May 23, 1903.3 
F5FlESt AND STREAM. 
46a 
methods, but folmd the latter most successful, as I was 
either too late or too soon with the net, much to the 
amusement of the natives. 
On Saunders Island the method of bird catching is 
not quite the same, as the bitds dnd condltiohs ai-e diffel;- 
ent. The net is used, liowever, to advantage. At thk 
rookery Brunnich's murre (Uria lomvid) is the jDfiricipal 
species taken, although when a Vefy lafgfe stlpply of birds 
3s needed, kittiwake gulls {Rissa tridact^la) are also 
hunted. The rookery is on a perpendicular cliff, rising 
from the water to a height of several hundred feet, the 
birds occupying a space about half a mile in length, and 
from a few feet above high tide to the very top, and 
every projection of rock is covered with birds, so that 
standing room appears to be at a premium. Hunting 
at this rookery is little short of murder, for the stupid 
ibirds can be clubbed from their insecure perches or netted 
Iby the hundreds. Approaching the cliff in his kayak, the 
Ihunler gently presses his net against bird after bird that 
tin its struggles to escape thrusts its head into the meshes 
fOf the net which entraps it. Each bird is quickly drawn 
fio the hunter and dispatched, those remaining not being 
rut all disturbed, and the space made vacant by one is 
iimmediately occupied by another. When the sea is smooth 
i'.he aaatives often climb upon the ledges of rock and club 
;ilie iiiutrres, hundreds being killed in this way in a very 
tshovk time. The hunters frequently meet with accidents 
.•at this rookery, for the perpendicular cliff and a heavy 
iswelJ jitaake "kayaking" dangerous. 
Puffin-s {F rater cula arctica glacidlis) and eider ducks 
(iSomalisria ■mollissima horealis and S. spectabilis) are 
imuch priced by the natives, and are killed by spearing 
ifrom the kayak. The spear is simply a sharpened rod of 
iiron set into the end of a light shaft. At fifteen or twenty 
yards the htmter seldom misses his mark. Ptarmigans 
\{Lagopus lagopus) are also taken, but in very limited 
snumbers, as they are not common. Dovekie and murre 
:3kins are used throughout the tribe for making clothing, 
:and hundreds of them are preserved each year for this 
jpurpose. In removing the skin, the wings are cut off 
mear the body, and the skins are cut loose at the base of 
!thc neck and stripped over the body. The Eskimo's sim- 
iple, but effective, method for removing all fat and making 
ithe skins soft and pliable, is to give them a thorough 
chewing. 
It would be impossible to estimate the number of birds 
taken by this tribe each year, even when other game is 
plentiful, but it must be enormous. Still, the birds do 
not appear to be on the decrease, for the outer edges of 
the rookery have a new appearafice that leads me to 
believe the breeding area is being extended. A few years 
ago an epidemic caused the death of a large percentage 
of the Eskimos, and as the food demand was consequently 
less, the extension of the rookery may have resulted. 
This, of course, is merely a conjecture, but it seems 
plausible. 
From an economic standpoint the birds of this cheer- 
less Arctic region are in the superlative degree a necessity 
to the Eskimo, and without them they would long since 
have perished by famine. That the natives can never ex- 
terminate the birds seems assured, for the greater portion 
of them are inaccessible; and if the great herds of seals 
•.and walruses become extinct, and even the natives them- 
j selves cease to exist, the birds will probbaly still con- 
tinue to rear their young among these desolate and rocky 
Fsurroundings. 
Food Flavots, 
^.Nmf York, May 14. — Editor Forest and Stream: You 
mo idc*tf!/jt recall an editorial published in Forest and 
S(rHEA\)is ;a year or two ago bearing on the flavor given to 
rthe .edibk products of various animals by the food which 
itilaey .eat. ' This editorial drew out several letters from 
carrespondejats confirming the position which it took, and 
m lEiay mind w^-s very interesting. 
I ftiave just ikeen reading a paper printed in the Pro- 
ceediiag-s of the X-innsean Society on the Mammals of 
Westchester .county, .by Mr. John Rowley, and quote from 
it a tew words of testimony on the subject of the edi- 
torial just refenred Ao. in his notes on the muskrat, Mr. 
