Aug, 31, 1901.] 
FUHEST AND STREAM, 
16B 
building her nest during the brief stops made by the train 
at the towns to which it runs, but why it should have 
selected such a place in the beginning is' the most sur- 
prising part. The nest was discoA^ered several days ago 
by a railroad man at West Chester. He saw the robin fly 
from beneath the car and made an investigation, the re- 
sult of which rather astonished him. The members of 
the train crews that run the car arc awaiting developments 
with almost paternal anxiety." 
Supplementary to tlie above, I may add that Mr. W. H. 
Button, general foreman painter of the Lehigh Valley 
R. R., advises me tliat he once found a perfectly luade 
bird's nest constructed between one of the main truss rods 
and the bottom of a passenger coach, at the point of the 
rod's attachment to the sill of the coach. The car was 
a regular service coach, daily used on a central new 
branch of the Lehigh system, in a section of country neces- 
sitating short curves, and a consequent heavy oscillation 
and wrenching of the equipment, and how the nest could 
have been built and made to stay in place without loss of 
symmetry or injury to the minutest detail of architectitrc 
has long been an undemonstrable problem to those who 
witnessed the unique location of the structure. 
M. Chill. 
Summer at the Zoological Park. 
August in the Zoological Park in this year of 1901 is 
not as Augusts of other j'ears have been. The grass and 
the foliage are as fresh and green as if it were June. The 
wild birds are busy and some of them are singing. There 
is nothing to be seen of the dead and dr'ied-up appearance 
of the late summer. It is trtie that it is hot, and that the 
caged birds and mammals suffer under the torrid g,un and 
in an atmosphere surcharged with humidity. The great 
buffalo bull, Cleveland, whose wrinkled hide is naked 
back of the shoulders, pants in the heat as he fights the 
tiny flies that sting him. and others of his kind, wiser 
than he, are standing shoulder deep in one of the great 
pools in the corral. 
The elk, too, have gone in swimming, and may be seen 
with nothing but heads and shoulders above the water in 
the tank in their range. Although it is so hot. the coats 
of these animals are thickening up. tlie horns of the great 
bull have been newly stripped of their velvet, and the 
calves have lost their spots. Soon the summer coat will all 
drop off and the animals will appear smooth and fresh 
looking in autumnal garb. 
Many changes have taken place in the park during the 
summer. Baird's court has been graded and surrounded 
liy a retaining wall, and on it the very handsome monkey 
house has been erected, and before the cold weather will 
be ready for occupancy. Of its inhabitants, the most 
interesting will be the recently obtained orangs, which now 
attract so much attention. One of these has been edu- 
cated to a point where he sits in a chair and eats his 
food from a table like any white man. 
Another important addition to the park is the Rocking 
Stone restaurant, which is now completed and in opera- 
lion, to the great satisfaction, apparently, of the visiting 
public. Its location is an admirable one, for it is in one of 
the coolest spots in the park, and it seems to be well 
patronized. 
The inhabitants of the beaver pond, which are recent 
additions to the collections, do not often show themselves 
to the public, but their works speak for them. These are 
to be seen in the shape of a house built at the foot of a 
group of little, soft maples, in the dam which they have 
erected — and which has flooded a good part of the inclos- 
ure — as well as in the devastation that they have wrought 
among the small trees, cut down for food and construction 
purposes. 
No doubt after a time the beavers, like many other of 
the wild creatures in the park, will become accustomed 
to the sight of human beings, and will carry on their 
operations more or less in the day time. It is interesting 
to see how the^tters, wild ducks, geese and many other 
mammals and birds have adapted themselves to their situa- 
tions here. They pay no more regard to the presence of 
visitors than if those visitors were so many stumps. The 
ducks continue to dabble in the water, the geese to pluck 
the grass, the otters to play with each other in the pool 
and all the different creatures to carry on their various 
pursuits, even though people are standing within 3 or 4 
feet of them. 
Among the extraordinary additions to the collections 
within recent months are a number of huge Galapagos 
tortoises, animals in which the carapax, or upper shell, is 
3 or 4 feet long, and which are big and strong enough to 
carry on their backs without difficulty two or three men. 
Their great size, stout, columnlike legs, long, slender 
necks and small heads, make them extraordinary objects. 
It is interesting to see them feeding on a heap of fresh, 
green grass, which they eat in a businesslike way, much as 
a cow might eat it. Through the summer a considerable 
number of the tortoises have been removed from the rep- 
tile house and turned out in pens on the grass. • 
Two Cuban crocodiles about 5 feet long, put into the 
reptile house in the large tank at the end of the turtle 
crawl, created some excitement recently by their wars. 
Thej' fought for a long time, and it was impossible to 
make peace between them, At last one defeated the 
other, and chased him constantly abottt the tank, and 
finally the beaten one, making a tremendous effort, sprang 
out of the tank and landed on the floor of the reptile 
house. 
