Forest and 
A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 
COPYKIGHT, 1908 BV FoREST AKD StRBAM PUBLISHING COc 
NEW YORK, SATURDAY, DECEMBER 19, 1903. 
Terms, $4 a Year. 10 Cts. a Copy. 1 
Six Months, $2. f 
j VOL. LXI.— No. £5. 
j No. 846 Broadway, New York 
THE CHRISTMAS NUMBER. 
The handsome Christmas number of Forest and 
Stream has been received with unvarying favor. It has 
been termed artistic, substantial and worthy. The demand 
for it has been large, exceeding anticipation. Copies are 
for sale on all news stands and by dealers everywhere. If 
in any case it cannot be obtained, orders sent to this office 
will be filled. 
GOOD THINGS IN STORE. 
Among the interesting series of papers which will ap- 
pear in these pages during the coming year will be the 
account by Raymond S. Spears of his expedition down the 
Mississippi River. The third of Mr. Spears' chapters will 
be printed next week. Another series, having special 
timeliness to the St. Louis Louisiana Purchase celebra- 
tion, will be from the pen of George Bird Grinnell, fol- 
lowing the "Trails of the Path-Finders," and dealing with 
the exploration of the early travelers in the further West, 
Beginning with Alexander Henry the elder, and 
Carver, these accounts will come down through Lewis and 
Clark, Henry the younger. Pike the hero of the earliest 
years of the last century, and many another traveler whose 
hardy deeds, never-failing courage, great achievements, 
and exciting adventures have been forgotten, along with 
his very name, by the busy, pushing people of to-day. 
CHINOOK. 
"The Story of a Stump" by H. G. Dulog, in our 
Christmas number has attracted much attention, especially 
in the Northwest, because the inscription quoted affords 
an extremely interesting illustration of the quick develop - 
ment of a newly invented written language. 
The Chinook jargon is well known to all who have 
traveled in northwestern America to have a wide cur- 
rency, extending from the land of the Eskimo south to 
California, and from the Pacific Ocean east to the Rocky 
Mountains. It is properly termed a jargon, for it is a 
conventional language similar to the Lingua Franca of 
the Mediterranean, and the Pigeon English of China — a 
trade tongue spoken by many people and sufficient for the 
expression of simple ideas. 
Although some persons have expressed the belief that 
the jargon was in use before the advent of the whites 
on the northwest coast, this may well enough be doubted; 
although it is probable that many words belonging to 
different tribal languages were in use among other tribes, 
and it is possible that there was some common tongue 
by which intercourse was carried on all along the coast 
before the coming of the whites. However, the Chinook 
jargon, as we know it, contains abundant internal evi- 
dence of English and French influence, and many of its 
words are drawn from these languages, just as many are 
drawn from the Chinook language and from that of the 
Nootka and other coast tribes. The multitude of different 
Indian tongues spoken along the coast greatly favored the 
establishment of some common speech. We are told that 
in 1792 Vancouver's officers who visited Gray's Harbor 
found that the natives there, though speaking a different 
language, yet understood many words of Chinook, and in 
the narrative of Hewitt, a captive among the Nootka in 
1803, a brief vocabulary of the Nootka tongue is given 
which contains words now found in the jargon. 
When Lewis and Clark reached the mouth of the 
Columbia in 1806, the Chinook jargon had become a 
spoken tongue, but when the Astor fur traders arrived it 
came into more general use, and received many additions. 
In this way its growth continued until the arrival of the 
railroad and the settlement of the country, since which 
time it has slowly begun to drop into disuse. 
