592 
FOREST AND STREAM 
Nov. 8, 1913. 
V\ josmt OF OUTDOOR LIFE 
TRAVEL NATURE STUDY SHOOTING FISHING YACHTING 
Published Weekly by the 
Forest and Stream Publishing Company, 
Charles A. Hazen, President. 
W. G. Beecroft, Secretary. Charles L. Wise, Treasurer. 
127 Franklin Street, New York. 
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THE OBJECT OF THIS JOURNAL 
will be to studiously promote a healthful in¬ 
terest in outdoor recreation, and to cultivate 
a refined taste for natural objects. 
—Forest and Stream, Aug. 14, 1873. 
NOVEMBER DAYS. 
In a midsummer sleep one dreams of winter, 
its cold, its silence and desolation all surround¬ 
ing him; then awakes, glad to find himself in 
the reality of the light and warmth of summer. 
Were we dreaming yesterday of woods more 
gorgeous in their leafage than a flower garden 
in the flush of profusest bloom, so bright with 
innumerable tints that autumnal blossoms paled 
beside them as stars at sunrise? Were we 
dreaming of air soft as in spring time, of the 
gentle babble of brooks, the carol of bluebirds, 
the lazy chirp of crickets, and have we suddenly 
awakened to be confronted by the desolation of 
naked forests, the more forlorn for the few tat¬ 
tered remnants of gay apparel that flutter in the 
bleak wind? To hear but the sullen roar of the 
chill blast and the clash of stripped boughs, the 
fitful scurry of wind-swept leaves and the rav¬ 
ing of swollen streams swelling and falling as 
in changing stress of passion, and the heavy 
leaden patter of rain on roof and sodden leaves 
and earth? 
Verily, the swift transition is like a pleasant 
dream with an unhappy awakening. 
Yet not all November days are dreary. Now 
the sun shines warm from the steel-blue sky, its 
eager rays devour the rime close on the heels 
of the retreating shadows, and the north wind 
sleeps. 
The voice of the brimming stream falls to 
an even softer cadence, like the murmur of pine 
forests swept by the light touch of a steady 
breeze. 
Then the wind breathes softly from the 
south, and there drifts with it from warmer 
realms, or arises at its touch from the earth 
about us, or falls from the atmosphere of heaven 
itself—not smoke, nor haze, but something more 
ethereal than these; a visible air, balmy with 
odors of ripeness as the breath of June with 
perfume of flowers, and pervading earth and 
sky that melt together in it till the bounds of 
neither are discernible and blending all objects 
in the landscape beyond the near foreground 
till nothing is distinct but some golden gleam of 
sunlit water bright as the orb that shines upon it. 
Flocks of migrating geese linger on the 
stubble fields, and some laggard crows flap lazily 
athwart the sky or perch contentedly upon the 
naked treetops as if they cared to seek no clime 
more genial. 
The brief heavenly beauteousness of Indian 
summer has fallen upon the earth, a few tran¬ 
quil days of ethereal mildness dropped into the 
sullen or turbulent border of winter. 
In November days, as in all others, the 
woods are beautiful to the lover of nature, and 
to the sportsman who in their love finds the finer 
flavor of his pastime. Every marking of the gray 
trunks, each moss patch and scale of lichen on 
them, is shown more distinctly now in the in¬ 
tercepted light, and the delicate tracery of the 
bare branches and their netted shadows on the 
rumpled carpet of the forest floor have a beauty 
as distinctive as the fullness of green or frost- 
tinted leafage and its silhouette of shade. 
No blossom is left in woods or fields, save 
where in the one the witchhazel unfolds its un¬ 
seasonable flowers yellow beneath cold skies, or 
a pink blossom of herb Robert holds out with 
modest bravery in a sheltered cranny of the 
rocks; and where in the other the ghostly bloom 
of everlasting rustles about the leafless stalks 
in the wind-swept pastures. And there are 
brighter flashes of color in the somber woods 
where the red winter berries shine on their leaf¬ 
less stems, and the orange and scarlet clusters 
of the twining bitter-sweet light up the gray 
trellis of the vagrant climber. 
