578 
FOREST AND STREAM 
Nov. 8, 1913 
HERE 
is a letter from a dealer in Cadillac, Mich. 
Dear Sirs 
Thought best to drop you a few lines to let you know that my 525 Stevens 
Pump Gun is still in A 1 shape. I shot this gun about 6,000 times and 
took it apart about 25,000 times to demonstrate it. I sold this fall thus 
far, 6 of your 520 Pump Guns and two 32 High Power Rifles. There 
is no doubt in my mind but that you have the best Pump Gun and the 
best High Power Lever Rifle in the whole world. I shot my 525 Shot¬ 
gun at the Trap for three seasons. I had never a shell stuck in it and 
never balked nor never broke one thing about the gun. I shoot heavy 
loads as I hunt ducks a whole lot. My STEVENS gets them. 
Respectfully, 
[Signed] JOHN H. MAURER. 
For light shooting with light loads you can’t beat the Stevens Repeating 20-Gauge Shotgun No. 200. 
It shoots close—it hits hard—and as Mr. Maurer says of the 525—you will never have a shell stick or 
clog in the mechanism. Sticking or clogging are unknown to Stevens Repeating Shotguns. 
Send to-day for our beautiful illustrated catalog describing in detail our complete line of Rifles, Shotguns, 
Pistols and Rifle Telescopes. 
J. STEVENS ARMS & TOOL COMPANY 
Largest Makers Sporting Firearms in the World 
325 Main Street, Chicopee Falls, Mass. 
Weather. 
BY WILLIS BOYD ALLEN. 
One of the simpler sort of pleasures which 
has somehow been crowded out of our modern 
life, especially in cities, is a wholesome interest 
and delight in phases of the weather. Mark 
Twain, to be sure, has said that we in New 
England have none of that commodity—-‘‘only 
samples.” But even samples may be interest¬ 
ing, in their way. Seriously, it seems a pity 
that the ever-varying conditions of sky and at¬ 
mosphere should have lost their appeal to us, 
save as affecting our material activities and our 
pockets. It is a far cry indeed from the ancient 
adoration of sun and stars, of Jupiter Pluvius, 
of the ice-compelling gods of the North, to the 
hasty modern glance, over our breakfast coffee, 
at the Government observations and predictions 
in the morning paper; important to 11s only as 
regards discrimination between arctics and the 
thin soles, ulster and light coat, to be worn 
down town. 
It may be objected that those very predic¬ 
tions have robbed the weather of its .distinctive 
charm, the mystery, the unexpectedness of its 
changes. Far be it from the writer to cavil 
at the prophecies of the official Sibyl at Wash¬ 
ington; to hint that its (let us be impersonal) 
vague suggestions of “cloudiness” or “possible 
rain” are elusively seductive; to reckon hyper- 
critically the percentage of fulfilled predictions. 
In modern parlance, the aforesaid Sibyl “holds 
down the job” with surprising ability and suc¬ 
cess, and doubtless is of immense value to com¬ 
merce as well as human safety; but it cannot be 
gainsaid that the movements of storms, the ap¬ 
pearance of “depressions” and otherwise afflict¬ 
ed “areas,” are sufficiently erratic to afford the 
weatherwise, in the old, homely sense of the 
word, some occupation, and to retain a por¬ 
tion, at least, of the ancient mystery of the fair 
or clouded heavens. The wind still “bloweth 
where it listeth,” to-day, as in Judea twenty 
centuries ago; we hear the sound thereof, but 
cannot tell whence it cometh and whither it 
goeth, on its mighty errands for the good of 
mankind. 
Let 11s go to sea, even in one of the floating 
palaces of the great trans-Atlantic lines, and 
how interesting the weather instantly becomes! 
Our first glance, on reaching deck in the morn¬ 
ing, is toward the sky and the sensitive surface 
of the ocean, that broad arid ever-renewed chart 
which records every wayward breeze and every 
passing cloud, only to erase the observation and 
enter a fresh report. To the voyager the direc¬ 
tion of the wind, unnoted at home, becomes of 
engrossing importance; the vault of heaven, 
stretching its gracious and wonderful arch day 
by day in vain above Wall Street, is scanned 
with absorbed eye, its beauties commented upon, 
its promises discused. The cinder-laden, smoke 
from our huge red funnel drifts over the after¬ 
deck; and lo! the thrilling information spreads 
through the ship that the wind has shifted to 
the east! A fringe of shower, trailing from a 
cloud-bank far down toward the horizon, excites 1 
more interest than a whole circus procession, 
elephants and all, parading the city street at 
home. 
In camp, the weather becomes an even 
more engrossing topic. Work, play, every oc¬ 
cupation is dependent upon its vagaries. The 
guide solemnly raises his moistened forefinger, 
and we hang upon his verdict. He pronounces 
the wind favorable for fishing; or shakes his 
head, with portentous gravity, deciding that rain 
impends, and we must hug the tent. The talk 
around the camp-fire at night is equally divided 
between stories of hunting or fishing exploits, 
and predictions as to to-morrow’s weather. All 
other subjects for meditation may grow flat, 
stale and unprofitable; the weather remains to 
spur our jaded perceptions. Consistently in¬ 
constant, it tantalizes, beckons, warns, but al¬ 
ways attracts. It is like Barrie’s bewitching 
girl, with “eyes that say you never must, nose 
that says why don’t you? and a mouth that 
says I rather wish you could!” 
Many a well-thumbed book of the vade 
mecum class is largely dependent for its charm 
upon the author’s na'ive observations upon 
everyday phenomena of the elements. Who has 
not envied White his simple delight in the varying 
developments of climatic conditions in humble 
Selborne, and the wondrous fluctuations of the 
mercury in his thermometer? What would the 
Odyssey be without its constant references to 
the boisterous winds, the clouds, and the moods 
of the wine-dark sea? How much that mar¬ 
velous Scritpure story in the eighteenth chapter 
of I. Kings—said to be one of the most dramatic 
narratives ever written—gains from the introduc¬ 
tion of the closing episode on the high slopes 
of Mt. Carmel; the appearance, in the west, of 
the “little cloud, like a man’s hand”; the final 
grand scene where “the heaven was black with 
