Forest and Stream. 
' A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 
Copyright, 1902, by Forest and Stream Publishing Co. 
rERMs, $4 a Year. 10 Cts. a Copy. \_ 
Six Months, $2. ) 
NEW YORK, SATURDAY, MAY 31, 1902 
( VOL. LVIII.— No. 22. 
\ No. 346 Broadway, New York 
RIVER POLLUTION. 
The Bogota Boat Club, of East Hackensack, N. J., has 
applied for an injunction to restrain the Hackensack Gas 
and Electric Company from depositing coal tar, refuse and 
gas drips in the Hackensack River. The club charges 
that because of the pollution coming from the. company's 
plant the boats of the club are damaged and that bathing 
in the river is rendered impossible. 
An Iowa correspondent, whose letter is given in another 
column, relates that because of a dam maintained at 
Bonaparte, fish are cut off from ascending the Des Moines 
River, and legal actions have so far proved powerless to 
compel the removal of the obstruction. 
In the Saginaw River and its tributaries in Michigan 
is seen each autumn a great destruction of fish caused by 
the large sugar factories on these streams, which use large 
quantities of lime, and drain the refuse into the rivers. 
The sugar-making season is in the autumn, when the 
fish are running up to their spawning beds. Another 
annual destruction takes place in the spring. Here is a 
picture given by the Saginaw Courier-Herald in March 
of this year : 
The people who live along Cass River are up in arms over the 
great quantities of dead fish found in the stream. The ice is 
breaking up, and tons of dead fish of all kinds are found in the 
stream, some weighing as much as five to seven pounds. The 
people of Bridgeport, Frankenmuth and Vassar, and farmers living 
near the stream, are bitterly complaining of the matter, as the 
decaying fish are regarded as a menace to public health, to say 
nothing of the depopulation of the stream of its food supplies, 
upon which many depend to a considerable extent. Steps are 
being taken to have a petition circulated and signed and forwarded 
to the Governor, asking the State authorities to take the necessary- 
steps to abate the evil complained of. It is asserted that no such 
conditions existed prior to the establishment of the sugar factory 
at Caro, and 'the general belief is that the refuse or chemicals from 
that factory deposited in the stream is the cause of the mortality 
among the fish. 
"The Forest and Stream should add to its Platform 
Plank," writes an Ohio correspondent, "another one 
✓demanding that our rivers shall not be polluted by the 
casting of refuse into them. I have frequently seen the 
banks of the Great Miami lined with dead fish that had 
been killed by the paper mills of West Carrollton,. Miamis- 
burg and Dayton." 
And so the list might be extended indefinitely. The 
story is the same everywhere. Individuals and corpora- 
tions have ruined the rivers, and outraged the rights of 
the people; arid because we began wrong and permitted 
these outrages in the early days, we appear to want the , 
spirit or the courage or determination to find and apply 
the remedy and win back for the public use and enjoy- 
ment the waters which of right belong to the public. 
LONG-RANGE RIFLE SHOOTING. 
The reawakening and broadening of practical interest 
in long-range rifle shooting in the United States, fol- 
lowing closely upon the defeat of the national teams at 
Sea Girt last year, has every sign of permanency. Agita- 
tion on the subject of the defeat resulted in influential 
and powerful organization, which in turn resulted in in- 
telligent and successful action in the attempt to retrieve 
the lost laurels. 
Last week at Rutherford, N. J., at the new range 
specially equipped in all particulars for long-range prac- 
tice, there was a large attendance of long-range riflemen 
who practiced industriously from midday till evening. 
This is but one day of many like ones in the future. 
All this shows a well-sustained purpose toward repair- 
ing America's recently impaired prestige in respect to skill 
with the rifle at the long ranges, and also augurs well 
for a possible return of the lost trophies to the former ■ 
holders, the riflemen of the United States. 
