S40 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Oct. 31, 190.3. 
the fact that near cultivated sections there is always 
more food to be found than in the uncultivated. The 
matter of providing food for itself and its young is 
quite as constant and insistent in the life of the quail 
as it is in the life of man. 
It often nests close by the cultivated fields. Its 
cheery, ventriloquous whistle, reiterating its favorite 
utterance "Bob White," may be heard about the farms, 
particularly in the morning hours, and "Bob White" 
has come into use to designate the bird itself. Some- 
times the call is uttered with a short introductory note, 
and these, with a few alarm calls, or calls of inquiry 
when the birds have become scattered, seem to be 
about all the vocal means of communication which 
these birds have. 
In many parts of the South, where the quail are in 
greater abundance, their sweet notes may be heard 
in many directions, at many distances, in the early 
morning and evening hours. These cries work great 
harm to it, for by them the shooter learns the where- 
abouts of all the birds in his neighborhood and "lo- 
cates" the haunts of every bevy. In the fall, the cry 
"Bob While" often serves to inform the sportsman as 
to the best course for the morning's hunt. In the 
South the quail is called "partridge." 
In the fall, when the shooting opens, the quail soon 
learns of the gmniing dangers, and its habits thereupon 
change quickly to conform to a life of greater safety, 
though it will run many risks to be near an abundance 
of food. However, when danger is impending, it 
ayoids the open much more than when danger is not, 
and is iTiOre alert, quicker to suspect mankind, and 
quicker to take alarm. 
When spring returns, the quail seem to lose their 
fears of man, and they breed with litte reference to 
concealment from him.. Their confidence is unimpaired 
till fall approaches, when there is a repetition of all 
the fears and tronhlcs and dangers of the preceding 
years. 
He who can average three kills out of five shots, 
cover and open, is an excellent marksman. The 
shooter may make a run of ten or twenty straight 
kills, but there arc soon sure to come misses if he does 
not pick his shots. In winter the shooting is much 
more difficult than in the fall. Of course, "the man 
who never misses" might do better, but "the man who 
never misses" is of the parlor, not of the field. 
B, Waters. 
Qttailii g Without a Dog. 
As THE day approached for chicken shooting there was 
much planning around my house for which a small boy 
was responsible. The corner of the attic, sacred to rods 
and guns and field toggery generally, was visited, and 
those things necessary for one on chicken shooting bent 
were collected and packed in the grip. 
Our family physician, possessed of several fine pointers, 
had planned the trip. We were to go to a farmer in the 
northern part of the State who had a number of coveys 
marked down and whose stubble fields were "posted" 
against all comers but the Doctor and his friends. The 
boy had never shot a chicken and his pulse beat high 
whenever the subject came up. Certainly the prospects 
for a day or two of royal sport were of the best. Every- 
thing was fixed and settled that on my return from St. 
Louis we should start off. But my engagements length- 
ened out, and although the Doctor waited two or three 
days for me, when I returned I found he had gone. And 
successive Saturdays brought responsibilities that kept 
me at rny desk. And the boy showed much self-control 
and patience through it all. One Saturday morning I 
slammed down the lid of my desk, and, gathering up 
some rods, we essayed a trip down to Prescott on the 
Mississippi River to try the bass off the wing dams, and 
boarding the train we waited for it to start, only to be 
told that on account of a washout it would be hours be- 
fore it left the depot, and drawing a sigh of resignation 
mingled with keen disappointment, the boy shouldered 
the rods homeward and I went back to my office. 
Then the quail season opened and Mr. Fullerton and I 
planned a trip. He was not only to supply the comrade- 
ship and good fellowship, but the dogs as well. He was 
to meet us at the shooting grounds, but some strenuous 
work in connection with the breaking up of the Heron 
Lake market-hunters held Mr. Fullerton at the last 
moment and we were like the mariner with "quail and 
quail everywhere, and not a quail to shoot," because we 
had no dog. And as far as we could learn there was not 
a dog in the village— that is, a quail dog. 
