80 
FOREST AND STREAM 
Februaey, 1919 
footsteps homeward with the red pelt. 
And ’18 was dying; these were but 
memories. What of 1919? It was a 
hazard of fortune. Then from field I 
turned to fireside, and my heart failed 
me. How could I let the Old Year go? 
Only I could see the faces that saw the 
year begin — comrades of forest and 
stream, companions of camp-fire and 
trail — gone %vere they across the Great 
Divide. What to them or I was the 
coming of the New’ Year? 
Then through the haze I saw the still 
white faces, heard the roar of a thousand 
guns, saw the wreck and ruin of a hun- 
dred battlefields; w'ould the bells of the 
new’ born year bring perpetual peace? 
But now as I wondered the shadows fled. 
The moon hid her fair face behind a 
cloud. I heard the sharp bai’k of a fox 
and the guttural call of a swamp bit- 
tern, the pond at my feet flung to my 
ears a dull boom as the ice settled, and 
a sudden chill came on the air as the 
forest sighed, moved by a gentle breeze. 
I took out my watch, the hour stood 
midnight. I knew the Old Year was 
dead and as if to mock, the jangling 
bells from the great city, told me the 
child was born. The Old King was dead 
— a year of life to the New King. 
Edward Wilbur, New York. 
THE VALUE OF OUTDOOR BOOKS 
To the Editor of Forest and Stream ; 
H unting and fishing has been the 
favorite hobby of mine ever since I 
was big enough to use a ram-rod, or 
twine a worm around a hook, and I have 
read books and magazines ever since I 
learned to read; but it’s just within the 
last two years that I awoke to the fact 
that I was missing, what would be to 
me, the most interesting things I could 
read — books and magazines devoted ex- 
clusively to entertaining and educating 
us in the very sport that so many of us 
love so well. 
I am one of that large class of hunters 
who, by force of circumstances, or other 
reasons, hunt year after year over almost 
the same ground, and give very little 
thought or study to game outside of our 
limited territory; except, to live in hope 
that some day the opportunity may come, 
and we can get into the big woods and get 
some real hunting. 
In the short time that I have devoted 
to reading outdoor books and magazines, 
I have found they are a source of educa- 
tion that enlarge our possibilities of 
pleasure, and open new fields of enjoy- 
ment for us in our old game covers. 
Last fall, while out with a friend 
shooting quail, we had a covey scattered 
on a low, swampy piece of ground, and 
we were taking our turn shooting first, 
when it was a single bird. The dog came 
to a point beside a small pool of water, 
and we started toward him, and when we 
were within about fifteen steps of him a 
slow-flying bird arose. It was my turn 
to shoot; I fired, and it fell. 
We walked over to it and I picked it 
up. I didn’t know what it was. My 
companion, who was older than I was, 
and, like myself, had hunted mostly 
around home, didn’t know what it was 
either. I carried it around with me 
awhile, and then took another look at it 
and threw it away. 
Near a stream, in some woods where I 
go fishing sometimes, I have at different 
times flushed a swift, erratic flying bird, 
but I never knew what it was. 
In a book that I got from Forest and 
Stream’s Book Department some time 
ago, I find both these birds described ; the 
first was a rail, the other a woodcock, 
and neither is mentioned in the Synopsis 
of Game Laws, printed on the back of my 
hunting license — they are almost total 
strangers in this part of the country. 
Here I had, through ignorance, thrown 
away a perfectly good rail, and it would 
have been worth more than the price of 
the book to me to have known at the time 
what it was — not the value of it, but the 
pleasure of knowing it was a game bird. 
There are other ways in which we are 
benefited ; we learn to be more observant 
of animal life, and that the pleasure of 
the hunt doesn’t always depend on the 
amount of game we are able to slaughter. 
I can take my .22 rifle and my rabbit 
hound and have an evening’s sport let- 
ting the hound chase one rabbit around. 
Of course I usually get the rabbit be- 
fore dark, which makes the evening’s 
sport a complete success. 
