480 
^ FORE ST AND STREAM. 
[Nov. 30, 1901* 
trated with pictures of Dorkings or Leghorns, or some- 
thing of the sort." 
Hunting and Game in Alaska. 
Virginia Shooting Notes. 
Cumberland County, Va., Nov. 22.— Not within the 
memory of the perennial oldest inhabitant of "Cumberlan' 
caounty" has there been anything in the way of a dry 
spell at this time of year which has exceeded, in length 
and persistent severity, the drought that prevails through- 
out this part of the State. No rain has fallen since the 
latter part of September, and at the present writing none 
is in sight. Day after day the sun shines out of a cloud- 
less sky upon fields and forests long since bereft by the 
winds of any moisture. Night after night the moon and 
stars look down at a frosty landscape, on which the rising 
sun throws its warm melting beams, and so it goes. Cut- 
ting out all poetry, the cold fact is that the "sacred soil 
of Virginia" is dessicated (accent on second syllable, 
please), and pulverizes under the foot of man or beast. 
A rifle ball shot into a wheatfield kicks up a cloud of 
dust, and much of the seed wheat sown six weeks ag© has 
not begun to sprout. 
Streams are running nearly dry, and many wells also. 
The Appomattox River, which last June rose more than 
a foot above the wagon bridge at Farmville, is now far 
below ordinary low-water mark. The tobacco industry, of 
which Farmville is an important center, is at a standstill 
owing to dry weather. Hundreds of thousands of pounds 
of tobacco in the leaf, possibly millions, hanging in the 
numerous barns throi:ghout the surrounding country, is 
so dry and brittle that it cannot be handled, and prices are 
rising in consequence. What all this dryness means to 
the sportsman must be obvious, at least to sportsmen. 
Quail, Icnown here as partridges, are abundant— in fact, 
more plentiful than they have been in years. Yet the dogs 
lind them with the greatest difficulty, especially after the 
covey has been flushed and scattered. The cover is very 
dense and heavy, and the woods are thickly strewn with 
dead leaves, which rattle loudly at every movement of 
man or dog. Moisture is essential to a dog in scenting 
game, whether furred or feathered, hence the quail, rab- 
bits and foxes have had a comparatively easy time of it 
tills fall so far. The Farmville fox hunters have not had 
a meet in over a month, as it is idle to chase old Reynard 
over dry and dusty ground. A good rainstorm, however, 
will change all this. Three; of us with a good dog got 
only twenty-one birds in a six-hour hunt yesterday. Wc 
would have killed fifty or sixty had the ground been 
mot3t, and we will do it, too — after a rain. 
J. L. K. 
Nov. 23.— rYou may "kill" all that drought stuff I sent 
you yesterday, if you want to. The Lord has sent a 
gracious rain upon His inheritance, and refreshed it when 
it was weary. K.' 
New York League* 
Seneca Falls, N. Y., Nov. 20. — Editor Forest and 
Stream: The annual meeting of the New York Fish, 
Game and Forest League will be held at the Yates Hotel, 
Syracuse, N. Y., at 10:30 A. M, on Dec. 5, 1901, and a 
full attendance is hoped for. 
The objects of this Association are to create and foster 
a more general public sentiment in favor of fish, game 
and forest protection, to procure the enactment of laws 
for the protection of fish and game, and for the preserva- 
tion of our forests, and to promote the observance of such 
laws. 
In order to carry out these objects, we most earnestly 
ask the co-operation of all fish and game clubs and asso- 
ciations within this State, who are not already enrolled in 
the League, and urge upon them the great desirability of 
joining forces with us in order to secure yet more united 
effort in attaining these objects. 
The initiation fee of $5, including as it does, the dues 
for the year commencing on the first Thursday after the 
first I\'Ionday in December, when our annual meeting takes 
place, gives to each club the privilege of sending two 
delegates to the annual meeting. 
The game laws of our State are at present in much 
better shape than they were a few years ago. 
The constant tinkering by the Legislature with the game 
law is, however, a serious menace to fish, game and forest 
protection. Bills are constantly being introduced which, 
aiming to grant exceptional privileges to certain localities, 
create a general feeling of distrust, and seriously inter- 
fere with the enforcement of good measures. 