"Come, pa, and let us tramp the woods; we may scare 
up something," and we tramped the woods. The boy was 
alive and alert to everything. The desolate and storm- 
beaten nests, the former occupants of which were now 
well toward the south, were quickly espied out by him, 
and the kind of bird builder conjectured at. The toad- 
stools, mosses, curiously twisted trees, the giant elm riven 
to the roots by the electric fluid, all absorbed his atten- 
tion. A passing flock of mallards, high up and afar, 
brought forth many questions concerning the proper way 
to hunt that wary bird. 
And then we tramped and rested and talked the hours 
away in the October woods. I remarked to the boy how 
disappointed I felt over the mishap to our plans, and was 
met by the reply: "Well, we're having a great time, any- 
way." And as we walked along through the rustling 
leaves and turned our faces toward the hotel for our 
noonday meal, I vowed to scour the village once more 
for some kind— in fact any kind — of a dog. And I 
found a Good Samaritan who owned a finely bred pointer 
dog, young and absolutely unbroken. The owner gave 
tlje pedigree of the dog, a^d while orognosticating all 
kinds of fool things the dog would do yet, promised us 
some fun with him. The dog would find the birds, that 
was certain; but as to holding them— that was another 
story.. 
And getting a rig we bundled in and drove out of 
town a few miles, stopping at the first combination of 
stubble, thicket and woods we came to. We put out the 
dog and worked up a steep knoll in the stubble field. 
As he reached the top the dog suddenly turned and stif- 
fened. A whirr, five quick shots, and the bii'ds like a 
flash disappeared behind the knoll and presumably into 
the thicket lining the woods a short distance off. The 
boy unmistakably had killed his bird, one going well to 
the right, and was elated beyond measure. 
And so the ball was opened. The dog certainly did 
"run in," and showed a thorough disregard for the first 
principles of discipline, obedience, and did no end of fool 
things, but he had a nose that not only found the living 
birds but the dead ones as well. As we drove along, at 
the roadside fifty yards ahead, grouped on a bit of closely 
cropped sward, we saw a bevy of quail. We pulled up. 
The dog scented the birds on the breeze, and, despite the 
yells of his master, started on a steeple-chase gallop for 
them. The main bevy stood alert and showed no inten- 
tion of rising. Separated from the bevy was one bird, 
a few yards nearer to us, and this quail the dog selected, 
and sprang at it like a fox at his prey, endeavoring to 
seize it in his mouth. The quail sprinted ahead of the 
dog and we were all interested lookers on. The bevy 
was seemingly as much interested as any of us. It was 
but a few seconds before the dog gained on the bird, 
when it flushed, and at the same time the whole bevy 
went into the air. 
The dog watched them, and tracking them down uner- 
ringly ran to the spot, which, fortunately for us, was a 
brush heap, but having hidden themselves well under 
same, the dog had to stand point until we came up. 
.^nd so it happened that with a no-account dog, a dog 
that some impatient hunter might have, in a moment of 
rage, filled full of shot, we yet not only got birds, but 
enjoyed ourselves — especially the boy. Skirting the divid- 
ing line between stubble and woods Harold gave 
us a dissertation upon rabbit hunting, and was 
somewhat confident in his belief in his marksmanship on 
rabbits, when round the corner of the fence and through 
the stubble thirty yards away came a cottontail bounding 
toward him. He fired and missed, the shot tearing up the 
stubble above the rabbit. Then quoting freely from Bo- 
gardus he tried to reconcile his miss. The shot had not 
dropped as he thought it would and for which he had 
made allowance, etc. 
It certainly %vas a day full of experiences — especially of 
a canine variety. But we certainly went out into the 
field under no false pretenses, as far as the dog was con- 
cerned. But despite opinions to the contrary, we found 
him far better than no dog at all. It only went to show 
how people in this world can get along if they will only 
adapt themselves to their surroundings and to circum- 
stances. We made allowances for the unbroken "purp," 
made the best of things, had a splendid afternoon's out- 
ing, gave the boy a most enjoyable time, and went home 
with a bunch of quail which the boy insisted on carrying 
himself, and of which he was A^ery proud. So why com- 
plain if the dog did many things that he ought not to 
have done, and left undone those things that he ought to 
have done? He did the best he could, -and did not do 
differently because of a lack of training. 
