Oct. t7, ipoa-j 
FOftESt AND STREAM. 
If he has never seen a real "raw log-jam" he should 
not write about one. A bunch of old tree trunks, water- 
logged and rotting in a cove of some dead water or bayou, 
may be "a wonderful study of hues — browns, umbers, 
faint pinks and purples, dull reds and yellows, silver of 
hchens and green and crimson of mosses," but it wouldn't 
be a "raw log-jam" or anything resembling one in the 
very least. 
If Mr. Brown has never heard the click of a well shod 
canoe-pole, he is no more an authority on the subject of 
canoe-poles than on that of log-jams. 
I am unable to infer from any one of his strictures on 
Kipling's words that Mr. Brown has any familiarity 
whatever with camp life or experiences in the wilder- 
ness. His assertion that campers do not "sleep on a couch 
of hemlock twigs if they can get spruce boughs" is the 
exact reverse of the facts in the case as I have known 
them. Moreover, the intemperateness of his attack and 
the amazing violence of his diatribe show him to be 
as unfamiliar with the calm temper of legitimate criti- 
cism as he is with the phenomena which he ventures to 
discuss. I doubt if anything more monstrous ever ap- 
peared in the liberal columns of Forest and Stream 
than the characterization of Kipling's sweet, truthful and 
most poetic lines as "mere fakir vociferation, squawking 
of a brood-goose on addled eggs, self-conscious mounte- 
bank strut and posing, brazen assumption by ignorance 
of real truth, insight and knowledge, bawling claim to 
Nature-photography," etc., etc. 
And now I wish, Mr. Editor, that you would, if per- 
mitted, reprint the whole poem, "The Feet of the Young 
Men" (just made av:iilable agnin in a new volume, "The 
Five Nations"), that we may all enjoy il again and realize 
anew the poet's exquisite accuracy of observation and 
■characterization, and the delicacy as well as strength of 
his poetic feeling. The third and fourth double quar- 
trains are wonderful, to those who can judge of them, 
in their contrasted pictures of life in the pile-built villages 
in the bamboo country and of the stalker of Ovis poll 
over Himalayan snows. 
And it is all done with such vigor, each characteristic 
put before you with one unerring stroke of the brush! 
Mr. Brown has done his readers one service, though un- 
■^ittingly. He has reminded them again of the one poem 
which perhaps more than any other of its length in the 
English language breathes the true inspiring spirit of 
Forest and Stream. C. H. Ames. 
[Copyright restrictions would prevent the publication 
of the poem. — Ed. F. and S.] 
The Mosqaito as Game Ptotectof* 
The Flats, Yukon River, Alaska, Aug. 30. — Editor 
Forest and Stream: One of the magazines, a copy of 
which recently fell into my hands, contained an article on 
mosquitoes. The writer of the article appears to be one 
of those who consume none but filtered water and who 
at every gulp wonder how many microbes went down 
with it. That he never slaked his thirst while prone upon 
the bank of a brook, using the rim of his hat for a chalice, 
and that he never in his life thanked Him who made the 
brook for one sparkling drink, is also evident. How else 
could he find in the mosquito nothing but that which 
justifies extermination? Such is not the plan of nature 
even in her smallest works. 
The article I have iin mind closed with the statement : 
"Science has found a use for nearly everything in crea- 
tion, but for what purpose the mosquito has been placed 
on earth science has, up to the present, been unable to 
ascertain." If that is true, then do I fail to see the use 
of science. To me the very fact that the mosquito is, is 
proof enough that he is here for a good reason. There is 
but one Creator; all things He makes are good. 
Could the scientist who sits in a mosquito-proof cot- 
tage in the bogs of the Campagna in the interest of 
science be induced tO' spend a season in these northern 
swamps, he would undoubtedly find that here the mos- 
quito serves a purpose even more praiseworthy than is 
his occupation in the south of Italy, which appears to be 
the malariaizing of possible Maffiosi. Could the mother 
moose, the wild goose, the duck, the snipe, and other 
fowl be interrogated on the subject of mosquitoes, we 
would probably find that they worship him. 
