April i6, 1904.] 
FOREST AND STREAM/ 
318 
when daylight comes they hide away as best they can. 
Hounding deer also tends to exterminate them, for 
the voung deer run more like rabbits, and making short 
circles are easily and quickly killed off. In sections 
where I have known hounding to be vigorously fol- 
lowed up this is so true that at the end of a season 
after a fresh fall of snow it would be almost impossible 
to find the track of a small deer, and when they are 
killed of¥ in this way, with every now and then an old 
one sandwiched in, how long will they last? Is there 
any glory or skill in sitting by the water all day. to 
kill a deer taking refuge there, which any boy could 
almost kill with a club? Is there any true sportsmanlike 
satisfaction in it, to say nothing of the condition of your 
venison, after the heat of a long chase by the dogs at 
full- speed? I like a hound as much as anyone and 
no one enjoys more than I do the sound of a dog 
giving full tongue in the woods, but I draw the line 
at using them on deer. 
There is another, even more unsportsmanlike method, 
of hunting deer and that is by the use of the head- 
light, and no other one thing has done more to ex- 
terminate the deer in northern Wisconsin than this. 
Dogged by day and headlighted by night, what chance 
for life has the game? I have heard engineers on the 
"Soo" and "Northern" roads say that in the hunting 
sections through which their trains run they have fre- 
quently seen a hunter with a headlight on to nearly 
every half mile. Probably this is exaggerated some, 
but it suffices to show how bad it has been. These 
men have patrolled the railroad tracks from dark until 
morning waiting to catch a "shine" as the deer crossed 
the track or occasionally walked up or down the right 
of way. For this kind of butchery a variety of weapons 
are used. The ordinary rifle or shotgun, of course, 
predominates, but frequently among such hunters are 
found No. 8 Cheasapeake duck guns, single barrel and 
weighing about nineteen pounds. These guns shoot 
nine bullets, not buckshot, with a corresponding charge 
of powder and kill at from fifteen to twenty rods. Then 
there are rifles with five or more barrels fixed to shoot 
singly or all together. A good, strong, cool-headed man 
with a powerful bullseye lantern strapped over his left 
eye and well armed, is pretty apt to kill three out of 
every five times he gets a "shine," which is the re- 
flection from the deer's eye, and I have known men who 
made a business of it to frequently kill from three to 
nine deer in a single night. They travel quietly against 
the wind and are quick, so that what chance does a deer 
stand that comes upon one of them suddenly and 
within range? There is no sound, no scent, nothing 
but that big flaming orb at which the deer stares in 
wonder until from out it comes the crash of death. 
It is the method of the butcher and it is moreover a 
dangerous way to hunt. I have known of many in- 
stances when valuable oxen and horses belonging to 
lumbermen were killed by mistake in this way, and in 
my personal experience two men have been shot down 
by careless hunters who mistook the light from their 
lanterns to be the reflection from the eye of a deer, 
for when a deer is standing sideways to the man witlt 
the light only one eye shows. Why, one time a party 
of surveyors who were camped near us were at work, 
in their tent by candle light, making out the "profile" 
for the day, when a bullet sped through their tent just 
over their heads. An investigation showed that a fool 
headlight hunter had caught the gleam of the candle 
and without stopping to turn his light ofif, thus seeing 
whether it was the reflection from an eye or the light 
from a camp, he let go. There is, of course, some 
sport about headlight hunting on land or on the water, 
but it is hard work, tiresome work, and worse for game 
and for the hunter than hounding. 
There are still other methods used in capturing deer, 
such as snares, pitfalls and set guns, but these are so 
barbarous and so little used that any discussion in 
regard to them seems useless, and yet even now they 
are used to some extent and rarely a season passes by 
that the press does not record the death or wounding 
of some hunter, in northern Wisconsin or Michigan by 
a set gun. 
