FOREST AND STREAM, 
88 
floating over the waving com and undertook to pass us, 
skimming low down over the pasture. We both saw the 
bird at the same time and each determining not to be out- 
done, we jerked up our Parkers together and pulled the 
triggers. I had the exquisite pleasure of seeing the Bar- 
rister's load as it tore through the straggling ragweeds 
behind the old cock, and exceeding exasperation at my 
own, which went off through space three feet above the 
horrified sandpiper. We had both been too previous and 
both scored a miss, and then we laughed, each blaming 
the other, but we knew we had scared the bird half lo 
death from the way he was beating tanbark up the aerial 
way. He had heard the report of our good Ideal shells 
and felt the wind of the whizzing shot, but that was all. 
His gray coat had not had a thread ruffled, and, we stood 
Ihere watching him, as on the wings of his silvery song, 
he disappeared off toward the masses of vapor in the col- 
bring west. 
But there were plenty of birds left and we knew it, 
and to avoid any further provoking contretemps of this 
5ort, we agreed to separate, and as I worked back along 
;he edge of the corn, Bill strode off cat-a-cornered across 
the pasture. 
We had hardly separated when two birds flushed in 
front of the Barrister. They were at a trifle long range, 
but he turned the first one over with nice skill and dusted 
the tops of the rag weeds around the second. He ran to 
retrieve his fallen bird, which proved to be wing-broken, 
md as it led him off through the patches of mullen, rag 
weed and purpling lobelia, he flushed at least a score of 
birds that had been lying in the thin shade out of the heat 
of the sun. All of these birds took to the corn, dropping 
iown here and there and everywhere, scattering, in fact, 
iust right to insure a big killing, and I made it, too. 
When T found Bill an hour later down by the old bars, I 
bad seven plover, all full-grown birds and in fine condi- 
ion. 
But lack-a-day, like all of the good things of life, our 
5port came to as sudden a close as it had begun. The 
jirds simply got up finally and quit the neighborhood. 
hs we stood by the roadside and lamented, we saw once 
iDr twice a streak of drab scudding across the azure of the 
;ky, miles away it seemed, and merge with the clouds, 
while now and then,_ coming from where we could not 
cell, came that mystic, farreaching tinkle, then all was 
juiet, save the insects in the grass by the roadside, the 
:all of the meadowlark and the chuck I chuck ! chuck ! of 
:he crossing blackbirds overhead. 
With feelings of supreme content we piled in the old 
phaeton, took a long pull — on our cigars — and drove 
lome through the glimmer of the gloaming. 
Sandy Griswold. 
A Comedy of Errors. 
It does seem incredible that a man with considerable 
experience in hunting should have made as many mistakes 
in one day as did I. 
But from making three great blunders, I learned three 
great truths : First, that a deer and a pack of hounds 
may go by while one slumbers, so conducive to sleep is 
the atmosphere of the pine woods. Second, that a deer 
is not necessarily dead because some one along his run- 
way has fired a gun. Third, that a deer "tucks" his tail 
if hit and does not "flop" it. How I have fretted and 
worried over the cost of learning those three plain facts 
of the chase ! How I have wished that I could get the 
chance to do it all over again I I would now have the re- 
spect of an old man, who though I may never see him 
again, stands out in my memory of humiliations like 
Mars at perihelion. But, as Artemus Ward said when the 
seventeen Mormon girls asked him to marry them, "It 
cannot was," My dear old hero, Slicker Harris, of 
Clark county, Arkansaw ; If you be yet among the living, 
accept this confession as the final and prayerful unloading 
of a burdened, penitent, and gloriously punished tender- 
foot. You suspected it all then, didn't you ? Ah, I knew 
you did ; but I was younger then and youth knows noth- 
ing of the joy of honest confession. That was in 1893. 
Slicker, and ten years — well ten years is a long time when, 
as in my case, it makes the difference between raven 
locks and those mixed with gray. And then, you will not 
forget, my dear old patient and generous soul, that at the 
start you made too much of me because I was the tender- 
foot and because, too, that I had the Spencer repeating 
shotgun, the like of which you had not seen, and with 
which, as my companions told you, I was able to do 
mighty things. You will not forget all that now after 
these years, and you will, no doubt, be better able with 
Ihe aid of the perspective that time gives, to be charitable. 
