Forest and Stream. 
A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 
Copyright, 1904, by Forest and Stream Publishing Co. 
Perms, $4 A Year. 10 Cts. A Copy, t NEW YORK SATURDAY, FE BRU ARY 11, 1 9 O B . ] No. 34^6°BroadwI;7newVrk. 
Six Months, $3. j ^ — ' ^ k-^ w ) 7 
^The Forest and Stream is the recognized medium of entertain- 
ment, instruction and information between American sportsmen. 
The editors invite communications on tlie subjects to wliich its 
pages are devoted. Anonymous communications will not be re- 
garded. While it is intended to give wide latitude in discussion 
of current topics, the editors are not responsible for the views of 
correspondents. 
Subscriptions may begin at any time. Terms: For single 
copies, $4 per year, $2 for six months. For club rates and full 
particulars respecting subscriptions, see prospectus on page iii. 
NETS IN LAKE CHAMPLAIN. 
There is no promise of an early adjustment of the dif- 
ferences between New York and Vermont on the one side 
and Canada on the other with respect to the fisheries of 
Lake Champlain. New York and Vermont prohibit sein- 
ing in the lake, while Canada permits it. The Federal 
and State commissions stock the lake, and Canada nets 
the fish. Strong efforts have been made to induce the 
Canadian authorities to abolish the netting, but so far 
nothing has been accomplished. At a conference between 
representatives of New York and Vermont with Mr. 
Parent, Minister of Mines, Lands and Fisheries, in Mon- 
treal last month, though it was shown beyond contro- 
versy that the netting meant the ruin of the lake fisheries, 
no assurance could be obtained from Minister Parent that 
Canada would co-operate to drive out the seines. • On 
:the contrary, he urged in return that the action of the 
United States in propagating yellow perch in the lake 
had been injurious to its fishing interests. 
As the matter now stands. Senator Prince, of the New 
York committee, and Chief Protector Pond express 
• themselves as favoring resort to strong measures unless 
the Canadian authorities shall show a change of front. 
If seine fishing is to continue in Canadian waters, the 
States should refuse longer to stock the lake. Some 
members of the committee are in favor of going so far 
as to take off the bar on netting and give full license to 
seiners on the New York and Vermont sides of the lake. 
This is heroic treatment which should not be resorted to 
so long as there remains the slightest hope of persuading 
the Provincial authorities to join in the abolition of nets. 
It is said that the question is a political one, the fisher- 
men and their allies holding a very substantial balance of 
power by their votes, and that action inimical to their 
personal interest is therefore impossible. 
p TRANSFER OF FOREST RESERVES. 
After efforts extending over several years, the cause 
of national forest protection has won a substantial victory 
by the passage of a law transferring the management of 
the forest reserves from the General Land Office of the 
Interior Department to the Department of Agriculture. 
The urgent need of such a measure has long been recog- 
nized. The adoption in 1891 of a forest reserve policy, 
the management of which should be in the General Land 
Office,' introduced to that bureau a number of novel 
problems which it was not well fitted to handle. It has 
received help from the United States Geological Survey 
and from the Bureau of Forestry, but for several years it 
has been recognized that a change should be made, and 
that the work of caring for the forest reserves should be 
' transferred to the Department of Agriculture, where the 
Bureau of Forestry is. 
This view was well expressed in the President's last 
message. He said: 
"As I have repeatedly recommended, all of the forest 
work of the Government should be concentrated in the 
Department of Agriculture, where the larger part of the 
work is already done, where practically all of the trained 
foresters of the Government are employed, where chiefly, 
in Washington, there is comprehensive first-hand knowl- 
edge of the problems of the reserves, acquired on the 
ground, where all problems relating to growth from the 
soil are already gathered, and where all the sciences 
auxiliary to forestry are at hand for prompt and effective 
co-operation." 
Bills providing for such transfer have been introduced 
in Congress in previous years, but have failed to pass. 
This year, however, the objections of Congress were 
overcome, and on February i the President signed the 
|jill which at once became law. It has transferred the 
business of the reserves to the Department of Agriculture, 
where such business and everything relating to it will 
hereafter be administered. The officials of the Forest Re- 
serve Service in the field and elsewhere — the force num- 
bering about 450 men — are transferred to the Department 
of Agriculture. What has been known as the Bureau of 
Forestry will hereafter be called the Forest Service of 
the United States Department of Agriculture, and Mr. 
Gifford Pinchot remains its head, with the title of Chief 
Forester. 
Under this branch of the service will now come all the 
cutting of timber, whether for sale or for free use, per- 
mits for grazing live stock, together with any changes of 
management and methods that the experience of the 
Forest Bureau recommends. For the present the rules 
and regulations of the General Land Office will remain in 
force, but before long we may look for changes and im- 
provements. 
The importance of the forest reserves to the industries 
of the Western States cannot be overestimated. Whether 
we consider agriculture, stockraising, mining or manu- 
factures, water is the absolute essential, and the chief 
purpose of the forest reserves is to insure an even and 
never-failing water supply. The whole United States, 
but especially the West, is to be congratulated on the 
change made by the present law, as well as on the fact 
that Mr. Gifford Pinchot, the man of all Americans who 
has done most for forestry in America, remains at the 
head of the Forest Service. 
POLICE MARKSMANSHIP. 
