Oct. 21, ipoS-T ' 
FOREST AND STREAM 
state that I strolled down one beautiful September 
morning, while at Evanston, to one of the many piers 
that have disfigured Lake Michigan’s picturesque shore. 
, Here I observed a number of anglers having great sport 
H in taking the toothsome perch. I finally saw one of 
! them land a four-pound carp with a worm-baited liook. 
i On inquiring from the carp-taking angler as to their 
; abundance here, he stated that the lake was full of 
; them, and that in the Calumet, a tributary, they were 
; so numerous that you could almost cross the river on 
j 4 heir backs. A little extravagant this, but it tells the 
story of the ever-increasing and advancing carp. . An 
additional fact of a similar character came to me this 
summer while at Sea Gull on the St. Mary in pursuit 
of the gamy black bass. Here I caught several baby carp 
in my minnow trap. Again the dynamite blasting of the 
rocky bottom was going on there, frequently bringing 
some goodly carp to the surface. At other places the 
same results ensue. It is therefore evident that those 
Great Lakes of pure water will soon be foraging fields, 
so to speak, for this vast multitude of cheap food fish 
which goes plowing through the waters like a destroy- 
ing army carrying and destroying everything before it. 
As we have introduced this all-important subject, it 
would not be amiss to give in connection with it a 
piscatorial detail of the carp in its European habitats. 
We glean from the Government reports, which are 
highly interesting, as well as valuable, that the carp is 
alleged to have been imported into England in the 
year 1504. In Austria, which possesses the most ex- 
tensive carp fisheries in Europe, the culture ol the 
carp can be traced as far back as the year 1227. The 
Emperor Charles IV., of Germany, by granting sundry 
privileges, favored the establishment of ponds in his 
dominions, arid the monks were especially assiduous 
in the culture of fish in ponds. As early as the first 
half of the, fourteenth ceirtury, Bohemia had its first 
large carp pond, and the culture of this fish progressed 
in that country, as also in Poland, and that district 
which now comprises German Austria; also in upper 
Lusatia, Saxony, Silesia and Bavaria. A celebrated es- 
tablishment for carp culture, with large extensive ponds, 
was located, as early as the fourteenth century, near the 
town of Wittengau, in Bohemia, Austria. The first 
beginning of it may be traced to the year 1367. At that 
time the lords of Rosenberg called into existence and 
maintained for centuries these establishments on a 
scale so extensive that to this day they are the admira- 
tion of the visitor, the main parts having survived, 
while the race of the Rosenbergs has long been extinct. 
The artificial ponds of the Manor of Wittengau com- 
prise an area of no less than 20,000 acres. The pro- 
ceeds amounted to about 500.000 pounds of carp per 
annum. The ponds of the Princess of Schwarzenberg 
are probably the largest and the most extensive of the 
kind on the globe. They are usually situated in some 
undulating country, lowland country, where small valle3^s 
have, been closed by gigantic dams for the purpose of 
forming reservoirs. There are also many hundreds of 
other ponds, but none of them covering more than a 
few acres, but almost every large farm possesses at 
least one of them. 
The carp are divided into three chief groups, viz., 
Ihe “scale carp,’’ the “mirror carp” and the “leather 
carp.” These fishes are partial to stagnant water, or 
such as have a not too swift current with a loamy, 
muddy bottom and deep places covered with vegetation. 
It inhabits now most of the larger and smaller rivers 
of Europe, particularly the Elbe, Weser, Rhine, 
Danube, Po, Rhone, Garonne, Loire, then the Bavar- 
ian and Swiss lakes, the Lake of Constance, etc.; even 
salt water seems to agree with it very well. They have 
been taken in the 'Black Sea, where its weight often 
amounts to from fifteen to twenty pounds. It is ahso 
found in the Caspian Sea in great numbers, and is 
known there by the name of “Sassan.” 
The carp does not grow in the winter. Warmth 
alone seems to exercise a favorable influence upon it 
and to promote growth. It only grows in the months 
of May, June, July and August, and does not appear to 
continue doing so in September. It is a most startling 
fact that the carp, though it does. not take any food dur- 
ing its winter sleep in its natural retreat, does not 
diminish in weight. The abundance of eggs in the 
carp is very great, and it is this circumstance which 
will explain its extraordinary increase in the natural 
waters. A fish weighing from four to five pounds con- 
tains, on an average, 400,000 to 500,000 eggs. Some 
statements figure still higher. 