No sense of loss or sadness oppresses the 
soul of the ardent sportsman as he ranges the 
unroofed aisles alert for the wary grouse, the 
skulking woodcock, full grown and strong of 
wing and keen-eyed for every enemy, or the 
hare flashing his half-donned winter coat among 
the gray underbrush as he bounds away before 
the merry. chiding of the beagles. The brown 
monotony of the marshes is pleasant to him as 
green fields, while the wild duck tarries in the 
dark pools and the snipe probes the unfrozen 
patches of ooze. To' him all seasons are kind, 
all days pleasant, wherein he may pursue his 
sport, though the rain pelt him, chill winds assail 
him, or the summer sun shower upon him its 
most fervent rays, and in these changeful days 
of November he finds his full measure of con¬ 
tent. 
AUTUMN FLOWERS. 
Our chief editor pirouetted into his sanctum 
two days ago with his face beaming and wear¬ 
ing a pretty button hole sprig of open air flowers 
which he had plucked from his garden on the 2d 
day of November. One blossom was a monthly 
rose, diminutive, it is true, and pinched by the 
cold, but still fragrant; the other a sprig of 
cerulean larkspur. Very pretty, but who will 
accept these as infallible tokens of ethereal mild¬ 
ness for the days to come? Shall we not rather 
mistrust their enchanting odors and captivating 
colors for siren devices to lure us into wayside 
paths, certain to be obliterated soon by driving 
snows? Or shall we prefer to consider them as 
poor foolish things, which either have the hardi¬ 
hood to brave the rigors of the frost grip, or 
who do not know enough to come in out of the 
cold ? Either way, we are not to be humbugged. 
When we go out into the field or down by the 
sea we shall take our warmest woolens and our 
most impervious rubbers all the same as if to¬ 
morrow were to be Arctic weather, with the 
Polar light snapping in the frosty air instead' 
of the lingering, unseasonable, almost summer 
weather which is now intruding upon the domain 
and prerogatives of December. Let sportsmen all 
be careful to wear sufficient clothing and avoid 
exposure. 
THE DRUM OF THE DRUM FISH. 
The drum of the drumfish has in it some¬ 
thing of the weirdness and mystery of a marsh 
bird’s croak in the darkness, and the cry of the 
catfish is, under favoring surroundings, positively 
uncanny. In the waters of Port Royal and Beau¬ 
fort in calm weather and in the afternoon, which 
is a favorite time for drumming, the drum may 
be heard at a distance of several hundred yards 
from the river. The explanation of the phe¬ 
nomena is that it is the universal passion alone 
that gives them utterance; as the sound is heard 
especially in the breeding season it is doubtless 
the signal by which the fish call to their mates. 
This is a theory which should sustain and soothe 
the weary drumfisher waiting for a bite, and get¬ 
ting only the poor satisfaction of hearing the 
drum in the water beneath him. If it be a lure, 
it may bring another within the attraction of his 
bait. 
There are circumstances, however, under 
which the voices of fishes may be a real distress. 
Silas Stearns once confessed that the grunting 
of the catfish when many were present was very 
annoying to him, and he passed more than one 
wakeful night from hearing it on the southern 
coast when the fish were swimming under his 
boat. 
The drumming of the squeteague has been 
studied at the Marine Biological Laboratory at 
Woods Hole, Mass., these conclusions being 
given in the Bulletin of the United States Fish 
Commission: 
1. There is in the squeteague a special drum¬ 
ming muscle, lying between the abdominal mus¬ 
cles and the peritoneum, and extending the entire 
length of the abdomen on either side of the 
median line. 
2. The muscle fibers are very short, and run 
at right angles to the long axis of the muscle. 
3. The muscle is in close relation with the 
large swim-bladder, and by its rapid contractions 
produces a drumming sound, with the aid of the 
tense bladder, which acts as a sounding board. 
4. This muscle exists only in the males, and 
only the males are able to drum. 
American corn is driving out rice in the 
Philippines as a staple article of food, according 
to the United States Bureau of Education. This 
result was brought about mainly through the 
vigorous crusade conducted through the schools 
of the archipelago by the Insular Bureau of 
Education. Rice hitherto has been the chief 
article of diet of the Filipinos. 