The tremendous flying cage, in which is the great col- 
lection of birds, chiefly aquatic, such as flamingoes, ibises, 
ducks, geese, swans, pelicans, cormorants and herons of 
various sorts, continues to be one of the most attractive 
things in the park. It is an interesting sight to behold 
these birds, practicallj^ at liberty, walking about or flying 
from tree to tree, or. as in the case of the pelicans, taking 
long flights over the water, and all of them apparently 
as healthy and as independent as so many wild birds in all 
their natural surroundings. 
At the bear dens, always a center of attraction for 
visitors to the park, there are two curious little, whitish 
bears, said to be from Corea, which are recent additions. 
An interesting exotic form died this spring — ^killed by 
some one who last year fed it with peaches, which it 
devoured, stones and all. - The death -of this rare and 
costly creature preaches a sermon on .the thoughtlessness 
of the public, which ought to make some impression, The 
polar bears, Kadiak, grizzly and black bears are in ad- 
mirable condition, though all are suffering somewhat from 
the heat. The polar bears have entirely recovered from 
Iheir last winter's skin trouble, and are now in superb 
coat and condition. 
From the far East has couh' a specimen of the small 
wild cow of Celebes (Anoa). It is the least of all the 
bovine animals, has straight, baclcward. slop ng horns, and 
looks somewhat like the African eland, though no bigger 
than a short-legged deer. There is also a tiny Chinese 
water deer, not very much bigger than a jackrabbit, and a 
number of other East Indian forms, allied to the sambur 
and axis deens. 
A number of animals have been born in the garden this 
year. One female buffalo calf, two elk. several deer of 
diffei-ent sorts, a number of wild ducks — redheads, mal- 
lards, etc. — wild geese and pheasants. 
The authorities of the garden have had some good luck 
and some bad. Their moose have not done well, and two 
or three have died. The mule deer seem to suffer greatly 
from the damp heat, and are thin and somewhat ragged, 
With the approach of cold weather they are likely to im- 
prove. On the other hand, the antelope, which have been 
a sotrrce of. constant anxiety to the director and his staff 
since the park was opened, seem at last to be doing well. 
They are fat, smooth and in good order. It would seem 
as if then- food problem had at last been solved. 
Word lias recently been received from Mr. J. Alden 
quail's nest. 
Photo by J. H. Madden. 
Loring, the head keeper in charge of the mammals of the 
park, giving some notion of what he has done during his 
trip to Alaska. It seems that he succeeded in capturing 
no less than three of the young of Ball's sheep, but that 
it was impossible to keep them alive on the food that he 
could offer them. Notwithstanding this misfortune, it is 
hoped that he will bring back from Alaska a considerable 
number of interesting specimens. 
It is hardly to be doubted that when autumn comes and 
all the summer vacationists return to New York, a re- 
newed interest will be felt in the park ef the New York 
Zoological Society. The collections now on exhibition 
there are well worth the seeing, and members of the 
Society should make it a point to take their friends 
thither and show them what the Zoological Society is 
doing, and to induce them to become meiubers. A 
great city like New York should furnish ten times the 
present membership of the Zoological Society, and would 
do so, if it were generally known what the Society is 
doing, and what it intends to do. 
Review of Notth American Snakes. 
It is nearly ten years since Prof. Cope's paper on the 
''Characters and Variations of North American Snakes" 
was published, and only a few months ago appeared, in 
the Report of the Smithsonian Institution for 1898, his 
work on "The Reptiles of North America." Now, from 
the Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of 
Philadelphia, we receive "A Review of the Genera and 
Species of American Snakes North of Mexico" by Mr. 
Arthur Erwin Brown, the Secretary of the Zoological 
Society of Philadelphia. 
Though extremely interesting, the paper is very largely 
technical. It is in the main an inquiry into the nature of 
the variations so commonly found among snakes — and on 
which so great a number of species and subspecies have 
been based — and an endeavor to determine how far such 
variations are promiscuous and without meaning, and to 
what extent they have relation to progressive modifica- 
tion. Thus, it would seem that the paper is, in a certain 
way, an object-lesson protest against the tendency of the 
present day toward the multiplication of species and sub- 
species, s 
"I think," said A. Bronson Alcott in one of his con- 
versations, "when a man lives on beef he becomes some- 
thing like an ox. If he eats mutton he begins to look 
sheepish; and. if he feeds on pork, may he not grow 
swinish?" "That may be," said Br, Walker, of Cam- 
bridge, who was one of the listeners. "But, when a man 
lives on nothing but vegetables, I think^ he is apt to be 
pretty small potatoes," — Springfield Republican. 
We Arc All Hwm?^ 
Editor Forest and S^tream: 
Some one once remarked that there was a great deal of 
human nature in people, and we all of us see constantly 
occurrences which impress this truth upon us. 
We are all of its disposed to lay down rules of conduct 
for our fellow men, but would like occasional excep- 
tions to be made in our own favor. Or we may wish to 
except from the application of the general rules which 
we lay down certain persons or creatures, which we par- 
ticularly like or dislike. I:i advocating the passage of 
certain laws or the repeal of others, we are very likely to 
be governed by our personal interests or our personal 
preferences rather than by broad consideration of what 
is for the general good. A man may be willing to 
acknowledge that spring shooting does harm to the duck 
supply, but if he believes that his only opportunity to 
shoot ducks comes in the spring, he is not likely to be an 
ardent advocate of having the open season for ducks close 
Jan. I. The free traders declare that the protectionists 
want protection merely for the benefit of their own 
pockets — to enrich themselves at the expense of their 
fellow citizens; while the p'rotectionists aver that their' 
political opponents are careless of the country's good and 
wish to see the American laborer crushed by the com- 
petition of the "pauper" "^hordes of Europe. 