Our favorite methods of hunting, as I have indicated, 
were driving, still-hunting and watching. It has al- 
ways been our plan while in the woods to get out 
early in the morning, experience having taught us that 
the best hunting is from daylight until about nine 
o'clock, as then the deer, if not dogged or hunted too 
hard, are generally moving around and the chances 
for a shot are greatly increased. After a drive or two 
we separate to hunt toward camp, figuring to reach 
there in time for dinner and then to work or loaf around 
until about half past three in the afternoon, for after 
that time the deer are apt to begin to stir around 
again. It is true that the deer are in the woods and 
not in camp, and if one wants to get them he must 
go where they are, so that a man when out in the 
woods, is apt to get a shot at any time, while the man 
in camp will certainly get none, but there is no use in 
working all the time or in staying out when the weather 
is bad, so that v/e have settled down to about the 
hours as given and generally with good results. Bright 
moonlight nights make still-hunting poor, for then the 
deer move and feed more freely during the nights and 
correspondingly less during the day, so that when the 
moon is full and bright we generally do more driving 
and watch late in the evening. For the latter salt 
licks and scaffolds have been an aid, but these adjuncts, 
too, have been abandoned as unworthy the true sports- 
man. To discover a good place to watch requires good 
powers of observation and knowledge, and the locality 
must be chosen with a view to the way the game is 
expected to come and which way the wind is blowing. 
It is "also a good plan to get up on a fallen tree, a 
stump or rock, for a person so situated is not in so 
much danger of being seen or scented. Once located 
it behooves the watcher to keep perfectly still, for a 
deer , is usually very quick to detect motion of any 
kind and their ears are keen to catch the first sound. 
In fact, no matter how he hunts, it behooves the man 
who would be successful to be constantly on the watch, 
to move carefully and when he gets a shot, be it 
standing or running, always to see hair through the 
&ight§ before he pulls the trigger, Carols, 
The Life of a Deer. 
Away far back in the deep forests of northern Maine 
a young deer was bom. He was a tiny little fellow, and 
his coat was spotted. His kind mother had selected a 
dense clump of young spruce for his early home. For a 
time he lay quietly on his bed of dry leaves, only standing 
up at such times as his mother came to him and roused 
him. But as he grew he began to frisk around, and 
began to want to go out, but his mother made him under- 
stand that he must obey, and taught him many things. 
She taught him that when danger came he must drop 
down flat in the bushes and leaves and lie perfectly still, 
not making the least sign, and he, being so Small, the 
enemy would not see him and he would escape. Then 
she taught him that if she left him at any place he must 
never move from that spot so she could find him on her 
return. He obeyed her, and so lived and grew through 
the summer and was a fine large fawn. He wintered 
with his mother and many others in the deep spruce 
v.'oods. Sometimes deep snow covered the ground and 
it was very cold, but he was strong, and the wild 
creatures know well where to look for food. 
Then spring came and new wild blood flowed through 
his veins. He went out aloile into the woods and finally 
left his mother alone to care for another young brother. 
He learned^ many things, one of which was to fear man. 
While feeding with others, he had heard a sharp crack, 
and a big buck that was feeding near him had sprung 
high in the air and fallen dead. He fled to the woods, 
but, lacking the caution of age, had turned and walked 
softly back and peered through the bushes to see why 
the big buck should fall and lie so still. He saw a man 
hurry out of the timber and cut the buck's throat, and 
while he stood trembling with fear, the man proceeded 
to skin and mangle the buck in a horrible way. Then he 
fled on, and on, not stopping till he was very tired, so to 
get as far away as possible from such a horrible, cruel 
creature as that man was. He never forgot. If he heard 
that sharp crack he always fled at once. Soon he began 
to have a soreness in his head and finally his horns broke 
through. Two "spikes" they were, but still horns, and 
were for battle and defense. He was proud of them, 
but they soon got him in trouble with older bucks who 
would have none of his lordly ways in their presence. 
But still he grew and waxed strong, and the next year he 
won some hard fought battles, and he had his mate with 
him till spring came again. 
Now he was full grown and had a magnificent head of 
antlers. There was not a larger or finer buck in the 
forest. He had many battles and was always victorious. 
His fame spread abroad and hunters went far into the 
forest to slay him, but he was quick of sight and keen 
of scent, and, with all his bravery, had learned caution. 
When his keen eye or keener nose told him that men 
were near he fled and would go deeper back into the 
forest and stay for days and weeks. Then he would ven- 
ture back cautiously and would not appear in sight till 
he knew that the man had gone. So he lived on, and 
was monarch of all that country. He had become such a 
terror to the other bucks that hardly one dared fight 
him. His pride was at last his ruin. On a bright fall 
day he came to the side of the lake with his herd to 
drink. All was still. Man had not been seen or smelled, 
and no danger was in the air. On a high bank a young 
buck stood in the warm sunshine. He did not move 
when the old giant came in sight. This made him mad, 
and he charged upon the bank and the young buck fled. 