The growth of a carp differs, according as the fish 
inhabits cold or warm water, a river, lake, or pond, 
finding plentiful food therein, or being fed. An ad- 
ditional factor is the quality of the soil, whether muddy 
or stony. In cold water, or such as hns a stony 
ground, the carp will not progress favorably. For this 
reason, the statements concerning the normal size at- 
tained to in a certain given time differ widely. 
The normal weight which a carp may attain to in 
three years, whether it be a scale carp, mirror carp, or 
leather carp, is an average of from 3 to 3f4 pounds; 
and that of one which has lived two summers, con- 
sequently is eighteen months old, will weigh 2j4^ to 
3J4 pounds the year following. 
Carp may reach a very advanced age, as specimens 
are to be found in Austria over 140 years old. The 
increase in length only continues up to a certain age, 
but its circumference will increase up to its thirty- 
fifth year. Some common carp in the southern part of 
Europe — in the lowlands of Hungary, Servia, Croatia, 
Wallachia, as also in Moldavia and the Bukowina— 
which weighed from 30 to 40 pounds and more, measuring 
nearly 3l4 feet in length by 2j^ feet in circumference. 
Old men. whose credibility and truthfulness could not 
be doubted, give detailed accounts of the capture of this 
species of fish in former year.s, giants, which weighed 
from 50 to 60 pounds, and which they had seen them- 
selves. During the Crimean War in 1853 a French en- 
gineer officer, stationed at Widden, on the Danube, in 
Turkc}', killed a carp by a bullet shot, some distance 
below the city; this fish weighed 67 pounds. The struc- 
ture of this fish indicated to a certainty that its age 
could be no more than twenty-four years at the most. It 
is a well-known fact that two large carp, weighing from 
42 to 55 pounds, were tfikon .several years ago on one 
of the Grand Duke of Oldenburg’s domains in northern 
Germany. They had been kept in some particularly 
favorable water, productive of plentiful food, and had 
been used as breeding fishes. These two specimens 
might, from their "size, be calculated to be comparatively 
very aged fishes; it was proved that they were only 
fifteen years old. If we may credit the chronicles kept 
centuries ago by old families, and especially by the 
monks, who had taken possession of all the best lo- 
calities along the banks of the beautiful blue Danube, 
then still greater giants had been caught, and that in 
the waters of the Danube itself. A chronicle of the 
Monaster}'" of Molk, in Austria, refers to a carp weigh- 
ing 78 pounds, which had been captured on Ascension 
Da}'" in 1520. Another record speaks of a carp which 
had been taken in the third decennium of the present 
century in the Lake of Zug, in Switzerland, and which 
weighed 90 pounds. These giants are certainly only 
wonderful exceptions, and have become celebrated 
through the scarcity of such occurrences, but still these 
facts are encouraging illustrations that it is possible 
for such large specimens to grow up in favorable 
waters. All the countries where these large fishes have 
been found, and which are situated between the Black, 
the North, and the Baltic seas, are pretty nearly such 
as have a late spring and a long, cold winter. Near 
Widden the Danube has been frozen frequently. There 
the carp passes from five to seven months in its winter 
sleep, during which it does not grow. 
If this fish thrives so well in countries which have 
such a very cold winter, where the rivers have not 
enough food for them, how much more would they 
thrive in the waters of this country, with their great 
riches of food? But if we take into account the rivers 
of the mild south and southwest of the United States, 
what remarkable success may be expected for this fish 
in those regions? 
Our waters, both north and south, which are rich 
ill vegetable and other food, have already shown their 
generous adaptability for the very rapid increase of this 
ignoble and coarse-grained fish, which bids fair to be 
dominant in this country. “It is here to stay,” and 
much to our sorrow', for it means the entire disappear- 
ance of all other fishes. Time, the old common arbi- 
trator, whose tooth is ever gnawing out the cold,_ hard 
facts, will soon give emphatic evidence of the verity of 
the above enunciation. Alex. Starbuck. 
Some Legal Aspects of the Case of 
Rockefeller vs LaMora. 
It was reported recently that the Appellate Division 
of the Supreme Court of New York had finally settled 
the case of William Rockefeller against Oliver LaMora 
by refusing to permit the attorneys for the defense to 
carry the matter to the Court of Appeals on questions of 
law raised by the attorneys for the defense. The report 
was untrue,, for the Appellate Division has granted the 
permission necessary to carry this case to the final court. 