His owner is to put him in the hands of a trainer, 
and some day we may again shoot over him when he will 
know better than to try to catch and eat every quail he 
scents and sees. Charles Cristadoro. 
That Reminds Me. 
The other day I had to go down East on a little busi- 
ness over the end of the week, and, of course, I took my 
shotgun along on the chance that I might be able to get 
a day off v/ith my friend, Ernest C. Davis, who has the 
inside track of a whole lot of bully good grouse and 
woodcock covers. On the way to the North Station I 
bought a copy of Fofrest and Stream of October 17, and 
noted with much interest the letter of Mr. E. LI. Kni.s- 
kern, of Ridgway, Pa., concerning "Grouse Self Kill- 
ings." I clipped this out and showed it to Mr. Davis 
w'hen I got to his house late the next night, and he told 
me of a case of self-destruction by a grouse which beats 
anything I have ever heard of in this line. 
Mr. Davis and a friend from down in Vermont had 
been shooting all day in the covers back of Rockland, and 
just at dusk were flying for home behind his little fast 
mare that only touches the high spots. As they came 
down over the brow of a little hill, with covers on both 
sides, something passed swiftly out of the cover on the 
right of the road and seemed to fly straight into the for- 
ward wheek The horse was pulled up, and just as Mr. 
Davis got out to go back and see whether they had run 
over a bird, a partridge dropped out from under the 
front spring of the wagon and fluttered in the road, start- 
ling the horse, and nearly getting Mr. Davis run over. 
Apparently the bird had either gone through the front 
wheel of the wagon or passed just in front of it and flown 
into the spring, its neck being caught bewteen the spring 
and the wagon box or between the spring and the axle, 
and it was so killed. The next day he showed me the 
exact spot where the incident occurred, and his descrip- 
tion of the affair was corroborated in detail by a native 
who keeps a little cooper shop just at the top of the 
hill. I do not mean :o inier that this story, remarkable as 
it is, would need any corroboration, for Mr. Davis is 
noted for his truthfulness, and anyway, I saw the wagon, 
tl;e horse and the hill where it all happened. 
While we were discussing the matter there in the road, 
and he showing me exactly how it all happened, the dogs 
rounded to a point in a corner of the cover just down 
the hill, and we shot there one of the biggest woodcock 
we got during the day. We found the woodcock fairly 
plentiful. 1 think they were mostly flight birds. We 
got nineteen birds in a day and a half, only five of them 
being partridges. There do not seem to be many young 
j>art ridges anywhere in New England this year so far as 
I can learn. It is the general theory that the young birds 
were hatched out during the drought ?arly in the spring. 
and were nearly all killed by the long spell of cold rait 
which folloAved during June. _ 
Not only is my friend Davis a good sportsman, but ht 
can shoot like oiled lightning, and when he gets into : 
streak of luck, there is nothing that cannot happen tc 
him. He has the slickest kind of a lunch box equipment 
made up to hold just the things you need, and this i: 
always in the bottom of the wagon. There is included : 
little alcohol chafing dish for frying the steak and boil 
ing the coffee at noon. After we got five or six mile: 
out of town, he happened to remember that the bottle 0 
alcohol for the chafing dish lamp had been left on thi 
kitchen table. He had hardly finished expressing hi; 
sentiments concerning the matter, before we saw in th^ 
road ahead of us a package which had been spilled out 0 
a wagon. _ I jumped out to examine it and found that i 
had consisted of two bottles — one of which, containinj 
that which passes in the prohibition State of Maine fo I 
whisky, having been run over and broken; and the othei 
sound and whole, containing a pint of alcohol. I thinl' 
this ought to make a fitting addition to your "Strang ' 
Finds of Sportsmen." 
1li:if night we opened the camp in the birches a 
Alford's Pond and by eight o'clock we had finished ou 
supper of broiled partridges and baked potatoes, ha 
washed up the dishes and were ready to turn in. It ha 
been decided that we should arise at 4:30 to get a go 
half day's shooting before going home, and Ernest und 
took the contract to wake us up on time. After I h 
been totally unconscious for what seemed about 
hours, I heard him getting up and feeling around fo 
match. He called across the partition to ask what ti 
I thought it was. I guessed it was about four o'clock. Af 
he had bumped himself against the furniture and 
doors, he got into my room and found a match in m 
shooting coat and got my watch out of my trousers an 
found it was 10:30. The next time I woke up it was 
o'clock, but we got away in a jiffy and managed to get i 
another good half day's sport before going back again t 
be "chained to business." Robert L. Warner. 