Having thus infused more energy, singleness of pur- 
pose, and inaugurated an era of practical effort through- 
out the entire class of United States long-range rifle- 
men, in the common purpose to regain the ascendancy 
cnce held, but now lost, the defeat of last year may have 
been after all a blessing in disguise. Prior to that defeat 
there was an inaction in long-range competition which 
could not result otherwise than in a lower grade of skill, 
a narrower field of action, fewer devotees and a conse- 
quent loss of public appreciation and interest. 
For the good of the long-range riflemen there was 
needed a stimulation which would be so profound as to be 
permanent. Nothing in this respect could have served the 
purpose better than a defeat under such abathetic condi- 
f s ■ - " 
tions, though personal and national pride in matters of 
sport were thereby wounded ever so deeply. 
For a number of years after the strenuous debate at 
arms between the States, the riflemen of America were 
not excelled in skill by any other people, even if it be con- 
ceded that in that period they had any equals. They had 
vanquished the best riflemen of the world. Nor was their 
skill afield any less eminent. As big-game hunters they 
had a reputation good and world wide. 
But the wars ended, the buffalo disappeared, the elk, 
deer and other big game grew scarcer in some sections 
and was exterminated in others; the best riflemen of the 
world had been defeated, so there were no more worlds 
to conquer. Inaction brought decline. Rifles were at 
rest for long-distance work. They are again in action. 
While there has been a thinning in the ranks of the 
long-range devotees, there is no doubt but what there is 
now available the material necessary for a recruiting of 
their ranks. In the United States rifles and ammunition 
are made as perfect as any in the world; therein also are 
men as keen of eye, as steady of nerve and as steadfast 
of purpose as are any men in the world. They should 
recover the lost trophies. 
There was needed the something to set the machinery 
of the long-range sport in motion. The last defeat did 
that. Practice and discipline will so perfect the abilities 
of the riflemen that the opposition may expect to meet a 
much more difficult struggle this year than last for pos- 
session of the coveted trophies. Ho.wever, let it all come 
as it may, all true sportsmen will hope that the best men 
may win, but it should ever be kept in mind that the best 
men in the competition are those who can show the best 
results therein. 
This sport, while of great and beneficial interest in it- 
self, has further contributed greatly to the improvement 
ill both rifles and ammunition. Nearly every rifleman is 
more than a mere shooter. He is a student. He is ever 
experimenting with new departures or testing the sound- 
ness of old ideas. He is constantly striving to under- 
stand the why and wherefore, and to readjust according 
to requirements. 
As a useful training, long-range shooting is a sport of 
the best; as a defense in time "of war, the effectiveness of 
long-range shooting by skilled marksmen has been a sad 
object lesson for some months in South Africa. It there- 
fore has its uses in peace or war. Revive it.' 
We confess to a constant and growing admiration for 
the combination of intellects evolving the annual changes 
in that section of the New York game law which has 
to do with the protection of birds other than game. It 
will be remembered that by reason of a bungle in the 
wording of the law the courts held that the Arctic Freezer 
cold storage people could not be punished for having in 
possession great stores of song birds. Another peculiar 
feature of the law, as pointed out in these columns, was 
that under a literal interpretation of the text, no one 
could lawfully kill a game bird without having been 
authorized to do so under a naturalist's permit. The sec- 
tion was twice amended in the last session, and the read- 
ing which necessitates a certificate for killing game birds 
has been retained., The text runs: "Birds for which 
there is no open season and wild birds other than the 
English sparrow, crow, hawk, crow blackbird, snow owl 
and great-horned owl, shall not be taken or possessed at 
any time, dead or alive, except under the authority of 
a certificate issued under this act." The term "wild 
birds" of course includes game birds, and game birds 
therefore come within the prohibition. In practice this 
application of the law will not be enforced. The game 
protectors will interpret the term "wild birds" to mean 
birds other than game species, and will construe the in- 
tent of the statute to be something else than wh&t it liter- 
ally is. But we trust that the tinkers of Section 33 will 
try again next year; it should be possible in the good 
State of New York to discover some pen able to write a 
simple section, which will protect the species whose pro- 
tection is desired without at the same time affecting game 
birds. 
