kvG, 31, 1901.] 
163 
as a life-long legacy from Him, tTie Father of Nature to 
us. the children of Nature and men, and as such duly 
tiliprectatc. lip.ppily realize, in the days when our steps 
y;rovv sliort and mir lin)bs feeble, that these sunshiny 
ypo*:3 are dear tii dwell upon? E. K. Stkdman. 
Pisgah Forest, N. C, 
BegINKIng at a point eight miles southwest of A^e- 
ville, we have in North Carolina a private forest reserve 
which to-day stands a rival to any forest reserve in the 
country. When Mr. George Vanderbilt first commenced 
buying property near Asheville it was not known that he 
expected to do anything but locate a small country seat, 
but from time to time he has added to his possessions 
during the past ten years, until to-day he has in one con- 
tinuous tract over 160.000 acres of land. Beginning at the 
mansion, which is located about four miles from Asheville. 
it is now possible for one to ride in a straight line forty 
miles in a southwest direction without at any time leav- 
ing the Vanderbilt possessions. 
The great bulk of this large tract is covered with virgin 
forests, and only a small portion or corner (proportionate- 
ly) has been improved or is under cultivation. For 
.several miles on all sides of the mansion the country is 
laid out as a beautiful park, and has been planted with 
almost every known growing shrub. This part of tlie 
estate is traversed by some of the finest macadam drives' to 
be found in any place in the world, these drives aggregat- 
ing something over sixty-five miles, the same, during 
the dry season, being daily sprinkled and rolled to as near 
perfection as possible. At no point on these roads is the 
grade in excess of 4 per cent. ; they are all under-drained, 
and on both sides of all these macadam roads have been 
planted various kinds of shrubbery, as above men- 
tioned. Whole mountain sides which were abandoned 
before Mr. Vanderbilt took possession of the property are 
now planted with young white pine and other trees, or 
with flowers, shrubs and grasses — in fact, there is to-day 
no place in the country where the botanist or horti- 
culturist could better pursue his favorite study than 
here. The streams are covered with stone bridges, and 
at almost every turn of these beautifullj^ kept roads one 
comes upon some surprise in the way of natural scenery 
or artificial treasure of forest life. 
Three miles from the mansion is one of the finest dairies 
to be found in the world, which at present contains over 
250 head of Jersey cattle ; in the opposite direction is the 
sheep ranch, further on the stock ranch, the apiary, the 
chicken farm, while on the Swannanoa River, between 
the estate and Asheville, is situated one of the largest 
nurseries to be found anywhere in the South. In this 
nursery are growing hundreds of thousands of shrubs and 
young trees, all set with thp intention of being trans- 
planted into various portions of the estate. 
At the main entrance of the estate is the town of Bilt- 
more, which town Mr. Vanderbilt has built as a model 
village, and, indeed, all those who see it pronounce it as 
near a model village as is possible to conceive. 
Leaving the neighborhood of the mansion and pursuing 
: a southwesterly direction for about seven miles brings 
. one to the beginning of what is the true Pisgah Forest- 
Here the macadam roads end, and to see the grandest 
"trails of the mountains from this point one must travel 
I on horseback. Eighteen miles in the distance looms tnp 
.Mt. Pisgah, 5,769 feet. The foothills of these larger 
iiiioinntains were to a slight extent formerly cultivated by 
!-imall land owners, btit since the owners have been bought 
tout their small truck patches have either been planted out 
iini young forest trees, or have been left to grow up as they 
would. Many of the houses have been torn down, but 
deeper in the woods are still to be seen the remains of 
cabins fast going to decay, and one may here travel miles 
upon miles without seeing a sign of habitation or a 
human being. 
Upon a .small portion of the forest itself cattle are 
allowed to roam. No dogs are allowed. In the more 
accessible part of the mountains lumbering is being car- 
ried on in the most scientific and tip-to-date manner. 
Dr. Schenck. who fills the position of chief forester, is 
also conducting a school of forestry, which school is 
already becoming famous and well known throughout the 
country as one of the most practical and complete any- 
where to be found for the study of forestry in all its 
details. Here students are taken directly into the woods ; 
they are taught how to build roads, and even the most 
inaccessible portions of the mountains are pierced. At 
: all times a large force of road builders are actively en- 
: gaged. The students are taught to lay out trails and are 
. educated in the practical technique of cutting timber out 
V of places difficult of access, as well as the many details 
(.•of forest growth, measurement, stumpage, watershed, 
voung growth, burnt lands, soils and the hundred and 
cone other things which go to make up a practical knowl- 
edge of forestry. 