The careful weighing of the merits or faults of pro- 
posed game legislation by the persons most interested, 
the indorsement of what is deemed desirable, and the op- 
position to what is deemed objectionable, in the main busi- 
ness that comes before our annual meetings, and after 
election of officers for the ensuing year, and one adjourn- 
ment of the said meeting, our Legislative and Law Com- 
mittee keeps careful watch, during the entire session, of 
all proposed legislation affecting the game laws. In order 
that they may be fully discussed at the annual meeting, 
all proposed amendments to the present game laws should, 
if possible, be forwarded to the chairman of the Legisla- 
tive and Law Committee, Mr. Charles H. Mowry, Journal 
Building, Syracuse, N. Y., prior to the first day of De- 
cember, 1901 . 
Applications for membership should be made to the 
secretary, who will gladly give any further information 
which may be desired. 
Robert B, Lawrence, President. 
Ernest G. Gould, Secretary. 
New Hampshire Deer. 
Bristol, N. H., Nov. 23.— Deer hunting- is now the rage 
with our local huntefs, as after a light fall of snow, which 
came the first of the week, they were all out. and good re- 
.sults were shown, deer being brought in from Cardigan 
Mountain, Bridgewater Hills, Tenney Hill, Crosby Moun- 
tain, Kimball Hill and other places, all within a radius 
of ten miles from the post office. S. H. 
An Hefoic Measure, 
Milwaukee, Wis. — I am sending you, under separate 
cover, copy of Milwaukee Sentinel, showing the casualties 
in the State of Wisconsin for the hunting season. Query : 
As it is impracticable to kill off all the fools that go 
shooting, would it not be better to externi'nate the deer 
than tQ ^Uow sygh d, Iq9§ Qi ^ 
Protective Matters in Chicago. 
The New State Game Commissioner, Mr. A. J. Love- 
joy, is not saying much these days, but is splitting a heap 
of wood all the same. He has appointed more than 400 
deputy wardens all over the State, and has what is prob- 
ably the largest force of deputies ever enlisted in the 
work of protection in the State of Illinois. He has col- 
lected a lot of license money and raised the biggest pro- 
tective fund ever yet known in this State. He has also 
made more seizures of game in the city of Chicago than 
were made last year, and seems to be lucky in getting ad- 
vance notices of illegal game shipments. Mr. Lovejoy is 
a man of good balance and judgment, and is making a 
cracking good executive officer. All the game dealers re- 
port that game is scarcer this year than it ever was in the 
history of Chicago. Partridges this week brought $10 a 
dozen, prairie chickens $9 a dozen, venison 30 cents a 
pound. Ducks are the only sort of game which bring 
moderate prices. Quail are reported in good demand. 
The wardens here meet the same devices which are em- 
ployed at St. Paul for the evasion of the game laws. The 
latest scheme is to ship quail in butter crocks, with a 
layer of about 3 inches of butter on top of the birds. One 
such seizure as that was made here in Chicago not long 
ago. 
Mr. M. R. Bortree has been appointed Special Deputy 
U. S. Marshall for the District of Northern Illinois, and 
also Congressional Warden for the Seventh District of 
Illinois. Mr. Bortree will have autliority to make seizures 
of game shipped contrary to the requirements of the Lacey 
Act. The reputation of this gentleman in protective work 
is too well known to require comment in these columns. 
On the whole, the outlook for an air-tight market here is 
better than it ever was. 
As to the amount of game left alive in the fields, 
opinions differ. The men of New Boston, on the Missis- 
sippi River, say that last spring there were as many ducks 
as they had seen for twenty j-ears. That may all be for 
one locality, and yet there may not be all together one- 
half the number of ducks alive that there were ten years 
ago. There would seem to be more hope eventually for 
the upland game than for the wildfowl. In parts of Wis- 
consin game is more abundant than it was three or four 
years ago. For instance, at Post Lake, where there is a 
little shooting club, there is now no market-hunting; and 
the partridges are quite abundant. The partridges (ruffed 
grouse) were nearly shot out in that locality. In South 
Dakota this fall the game supply seemed to be picking 
up. In Illinois the quail supply is not cut down seriously. 
Upon the whole the upland game of this group of Western 
States seems to have a very good chance of survival. The 
probabilities are that the trend will be toward increased 
strictness in the game laws and a greater respect for the 
laws as the days go by. The first stages of the battle for 
the protection of Western game have been won. 
Pretty Good Fine. 
As instancing the occasional seriousness with which the 
game laws are accepted in the courts of this State, one 
might cite the case which was brought before a certain 
Illinois justice of the peace of one of the lower counties 
this fall. A man was convicted of having 100 quail in his 
possession, and the justice promptly fined him $4,000. 