The people of New York city have just been awakened 
to a danger which threatens their Central Park. Super- 
intendent Parsons declares that under present conditions 
the park is doomed, because of a lack of shil. "In many 
places," he told an Evening Post reporter, "the soil of the 
park is not more than six inches deep, and it is the same 
old lifeless, sandy soil that has covered the rocks since 
the island was discovered. Plant life cannot live long 
in such soil as that. To put a new surface of soil over 
the entire park- and plant and replant it, as should be 
done, would cost something like ^1,500,000; but all this 
work could be done in sections, so that the expenditure 
would not be so burdensome, and the city would not be 
deprived of the use of the entire park while the work was 
being done." Such is the confidence reposed in Mr. Par- 
sons that this statement by him of the park conditions 
will mean the provision of the remedy. Time and again 
demonstration has been made that the Central Park is 
very close to the popular heart, and the city will appro- 
priate all the money needed and will appropriate it gladly 
to preserve it. 
H 
The case of the Blooming Grove Park Association 
members who were indicted last season for attempting 
to carry game out of Pennsylvania has again come before 
the Grand Jury, and new indictments have been found, 
charging them with having killed game illegally and car- 
ried it out of the State in violation of law. The Game 
Commissioners who are the prosecuting parties express 
themselves as perfectly satisfied with the situation. They 
declare that they are now ready in the new case as made 
up to test the merits of the Lacey Act, since they will be 
able to prove beyond a doubt that the game was killed 
out of season and was carried out of the State in viola- 
tion of the non-export law. Further, they express a hope 
that the Blooming Grove members implicated will be 
disposed to lay aside all quibbles and make a fair test of 
the facts and the law. 
t 
That is an extremely interesting and suggestive photo- 
graph of which we give a reproduction elsewhere, show- 
ing the tameness of .the wild ducks which winter at Palm 
Beach, Fla. There is in force there a local law which 
forbids the capture of wildfowl or other game within one 
mile of the corporation of West Palm Beach, and the 
pleasing results are seen in the confidence and tameness 
of many varieties of birds. Even the alligator is given 
immunity, and the bloodthirsty exterminatory peregri- 
nators might perish of ennui. The photograph shows in 
the distance the vast Royal Poinciana Hotel; the wildfowl 
thus are in a locality which in winter has a dense popula- 
tion. 
Our St. Augustine correspondent, Didymus, makes a 
feeling and sensible protest against the destruction of 
turtle eggs on the Florida coast. It is an abuse of long 
standing, and the resulting dearth of turtles is precisely 
what was to have been anticipated as inevitable. Didymus ; 
is right in demanding of the Florida press an attitude 
hostile to the foolish persons who thus are making an 
end of one of the State's important natural resources. In 
this connection it is a pleasure to note the stand taken and 
maintained with intelligence and vigor with respect to fish 
and game protection by the Jacksonville Times-Union and 
Citizen. This journal has taken up the preservation of 
the State resources in forest and stream and its voice is 
always on the right side. In its "warfare upon the turtle 
egg gatherers, the bird destroyers and the spring deer 
killers, it should have the support and co-operation of 
every Florida journal in the coast district. 
New York has extended the scope of its restrictions 
against non-resident anglers and shooters. The law for- 
merly was that non residents who were citizens of States or 
countries which exacted licenses might not fish or shoot 
on interstate waters without taking out a corresponding 
license; as amended the license requirement covers the 
entire State, so that nowhere in New York may a. non- 
resident shoot or fish without a license, provided that he 
hails from a license-exacting State, Pennsylvania or New 
Jersey, for example. 
-M 
The Department of Agriculture, which controls the 
importation of exotic species into the territory of the 
United States, has promulgated an order forbidding the 
introduction of reptiles into the Hawaiian Islands with- 
out a permit, and 'it adds that no permit will be issuor^l 
for the entry of poisonous snakes of any kind. Tb,\|| 
shall the Pacific Eden be protected from its serpent, j 