Starting from a point on Bent Creek, about eight miles 
from Asheville, one can take a trail which enters Pisgah 
Forest, and after winding through innumerable gorges 
and valleys, brings one out at the top of the Pisgah range 
in Yellow Gap, a point some ten miles away. As he 
ascends this trail, as was our pleasure last week, he goes 
through the various forms of forest growth which one 
meets at the different altitudes in this section. The 
best timber is all on the northern slopes, and is made rap 
principally of poplar, walnut, cherry, oak and chestnut. 
As one comes out into Yellow Gap the larger trees have- 
long since been left behind, even the rhododendron, laurel, 
and azalias have become stunted in their growth, and up' 
here they bloom much later than in the lower valley, and', 
do not attain near the size which they have lower down. 
Descending the opposite, or south, side of Pisgah ridges 
from Yellow Gap. this trail winds in and out among 
gorges, valleys, around precipices, over ridges, fords 
streams and finally brings one out at a point on Bradley 
Creek, about fifteen miles from the point where he entered 
the woods. On Bradley Creek is the first signs of human 
habitation he has seen during the fifteen miles, and never 
once ha.s he been out from under the overhanging trees. 
Bradly Creek is a rushing, roaring mountain torrent, 
about 15 feet across*, and has long been famous as one of 
the best trout streams anywhere in the Southern Appa- 
lachians. 
The trail follows the bank of Bradley Creek to its source 
in the Pink Beds. These Pink Beds are nothing more or 
less than a great flat or plateau situated at an elevation 
of alxnit 3,500 feet, sparsely wooded a»d thickly grown 
up in laurel and rhododendron. In fact, it is almost Jm- 
Ijossible for one to move when he once leaves the trail on 
account of the excessive growth of laurel bushes. Years 
ago this was one of the best deer-hunting sections in the 
whole South, and .since Mr. Vanderbilt has established the 
Pisgah Forest Reserve he has made these Pink Beds 
a part of the game preserve; the deer and other wild 
life are rapidly returning. 
There has been no shooting in this section now during 
the past ten years, except what has been done by the 
owner and his immediate friends. For convenience they 
have had, about every quarter of a mile, runways or open 
places cut out, about 20 feet wide, and in many places 
several miles long. These open places are perfectly 
straight, and extend across the valley, and are useful not 
only in hunting, but also act as breaks for po.ssible forest 
fires, which are ever occurring. These Pink Beds, which 
are about seven miles in diameter, Avill, in a few years, be 
well stocked with game, while the streams at present are 
fairly alive with trout. 
From any of the peaks rising abruptly from one to two 
thousand feet, and surrounding this amphitheater, one can 
look as far as the eye will carry, and in any direction see 
nothing but an unbroken forest. Such lumbering as is 
being done removes only those trees which are ripe and 
ready to be cut ; they are removed in such manner as will 
in the least possible way interfere with the young and 
growing timber. 
Dogs of any kind are not allowed in the forests, and 
hunting and fishing are absolutely forbidden, unless hy 
special permit from the office at Biltmore. 
The owner of this vast estate does but little fishing 
himself, and does not greatly enjoy hunting, although 
he proposes to make this one of the best hunting and 
fishing preserves to be found any place in the country. 
Indeed, we of the South, who are to-day attempting to 
interest the Government toward the establishment of the 
Appalachian JNational Forest Reserve, cannot expect to 
do better than has the owner of this vast estate. Here is • 
a tract of primeval forest which, under its present man- 
agement and care, may, for all time, hand down to pos- 
terity a tract of primeval woodland, well stocked with all 
kinds of game and animal life. Here will be seen roads 
which will compare with any ; here are streams, and here 
cliffs, valleys, gorges and plateaus, high mountains, bar- 
ren peaks, springs, ivoodland cpver every woodland 
creature. 
The natives who have sold out their property to the 
present owner are even loath to leave, and some, after 
receiving the price they asked, are to-day employed on the * 
estate, simply' liecause they cannot bear to leave the section. 
The property is all patrolled, and forest rangers make 
every effort ±0 protect the animal life as well as the forest 
itself. 