Rowley says: 
"The name 'muskrat' ii-s obviously applied to the animal 
because of the muskj oil which the glands secrete; and 
this secretion so strongly permeates the entire anatomy 
that a piece of flesh cut from any part of the body will 
be found to savor strongly- of this esserttial oil. The 
) flesh is eaten by some people, but unless very much dis- 
• guised in the cooking, the musky flavor is so strong as 
i to be extremely disagreeable. I am informed that a 
' 'professional' muskrat trapper who fed his fowls dnring 
I'the winter largely upon the carcasses of muskrats, tlje 
• (following spring found that the eggs were so strongly 
iimpregnated with the musk as to be unmarketable," 
Sage. 
A Mysterious Bird Mortality. 
Clarksoale, Miss., May 8. — Editor Forest and Stream: 
A very curious and apparently inexplicable visitation 
of mortality has recently been inflicted upon many 
birds in this locality. On the morning of May 6 it 
was the oom-mon talk of the town of Clarksdale that 
the streets and yards were strewn with numerous dead 
birds, as well as the roads in the immediate vicinity 
of the town. So far as could be learned by limited 
inquiry this strange phenomenon did not extend far 
outside of Clarksdale as a focus. I regret that I was 
so occupied indoors at the time that but little atten- 
tion could be given by me to the subject. The mor- 
tality was mainly cotifined to one day, or night, but 
some additional dead birds were found on the follow- 
ing day. 
As well as could be learned by inquiry this mortality 
embraced all the common varieties of birds that come 
iiere in the spring and remain during the breeding 
.season. Only two of these dead birds came under my 
own observation, one of which, by reference, to Audu- 
bon's work, was identified as a vireo; the other was of 
the size and general appearance of the sparrow family, 
except that the bill was too slender. One gentleman 
said that among eleven birds picked up by him in his 
yard there were seven different species, one of which, 
Jrora his description, was an indigo bunting. It does 
not appear that any of the abundant English sparrows 
were aniong the victims. My information is that none 
of the dead birds showed marks of violence on their 
bodies. 
I have hfeard no plausible theory offered to account 
for this extraordinary occurrence, and have nohe to 
offer itiysfelf. Can any cif the readers 6i FOrest ai^td 
STiiEAivt sug^fest a solutidh df thte casfe? 
CdAiidMA. 
— ❖ — 
Proprietors of shooting resorts will find it profitable to advertise 
them in Foust and Stxxau. 
Saskatchewan and the Rocky Mts. 
For many years after the California and Oregon trail 
had been opened, and regular journeyings by wagon train 
were taking place between the Missouri River and the 
Pacific Slope, the far Northwest was still an unknown 
country. Its trade was a monopoly of the Piudson's Bay 
Company, and few people penetrated it, except the em- 
ployes of that great corporation, and the occasional free 
trappers who crossed it. Except for the trading posts 
dotted here and there over the vast region, its only in- 
hj;bitants were the Indians and the so-called Red River 
half breeds, who in many qualities of mind and body, and 
in many of their ways of life closely resembled the 
Indians. 
Among the interesting out-of-print books on this terri- 
tory, is one entitled, "Saskatchewan and the Rocky 
Mountains," a diary and narrative of travel, sport, 
and_ adventure during a journey through the Hud- 
son's Bay Company's Territories in 1859 and 
i860, by the Earl of Southesk, formerly. Sir James 
Carnegie, a Scottish nobleman, veiy much devoted 
to sport, absolutely ignorant of America, and of course 
of the West, but eager to travel and to find good shooting, 
as well as to recruit his health by an active open-air life 
in a healthy climate. To him in the year 1858 a friend 
recommended the Hudson's Bay country, and, as it hap- 
pened, this friend exercised a very powerful influence 
in the councils of the great company that dominated those 
enormous territories in British North America. Said the 
friend : "The country is full of large game, such as buffalo, 
bears and deer. The climate is exactly what you require." 
As a result of this conversation, in the spring of 1859, 
Sir James Carnegie sailed from England for New York, 
and early in May joined Sir George Simpson, then Gov- 
ernor of the Hudson's Bay Company, and proceeded 
westward with him to Saint Anthony, Minnesota, where 
he met James McKay, a Scotch Iialf breed and an em- 
ploye of the company, whose brother was to be his guide 
during his journey. 
The party traveled westward, meeting various adven- 
tures, and at last reached Fort Garry, now Winnipeg. 
The Indians whom they constantly met, the birds and 
the mammals, the methods of travel, now wallowing 
through marshes and again ferrying across flooded 
streams, were all strange to the Scotchman, who never- 
theless bore himself well under these new conditions. At 
Fort Garry he purchased his supplies and hired his men, 
and with considerable outfit, including one wagon and 
seven Red River carts, the expedition started for Fort 
El lice. 