I speak from personal observation and experience here 
/in the "Flats." Were it not for the swarms of mosquitoes 
who have guarded this magnificent breeding place of 
moose and all species of waterfowl as well as rabbits, for 
ages, then would we thrill at this late date no more at 
the thought of a hunt in the fall. Down at the mouth 
of the Yukon I have known the natives to give up an 
egg-hunt, saying the mosquitoes were too bad. Each one 
of these hunts, if not spoiled as this was, means thous- 
mds of eggs eaten instead of hatched. Here in the upper 
ilats everybody keeps away from the timber and the 
myriads of lakes from the beginning of June until the 
(latter end of August; camping is possible only in the hills 
r on the sandbars in the river. The wolves, wolverines, 
xes, lynx, and marten, all lovers of raw eggs, and 
inef of them all the black bear, betake themselves to the 
nountains, and thus the cradle of the things that make a 
winter's life worth Hving remains undisturbed — thanks to 
.the mosquito. Wm. Yanert. 
IAIIigfatof and Dog. 
St. Augustine, Sept, 13. — ^L. O. Davis, who lives on 
ilic Pacetti Place, a short distance from St. Augustine, 
I '^t a valuable dog yesterday in a very peculiar way. 
W hile sitting on his porch he heard the dog howl, and, 
: king his gun, ran toward Von Balsam Branch, from 
nence came the sound. Reaching the bank, Mr. Davis 
J -aw his dog in the jaws of a large alligator. The saurian 
Iwas backing toward the branch, when Mr. Davis sent the 
ntents of his gun into the alligator's head, killing it in- 
iiitly. He then went forward to rescue his dog, but 
I Lind it dead, the jaws of the alligator having crushed 
il- life out of it. He could not even "prize" the jaws 
•Ml with a stick. 
> The alligator measured 7 feet 4 inches. Mr. Davis 
lhas lived in the neighborhood for some time, and had no 
' -a such a monster had its home so near. As Mr. Davis's 
ildren have been in the habit of playing around the 
"anch, it is probable that they had a narrow escape. The 
nigator was evidently hungry, and, fortunately, chose 
■ dog instead of the Davis children. — Florida Citizen. 
— • — 
North Carolina Wild Horses. 
Nothing on the Atlantic Coast is more replete with 
curious features than the "penning" of the wild ponies 
in North Carolina. These animals, the descendants of 
the "httle Barbary horses" which far-seeing Sir Walter 
Raleigh sent with his expedition to Roanoke Island in 
August, 1583-4, have their home only on the long and 
narrow sand-bank which divides the sea from the body 
of salt water known as Core Sound, the latter forming 
part of the long chain of "sounds" of various sizes 
which so mark the eastern portion of North Carolina. 
Core "Banks," as this strip of land is known, is 
about sixty miles in length, extending from Old Top- 
sail Inlet at Beaufort, to Ocracoke Inlet at Ocracoke. 
Along this stretch ot mingled sea and beach, sand 
dunes, forests and marshes, are some 3,500 ponies, 
hardy little fellows, weighing on an average 750 to 800 
pounds. 
There are several "pens," really corrals; these hav- 
nig names, such as the Diamond, Jack's Island, Hunt- 
ing Quarter, and Middle. The writer attended two of 
these "pennings." One at the Hunting Quarter pen 
and the other at the Middle. There was a fleet of no 
less than sixty-seven sailboats of all sizes on the way 
to the Middle pen. The scene near the pen was vividly 
picturesque, and needed only cocoanut palms to make 
it tropical. There were the grass-thatched huts of 
the "crabbers," who search in the earliest spring for 
the toothsome softshell crab, while the vegetation, 
yeopon, dwarf live oaks, fan palmetto, pellitory and 
dwarf pines, added to the oddness. A slue or creek 
made close to the pen, and up this smaller boats went, 
persons from the larger ones wading to them or being 
carried on the backs of the sturdy boatmen. There 
was much merriment as all hands made for the pen, the 
time being then nearly noon. 
Since dawn two gangs of men had been at work driving 
the ponies; one from the north, and the other from the 
south end of the long stretch of banks. Each gang of 
about thirty had fifteen miles to go, and the driving of 
the ponies out of that wild waste of scrub growth, 
marsh and sea shore was no easy task. One of these 
"drives" is known as the Northern Drive, the other 
as the Southern Drive. The men from the north made- 
their drive fire, and here came the ponies, 200 in num- 
ber, in a wild charge, being headed off by a long line 
of perhaps a hundred men, who prevented them from 
going southward. 