The man said he thought that was a little high, and the 
justice finally let him off with an imprisonment of fifteen 
days in the jail. The J. P. seemed to think, on second 
thought, that it would be just as well to restore this 
offender to his family as to keep him in durance for the 
rest of his natural life. This is not such a bad sort of an 
enforcement of the laws, when you come to reflect that 
quail are not protected under the' statutes of this State. 
Where the Forest Went. 
On the morning of Nov. ig, at Marinette, Wis., the 
Menominee River Lumber Co. sawed its last log and quit 
the lumbering business. A mill was located on the pres- 
ent site of _the_ company so lopg ago as 1851, Jesse Spauld- 
ing, of this city, being interested in the enterprise from 
that time to this. This mill has been burned down two or 
three times, but replaced. It has cut over one billion feet 
of lumber from 150,000 acres of land, this lumber being 
valued at over $15,000,000. This mill is one of many. 
Presently we shall hear of yet others going out of busi- 
ness. The great pine forests of Michigan, Wisconsin and 
Minnesota are being wiped out with greater rapidity than 
the average man realizes. 
Davy Crockett's Powder. 
Having occasion this week to do a little readinjr about 
that pioneer Western hunter, Darvy Crockett, I ran across 
one of his political speeche? iti which he- remarked re- 
»-ardins: ' cr - Mr. P. B. Barbotff, 'Til be 
blamed li .■ ain't quicker than IDupont s 
treble." I wonder it he unauL the ild Duponc treble FG 
which a good many of us knew in our boyhood days? 
Reading further, I discovered that when Crockett was 
on his trip to the North in 1834 he was asked by "Mr. Du- 
pont, the powder manufacturer," if he would accept a few 
canisters of pawder. Davy said he woidd, and he was 
later the recipient of a dozen canisters of powder, as his- 
tory goes on to state. 
Old Time Rifle Man. 
By the way, speaking of old-timers and old-time rifle- 
men, one just receives the following letter from Mr. G. 
W. Cunningham, of Portland, Ind. "I send you a local 
paper containing a sketch regarding my worthy sire, who 
followed west in the wake of General Wayne's victories. 
He was one of the finest rifle shots in the country, and to- 
day is not bad when at the business end of a gun." The 
portrait of Isaac Cimningham above referred to, is that 
of a hale and hearty man now past eighty years of age. 
He followed the front across the Ohio, over the line and 
into Indiana, and saw the days of turkeys, deer and 
Indians. In those days they used to train up rifle 
shooters. I don't think that any of us repeating-rifle, 
blaze-away, hit-or-miss sort of shooters are worthy to 
be called rifle shots as compared to some of the handlers 
of the old-time muz;?leloaders. 
Five years ago Mr. Geo. G. Cantwell, a young taxi- 
dermist whose push and capabilities are well known at the 
Smithsonian Institution, started for the Klondike with his 
rifle and camera, after having spent some two or three 
yc:ars in field work along the coast of southeastern Alaska, 
with headquarters at Howkan. The result of his efforts 
in the higher latitudes involved a deal of hardship from 
exposure, and a modicum of danger, and are now pre- 
sented to the public with most vivid and impressive force 
through the medium of a "Klondike S»uvenir" of 300 
half-tones, put into attractive form by San Francisco 
artists and pressmen, and far surpassing any emanations 
in this direction from tliat sub-Arctic region. The illus- 
trations not only cover the summer and winter aspects 
of every phase of social and industrial life with its natural 
environment and meteorological adjuncts, but present in 
consecutive orders the coming and going of the gold 
seekers and their camp followers and parasites, their min- 
ing methods, the vicissitudes of the old-timers and the 
comforts of the new, the phenomena of the weather, the 
amusements of the people in the long winter nights, the 
life of the soldiers, the wonderful evolution of Dawson, 
the mountain and river scenery, the aborigines in native 
costumes, the camps of the hunters and the game of the 
country with methods of chase. Sun dogs, parhelia, the 
aurora borealis, moonlight, and even the bones of the 
mastodon are faithfully shown. As a whole, the matter 
presented is an astonishing revelation, even to men who 
have read much of this region. 