These, of course, were the days of muzzleloading arms. 
The men carried smoothbores, running from the ordinary 
Hudson's Bay fuke up to excellent heavy double guns, 
which carried a bullet accurately for 100 yards or more. 
The leader of the expedition, besides a smoothbore, had 
a pair of double-barrel Purdey rifles. 
They had not been long gone from Fort Garry when 
they met with a large camp of Red River half-breeds, 
who were now just starting on their annual tinnmer buf- 
falo hunt. With some of the characteristics of these 
people the author was disgusted, yet he was much inter- 
ested _ in their appearance, as shown by the following 
description : 
"Fervently as I wished them away, it cheered one's 
spirits to see the hunters on their march. There was in- 
finite picturesqueness about them. Their long muring 
columns sparkled with life and gaiety. Cart-tilts of evt-ry 
hue flashed brightly in the sun, hosts of wild wolfish do^s 
ran in and out among the vehicles, troops of loose 
horses pranced and galloped alongside. The smartly- 
dressed men were riding their showiest steeds, their wives 
aiid daughters were traveling in the carts, enthroned on 
high heaps of baggage. Many of the women were clearly 
of unmingled Indian blood. Tall and angular, long 
masses of straight black hair fell over their backs; blue 
and white cotton gowns, shapeless, stayless, uncrinolined, 
displayed the flatness of their projecting figures. Some 
wore a gaudy handkerchief on the head, the married 
bound one also across the bosom, 
"In M. B.'s first cart there sat a singularly handsome 
girl, a dark-complexioned maiden of the mixed French 
descent. As with so many of her race, her countenance 
bore a half-shy, half-disdainful expression; she looked 
like one who would be amiable to few, ill-tempered to 
most, but true to the death to her husband or her lover. 
"The hunters were all in their summer clothing, wear- 
ing the usual brass-buttoned blue capot, with moleskin 
trousers and calico shirts. Wide-awakes, or cloth caps 
with peaks, were the favorite head-coverings. Gaily-em- 
broidered saddle cloths and belts were evidently preferred 
to those of a less showy appearance; red, white and blue 
beading, on a black cloth ground, seemed to form the 
most general arrangement. 
"Mr. R., _ who accompanied us part of tha way and 
slept that night at my camp, rode beside me on his well- 
bred old white horse adorned with red and black trap- 
pings. He himself wore the dark blue capot, a black 
cap, and black moleskin trousers and moccasins, and to 
English notions looked a most unsportsmanlike figure, 
but, like all the rest, he rode gracefully and well. 
"They sit very upright, with the leg nearly straight up 
and down. Their saddles are exceedingly small, either 
mere Indian pads, or narrow Spanish frames, high before 
and behind, with a long peak to the front. Over such a 
frame they stfap a blanket, and sometimes also place 
another beneath, but nothing can keep these ill-contrived 
saddles from galling the horses' backs." 
At Fort Ellice tlie party reached the border of the 
buffalo country. Here they feasted on fresh tongues, 
carts came in from the plains bringing fresh hides, and 
also four calves to. be added to the tame buffalo already 
grazing about the fort. Here another man named Pierre 
Numme was hired. Journeying on toward Fort 
Qu'appelle, they began to meet antelope, or, as they were 
there called, cabfee, of which a good number were killed. 
At this place there were some Ojibway Indians ,but they 
were now in the country of the Crees, both of the woods 
and of the plains. Also, they were near enough to the 
Blackfeet and the Assinaboines to feel some doubts as to 
how these people might receive them. 
It was July 4 when they left Qu'appelle fort, and only 
a little later they began to see buffalo — at first a few scat- 
tering bulls. They were now in a sandhill country, of 
wdiich the author says: "These hills, covering a con- 
siderable tract, are about 200 feet high, and are entirely 
composed of sand aS fine as that of the sea shores. Near 
them the grass grows short and scantily, much as on some 
of the 'links' along the Scottish coast. The Crees fancy 
that the souls of good men enter into a paradise concealed 
amidst these arid ridges." It will be remembered that the 
Blackfeet Indians locate the home of the dead in a sand- 
hill country not far from this. Now Ihey began to see 
bulls and to be seized with the lust of killing that seems 
to attack all men when such temptation approaches them. 