Everything was strange, from the first view as the 
ponies, looking like a long line of cavalry in skirmish- 
ing order, appeared in the distance and came up on 
the run, with the penners or beaters in the rear. At 
that distance it was difficult indeed to tell land from 
water, and ponies and men appeared to be running on 
air. The line of beaters, all on foot, swept up ceaselessly 
but noiselessly, and the ponies, seeing their way south- 
ward blocked by the long line of men at right angles 
across the beach, dashed in a wild charge into the pen, 
a structure built of all sorts of driftwood, and some 
eighty feet square, with a large opening. On the in- 
stant that the ponies entered the pen, they packed 
themselves in a dense mass. Their faces were a study, 
many of them being as wild as a prehistoric horse 
ever had. They next rushed backward and forward, 
then 'round and 'round; in this frantic movement all 
joined, no matter whether the tiny colt or the veteran 
who had figured in many such scenes. First, the sea 
of pony faces turned one way, then the other; with lit- 
tle wild eyes and penthouse of hair hanging far over 
the forehead, the hair on the bodies of many being so 
rough as to make them look like alapacas or llamas. 
The manes of many were as long as the tails. The 
prevailing color was dun, but there were dashes of yel- 
low, and one was almost black. 
Strapping men plunged into this mass of struggling 
and quivering flesh, and first snatched out the little 
colts to save the latter from being crushed to death. 
Desperate indeed was the scramble, as they sought to 
seize the larger ponies. Those pursued sought refuge 
in the thickest of the press, which literally became 
a dangerous crush, and it appeared that rib-cracking 
must be a certainty, yet strange to say,, neither pur- 
suers nor pursued were in this case hurt. A veteran 
looker-on said that there were accidents at times, and 
that he knew cases where men had been killed in the 
pen. 
All the beaters and other participants were fisher- 
men, and their costumes made a picture in themselves; 
red shirts and blue shirts, high rubber boots, rubber 
hats, with an occasional palmetto hat of great size. 
Some went into the ruck wearing only a shirt and 
trousers, risking their bare feet amid that wild tramp- 
ling of hoofs. There was an all-pervading odor of 
wild animals mingled with a milky smell and the salty 
tang of the sea air. Above everything rose the roar 
made by the incessant trampling of the ponies' hoofs. 
A giant negro, known near and far along the coast 
as Big Bart, dashed into the pen and seized a furious 
stallion. Bart is the most expert "seizer" cn the 
banks, where there are only one or two negroes, and 
there was a rush of the white spectators to see his 
work. With his hands he caught the stallion by the 
nose and strained every muscle to hold him. Four or 
five times the animal broke away, while Bart renewed 
his efforts. It finally required eight men to help 
Bart hohl the powerful stallion, after the big negro had 
gotten a secure grip on the animal's nose, and had 
nearly cut off his wind by pressure above the nostrils. 
The rough rope halter with the double hitch, which 
is alone used at the pens, was put on the stallion 
after a ten-minute contest, and then three or four men 
led the creature out of the. pen. 
Incidents happened like flashes, among these being 
fights by stallions, which reared up and fought with 
forefeet and teeth, and then lashed out with heels, 
hammering with resounding blows the sides of any 
animals in range, which yet seemed unhurt, so grreat 
is their tougliness. Tliere was no lassoing during the 
penning; only the bare hands being used, it being a 
matter of special pride to thus take the ponies. So 
they have been taken, the records show, since 1713, 
when the register of brands begins. But these ponies 
were in use long before that date. The colts which 
follow the mares are all the property of the owners of 
such mares, the latter being branded; but the mother- 
less colts— that is, the ones which do not follow any 
mares— are "mavericks," and become the property of 
the beaters or penners as a reward for the extremely 
arduous work the latter do in making the long drives, 
the tmy colts are first branded, and then the larger 
ones, while the penners brand their mavericks or 
'"motherless colts," as they always term them. After 
the desired animals have been picked out and roped, 
the httle boys were allowed to enter the pen and show 
their skill and prowess in seizing the yearling colts, 
their elders looking on approvingly. It was noticeable 
that the talk was all low, and that there was but one 
bursts of applause. These coast people are a quiet 
sort, and chary of speech; really almost Quaker-like. 
lliere was a steady driving of bargains for ponies. 