Then he marched in lordly style to the top of the bank, 
raised his head and snorted forth his note of defiance to 
all the world. Crack went a rifle from the lake below 
and the noble animal leaped high forward, and a few 
more jumps, and down to earth he went with the hunter's 
rifle ball through his heart, and the famous buck of the 
great forest was no more. Hunter. 
Bear Mention. 
When I started the town of Hallock, in the northwest 
corner of Minnesota, in 1879, bears were quite plenty in 
the timber belt which lines the Two-River Creek on 
which the settlement is located. In winter they denned 
in the banks on the creek and in summer played pranks 
in the school house yard. There was no settler nearer 
than at a point eighteen miles up the creek, toward the 
Roseau region, where one Carney had a cattle ranch of 
some eighty head. These animals grazed on the open 
prairie and housed in the timber belt. Ephraim Carney, 
a youngster of, fourteen years, was his father's chief 
herder, and one day when we were walking through the 
oak woods I noticed that a good many of the smaller 
branches were broken where bears had garnered the 
acorns ; it being their habit to climb out on the limbs as 
far as they would hold, and then to scoop in an armful 
of twigs and nip off the nuts. I asked Ephraim if he 
saw many bears in the course of the year while herding 
the cattle. "Oh, yes," he said, "quite a few !" "What do 
you do when you see a bear?" "Don't do nawthin !" in 
a tone of contemptuous surprise. "Well, what does the 
bear do?" "What does he do? Well, if he's on the 
ground he stands up, and if he's up a tree he just goes 
up higher." I thought this was a cute description of 
bear traits. Then I asked Ephraim if the bears didn't 
sometimes bother the cattle, and he said "no." 
This statement seems to settle the question for the 
northwest. The bears should never lack for food nor 
be hungry for meat, except when they come off their 
hibernation in the spring. I spent parts of seventeen 
years in the vicinity of Hallock and n^ver heard of bears 
troubling pigs or calves. 
With the middle south the case wears quite a different 
aspect. Only last week I was talking with Supt. Mann, 
of the North Carolina State Experiment Farm at Til- 
lery, about the depredations of bears in Hyde County. 
It seems that they became so destructive to the North 
Carolina Cattle Co. that experts were employed to thin 
them out with trap, gun, poison, deadfall, side hunts and 
drives. Forty-six were killed by old Bob Gerry, a col- 
ored man, in one winter. I think it was in 1876. A par- 
ticular class of large bears known as "sinnakero" made 
the havoc. Hog bears are smaller and different. But 
both kinds go for meat in any hard winter, after berries 
and mast are "done gone,'- and the cow peas and corn 
and sweet potatoes md apples are stacked or housed. At 
such times the range cattle are afraid to go into the 
pocosons, and keep to the savannahs and "reed lights," 
reeds or canes constituting their principal feed. The 
bears climb the junipers, gums, and cypresses where the 
cattle trails pass, and lying along their extended lower 
limbs drop like felines on the luckless animals passing 
underneath, suck the blood from their necks while cling- 
ing to them as they run. In the end the victim succumbs 
from fright, exhaustion, and loss of blood, and dies mis- 
erably. Charles Hallock. 
Which of them Favor Cold Stofagfe and which 
of them are Opposed to the Pfo- 
tection of Game? 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
A bill was lately introduced in the Assembly by Hon. 
E. P. Prentice, of the city of New York, representing the 
Twenty-fifth Assembly District, to amend sectioji 141 of 
the game law. This section 141 was introduced for the 
benefit of the cold storage men and provides by giving a 
bond for $i,cxx) a dealer in fish and game may keep fish 
and game during the close season; in other words, a 
dealer in fish and game, by giving a bond for $1,000, may 
break a law the remaining inhabitants of the State may 
not break. The manner in which this section 141 was 
placed on the statute book was, in the opinion of the 
writer, disgraceful, and the subject has been referred to 
in a letter in your issue of 26th March, 1904. 
The Prentice bill seeks to amend section 141 by striking 
game from the provision of the section, and thus pro- 
scribing the possession of game during the close season. 