One of the most interesting developments in connection 
with this language is the establishment of a method of 
writing it. This invention is due to the energy of the 
French priest, Father Le Jeune, who in the year 1S90 
conceived the idea of adapting the Duployan system of 
stenography to writing the jargon. This was done at 
once, and it was found that the system answered perfectly 
well for the purpose. An Indian who saw the writing 
for the first time soon learned its principles, and taught 
other Indians. In July, 1891, a little instruction in it was 
given to the Shuswaps, later to the Thompson Indians, 
those of Douglas Lake, and other interior points, while in 
T892 lessons were given to the lower Frazer and sea coast 
Indians. All these people took hold of this writing with 
extraordinary readiness, and easily perfected themselves 
in the reading and writing of it. It has since spread very 
extensively among British Columbia Indians. 
In 1891 Father Le Jeune issued the first number of a 
little paper written in these characters, which he called 
the Kamloops Wawa — the Kamloops Speaker. This 
periodical, written by Father Le Jeune, and by him printed 
on a mimeograph, has had a very considerable circulation, 
and has done much to diffuse a knowledge of these writ- 
ten characters. How generally they are in use is shown 
by the copy of the letter carved on a stump included by 
our correspondent, H. G. Dulog, in the charming Story 
of a Stump, already referred to. 
Syllabaries of Indian tongues are not great novelties. 
We have the alphabet of Sequoya, the Cree syllabary in- 
vented hy the missionaries of the North, and now in gen- 
eral use among Indians and half-breeds of the Northwest, 
possessing as well a very considerable printed literature. 
But for extraordinary character and for swiftness of 
adoption there is perhaps nothing quite like the written 
Chinook zvazm. As Mr. Pilling well says, "Written in an 
international language, 'set up' in stenographic characters, 
and printed on a mimeograph by its inventor, editor, re- 
porter and publisher all in one, this little weekly seems 
to leave nothing in the way of novelty to be desired." 
GAME POSSESSION IN LOUISIANA. 
We print elsewhere a recent decision of Judge Baker 
of the New Orleans District Court in the case of a hotel 
proprietor who was under prosecution for the possession 
of venison in close time. The decision is interesting as an 
illustration of the extent to which one with a precon- 
ceived opinion may find in the warding of the law somx- 
lhing diametrically opposed to the meaning which another 
may find in the same language. In this instance, Judge 
Baker reads the statute to confirm his notion of the in- 
tent of the Legislature, which he expresses in these words : 
"I imagine it would be difficult to find a statute which 
makes, or undertakes to make, the possession alone of 
property which has a legitimate use in and of itself a 
crime. Ordinarily, when possession is made criminal it 
is made so because the possession is wrongfully obtained, 
or the property had in possession is intended for some 
wrongful purpose. * * * Believing as I do that the 
possession of deer during the prohibited season can only 
be unlawful when the killing or taking was unlawful, the 
judgment, herein rendered must be set aside." 
As a matter of fact there is not the slightest difficulty 
in finding "a statute which makes the possession alone 
of property which has a legitimate use in and of itself a 
crime," that is to sa3% a misdemeanor. The game laws of 
the country at large do this very thing. It is the prevail- 
ing principle that the possession of game in close season 
is prohibited and made a misdemeanor. Game is "prop- 
erty" of a certain nature "which has a legitimate 
use," and the possession of it is forbidden without respect 
to whether it was "wrongfully obtained." Judge Parker 
appears altogether to have missed a recognition of this 
common element in our game protective system. Pro- 
hibition of possession in close time is essential for two 
purposes; the first to prevent the killing in the close 
season, and the second to prevent the excessive slaughter 
in open season for marketing in close season. The game 
supply of Louisiana, like the supply of the rest of the 
country, could not stand the drain of killing for un- 
restricted possession and sale in the close time ; nor is the 
executive system of the State so perfect that it could en- 
force the law against .killing in close season were there 
no restriction on possession in close season. It is reason- 
able to assume that the Legislature intended to adopt the 
system elsewhere in force and by statute to confine the 
possession of game to the period open for the taking of it. 
.And, indeed, the law as quoted by Judge Baker himself 
does thus explicitly forbid possession in close time. 
Section i provides that it shall be unlawful to have 
any deer in possession except as hereinafter provided. 