Really you may get some enjoyment out of that day's 
occurrences as you view them in the added light of my 
confession, though at the time, and in spite of that air 
of credulity with which you listened to all my explana- 
tions, you must have felt like losing me in the bush. Ah, 
you old rascal ! what a courteous son of the South you 
proved yourself to be! 
Do you remember, of course you do, when your darkey 
put me upon that stand early in the morning? It was a 
"stand" that promised all but a certainty if a deer should 
be started. When your man had gone-;-now Mr. Harris, 
please do not tell anj'one of this — I waited very patiently 
for a long time. It seems that way to me now, though 
I would not testify under oath that it was over half an 
hour, for time does go awful slow under such circum- 
stances. I say I waited patiently for something to turn 
up. But nothing turned. Then I began whiling away the 
time in the good old fashion, _ having a bunch of cigars 
in ray pocket. But, my dear sir, there is nothing so con- 
ducive to the spirit of game preservation in the heart of 
the tenderfoot as the utter loneliness of a vast wood. 
How insignificant does a deej, dead or alive, then seem to 
be! I soon sank into a condition in complete harmony 
with mother nature. Tossing my cigar away I dropped 
upon a seductive bed of leaves at the side of a log — do, 
please, never repeat this — and was soon fast asleep. So 
now you can understand how it was, when you and your 
troop of "boss" came dashing through the wood an hour 
afterward, that I was telling the truth when I responded 
to your excited query why I did not shoot that I had 
seen no deer to shoot at. O, I'll never forget your look 
of disgust ! Nor will I ever forgive myself the folly of 
trying to deceive you. You thought I had gone from the 
stand, didn't you? You did not dream that I had com- 
mitted the unpardonable offense of going to sleep at ray 
post. 
But you, grand old fellow! I learned then most em- 
phatically that it does not take scholastic acquirements 
and fine clothes to make the gentleman. You seemed to 
take no note of my humiliation, though you must have 
guessed it. And vvhile you relieved the strain by renew- 
ing your questioning interest in my repeating shotgun, 
you hardly guessed how great a solace to me were your 
assurances given in that hearty way of yours that you'd 
give me a fine chance before the day was over. 
Then you'll remember, too, the next stand upon which 
you placed me? It was about a mile and a half west of 
the cotton gin. Ah, my dear friend, it was there that I 
determined to redeem myself with you. And "Slicker," 
I did stand for two long hours at my post hardly batting 
an eye, while I listened to the coming and the going of 
the baying of your old dog Boss, and his companions. I 
kept my gaze intently upon the point in the bush what 
wreathed that knoll about where you had told me the 
deer would first come in sight toward me. It would 
have been all right, too, if you had not shot and yelled 
as you were driving the deer toward me. Really, it seems 
to me you should have known that the shot might have 
the effect of misleading me. You remember that the deer 
astonished you by turning to the north and away from 
his usual course just immediately after you had shot and 
hallooed? Well — I'm ashamed to tell it, but here goes — 
the fact is that thinking you had killed the deer, I left 
my stand at a dead run right down through the bush 
toward you. The deer found it out, though you did not. 
The ways and customs of the game which you had learned 
from fifty years of hunting were all changed and broken 
that day, weren't they? No doubt if I had stood my 
ground I would have gotten a good shot at that deer. But 
how wa.s I to know? You had not told me when you 
found him coming directly into my net that you would 
fire your gun that I might be notified. 
I remember most vividly your disappointment mixed 
with something of chagrin, but you will never be able 
to realize how heavy was my heart. Two magnificent 
opportunities missed! And just to think of it! Oppor- 
tunities that I had been praying for years that I might 
have ! 
I thought it was all "off" then. I fully expected you 
to abandon all effort to make a kill. But the day was but 
partly spent, and like the true, big-hearted, generous, 
courtly and most hospitable gentleman that you were, you 
were gladly giving the day to the enjoyment of our com- 
pany. 
I recall with a feeling not unmixed with pain, how 
you got off your mule and walked with me up through 
the woods in the direction the deer had taken, and how 
you chatted with me in your quaint and most entertain- 
ing way. Do you not remember telling me so proudly — 
and I was proud for you — of the daughter that was away 
at school and of the letters that she wrote back to you — • 
letters that "only jist teched the high pints?" And do 
j'ou not remember the clump of persimmon trees we came 
upon? Trees that grew fruit that had no seeds — great, 
big, luscious bites that were waiting for us in bushels? 