No one could have dreamed five years ago of the won- 
derful introduction and spread of civilization and its ap- 
pliances into such a remote and inhospitabl.e country. All 
the frosty rigors of that zone have been mitigated or coun- 
teracted, so that life and existence is 'as tolerable there 
as in most other places. The gloom of interminable win- 
ter has been dispelled by electric light and social functions 
— pianos, bicycles, dress suits, department stores and 
even pleasure craft are no more novelties. The transfor- 
mation is tmsurpassed in the tales of the Arabian Nights. 
Now, as to that particular section of Cantwell's 
"Souvenir" which comes within the scope and embrace 
of Forest and Stream, we find realistic pictures of the 
big-horn sheep and its pursuers in almost inaccessible 
haunts among the high mountains; the abundance of 
trophies demonstrating the courage, tact, skill and per- 
severance which is indispensable to success. Once it was 
disputed that this animal existed in Alaska. It was said 
to be confounded with the mountain goat which makes a 
large portion. of the coast range its habitat. The camera, 
however, is truthful. One specimen, shown in the picture 
of the hunter's camp, represents dead sheep standing 
erect, the intense cold having frozen it stiff in that posi- 
tion. In the half-tone which illustrates a caribou hunt is 
the snowslroe. pattern, which is different from any on 
view at the National Museum. Another pattern of shoe 
is shown in the photo of the dying moose taken some 
dozen years ago by Hartmann and ■ Weinland, the 
Moravian missionaries. Cantwell's sketch of a moose 
country is very graphic, and tells its own storj--. The- 
bunch of ptarmigan on the rock side above timberline is 
a great triumph of art and perseverance in climbing moun- 
tain heights, and recalls our Admiral Beardslee's descrip- 
tions of Alaska hunting scenes published in the early vol- 
umes of Forest and Stream some twenty-five years ago. 
Bears, however, seem not to have engaged the camera's 
attention. Charles Hallock. 
Sowing Wild Rice. 
Port Hope, Ont., Nov. iS.— Editor Forest and Stream: 
I see in your issue of Oct. 19 that you would like to have 
full directions for planting wild rice. I buy the rice from 
the Indians, as they gather it in their canoes. They fetch 
it to me every evening. I spread it on the floors of my 
drying house (no fire in the house), and my man turns 
it four times a day for nearly three weeks, until it is per- 
fectly dry. I then put it through a flouring mill and 
take out all dirt and chaff and then I pack it in barrels. 
Directions for Planting. 
Put the rice in coarse linen bags. Sink the bags in 
water over night before sowing, and let the rice soak un- 
till morning. The husks are dry, but after being soaked 
the rice will sink at once to the bottom into the mud. 
Take the rice out of the bags and scatter it on the water. 
Sow in water from 6 inches to 6 feet deep with soft mud 
bottom, or low marshy places where it is covered with 
water the year round. If sowed in lake, sow in the bay. 
Drowned lands make a good place when there is water the 
year round. All the drowned lands round Rice Lake are 
ftill of rice. Once get it growing and it will crowd out all 
other weeds. 
The best time to sow the rice is ju.st before the water 
fret'^es and the diving ducks have gone south, such as 
redheads, bluebills, canvasbacks and whistlers. They are 
'stire to^ad it, and will pick every seed from the bottom 
if & -mail quantity is planted, and is planted in October 
or fore part of November. 
I received a letter from a man fifty miles north of here 
last year to send him a barrel. I sent it to him in 
October and gave him directions for sowing. I warned 
him about i.he ducks finding it. I received a letter from 
him this fall saying he had a fine bed of rice and a big 
crop, but he had had hard work to save it. The ducks 
found it. He went to the place where he had sowed it 
the next day and he said there were several hundred 
ducks on the bed diving for all they were worth. He 
and his son had to be there all the time. He Icilled a 
good many, and finally drove them away. 
The great trouble with parties getting rice is that they 
have some persons sow it, hired help, who don't cafe how 
thew sow it, on gravel beds or in 10 to 15 feet of water. I 
sowed two barrels in a pond hole three miles from here 
fifteen years ago. The pond is about 400 yards long and 
150 yards wide. I sowed it the 20th of November, and the 
pond hole froze up that night. It is about four feet deep. 
The next spring the rice all came up. It seeds itself every 
fall, and comes up in spring. Last report it was a big 
crop of rice. 
I have given about all I know about planting rice. If 
parties who get rice will follow these directions they will 
Jim no trowbJf in rearing gop(3 ergps. 
Chas, GiLeHR;sT. 