"As I returned from the second rhase I perceived 
McKay and Numrae driving a large buffalo before them, 
which on my nearer approach I found to be an old bull, 
very thin and sickly and hardly able to move. It was a 
mercy tQ save him from the cruelty of the wolves ; so, as 
he had to die, I i-ode past him on Black and gave him a 
shot for practice sake— a buffalo's strange form making 
hnn a puzzling mark for a beginner— but I placed it too 
high, as one is always apt to do, and it merely dropped 
him on his knees without depriving him of life. I then 
dismounted, and, walking close up to him, fired both bar- 
rels of my gun fight at the center of his forehead. There 
was no result, no more than if a clod of earth had struck 
him; the bull continued in the same position, glaring at 
me with savage eyes ; the densely matted hair on his thick 
skull had completely defied the penetrative force of a 
smoothbore. McKay then gave me my Purdey rifle. At 
the very first shot the conical bullet passed clean through 
hair and bone, and the huge buffalo rolled over, dead. 
"Soon afterwards we saw another bull feeding about, 
a good distance away on the prairie. I mounted the 
Btchon, M'Kay took his favorite Wawpooss, and we set 
out, using every depression in the ground to conceal our- 
selves from view. The bull, however, quickly observed 
us, and made off at a remarkably fast pace, with a long 
start in his favor besides. After some miles' galloping we. 
began to near him. McKay was leading, though not by 
much, and when signs of the finish appeared, he drew rein 
and let me pass on. 
"The bull was still running, but in evident distress. 
Suddenly he stopped short in a small hollow, turned 
round and faced me. Bichon was rather blown, and as I 
checked him at the edge of the hollow he made a great 
stumble, as nearly as possible falHng on his head— in 
v\ hich case I should have landed directly on the horns of 
the buffalo. Happily my pony recovered himself in time, 
and the bull remaining at bay about ten yards from me, 
I dropped him with a bullet in the shoulder, and finished 
wuh another m the brain. Like many of the males at that 
season this fine, well grown bull was exceedingly scant of 
flesh, so we left his carcass and merely brought in the 
tongue. Even that w&s tough eating, though far from 
being rank or ill flavored." 
Buffalo were abundant, and there was much hunting. 
Cows were killed for food and especially fine bulls with 
perfect horns and long manes and beard for heads to be 
taken back to the old country. There is much that is curious 
and mterestmg in the various accounts, and the author 
contmually mentions that his balls struck the buffalo high, 
the old-time common blunder made by the novice. It was 
now mid July, a season when, as was formerly well 
known, the buffalo bulls were quite as likely to fight as 
t^hey were to run, and two or three times a group of bulls 
dechned to move oft' when approached by the author, who 
usually left them to themselves. He mentions also about 
this time seeing a peculiar looking skull with slight much 
curved horns— that of the buffalo ox. Later he saw one 
o^f these animals, but was unable to overtake it. At the 
Bad Hill a couple of bears were seen and shot at, but the 
wouudid animal got hiio the brush and no one dared to 
follow it. '1 he next day it was found dead. ' 
Carlton House and J'urt Edinonton'^ were the next 
points reached. Mr. Hardisty was in command at the first 
of these forts, aitd as usual he gave every assistance to the 
traveler. At l<<?vt Edmonton was met Mr. Woolsey a 
rnissionary, who gave the author much information about 
the country and the Indians, and especially about that 
great Blackfoot Pi-tah-pi-kiss (Eagle Ribs), figured by 
Cathn and still remembered by old men in the northwest 
Shortly after leaving Edmonton the author encountered 
Mr. Moberly, of the Hudson's Bay service, a gentleman 
who formerly was a correspondent of Forest and Stream, 
and just before leaving Edmonton he had hired as a guide 
oyer the new country into which he was to pass, Piskun 
Monroe, a Scotch half-breed, whom it was important to 
engage as interpreter, for he not only knew the Blackfoor 
language, but was on intimate terras with the tribe bein«- 
closely connected with it by blood." This man, old John 
Monroe, is still living on the Blackfoot reservation in 
northwestern Montana, hale and hearty at an age between 
75 and 80 years; 
They were now traveling through the swamps and the 
timber, by roads that were difficult enough but they at 
last came within sight of the great mountains, and his 
n^lJ'^'^^ stupendous peaks repaid the leader for 
all the sufferings and difficulties of earlier days 
With the mountains came a new fauna. There was 
fishing and there were marmots, porcupines, wild sheep 
and white goats. Iheir first efforts at hunting these an£ 
mals were not very successful, but they got much practice 
in climbing. A httle later sheep were met with so 
abundant and tame that numbers were killed on a sinele 
hunt. And whUe at first most of the animals killed were 