And how you chided me for trying to "overdo a good 
thing?" 
Then how good those hard-boiled eggs tasted as we 
sat at the roots of those pines at lunch hour! Then the 
cigars as their aroma mixed with the aroma of the woods ! 
And then you do not forget how old Boss, who had 
been quietly dozing just a little distance away, got up, 
and nosing about, opened upon a trail just at the edge of 
the thicket of undergrowth, that was just to the north 
of us? Though you may have forgotten it, I .have not, 
for it aroused in me an enthusiasm that had died with 
the second mistake I had made that morning. All at once 
1 saw visions of leaping bucks and scented again the 
chance of getting a shot. And, oh, to redeem myself! 
That I fully determined on at once. And as I started 
around the thicket in response to your suggestion to 
make "tracks" for the point that jutted out to the north- 
west, where you assured me excitedly that the deer would 
come out, I almost bit my lips and crushed my gun in my 
grim and most resolute determination to make up for the 
past if only the opportunity should come to me. What 
music was the baying of old Boss as he trailed around 
through that thicket on the wake of that buck! I knew 
it was a deer, for you had said so when first you heard 
the dog open on the trail. And what a thrill it sent 
through me to hear you calling, "Whoop 'em up, Boss; 
whoop 'em up," when finally I had reached a point of the 
thicket which, in my tired and worn condition, from the 
hurried run I had been glad to accept as the one you had 
had in mind when directing me. And what a picturesque 
sight you presented to me, as just with your head and 
shoulders above the bush, I saw you forcing your mule 
through that thicket in the effort to follow the dog ! There 
was no danger of sleep then. Nor was I going to leave 
my position, no difference what allurements were offered. 
How excited I became and yet how eagerly determined 
as the bay of the dog came closer and closer. Soon he 
was coming right in my direction, and I could see you, 
not over one hundred yards from me, and the dog be- 
tween us. At every moment I expected the deer to bound 
in sight. But he did not, and it was a puzzling query that 
presented itself to my mind when, at the mouth of an 
opening in the bush and not over fifty yards away, the 
dog, nose to ground, came in plain view, then turned to 
the northeast still trailing. Do you suppose that the deer 
had been at that opening, too, and had been turned by my 
presence and without my having seen him? It was cer- 
tainly without my seeing him if, in fact, he were there, 
but I'm sure now that it must have been that way, else 
why did old reliable Boss come that way? Really, now, 
"Slicker," was that another opportunity missed that a 
practiced deer hunter would not have overlooked ? Turn- 
ing about just at this time ^ny delighted eyes fell upon 
the deer, just as he had come out of the bush a little 
further up, and was cutting across my path in eager haste 
to the southwest. And then it was that my repeater 
began to talk. Ah, that was the wildest moment of my 
life! After every discharge of that gun I fully expected 
to see that buck "toss his beamed frontlet" to the 
ground. Do you not remember how the bark flew from the 
pine trees among which he ran and into which I poured 
the leaden hail? You don't? Well, you were some dis- 
tance away. That's true. But you were coming some, 
weren t you ? Ah, I can see you now, old fellow, as you 
belabored that old mule with your hat in the effort to be 
m at the death, all the while shouting to me, after I had 
unloaded my gun, to "Run ! Run ! Run !" as if you had a 
notion that I might catch a live deer in a pine wood. 
And you will remember that I ran, too, just as hard as 
I could m the direction the deer had taken, even though 
he then was out of iny sight in the brush, until you came 
up with me and yelled down into my ear that bewildering 
question, "Did he flop it or tuck it? Did he flop it or 
tuck it?" Oh, Slicker! that was an unfair advantage you 
took of me. Did you think I had been paying any atten- 
tion to whether he had flopped it or tucked it? to say 
nothing of my lack of knowledge of the significance of a 
deer "flopping or tucking" it when determining he was 
wounded. Yes, I am free to admit that under the neces- 
sity to make quick answer, I did say that he "flopped it," 
but I will never quit believing that that deer was hard 
hit, and that he became the meat of wolves and that we 
might have had him had we followed on his trail. But 
after my word had gone out, how was I to admit that I 
did not appreciate the significance of your question? 
and once I had declared that he had "flopped it" how was 
I afterward to say that he had "tucked it?" For all that 
was ten years ago, and my hair was not then streaked 
with gray as it is now. But, ah, my dear friend, how 
often have I wished that he had "tucked it!" 