These are just instances illustrating 
that by reading “our” magazines we can 
get better acquainted with the animals 
and birds that we meet, and that they 
educate us up to a higher standard of 
sportsmanship and a greater need for the 
preservation of our game. If every per- 
son that owns a gun received and read 
each month a sporting magazine or two, 
he would consciously or unconsciously 
become a better sportsman, and the game 
supply would be safe for years to come. 
We shotild like to give credit for the 
above article, but the last page became 
separated from the body of the letter and 
we can only hope that the writer will 
apprise us of his name and address so 
that we may thank him in another issue. 
The letter is very gratifying to us as it 
bears out a belief of ours. Books of 
sports are useful and necessary to the 
sportsman. We all like to look at the 
world of outdoors through other people's 
eyes. — [Editors.] 
WHO OWNED THIS PIGEON ? 
To the Editor of Forest and Stream : 
I AM enclosing leg bands taken from a 
carrier pigeon that was picked up ex- 
hausted on the Hudson River, midway be- 
tween Ossining and Rockland at 4 P. M. 
on September 23, 1918. It was still alive, 
but very weak and did not survive the 
night. 
J. H. Carpenter, Ossining, N. Y. 
The bands enclosed in Mr. Carpenter's 
letter were one of aluminum marked 18 
(enclosed in a diamond-shaped figure) , L. 
M — 1470; also a narrow band of brass 
marked 3189. Some feathers were also 
enclosed in the letter, showing the bird 
to have been buff-colored and white. 
We should be very glad if the owner of 
this bird will write to Forest and 
Stream, and we unll return the leg bands 
to him. No messages were found on the 
bird. [Editors.] 
WHAT IS A GAME FISH 
To the Editor of Forest and Stream : 
T O settle an argument, will you kindly 
give us an opinion on the following 
question : 
A contends that a game fish is one 
that puts up a game fight. B contends 
in the eyes of the Fish and Game Laws, 
any fish that is protected by law and an 
open and closed season thereon, is a game 
fish, that the fighting propensities of the 
fish have nothing to do with it. 
This question has been discussed con- 
siderably in the Elks’ Club here and we 
are referring it to you for settlement. 
W. W. Menchel, New Hampshire. 
Realizing that our Benevolent Brethren 
merit the best and most authoritative 
opinions that can be obtained, we sub- 
mitted this question to several angling 
experts who are well known to the read- 
ers of Forest and Stream. Their an- 
swers, which are varied and interesting, 
are given below. [Editors.] 
DEFINITION OF A GAME-FISH 
To the Editor of Forest and Stream : 
I N the Game and Fish Protective Laws 
of the various states a game-fish is 
considered one that is usually caught 
with hook and line, and one that takes 
a natural or an artificial bait. 
From the angler’s viewpoint a game- 
fish has quite a different meaning, which 
I have elsewhere expressed as follows: 
“In co-ordinating the essential attrib- 
utes of game-fishes, each inherent trait 
and quality must be duly and impartially 
considered. Their habits and habitat; 
their aptitude to rise to the artificial 
fly; their manner of resistance and 
struggle for freedom when hooked; their 
finesse and intelligence and their excel- 
lence as food must all be taken into ac- 
count and duly weighed.” 
Dr. James A. Henshall, 
Cincinnati, Ohio. 
GAME FISH AND OTHERS 
To the Editor of Forest and Stream : 
T he term game as applied to objects 
of pursuit has of late years been made 
to embrace a number of animals and fish 
far in excess of the original ones. 
Strictly speaking game fish are fish of 
the salmon family only, all others come 
under the head of “Pike and other coarse 
fish.” 
The terms used in venerie are very 
ancient and were used long before the 
discovery of the American continent with 
its numerous forms of game, totally un- 
,known to those who originally specified 
just exactly what game consisted of. 
It is impossible to draw the line be- 
tween game fish and other kinds of fish 
without offending the susceptibilities of 
some. A man who had fished for and 
caught numbers of black bass would be 
highly indignant if you told him he had 
only caught “coarse fish” and not game 
fish, whereas the same man might pos- 
sibly regard catfish as anything but 
game fish. 
The origin of the term game lies 
somewhere in the time of the feudal 
system. Certain animals of the chase 
were reserved for the pleasure of the 
