayling on the Manistee was introduced in the 
Legislature of 1901, but we regret to record that it was 
defeated hy a combination of selfishness and stolid indiffer- 
ence ; in particular by the pig-headedness of a certain 
Senator Palmer, who came from some upper county or 
district through which the Manistee River passes, and 
who thought it would abridge the rights of his con- 
stituents if they were not allowed to go out and extermi- 
nate this fish. The other members of the Legislature failed 
to recognize that the Manistee River did not wholly belong 
to this backwoods legislator, .and did not recognize that 
the fish in Michigan were the property of the entire State 
of Michigan instead of this one little district, so they 
allowed him to have his own way and had what they con- 
sidered the courtesy of not interfering in a local matter. 
Inasmuch as the Legislature will not meet agian for 
two years, and thus two seasons will be left for the gray- 
ling fishermen to prosecute their industry, the probability 
is that the fish will have been cleaned out from the Man- 
istee as they have been from other Michigan waters. 
DOGS AND MEN. 
In the United States the history of the dog, concerning 
his legal, commercial and domestic status, shows that the 
people at large have been much divided in their opinion 
concerning him. 
From the extreme point of view which magnifies him 
into a paragon of nobility and worth- on the one hand, to 
the point of view which reduces him to an unmitigated 
nuisance on the other, there are many graduations and 
qualifications of opinion. It is less so in England and 
other countries of Europe wherein there is more uniform- 
itj' of opinion on the value and rights of people and 
dogs, and more respect for the laws governing them. 
Dog owners of the United States have felt that they 
were and are most unjtistly discriminated against, to the 
deep hurt of their pride in a noble friend, to say nothing 
of inroads on pocketbooks. State legislatures and courts 
have many times refused to recognize the dog as 'being 
property, though in a few instances an involved qualified 
interest has been conceded to owners; municipalities have 
imposed burdensome special license fees with the further 
obligation of a collar with a special tag thereon as a 
condition precedent to the rights of the owner to keep 
the dog at all, and the right of the dog to continue to 
live; express companies exact double rates for carrying 
dogs to and fro, at the same time disclaiming all re- 
sponsibility for their loss, death or escape ; park com- 
missioners and railway managers exclude dogs entirely 
from the properties of which they have charge; many 
landlords show a hostilitj^ to dogs living on their premises, 
and many families, neighbors to other families which own 
dogs, exhibit a most peevish disposition when said dogs 
bay the moon of nights, or hold barking dialogues by 
the hour when people best sleep if dogs do not bark; or 
make predatory calls in the neighbors' cellars or kitchens 
to steal food or visit the gardens to kill the flowers. 
All these subjects have been topics of deep and pro- 
longed discussion, public and otherwise, from time im- 
memorial. The dog owner contended that he truly loved 
his dog, that the latter was the children's pet and the 
guard of the home, and had a pedigree or should have one 
if it could be uiieartbed; the injured or disturbed party 
maintained, with some show of justice, that, if the dog 
loved his owner and guarded his family, such did not 
condone the dog's misdeeds in respect to others, if indeed 
he were guilty of any. Express companies found that 
dogs were presented for- shipment with a piece of rope or 
dog chain to secure them, and that a dog, commonplace 
to the eye before shipment, increased several hundred 
times in value if lost after shipment. Legislatures viewed 
with disfavor a property recognition of dogs, because for 
each really valuable dog there were himdreds of worth- 
less curs, many of the latter living a predatory life, and 
exceedingly prejudiced to sheep growing. Municipalities, 
for special sanitary reasons, and for general reasons of 
comfort and protection, were forced to restrict the multi- 
plication of curs, vagrant and otherwise, incident to irre- 
sponsible ownreship. 
However, all these subjects have been given earnest and 
prolonged discussion from time immemorial. Grave as 
they were and are, they sink into relative insignificance 
'when considered in relation with the actual killing of 
a dog for any cause by any one other than the owner. 
Many years ago some of the States adopted laws which 
justified the summary killing of dogs caught in the act 
of pursuing deer or sheep. At that time such laws met 
the resentful denunciation of many dog owners. Never- 
theless, the laws remained, and time and experience- have 
proved their wisdom and beneficence. This legal prin- 
ciple as it concerns dogs seems to be gaining wider adop- 
tion, for one State after another has added the law to "its 
statutes. The owners at large accept it passively, there- 
fore with their approval presumably, in noteworthy con- 
trast to their protests of years ago on this point. It thus 
implies a recognition of the rights of others on the part 
of dog owners, which is better for themselves as owners, 
and incompai'ably best for the advancement of the dog 
in public esteem and his property possibilities. So long 
as owners as a class were insistent on the dog being a 
matter of property, and that regardless of whom he might 
assault or what property he might destro}^, or what dis- 
trubance he might create, he still was property to be 
dealt with only by due process of law, they could hope for 
nothing favorable to their cause from public opinion on 
legal enactment. There is a distinct gain when their own 
rights are recognized in conjunction with rights of others. 
PROTECTOR OVERTON'S RAIDS. 
Arrangements for beginning action in the cold storage 
cases which recently made such a sensation in New York 
have not yet been completed, though the negotiations are 
more or less well under way. 
Incidentally, the case against Frank W. Burns, a dealer 
in poultry and game, of 390 Park avenue, who was the 
first man arrested by Protector Overton this spring — 
May 7 — for selling game . out of season, came up in 
Special Sessions before Justice Jerome, upon motion of 
the defendant's counsel for an adjournment to give the 
defendant an opportunity to obtain witnesses from Penn- 
sylvania. It is inferred from this that the defendant's 
plea will be that the birds which he sold came from that 
State. If such a defense is to hold against the laws of 
New York, all attempts to enforce game laws so far as 
they refer to sale and possession might as well be aban- 
doned. It had been reported that the arrest of Burns gave 
Protector Overton the first evidence that he had against 
the Arctic Freezing Company. This, however, is not the 
case. The evidence against that company was obtained in 
quite a different way, which, however, is not made public. 
The interest in this attempt to enforce the State laws 
is very widespread. Protector Overton has received let- 
ters from many parts of the country, congratulating him 
on the raid. Vice-President Roosevelt, who, as is well 
known, is deeply interested in game protection, and is 
especially desirous to see the illegal cold storage business 
broken up, has written a very strong letter to Mr. Over- 
ton, and says: 
I want to tell you how heartily pleased I am at your recent 
really noteworthy feat in making the raid on the cold storage 
offenders. You are entitled to the respect and gratitude of good 
citizens generally, and in particular of all believers in the pro- 
tection of game and soiig birds. Sincerely yours, 
Theodore Roosevelt. 
While from the mountains of California a reader of 
Forest and Stream writes: "Away up here in the 
mountains 3,000 feet above the sea I read of your quests 
for illegal game, and congratulate the State of >^ew Yorl^ 
upon having a square game irotector," 