We have from time to time had to report the fearful in- 
roads that kiniljermem are now making upon the forests of 
this mountain Sfecfti-om.. the wide destruction which they 
have wrought, and t!b«- 4estruction which is also con- 
templated in the aiear tenre. We have shown that the 
wholesale destruction of the timber of the forests is result- 
ing in a change of climate; many of the streams heading 
in the Southern Appalachians are now practically dry 
during the summer, and become raging torrents during 
the wet season. W^ater powers are being ruined and the 
thoiisand and one other things incident to the destruction 
of forests have here for the past few years been rife. It 
is refreshing, however, to be able to see that there is one 
private citizen who has done more than all the best of the 
citizens of this and adjacent States in the way of forest 
protection. Would that there were more of them ! Would 
that more of our money kings could see their way to the 
establishment of such preserves I 
C. P. Ambler. 
Boyhood Reminiscences. 
Mr euTliest rifle practice is recalled by the perusal of a 
letter writtem by me to my father in March. 1850. when 
at the .a^e of eleven, while on a visit to my maternal 
grandmother at iB^llona, N. Y.. in which occurs this pas- 
sage: "'The other <day Uncle Charles and I went to, Mr. 
Bannes'., ,aixd tto 'the <»£)ods where Warren was boiling sap 
with his hodk in his "htund and Uncle W^ebster was hunt- 
mg. W'c "all shot at a irjflark, first Webster, then Warren 
ramd Uaicle Charles, then Cjharley Barnes and myself, and 
hy the'tims we got through (the tree was well covered with 
ibtillet holfrs." Shortly thereafter I owned my first rifle, 
and when :not :at school lay in wait for woodchucks, whose 
hides I would tan and sell for whiplash and belt-fasten- 
ing material, and with the proceeds obtain powder, lead 
and percussion pills for fresh forays. Occasionally I 
^vould bring in a few black and gray squirrels, and my 
TDofher would prepare a stew that was enjoyed by all. 
Whenever a chicken was wanted I was delegated to ob- 
tain it. and would sometimes make a number of shots ere 
I .succeeded in killing, by shooting at the head, at which I 
always aimed. One day when watching for squirrels on 
a ridge adjacent to an alder swamp. I heard the drum- 
ming of a partridge (ruffed grouse), and my ambition was 
at once excited to see and, if possible, obtain it. I care- 
fully .stalked in the direction, waited until the soul-stirring 
drum beat was repeated, and was finally rewarded by the 
never-to-be-forgotten sight of the bird in the act 
upon a fallen log. not over 20 feet away from the tree 
behind which I was concealed. I watched him for a 
1:in''e, until my nervous agitation had passed, and then 
caut'ously and carefully aimed and pulled the trigger, 
and lo and behold! the bird fluttered off the log in its 
death struggles, and with joy unspeakable I picked up 
and admired my first partridge, with its neck .severed 
just below the head, and proudly bore it home, together 
with the squirrels I had secured, and thought the potpie 
that followed the best of my life. 
There w-as good woodcock cover near my home, and I 
well remember the occasion when I first saw bird- dogs at 
work, and birds shot on the wing. Some cousins of my 
iather visited him and brought with them a couple of 
setters, and my surprise was great to see the work of 
the dogs, and the expert skill of my cousins, as bird after 
hird came to bag. and then that feast of broiled woodcock 
— the first I had ta.sted — can never be forgotten. My first 
experience with hook and line was the catching of bull- 
heads in a pond on Flint Creek Avhen about eight or nine 
years old, and many the good mess taken home 
found their way to the frying pan and were eaten with 
a relish. One night a bite was followed by a heavy pull, 
and it required all my strength to hold and finally land 
my first eel, that was about 3 feet long — and the first I had 
seen — and which I thought Was a water silake. Until an 
older companion otherwise informed me, and killed and 
removed it from the hook. 
A little later I skittered for pickerel with a pork-rind 
bait on Saturday afternoons with more or less success 
and any amount of enjoyment. Afterward, in 1853, I 
visited an uncle at Coudersport, Pa., and caught in the 
mountain streams of that vicinity and in Pine Creek and 
the Sinnamahoning waters many a fine string of brook 
trout It was also there that I witnessed the greatest 
flight of passenger pigeons, and was in the slaughter 
armed with a pole, knocking them down as they rounded 
a point, together with almost all the rest of the towns- 
people. 
Pierre Stebbins and myself, armed with shotguns, visited 
a pigeon nesting a few miles away, and after obtain- 
ing all the young birds, just able to fly that we could carry^ 
built a fire by a brook and broiled some squabs for our late 
dinner, and then started for town, but actually after a two- 
hour tramp in the woods, found ourselves back at the lunch 
place, having been completely turned around and lost. 