With regular periodicity there appear accounts in the 
daily papers of the policeman who shoots at a malefactor 
and kills an innocent dog, or who shoots at a dog and 
kills an innocent citizen, or who shoots in the air and 
kills a prattling infant on the doorstep of its home. Per- 
chance there is need, as a humane act, to kill a crippled 
horse, than which no target is easier to hit, yet the ac- 
counts now and then show bungling work, a number of 
shots being necessary to have the effect of one properly 
placed, with some peril to the immediate neighborhood 
from wild shots. There is betimes a pleasing variation in 
the recountals of such revolver practice on fleeing 
offenders, inasmuch as all six shots, flying promiscuously 
around in the city streets, do not hit anything whatever 
so far as can be discovered. Once in a long while, prob- 
ably due to the laws which govern even long chances, an 
offender is hit. It is truly marvelous that in police use 
of the revolver there is an impartial result in the hitting 
of men, women, children, horses and dogs. 
For all this deplorably inefficient marksmanship there 
is a good reason, namely, the policemen as a class are 
unskilled in. the use of the revolver. Many of them have 
never been taught the elementary principles of handling 
it, much less to shoot it accurately. To turn loose a large 
body of men, nominally guardians of the public weal, 
armed with weapons of whose use they are ignorant, 
would seem to be more of a menace, so far as the use of 
revolvers is concerned, than a protection. 
The following, taken from the columns of the daily 
press, will show clearly why one thing is shot at and an- 
other thing hit by the average New York policeman, who 
probably is a fair type of the policeman-marksman 
throughout the United States. Commissioner McAdoo is 
quoted as saying : 
"The reports show that out of 1,500 men who have 
been at the ranges so far, only nine have qualified as 
marksmen. That is deplorable. A man who scores 55 
out of a possible 75 with three rounds of five shots each 
at fifteen yards gets the grade of m.arksman. A man 
who gets 70 is a sharpshooter. This poor showing ex- 
hibits the necessity of beginning at the beginning and 
teaching the men how to handle and clean their weapons. 
The situation is worse than I thought it was. Already 
one man has killed another at the range. It was purely 
accidental, but certainly ought never to have happened." 
Skill with the revolver is acquired only by constant 
practice. The unskillfulness of the police is in no wise 
different from that of all novices in the use of firearms. 
The individual policeman is not to be held responsible 
for his inefficiency as a marksman. The responsibility 
rests with the higher officials whose duty it is to attend to 
the efficiency of the department in all respects. To 
able to shoot accurately is as essential to the police officer 
as it is to the soldier. If the policemen cannot use their 
revolvers properly, the question naturally arises then as 
to why they are armed with them. 
GAME FOR CHARITY. 
This is the season of the year when patients in hos- 
pitals, children in orphan asylums, and the dwellers in 
homes for the aged and indigent are surprised and grati- 
fied by having set before them quail on toast, woodcock 
and other choice tid-bits of game from the markets. In 
Springfield, Mass., the other day the sick in the hospitals 
had such a treat at the expense of the Eastern States- 
Refrigerating Company, a local concern upon whose cold 
storage vaults the game constables had pounced, dis- 
covering therein thirty-five woodcock and seven par- 
tridges, which were promptly confiscated and turned over 
to the authorities. The Eastern States people got off 
cheaply at that. The fine which might have been imposed 
for the unlawful possession of the entire number of forty- 
two birds would have amounted at $20 per bird to $840. 
The court, however, appeared to entertain the opinion 
that such a penalty would have been excessive, and the 
defendants were therefore permitted to plead guilty 
to having in possession three birds only, for which the 
fine amounted to $60. 
In California the same course is followed of donating 
contraband game to charitable institutions. A current re- 
port of the State Board of Fish Commissioners, which 
records seizures at various times aggregating more than 
13,617 pounds of striped bass, 2,400 pounds of salmon, 
1,200 pounds of steelheads, 1,290 pounds of sturgeon, 260 
abalones and 600 pounds of trout, all taken as evidence 
against violators of the fish law, also records that there 
were seized 1,500 California deer hides which were 
offered for sale or cached awaiting a favorable oppor- 
tunity for shipment, some in transit as baggage, being 
packed in trunks, others in dry goods boxes marked 
"household goods," and consigned to private residence' ^ 
As the skins could not be eaten by the folk in the oh' 
people's homes, they were disposed of to tanners ano 
the proceeds deposited in the game preservation fund. 
There did go, however, to the hospitals, ^orphan asy- 
lums and old people's charity homes of San Fran- 
cisco, among them the Little Sisters of the Poor, the 
Alms House, and the Protestant and Hebrew and 
Catholic orphan asylums about iii dozen of quail, 175 
dozen of ducks, 30 dozen doves, and snipe, grouse, pheas- 
ant and venison in small lots aggregating large amounts. 
The investigation instituted by the New York Forest, 
Fish and Game Commission to determine the cause of 
the unusual mortality of Adirondack deer last winter, has 
resulted in a finding of don't know. We print elsewhere 
the conclusions of the experts who studied specimens, 
made the subject of autopsies. This is disappointing, in- 
asmuch as until the cause of death shall be determined 
and demonstrated to be something within the power of 
man to control, we may not hope to provide a remedy. 
Aside from this announcement of the futility of the deer 
inquiry, the report of the State game authorities on the 
animals of the Adirondacks will be read with sincere 
satisfaction. 
The Grand Army man and the amateur deer hunter 
were discussing their favorite themes. Said the G. A. 
man : "I was in every battle of the Civil War, where the 
bullets rained, and came through without a scratch. The 
ratio was about 10,000 bullets to one kill." "Pooh," re- 
torted the deer hunter, "I hunted one day in the woods 
for deer, and escaped death. The ratio is one bullet to 
one kill." 
The services of Secretary John D. Whish, of the New 
York Forest, Fish and Game Commission, in providing 
for the St. Louis Exposition the admirable exhibit of 
New York fishes, has received merited recognition in the 
award of a silver medal. The exhibit comprised about 
100 specimens which representee! all the better known 
species. 
