May 6, 1905.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
381 
rii 
it seems impossible to conceive of any other process of 
destruction within the power of man that could effect that 
which has been demonstrated in this region. 
With the operations of the Keswick corporation as a 
precedent, half a dozen other smelting plants are under 
way and projected in this region, some of them have sites 
near large bodies of as fine timber as is found on the 
Pacific coast. It would appear from these facts that a 
large portion of northern California is doomed to abso- 
lute destruction, for the sole purpose of smelting opera- 
tions connected with mines that usually prove unstable 
;md temporary. 
After four or five years of investigation and legal pro- 
cedure an injunction was issued from the Federal Court 
in San Francisco last month, enjoining the Keswick cor- 
poration from further smelting operations in Shasta 
county. 
"The Mountain Copper Coriipany has appealed to the 
United States Supreme Court from the judgment issued 
out of the United States District Court by Judge 
Morrow, enjoining the company from operating its 
smelter at Keswick to the injury of vegetation. * * * 
"The filing, of the appeal insures the company against 
interference with the operation of its great smelting plant 
for a considerable time to come. The most conservative 
estimate of the time which will elapse before the matter 
can be heard by the Supreme Court is six months, while 
other estimates run from one tO' two years. General 
Manager Lewis T. Wright is said to have made the state- 
ment that the injunction came as a great surprise to the 
company. 
"The granting of the injunction is of but little effect, 
as there are many loopholes in the law and more than 
one way to avoid the consequences of an injunction, even 
when issued out of a United States court." 
In this land of freedom we have been criticised abroad 
for being too strenuous. It would seem that this view 
must have been taken somewhat obliquely. It did not 
include the more deliberate action of courts and protec- 
tive legislation. 
The moral, the educational effect of this denudation 
of northern California, may perhaps some time affect 
other regions for their good. Here, it has a tendency to 
make the preservation of forests, the conservation of 
water sources, the protection of game and fish, the dignity 
of general government and the fundamental provisions 
of the Federal Constitution look somewhat kaleidoscopic. 
Charles L. Paige. 
About Bob Rodgers. 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
I had been sent with a mail from Fort Concho, Tex., to 
Camp Charlotte, an outpost that we had west of the 
Concho and half-way between it and the Pecos River. I 
was allowed to take two days each way on this trip; I 
would have taken a week, probably, only the officers 
would not stand for it, and I was on my way back to the 
Concho when late in the afternoon, while I was thinking 
of going into camp on a creek just ahead of me, I noticed 
a party of cowboys with a wagon in camp there already. 
My camp would be with them to-night, so riding down 
to them I had just time to get my saddle off and my 
horse staked out before the cook began to hammer on his 
tin pan with a spoon, a sign that supper was ready. 
Before we sat down to it, though, the cook going to his 
mess-chest at the tail end of the wagon, brought out a 
quart beer bottle half full of the post trader's "old rye 
whisky" — six weeks old, remarking that we might as well 
finish this now, as this was the last we had; we could 
trust to luck not to get bit by a snake later on. "You 
have the most of them killed," he said. I had been shoot- 
ing them around the post. 
This cowboy outfit belonged to a man who had his 
ranch down near Fort Mason, but he had the contract 
here of supplying Fort Concho with fresh beef, and these 
men were out here now hunting up the beef. 
The contracter did not own a single head of cattle in 
this country then. Neither did anyone else, although 
there were plenty of cattle here — part of them were 
mavericks — cattle that had never been branded; and the 
rest were cows that had become footsore and had been 
left behind out of the different droves that passed here 
on the way to California; but this man seemed to think 
that he owned them all, and would try to prevent us from 
shooting them when we wanted extra beef. He was not 
here to-day. One of these men I had known ever since 
we were small boy?; he had gone west when nineteen 
years old to hunt bears and gold, he said. The bears he 
had found; the gold still remained to be hunted for. He 
had done his hunting for it in a country where there was 
none ; and to-night while we were seated around the camp 
fire I got his story for the first time. His name was Bob 
Rodgers. We had been giving each other an account of 
how each of lis had met our first bear, when Rodgers 
spoke up addressing me with, "Say, did I ever tell you 
how I met my first bear?" 