The "hereinafter provided" exception is given in Sec- 
tion 2, which names an open season for killing deer. 
Section S provides that it shall be unlawful to have 
any game in possession "within the period during which 
they are intended to be protected by the provisions of this 
act," The period during ■vehich they are intended to be 
protected is specified in Section i. It is all the time ex- 
cept during the open season provided in Section 2. That 
is to say, they may be possessed only in the open season; 
they may not be possessed in the close season. 
The Audubon Society would do well to appeal the case. 
MONEY BY MAIL. 
The season of holiday buying accentuates the very 
common inconvenience of sending money by mail. This 
is often so great as actually to discourage a prospective 
purchaser, who would send for the desired article were the 
transmission of money simple and convenient. We esti- 
mate that the mail-order book business of the Forest 
AND Stream would be very much greater were the send- 
ing of money by mail practically as ready and simple as 
the handing of money over a counter. One transaction 
should be no more inconvenient than the other. A buyer 
should be enabled to do business at a distance directly 
without going to the post-office for a money order or to 
the bank for a draft. 
We have alluded before to the work of the Post Check 
Currency Bureau, which is making an organized effort to 
secure action by Congress which will provide a system of 
check currency by which the currency in every day use 
may be converted into checks for safe transmission to 
th^* ~'' e. 
The measure now before Congress is H. R. 1976, intro- 
duced Nov. 12, by Mr. Gardner, of Michigan, It provides 
in brief that paper currency of the denominations of one, 
two and five dollars shall have upon the face of the note 
suitable blank spaces, in which the holder may write his 
own name and the name of a payee; and the note thus 
filled out and stamped with a two-cent postage becomes 
thereupon a check payable only to the person or firm 
designated, and may be sent through the mails with per- 
fect security. When receipted by the payee it may be 
cashed at any money-order office, or may go through the 
banks for ultimate return to the Treasury for cancellation. 
To illustrate the working of the scheme: A subscriber 
wishing to send the subscription price of Forest anb 
Stream would take two two-dollar notes and write upon 
the face in the blanks provided his own name and the 
name of the Forest and Stream Publishing Company, 
affix a two-cent stamp to each bill and mail them. Upon, 
receipt, the Forest and Stream Publishing Company would 
affix its signature in the spaces provided and deposit the 
notes in the bank. 
The system is admirable in simplicity and safety. The 
adoption of it by Congress would facilitate trade to an 
extent incalculable. Public interest in securing the post 
currency system should be given such expression as will 
prompt action by Congress. 
The probability is that when the Mayor of Freeport, 
111., and his friends started out on a deer hunting expedi- 
tion in the wilds of Wisconsin, they had not the slightest 
intention of providing venison for the inmates of the Wis- 
consin State Hospital for the Insane. On the contrary, 
it was their purpose to bring the game home for their own 
tables and those of their friends. To this end they took 
the precautions and adopted the expedients known to 
visiting sportsmen intent upon violating the export laws 
of the State in which they are hunting. The venison was 
carefully packed in trunks and the trunks were then 
checked through to the Illinois destination. All would 
have gone well but for the unseemly conduct of the game 
warden. That individual, as the Mayor of Freeport ex- 
plained to the Governor of Wisconsin, was "unduly 
active and over-officious;" very disagreeable traits of a 
game warden, it must be confessed, when one is trying to 
sneak his game out of the State. As for the unfortunate 
Mayor, the warden's over-officiousness threw the fat into 
the fire; that is to say, diverted the trunked venison from 
its way to Freeport and landed it in the Hospital for the 
Insane.. There may the chaplain say grace over it with 
good heart. The Mayor, bereft of guns, dogs, venison and 
honor, has perhaps already said about this piece of meat 
something else which was neither the giving of thanks 
nor the invocation of a blessing. 
K 
The Forest and Stream of January 2, the New Year 
number, will contain a color^^ supplement printed in 
tsvelve colors. 