Should this bill be passed, it will be unlawful to have 
game in possession during the close season, and to ac- 
complish this end is the sole object of the bill. 
Now, it goes without saying, if one be opposed to the 
possession of game in the close season, he must favor the 
passage of the bill, while if he favor cold storage during 
the close season he will oppose the bill. 
The Assembly Committee on Fish and Game is com- 
posed of thirteen rhembers. As Mr. Prentice's bill has 
not been reported, it is obvious that a majority of the 
committee are opposed to game protection, favor the 
keeping of game in the close season and favor the cold 
storage of game in such season. 
The names and addresses of that committee are as fol- 
lows : 
Hon. Willis A. Reeve, Patchogue, L. I., N. Y. 
Hon. Edwin A. Merritt, Jr., Potsdam, N. Y. 
Hon. Chas. S. Bridgeman, Kendall, N. Y. 
Hon. H. Wallace Knapp, Mooers, N. Y. 
Hon. John F. Simpson, Hurleyville, N. Y. 
Hon. A. P. Smith, Savannah, N. Y. 
Hon. C. R. Matthews, Bombay, N. Y. 
Hon. Frank L. Stevens, Hoosick Falls, N. Y. 
Hon. Jay H. Pratt, Verona, N. Y. 
Hon. F. C. Wood, Gloversville, N. Y. 
Hon. John Wolf, 251 Powers street, Brooklyn, N. Y. 
Hon. Edw. Rosenstein, 141 Clinton street, N. Y. City. 
Hon. Robert W. Chanler, Fishkill-on-Hudson, N. Y. 
Doubtless some of the above are in favor of reporting 
the bill, and it is but right that they should declare them- 
selves. As for the others, they can safely be left to their 
constituents. 
New York, April 5. 
Nofthern Big Game Gfottnds. 
Montreal, April 4. — Editor Forest and Stream: I had 
occasion to look for good fishing grounds in the Rocky 
Mountains and wrote to a disinterested party at Golden, 
B. C, and the Canadian Pacific Railway, asking him 
about the pack-horse trains to certain good grounds, and 
also asked him to advise a friend of mine. He writes as 
fellows : 
"I have written to Mr. , sending him two 
large maps covering a choice of three separate trips 
where the party would doubtless obtain game. These 
American hunting parties are chiefly keen on the black- 
faced caribou and it means dollars and cents to the rail- 
way company to put them directly in the way of getting 
at this game without a long, tiresome, pack-train journey 
to reach the best grounds. If these hunting parties fail 
to get game they will soon fire up the country in disgust. 
No local prejudice should stand in the way. The valley 
of the Beaver-foot and across the east slope of the Rock- 
ies has been shot out and bands of Indian hunters clean 
up the game almost every season. 
"Parties coming should be put into a practically new 
and unexplored section (though we know game is 
abundant there), and then if they have a successful hunt 
they will come again and bring others. Long pack-train 
journeys should be avoided and the party put on the 
shooting ground with as little delay and unnecessary 
work as possible, and this cannot be done by coming in 
from Banff and Simpson Pass. The very best shooting 
ground at present is under the east slope of the Selkirks 
in the valley of Dutch and Findlay creeks, and in the 
vicinity of Prairie Mountain in the valley of Beaver. I 
send you a small map showing the location of the latter. 
The first mentioned is south and west of Sinclair Pass 
and is not shown on this map. In writing Mr. 
I traced out for him three different routes the party could 
make, in which I think they will find ample game, and 
of a variety." 
Golden Station is between the Rocky and Selkirk 
ranges, on the Canadian Pacific Railway where the two 
ranges are only about a mile apart. A line of small 
steamers runs from Golden to a point quite close to these 
hunting grounds. This information may be of value to 
oihers. L. O. Armstrong. 
Fot a Man Who Really Wants a Gtizzly* 
Montreal, April 7.— There are occasionally bits of in- 
formation that will be of value to your readers, and 
which I can personally vouch for. I have a letter from 
a sportsman who resides at Golden, B. C. He says: 
"You can guarantee bears to at least five or six parties 
within a few miles of Golden if they can get here before 
the 15th of May. We have guides and outfits here for 
that number. A man who really wants a good grizzly 
skin should come now." L. 0, Armstrong. 