"No. Let us hear of it now, though I have often won- 
dered, Bob, since I met you here, what brought you west, 
anyhow. You were not meant for a cowboy. Your 
mother meant to make a minister of you, you know." 
■'Well, it w^as this way. You remember the time that 
General Floyd started from Leavenworth to go out and 
whip the Mormons, don't you?" 
"Oh, yes ; I was going out to help him whip them when 
my mother put her veto on it. But he did not have to 
whip them, he only got as far as Fort Bridger before the 
winter overtook him and by the following spring Brigham 
Young had got one of his messages that he was in the 
habit of getting from God or elsewhere. It told him not 
to fight." 
"Well, I was a kid of nineteen then, and was helping 
to navigate the old John C. Fremont: you remember 
her?" 
"Yes. I knew her; go on." 
"Well, we took the old tub up to St. Louis and here 
the United States marshal tied her up for us for debt. 
When the rnarshal took the boat we were paid off and 
sent adrift in St. Louis. There were two other young 
men in this crew, cousins of the name of White; they 
came from Ohio ; and we three formed a plan to go up 
to Leavenworth, then join Floyd either as teamsters or 
soldiers. I and one of the Whites thought we would not 
be taken as soldiers, we were both minors yet." 
"Yes, you might both have gone as soldiers ; age would 
not have cut any figure there; your parents would be too 
far away then to object, and Floyd needed men then. 
You would be the very fellows I would grab at first, had 
I been with him and had been sent to hunt recruits." 
"Well, the next thing would be to get to Leavenworth 
without having to walk there; and we thought we saw a 
way to do it. There was a small stern-wheel boat here 
that was going to Kansas City, or they thought it was ; it 
may have got there in time, but did not get there this time. 
It drew two feet when loaded, and no feet when light. 
We shipped on it. She stuck on a bar about twenty miles 
below Independence, Mo., and we left her there arid 
walked into town. There we were told that Floyd did 
not need any teamsters; that all his hauling would be 
done by contractors who would use bull teams and fur- 
nish their own drivers. We held an9ther council, and 
concluded to let Floyd go to Utah, while we would keep 
on west and fight Indians, hunt and prospect. Neither 
of us knew any more about prospecting than we did . 
about preaching, but I thought that I did, and I'll bet that 
I have waded one hundred miles through those creeks 
up in Kansas with a tin pan washing out sand and hunt- 
ing for gold. We had to get an outfit next before we did 
any prospecting and we got it here. The three of us had 
about $200 between us, but that would not get much of 
an outfit then. We got three heavy rifles, old ones, and 
plenty of powder and ball. Then we got two Texas 
ponies for packing; the man that we got them from was 
so anxious to get rid of them that he let us have them 
for $30 each ; then threw in a couple of old pack saddles, 
his ropes, an ax and spade, and his cooking pots, a whole 
cainp outfit, in fact, all except the tent; that we never 
had. 
"We could not afford to get ponies to ride, so we 
walked, and on the march one of us always went ahead 
while the other two drove up the pack train. 
"We made mistakes, of course, but for three tender- 
feet, two of them only boys, we got along first rate. 
The Whites had both been farmer's boys ; they knew how 
to use a rifle, and so did I. I have you to thank for that ; 
you taught me. So we always had plenty of meat; in fact, 
we wasted it. 
"Before we left Independence we inquired about the 
dangerous animals we would be likely to meet, and were 
told that the black bear would be about the only one 
which would give us trouble. But he would, he was 
really dangerous, he would charge the whole three of us 
if our guns did not stop him ; and it took a whole lot of 
lead to kill him, they said. And after night he would be 
liable to charge our camp. We must keep a good look- 
out for him. We swallowed this stuff, of course. The 
only bear I had ever seen was one that was kept chained 
up in a slaughter house at home. You knew him." 
"Yes, and he would be far more dangerous than any 
you would be likely to meet out in Kansas." 