The fact of the matter is, the attorneys for the defense 
won in the most recent of the legal skirmishes in the four- 
year-old case, which has aroused so much interest among 
sportsmen and woodsmen on both sides of the game pre- 
serve posted lines. On the result of this case depends the 
future of the Adirondack private preserves, and, to some 
extent, the rights of hunters and fishermen to the game 
and fish w'hich are found in the Adirondack region. 
Briefly, the situation is this : • 
William Rockefeller established a “private preserve” in 
tow'nships 16 and 17 in the town of Santa Clara, Franklin 
county, N. Y., which surrounded the village of Brandon. 
Gradually the preserver secured all but twelve or thirteeen 
lots in this village, these lots being owried by Oliver 
LaMora, “Black Joe” Peryea and others. The hunting 
ground of the village was posted and the residents found 
fhemselves cut off from what they considered their deer, 
fish and birds. Fear of the law and of the man of great 
wealth dismayed them, and for a time they took great 
pains not to interefere with the preserve, but gradually 
venturesome spirits sneaked into the forest and caught 
fish or shot deer, They grew bold w'ith success, and, 
finally, after LaMora became boldest of all, he was called 
upon to answer the charge of trespass under the common 
law.' He went to Saranac Lake, and on advice of W. J. 
Saunders, his attorney, LaMora paid the nominal damages 
for trespass, committed three times — 18 cents and $f. 50- 
costs. 
“You can’t afford to fight the case,” Saunders said to 
the woodsman, “and if you pay now it’ll be the cheapest 
way out of the matter.” 
The money was paid, hut before LaMora got out of 
town he w’as served with papers charging him with the 
violation of the so-called Private Park law by catching 
trout, the trespasses for which he had paid damages 
amounting to eighteen, cents, being cited in this case. It 
was asked by the attorneys for Mr. Rockefeller that $55 
damages and costs be awarded the owner under the park 
law on T:he charge of committing trespass by catching 
trout out of the Middle Branch of the St. Regis River. 
“This is putting a man in jeopardy twice for the same 
crime— -this is punishing a man twice for the same act. 
This is unconstitutional,” said Attorney Saunders. “We’ll 
fight it.” 
This was four years ago, and Saunders has made good 
his word of “fighting the case.” He won the case before 
the justice of peace, and Rockefeller appealed to the 
county court, and a jury turned him down. The Appellate 
Division of the Supreme Court sent the case back for a 
new trial the jury again found for the defense;, the 
Appellate Division sent it back for another trial. The 
county judge directed- the jury' to find for the plaintiff, 
and the case was taken to the Appellate Division by the 
defense. The Appellate Division justices affirmed the 
jury’s unwilling verdict, and LaMora’s attorney found 
himself face tq face with eighteen cents damages and 
$790.31 costs, but by no means at the end of his rope. 
■In its opinion on the case as first handed down, the 
Appellate Division ignored the people’s right to the wild 
game, fish and birds, laying stress on the fact that Rocke- 
feller had “spent vast sums of money” in making the pri- 
vate preserve. This is' hot the least interesting feature of 
the case. In other opinions which were handed do}\hi tlie 
expense to which Mr. Rockefeller had been put also fig" 
ures, but in the last opinion the right of the public to ffs 
own game, fish and birds was at last granted. In all the 
opinions the Justices of the Appellate Division all con- 
curred. . , ; 
As the Justices of the Appellate Division had all con- 
curred in the last finding of the county court, it was 
necessary to get the permission of this court to carry the 
matter before the Court of Appeals on questions of 
If this permission had not been given Saunders’ fi^t 
would have ended as far as this case was concerned. He 
must argue the matter before the Appellate Division, so 
he prepared his brief. 
I was at Dickinson Center on the day that the canard 
reached that place saying the Appellate Division had re- 
fused to grant permission to carry the case to the Courfe 
of Appeals. It seemed as though four years of legal cam- 
paign had been lost and the junior member of the law 
firm of Saunders & Saunders (Leslie Saunders) was cor-- 
respondingly blue, but not saying anything until word' 
was received from Attorney Fiero, of Albany, who argued 
the matter of taking the case to the Court of Appeals 
before the Appellate Division for LaMora. 
Fiero read in a New York paper that LaMora’s case 
had been lost, but to make sure he telephoned over to the 
clerk of the court and found that the New York paper 
was wrong. The Appellate Division did not refuse per- 
mission to take the case to the Court of Appeals, but 
granted it in spite of the arguments which Rockefeller’s 
attorneys were able to make. 