Prices generally ranged Irom $25 to $50. These shaggy 
little animals, taken from the bank, broken, cared for 
and given other food, quickly become glossy, lose 
their wild look, and are highly valued. The older stal- 
lions are always smoother of skin and darker, and not 
nearly so wild-eyed as the other ponies. None of these 
animals in their wild state ever eat anything save 
marsh grass and leaves of plants and trees, and so the 
ponies really have to be taught to cat the food given 
other horses. This is done by putting them in a stable 
beside a horse. The experiment of increasing the size 
ot these ponies while in a wild state by placing horses 
on the banks has been tried, but failed, as the pony 
stallions invariably surround and kill the horses, which 
they regard as intruders. 
After all the ponies secured by the northern drive 
had been picked over, those remaining, including the 
mares, which are never sold, were turned loose. Out 
of the wide gate of the pen they lied, but stopped 
when a few hundred yards away and began eating, the 
little colts, freshly branded, joining their dams. The 
drive of the ponies from the southward was next com- 
pleted, and there was another stirring sight as the 
animals came up in a long-extended line. About a 
score of them suddenly executed a tiank movement by 
dashing out into the shallow waters of the sound and 
making a wide circle around the line of beaters, re- 
turned to their wild home. The thunder of their hoofs 
and the showers of shining spray which they beat up in 
the shallow water made a striking spectacle, as they 
made their headlong dash for liberty, and in but a few 
minutes they had reached the sky line. The remainder 
of the ponies were with ease driven into the pen. The 
bottom of the latter was covered with rainwater to the 
depth of a couple of inches, and this had quickly be- 
come black mud. The ponies' feet threw out this mud 
in great splashes on the faces and bodies of the work- 
ers and the spectators, but nobody minded it in the 
least. The hoofs of some of the ponies, which are 
never shod, were a foot or more in length. This was 
generally the case with the older mares. Some of the 
latter were said to be over twenty years of age. The 
total number of ponies in the pen was 412. 
The ponies which had been sold were, after more or 
less struggling, led down through the high marsh 
grass to the shore of the sound and were hoisted into 
the larger boats. The more modern of the boatmen 
hoisted them in with slings, while others let down a 
panel in the side of the boat and literally dragged the 
beasts in, this being the old-fashioned and really bar- 
barous method. The ponies, which struggled in the 
water and in the air, appeared to be quite at home in 
the boats, which soon hoisted sails and went careering 
away with them. When the mainland was reached the 
buyers took their ponies out and led them away to be 
broken, civilized and trained to eat grain and other 
food utterly strange to them. The ponies on the^ 
banks are as wild as the rabbits, which likewise abound 
there, and they have much instinct, this teaching them 
to get water by pawing holes in the sand not far from 
the shore, in which it rises, being filtered by the sand, 
and they know how to swim fearlessly and far in water 
reasonably still, and also which are the shallow places 
in which they can walk, and save the trouble of swim- 
ming. Thus in times of storm they sometimes walk 
and swim to the mainland, three or four miles from 
their home, this movement being before the elemental 
outbreak. But at other times instinct appears to some- 
what fail them, and though they must have premoni- 
tion of impending storms, they yet occasionally are 
caught by phenomenally high tides, which sweep over 
spots on which they had in previous times found safety. 
The water rises to their knees, to their bodies, to their 
ej'es, and they then become terror-stricken, and are 
drowned as, huddled in a mass, they kick and plunge. 
Thus in August, 1899, in a notable storm, 400 were 
drowned on knolls which had before been places of 
safe refuge. The ponies could have gone to other even 
higher places, which the water never covers. 
These ponies, as has been clearly proved, were 
brought over by the first English colonists to America, 
and, as stated, came from the coast of the Mediterra- 
nean, they being then thought to be hardier than the 
English horses. There are in western North Carolina 
other ponies, commonly known as Indian ponies, which 
are of Spanish origin, and which are of entirely differ- 
ent appearance. These ponies are in many cases spotted, 
this being never the case with the banker ponies. 
They are under the medium size, plump and graceful. 
They are so gentle at all times that they are at home 
in the yards or even the houses of their owners in the 
Cherokee reservation in Jackson and Swain counties. 
They are in fact pets from birth, and the Indians have 
always disliked to sell them. They are becoming very 
scarv.e now. Fred A. Olds. 
If you want to be posted as to the constant changes, 
and have the latest and correct edition of the Came Laws 
in Brief J you should subscribe for it. Price $1 per year. 