"These fellows told us this stuff to keep us awake at 
night I suppose. Anyhow, it did not keep me awake one 
night when I was watching for the bear to come and do 
that charging. When leaving Independence we first 
struck out to the southwest. We wanted to strike the 
Arkansas River, w^hat for I don't know, unless it was to 
give the Comanches or Cheyennes a better chance to find 
us ; and I have often since wondered why they never 
troubled us. In all the time that we were out I never 
saw them nor any signs of them, and in the next few 
months we traveled pretty well all over western Kansas, 
and at last brought up in the Indian Territory, never once 
seeing a hostile Indian. They may have seen us often 
enough but may have thought that we were not worth 
plundering. We set out to make only twenty miles each 
day, then camp if we could find water at the end of those 
twenty miles. We generally could find water almost any- 
where ; but on the fifth day out we had to go at least 
thirty miles before we found any, and when we did find 
it we were about ready to drop. 
"On account of these bears being ready to charge our 
camp at night we had up to now alwa}'s kept a guard on. 
Each of us would stand one-third of the night, then 
tramp on foot all next day. 
"We were camped to-night on a small creek that had 
a fringe of small cottonwoods growing along it; and after 
dark I took my rifle, and, going just below camp, went on 
post to stand my share of the guard. I was dead tired 
and sat down, then lay down, and must have fallen asleep 
almost right off. I was wakened up some time in the 
night by feeling something cold scraping across my face, 
and just got my eyes open in time to see a young bear 
cub about a year old making off as fast as his legs could 
carry him. He was down in the bushes and out of sight 
before I had time to fire at him. 
"I looked at my watch and found it to be just 3 o'clock. 
I had been 'standing guard' six hours. Then I went and 
called my relief, telling him what time it was. I had the 
only watch in the party. This was the last night that 
any of us ever stood a guard. After thinking the matter 
over next day, I told the others just how everything had 
happened and that those men had only been making fools 
of us ; and this guard was killing us anyhow. I for one 
would risk the bears killing me. 
"We had been out nearly two months, and in that time 
had not seen a dozen of ranches in this whole country; 
it was all a wilderness yet, and at last we ran across a 
small log cabin that we afterward found out had been 
built by a sheep herder. It was vacant now, and we took 
possession of it, meaning to stop here a month or more. 
The cabin was only about ten feet by six and had a flat 
mud roof. The door, which was next to one corner of 
it, had been broken off but it lay in the cabin and we put 
it in place again. We were still more or less afraid of 
those bears, though none of us except me had ever seen 
any yet. The cabin had no window, but to the right of the 
door a log had been cut out leaving a space about two 
feet long and less than a foot high. We always left this 
open at night to let fresh air in. To the right of this 
space I had a small shelf where I kept my cooking uten- 
sils and anything we did not want lying on the floor. 
"My partners had taken both the ponies and gone after 
supplies, expecting to be gone about four days, and on the 
second night after they had left I was wakened up about 
midnight by . the racket made by my tin pans and cups 
falling off the shelf down on the floor, and looking to 
see what was wrong now, I could just see the head and 
shoulders of a bear shoved in through this narrow open- 
ing ; but he could not get any more of himself in through 
it. I had a wooden water bucket half full of coarse 
brown sugar back at the far end of the shelf. The beat; 
had it now, he held it between one of his paws and his 
breast, and was trying to clean the sugar out with his 
other paw, but was not getting much of it. The sugar 
was in a hard cake; I had to use a knife to get any out 
of it myself. In reaching for the sugar he had upset my 
pans, causing the racket. I was lying on the floor in the 
far corner of the cabin and the bear had not seen me yet. 
J had left my gun standing leaning against the wall at 
my head, and keeping my eyes on the bear I reached^ to 
get it, and knocked it down instead; and the bear letting 
go of the bucket, it dropped to the floor while he dropped 
to the ground outside and made off. 
"I had the door held shut by a prop on the_ inside, and 
picking up my gun I ran to the door and got it open part 
of the way, then sticking my head out began to look for 
the bear, but at first I could see nothing of him. There 
was moonlight, but the cabin stood up on a hillside in 
among the trees. At last I made him out about fifty yards 
away. He had stopped now, then turning around he 
started to come back again. Not after me I suppose, he 
had not seen me ; he probably wanted more sugar. I tooki 
the best aim I could in the light I had, then fired, then 
slamming the door shut I put up the prop first, then lit 
a candle to see to load again, and then got the door open 
but could not see any more of the bear. Not caring to 
go out after night looking for him I closed the door, put 
the tin pans in the opening for him to knock down again 
should he come back, then went to bed again. Next 
morning, as soon as it was light , enough to see, I started 
to hunt up the bear, first going to where he had been 
when I shot at him. There was no blood to be seen here. 