• The points on which the case will be taken to the Court 
of Appeals are of vivid personal interest tp sportsmen, 
woodsmen and all others who visit the Adirondack and 
Catskill regions. This case is unquestionably the greatest 
case involving game preserves ever tried in America, and 
on its final result hangs the fate of the efforts to establish 
“parks” in Adirondack wild land after the English “farm 
and preserve” system. In the Adirondacks the preserves 
are engaged in lumbering, while in England agriculture, 
etc., is follow'ed. 
The case has reached a point where the old soldter 
LaMora sinks into comparative insignificance. The real 
defendant in the matter is the public. Rockefeller is not 
trying to defend himself from aggressions on his rights,, 
but he is suing a man who followed a public highway tO' 
a stream of water to which the public has as much right 
as to the air they breathe, and caught trout which Rocke- 
feller did not plant, but some of which the State did 
plant, and the rest of. which were propagated naturally, 
and under circumstances, and in waters which made them 
unquestionably public property. 
The broad, undeniable principle for which Saunders 
has been fighting is this: Time and again the courts, 
legislatures and juries have held that wild game, wild fish 
and wild birds belong to the people. If RockefeHer 
finally wins this case he, a private individual, will receive 
from Oliver LaMora exemplary damages because LaMora 
caught public, trout out of public waters reached from a 
public highway. The suit is not for trespass under the 
common law ; it is for damages under the Private Park 
law, so-called. And it is held hy the defense t^t this 
Private Park law is . unconstitutional because it takes 
public property from the people and puts it into the pos- 
session of private individuals without the consent of the 
required two-thirds vote of the Legislature and the vote 
of the people. 
It is a principle, long established in law and custom, and 
now admitted by the Appellate Division that wild garne, 
wild fish and wild birds belong to the public. _ The robin, 
which sings in the marbles of a private lawri is owned as 
much by the laborer digging the drainage ditch as by the 
man he works for. The trout, flashing in waters of the 
rifts of a natural stream, is owned by any man, woman 
or child w'ho takes it. And the wild deer, whether it is 
upon a preserve thrice posted by a man or association of 
men, or upon the State’s forest lands, is as much the 
property of the sportsman who belongs to no club, and 
owns no preserve, as it does to the holder of the titles to 
the lands. The courts have held this to be so repeatedly, 
but William Rockefeller’s case against Oliver LaMora is 
a fight to break down this oft-repeated principle. 
Ihe case has got far beyond a mere justice’s court 
suit between a land holder and a -poacher. It is now a 
question of how' much a man of vast wealth and tre- 
mendous influence can take from the public. An associa- 
tion to which Mr. Rockefeller belongs claims thousands 
of acres of land in DeBar Mountain Park, so-called, 
which only a few years ago was claimed by the State. It 
remains to be seen whether Mr. Rockefeller can get the 
very birds of the air, and the fish of the waters, and the 
mammals of the land into his possession, as he has 
gotten the lands. 
The points made in the brief, backed by numerous 
cases which were cited, are as follows: 
“First, the court erred in holding that a common law 
action for trespa.ss is involved in this case. It cannot be 
said- that this action is a common law action for a pen- 
alty on the Private Park Statute. 
“This is an action to recover a penalty for disturbing 
and capturing fish, the property of the people, which the 
people, including the defendant, had a right to capture 
at the time defendant did take them, and they became his 
property upon capture and retention.” The cases of Hill 
vs. Bishop, Tremain vs. Richardson, Rosin vs. Lidger- 
wood Mfg. Co., People vs. Hall, etc., were cited. 
“Plaintiff has no right of action under the Private 
Park Statute. He has no right of action for the value 
of the fish caught by defendant, as he did not own them. 
They were the property of the people of this State. Plain- 
tiff had no greater property right in those fish than had 
the defendant. All rights of property of the plaintiff and 
of the other people of the State, except the defendant, 
in and to the fish caught bv defendant ceased the moment 
defendant caught them.” 
“The exclusive right of fishery depends solely upon the 
right to stand upon the soil, and the only remedy the 
owner of the soil has against another for fishing in 
waters passing over his land is an action for trespass on 
the land.” 
Numerous cases are cited in support of these conten- 
tions. . 
Point 2: “The court erred in not granting -defendant’s 
jnotion for a non-suit, since the plaintiff did not h^ve the 