We then followed the brook, which we knew entered the 
stream that flowed through town, and finally arrived 
there all right, but very tired. E. S. Whit.mcer. 
Cahth.^ge, O. 
A Pack of Hounds. 
Every time Harry Reynolds visited the Florseshoe 
ranch he broke the Tenth Conmiandment. Among the 
different members of the canine family that called this 
ranch their home was a full-blooded greyhound bearing 
the well-merited name of Queen. She was a beautiful 
animal, tawnj;^ yellow in color, with slender, shapely 
limbs, deep chested and possessing all the lines that mark 
a dog as a thoroughbred. As for her speed and en- 
durance — well, there was nothing on four legs in that 
part of the world that could outstrip her in the race. 
Taking all these things into consideration, it was no 
wonder that Harry Reynolds coveted her and longed to 
call her his own. 
• How Windy Bill Robinson, manager of the Horseshoe 
ranch, had become the owner of such a valuable hound 
was an un,solvahle mystery to Reynolds. Windy Bill's 
answers to all inquiries on the subject were somewhat 
vague and unsatisfactory. 
"A feller got her from another feller, a friend of mine 
got her from this other feller who was a friend of his'n, 
and I borroAved her from my friend and ain't had time to 
return her, not knowin' where my friend went to," was 
the only explanation he would vouchsafe to give. 
Although he did not seem to set great store by the 
greyhound, still he refused to part with her on any terms 
half-way within reason. Every time Reynolds saw the 
dog he coveted her all the more, and of late this covetous- 
ncss had grown into a fixed determination to gain pos- 
.';ession of her by fair means or "foul, and settle with 
Windy Bill afterward, even though the operation bid 
fair to result in an appeal to arms. He was not without 
special reasons for this seemingly unworthy resolution. 
Ever since he had removed Old Duke, the Scotch stag- 
hound, from Beardy Miller's unchristianlike guardian- 
ship, the hound had picked up wonderfully, and although, 
in all probability, he would never entirelj^ recover from 
the effects of that terrible run through fehe scorching 
heat, when he had all but yielded up his life, there was 
much good stuff left in him. He had lost his former 
wonderful powers of speed and endurance, but nothing 
of his matchless courage, and Reynolds' heart went out 
to him in his present fallen estate. 
With the arrival of Old Duke at the Horizontal Bar 
ranch and his subsequent recovery, Harry saw a chance 
of raising such a pack of hounds as he had always longed 
to own, provided he could gain possession of Queen. The 
mother would furnish the speed, while from Old Duke 
they would get a fighting strain that would make them a 
match for any wolf on the plains. He was careful to 
say nothing that would in anywise arouse the curiosity 
of the manager of the Horseshoe ranch, so that one day 
when Queen disappeared mysteriously from her accus- 
tomed haunts. W'indy Bill never thought to inquire par- 
ticularly at the Horizontal Bar ranch for the missing 
hound. 
Windy Bill was not greatly disturbed over his loss, and 
when Reynolds made him a present of a fine bull terrier, 
as a mere friendly act of sympatllJ^ he felt more than 
pleased with the substitute, and in a short time Queen 
became a fast-fading memory. 
About a year afterward all of Harry Reynolds' spare 
time was taken tip with the education and disc'plining 
of six awkward, irrepressible puppies, being well sec- 
onded in his efforts by Queen, the mother of the family, 
and. as they grew older, by Old Duke, the daddy of the 
pack. There was another dog. Sharp by name, on the 
Horizontal Bar ranch, a big, bony animal, half of grey- 
hound, half bull, and he was of much valuable assistance 
while the tra'ning and education of the young dogs was 
under way. PTe it was who taught young Tige his own 
famous throat hold, from which no creature could escape 
when once the strong jaws were set in their deadly grip. 
He also showed the pack many interesting things about 
a dog's life on the plains, but Tige. because of his pi^g- 
iiacious disposition, no doubt, became his special charge. 
The dogs waxed stronger day by day, and passed 
through" their early puppyhood without misadventure. 
The next year found them tall and Avell-proportioned and 
almost fully grown, as fine a pack of wolfhounds — with a 
little more experience — as a hunter would care to ride 
behind. They still had much to learn — in fact, their edu- 
cation had only begun, but in Old Duke and Queen, not 
to forget Sharp, these young gladiators had instructors 
worthy of the name. 
Thus did Harry Reynolds become the possessor of his 
afterward famous pack of hounds, and he seldom went 
abroad without some, or, more probably, all of thera. 