I had no doubt missed him I thought. But his trail led 
off toward the creek, then up it, and after following it 
for 200 yards, I found the bear lying in among the wil- 
lows dead. My big ball had taken him in the breast, then 
going nearly the whole length of his body, had passed out 
through his flank. 
"It took me half of the forenoon to get that skin off. 
I was not an expert at skinning bears then, and did not 
want to spoil the skin, and did not. We afterward traded 
it for enough supplies to last us nearly three months. 
As soon as I had the skin off and had it pegged out to 
drj', I next cut up the bear and had him hung up on trees 
when my partners got home late that evening. 
"This was not the last bear we shot in that country, 
either. We began to hunt for them now, and in the next 
few weeks got two more. Then we abandoned the cabin 
and left that country finally, going down to the Indian 
Territory next. There in the Choctaw Nation we put in 
the whole of the following winter, then kept on down to 
Texas and from here both of the Whites went home, I 
staid in Texas." 
"I'll bet that both of those Whites and I were shooting 
at you, Bob, a few years after this." Bob had been in 
the Confederate Army. 
"I should not wonder if you were," he told me. "Do 
you know that you came very near never getting a chance 
to shoot at me? When I first saw the flag of your divi- 
sion, the winter you were at Camp Pierpont, I had half 
made up my mind to desert the first time I went on 
picket and go over to you. That time when you charged 
us out of Drainsville, I saw the flag that you fellows car- 
ried for the first time and refused to fire on it. My cap- 
tain was going to shoot m.e, until I told him that your 
flag was the flag of the State I had been born in. Then 
when I found out that you were at Pierpont I had half a 
mind to desert and join you, only I was afraid of get- 
ting sent to prison." 
"No, you would have been given the oath of allegiance, 
then sent home to Allegheny." 
The flag that Bob would not fire on was the State of 
Pennsylvania flag. We never carried a United States 
flag, only the State flag ; it has the State coat of arms in 
the blue field instead of the stars. 
The last time that I ever saw Bob, fifteen years after 
this, was when I defended him tiefore a judge and jury 
in Silver City, New Mexico, on a charge of horse 
stealing. 
He and two other men had a fast trotting horse that 
they were using as a "ringer," entering him under a false 
name in a class that would be too slow for him. It is 
the worst offense that can be commited on the turf. They 
had some difference about money and Bob sold his share 
in the horse for $100 cash, and a judgment note for $600. 
Then when he tried to collect the note he could not, so 
he took the horse down the country and sold him and 
was arrested for it on his return. Then he sent for me 
to defend him. In a northern court of record, the only 
one that I would be allowed to defend would be myself, 
and I at first thought that it would be the same in these 
Territory courts, but a lawyer to whom I went to get 
him to defend Bob got the judge to let me do it. I put 
in part of a forenoon raising objections to everything that 
the prosecuting attorney said or did, and in badgering his 
witnesses. Then as I had no witnesses except Bob — and 
I took good care not to use him as one, though the op- 
posing counsel was anxious for me to call Bob — I put in 
the greater part of another hour in trying to talk that 
jury to death. They acquitted Bob, and I then had this 
lawyer collect that note for him. The horse had to be 
sold again to pay it. Then Bob, taking my advice, went 
home to where he had been born, the first time he had 
been there in thirty years. Cabia Blanco. 
For listening to the noise made by fish in the depths of 
the seas, a Norwegian inventor has devised a telephone 
to be lowered overboard from fishing boats. With this 
he claims a fisherman can detect the presence of fish, their 
numbers, and even their kind. Herrings or smaller fish, 
when they come in large numbers, make a piping, whist- 
ling sound, while cod make a roaring noise. When they 
come close to the submarine telephone the movements of 
the individual fish can be distinguished. The pouring of 
the water through the gills sounds like the labored 
breathing of a huge beast. The action of the fins gives oflE 
a rumble like surf beating on a beach. Crunching of 
teeth and rustling of scales are also appiarent. The in- 
strtmient consists of a microphone in a heremetically 
sealed steel box. It is connected by electric wires with a 
telephone in the vessel above. Every sound in the water 
below is intensified by the microphone and conducted by 
the electric wires to the telephone.--Weekly Scotsman.. 