Wm. J. Beck. 
Columbus. Tnd. 
Meadowlark and Robin. 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
It seems that I can never get into a mild sort of con- 
troversy in your pages without danger of wearing a sub- 
ject threadbare, perhaps to the wearying of your readers. 
Nevertheless, I feel constrained to make reply to friend 
Dixmont's latest remarks about the Meadowlark and 
Robin. 
In the first place I wish to say that I am an advocate 
for the enforcement of all laws. If laws are not to be en- 
forced they should be expunged from the statute books. 
The greatest evil that now rests upon our free and demo- 
cratic country is that the principle of individual liberty 
is carried too far, as a result of the non-enforcement of 
law. 
I have no quarrel with the State of Nebraska for en- 
forcing her game law, nor with the game warden for ar- 
resting and prosecuting violators thereof. 
_ The prime object of the article that excited Dixmont's 
indignation was to rebuke a preacher for holding up an- 
other preacher, in a public manner, as a moral monster 
because he shot some meadowlarks; and incidentally to 
justify preacher number two for "regretting the incon- 
venience he was subjected to," which was one of the of- 
fenses charged against him ; and which inconvenience ap- 
peared to have been aggravated by the manner in which 
the game warden performed his office, in which perform- 
ance he might have been less invidious and uncandid if 
he had been so minded. 
I failed to note the statement cited by Dixmont, that 
the meadowlark is protected by law in Kentucky; but 
suspected that he is protected, as in Mississippi, as a 
"game bird," and not as a "song bird." 
I do not know where the Rev. Craig hails from, but 
have learned that Mississippi was the State of his adop- 
tion a few years ago. 
I wish to take issue with Dixmont in his statement 
that "there were many things done in his (Audubon's) 
day m the pursuit of game which would be considered as 
highly unsportsmanlike in our day." On the contrary, 
I believe a high standard of sportsmanship was recog- 
nized in Audubon's time. 
So much for the meadowlark. Now for the robin. 
I wish to impress Dixmont by reiterating the statement, 
that robins are not regarded as "game birds" by South- 
ern sportsmen, any more than the Northern angler con- 
siders the oyster as a game fish. Dixmont, and I pre- 
sume all Northern residents who possess a commenda- 
ble degree of sentiment in their mental furnishing, has 
invested the robin with a sort of sentimental sacredness 
that makes it diliicult or impossible for him, or them, to 
view the question under discussion except in its senti- 
mental aspect as presented to his and their minds. But 
let us endeavor to take a rational view of the subject. 
I believe it must be conceded as a general proposition 
that man is at liberty to, and in fact does, use all of the 
lower creatures in animated nature, in any manner that 
may afford him the greatest benefit or gratification in 
the aggregate. If in one geographical division of the 
world, the inhabitants, by force of circumstances, use 
any particular creature in the only manner that it can 
be made to contribute to their benefit, and in another 
geographical division the inhabitants utilize the same 
creature in a different manner, but in the only way that it 
can be made to serve their uses, can either one of these 
parties make legitimate objection to the manner in which 
the other party utilizes this particular creature? 
If there was conflict of interests between the parties, 
then another question would be involved. The North 
might say, "The robin is our song bird." The South 
might, with equal right, say, "The robin is our table bird." 
An impartial umpire would say, "The robin belongs to the 
North when in the North, and belongs to the South when 
in the South; neither has any rights in him when he is 
in the other's domain; but each is at liberty to use him 
as occasion affords." 
But it has not been suggested that there is any real 
conflict of interests involved. There has been no com- 
plaint so far as I am aware, that eating robins in the 
South has appreciably diminished the supply of songsters 
in the North. If that were true, then a legitimate inquiry 
might be raised as to the comparative rights of the two 
parties, each to employ its particular mode of utilizing 
the robin. Such inquiry might be made on a higher plane 
as to which mode of using the robin should appeal to the 
more elevated sensibilities of those using him in their 
respective manner. 
If the issue were presented in that form, that is, that 
eating robins by Southerners deprived Nortlie|-ner§ <>{ 