The letter from Mr. H. Stewart, printed in the Forest 
AND Stream which has just come to me, is an example 
of the human nature which sticks out of us all so strongly. 
Mr. Stewart, if I have read his writings correctly, is a 
true sportsman, and a nature lover, if not a naturalist. 
Yet he calls the ravens cruel, as nearly as I can under- 
stand, chiefly because they kill his sheep and lambs. That 
the ravens attack the eyes and certain other parts of the 
animals is advanced as proof of the birds' cruelty, but, of 
i-ourse, Mr. Stewart knows very much better than I can 
tell him why the birds make these parts especial points oi 
attack. It is because thej- are soft, and yield most easily 
in the stout bill. 
It has become a fashion in these latter days — and it is 
a fashion now running riot — to credit animals with human 
'ntelligence and reasoning power; to make them, in fact, 
men, women and children, but clad in feathers or fur and 
able to run or fly swiftly. This, of course, is highly 
inartistic, and is a return toi the beliefs and stories of 
our naked ancestors of 2,000 years ago; but it is the pres- 
ent fashion, and must run its course, just as in the recent 
past the various fads of archery, lacrosse, the bicycle and 
other sports have arisen, flourished for a time, and then 
fallen into desuetude. 
There is no particular reason for believing that birds 
or animals have human feelings, nor is there any reason 
to think that the raven looks at the killing of a sheep 
with any more regard to the feelings of the sheep than the 
human butcher has for the steer whose throat he cuts, or 
the chicken whose head he chops off. Birds and mam- 
mals gather food as the farmer gathers corn, and whether 
that food is a seed, an earth worm, a ruffed grouse or a 
sheep, makes no difference. It is food, and it is looked 
upon as food, and not as anything else. From my point of 
view, therefore, it is simply absurd to speak of a hawk, a 
raven or a: fox as cruel. Each of these animals is strug- 
gling to exist, just as, in another way, every human being 
struggles. I conceive that there can be nothing immoral 
in the killing of a sheep by a raven, or a ruffed grouse by 
the hawk, and if we regard it as immoral, it is chiefly 
because it interferes with our selfish pleasures. 
Our human nature establishes in us many selfish preju- 
dices and frequently sways us from our usual lines of 
conduct. Mr. Stewart is a nature lover, and so a bird pro- 
tector. Yet he draws the line at ravens, partly because, 
they ^interfere with his sheep and partly because they 
interfere with other birds. Am I taking too much for 
granted in inferring that Mr. Stewart would protect all 
birds except the ravens and their kin? 
I have a friend who is a farmer. Sometimes when I see 
him and ask how the farm is going on, he makes remarks 
about the crows, which pull up J;he newly planted corn 
and destroy the crop. I have endeavored to convert him 
and have sent him much good literature on the subject 
of the crow. I have been unable, however, to convince 
him that the crow does a great deal of good as well as 
harm. He thinks only of his spring fields, robbed of their 
tender shoots of growing corn. Yet this man is one of the 
most enthusiastic of bird protectors, and on his piazza 
and in the buildings immediately about the house he 
owns, there were last spring five or six robins' nests, two 
peewees' nests and one of a little house wren, besides nests 
of orioles and scarlet tanagers in the trees immediately 
about the house, 
I have a relative who has what I call a hen ranch, but 
he more elegantly terms it a poultry farm. His language 
about hawks at certain seasons of the year I do not ven- 
ture to write to you. I am quite sure that you would 
say that it was not "fit to print." I have sent him Br. A. 
K. Fisher's valuable little volume on the "Hawks and 
Owls of the United States," but it is my impression that 
he regards Br. Fisher as one of the foremost of Amer- 
ican writers in the department of light fiction. He shoots 
hawks whenever he can. Yet this man is an ardent bird 
lover and bird protector, and is a game warden— or what- 
ever the term may be— serving without pay in the State in 
which he lives. 
'Way up the Hudson lives one of the most genial, sweet- 
est natured and delightful of men. His descriptions of 
nature, and, above all, of bird life, are among the most 
charming things that have ever been written in Amer- 
ica. If in all this broad land there is one who loves the 
birds, enjoys their society and takes pleasure in telling 
to others how much delight he takes in all their wonder- 
ful ways, it is John Burroughs. And yet, unless my 
memory has altogether gone astray, it is not many years 
since John Burroughs declared in substance that while he 
iikes orioles very much, he likes his own grapes better, and 
that he protects his grapes from the orioles with a shot- 
gun. . 
■\nd if John Burroughs falls from grace m the matter 
of bird protection, what excuses may not be made for 
us poor folks, who, occupying a plane somewhat lower 
than his, sometimes or often totter and fall? 
J. Edwardes. 
Connecticut. 