Boston, Oct. 23. 
la Maine Woods. 
Bangor; Me., Oct. 24. — Editor Foreast and Stream 
The strange and curious things that people will read ai'^ 
what is worse, believe, in the metropolitan papers, ' 
actually bej'ond comprehension of the ordinary mini 
To one living in the State of Maine, or who has beccri 
familiar with it by virtue of frequent visits, the grej 
mass of so-called "information" that might w^ell 1 
termed "misinformation," sent broadcast through the lait 
by reporters who are merely filling space in the dai' 
press, is both disgusting and amusing. 
A striking instance of this misleading "news" came • 
your correspondent's notice this week, and it gave hi' 
cause for many a hearty laugh, although he was caref 
not to hurt the feelings of the two "innocents" mo 
nearly concerned. Upon a train going north he met tM 
men with rifles, who inquired the distance to Greenvil! 
and later secured all the helpful information the new 
paper man was able to give them in the way of names of r 
liable guides, etc., as an aid to a pleasant and succes 
ful trip. They told, by degrees, how they had read in 
highly reputable New York city newspaper of the woi 
derful increase in bears in Maine, embellished by woi 
derful instances to prove the story, and on the strengi 
thereof they had come to Bangor, fully expecting to 1 
able to pick up (in Bangor) a guide anywhere on tl 
streets, and go forth to kill bear from there. It w 
something of a shock to find, when 700 miles from honri 
that they must go nearly another hundred — as someoi 
advised them — before they could hope to meet with tl 
game of the great Maine woods. To be sure, one net 
not go as far as Greenville to find game, but neither ci 
it be found in Bangor, except in very rare instances. 
To-day has proved, at this writing, and the evenii 
trains are yet to be heard from, the record breaker of tl 
season, as more deer and moose have passed into al 
through this city than for any previous day of the opt 
season. Over fifty deer came into the city on one noo 
train, besides several moose and bears, and the tot 
pieces of game examined by the wardens at the noc 
trains was close to the hundred mark. To-night's trai: 
will be nearly as heavy, if not greater, and the shipmen 
of the twenty-four hours ending at midnight will 
more like the "good old days" of 1902, when all previo" 
records were eclipsed. 
A matter that receives far less attention than it oug 
from sportsmen going into the woods of Maine, is ti 
leaving of names and woods addresses with the neare 
telegraph office. Nobody expects bad news, but it 
liable to come when least expected, and the man who te^ 
the station agent or telegraph operator how he can 
found in case of urgent need, may save much delay ai 
sorrow for himself. This was forcibly illustrated th 
week when an out-of-the-State man was telegraphed th 
his father was dead. The telegram was addressed to s 
unknown camp via Katahdin Iron Works, no one the 
or in that vicinity having ever heard of a camp run by 
man of the name given. But a man was at once di 
patched to Camp Comfort, thence to Brown & Son's, ai 
still beyond Freese's, whence the messenger returned 
the Chairback Mountain camps, which he reached 
night, only to find his quest fruitless there. Believii 
that the one remaining camp in that vicinity, the Houstf 
Pond camp, must harbor the bereaved sportsman, 
sportsman stopping at the Chairback Mountain cam 
volunteered to do as he would be done by, and pilot tm 
messenger through the notch of the Chairback range 
the camps, which was made as quick a trip as was pos.< 
ble, the trail being followed on the lope so as to get til 
man word in season to take the forenoon train out 1 
Brownville. Finally the man was located and the me 
sage delivered at Barnard, miles away from the Katahd 
Iron Works region, and on another line of railroad, 
the sportsman had left his address when he left the ra. 
road for the woods, there would have been no delay ;i 
the receipt of the message, not to mention a great savir 
in unnecessary expense. 
Caribou are undoubtedly drifting back into Maine, av 
unles^ the cpf>t§ntio}j of §p;ii? pld hi^Ot^l"? that they v^e; 
