656 
FOREST AND STREAM 
NOV. 22, I 9 I 3 . 
Published Weekly by the 
Forest and Stream Publishing Company 
Chas. A. Hazen, President 
W. G. Beecroft, Secretary. Charles L. Wise, Treasurer. 
22 Thames Street, New York. 
CORRESPONtDENCE:— Forest and Stream is the 
recognized medium of entertainment, instruction and informa¬ 
tion between American sportsmen. The editors invite com¬ 
munications on the subjects co which its pages are devoted, but, 
of course, are not responsible for the views of correspondents. 
Anonymous communications cannot be regarded. 
SUBSCRIPTIONS:— S3 a year: SI.50 for six months; 
10 ets. a copy. Canadian, $4 a year: foreign, S4.50 a year. 
This paper may be obtained of newsdealers throughout the 
United States, Canada and Great Britain. Foreign Subscrip¬ 
tion and Sales Agents—London: Davies & Co., 1 Finch Lane; 
Sampson, Low & Co. Paris: Brentano’s. 
THE OBJECT OF THIS JOURNAL 
will be to studiously promote a healthful interest 
in outdoor recreation, and to cultivate a refined 
taste ior natural objects. 
—Forest and Stream, Aug. 14, 1873. 
THE OLD GUN. 
It is not to be denied that there is great 
satisfaction to the sportsman in being the owner 
of a fine new gun. The perfect result of the 
handicraft of a master of the art of gun-making; 
a piece so nicely balanced that it will almost 
take, of its own mere motion, the line of flight 
of the swiftest flying bird, all its parts so neatly 
fitted that a spider’s web inserted might cause a 
jam; its polished and gracefully turned stock the 
chosen bit of many a goodly tree; the variegated 
barrels almost as beautiful to look upon in their 
regular irregularity as a golden and purple barred 
sunset sky, or the shimmer of a rippled lake. 
It is a delight to the eye to look upon, to the 
hand to hold, a satisfaction to the soul to feel 
that one is the possessor of such a weapon. 
And yet, like other riches, and like love, it has 
its cares, anxieties and jealousies. One dislikes 
to be caught in the rain with such a gun in its 
untarnished beauty, or to take it out under threat¬ 
ening skies, or to breast haphazard blackberry 
briars with it in hand; to leave it at night un¬ 
cleaned, though the day’s tramp has been a weary 
one, and all one’s muscles and bones cry out for 
rest. One’s richer neighbor may have a costlier 
gun, hence a pang of unchristian envy, and the 
breaking of a holy commandment, all for a stock 
.and a bit of iron. 
Not these frets and worries and ungodly 
"heart-burnings are felt by him whose only wea- 
ponly possession is an ancient hammer gun, the 
"barrels whereof half way from breech to muzzle 
are worn bare of their first and only browning, 
with stock battered, scratched and bruised, locks 
rickety and inviting irrigation. The rains may 
fall upon it and brambles scratch it, and it be 
none the worse' for looks or use. Its owner may 
hang it on its hooks at night, with barrels foul 
and dully blushing with a film of rust; and sup 
with slow comfort and then betake himself to 
dreamless sleep, untroubled by thought of duty 
unperformed. 
Then what happy memories are awakened by 
the sight and touch of the old gun, with which 
one’s first woodcock and snipe, wild duck and 
grouse were brought down. The very alder 
brake, and bog, river bend, and russet and green 
bit of beech and hemlock woodland rises before 
him, each the scene of a first glorious triumph 
in autumns long ago, and each in apparition al¬ 
most as real as then, though all are changed or 
passed away. This bruise of the stock and dent 
in the barrel were got in a tumble over a ledge 
when you were rushing for a runway, and you 
remember how your heart tumbled at the time, 
and it aches and burns yet with the fall it got, 
and the recollection of lost opportunity. 
But for use the old gun is as good as it was 
then—though its owner is not quite, perhaps— 
and as for looks, he has none the better of it. 
Maybe there were those who used it before him, 
old hunters of the by-gone days when game was 
plenty; over whose tough old bones the grass 
has grown and withered, and the snow lain for 
many a year, and who are now remembered more 
by the guns they carried than by their grave¬ 
stones. For the sights their now faded eyes 
beheld, for a chance at the game their guns 
brought down, what would one not give? The 
old gun is a link that holds one to the past. 
Let us not despise it, though it is of a fashion 
of other days—though it is rusted and battered 
and its maker’s name worn off and forgotten, it 
has that in it more enduring than iron, that which 
no new gun can have, no matter how handsome 
or good. 
Red-Letter Days. They come in October 
and November. The sportsman who finds game 
abundant knows nothing of the “melancholy 
days” sung by the poets. Now and then a field 
tramp ends in disappointment and a touch of 
disgust, but there is compensation in reading of 
the happier experiences of others; that is one 
reason why the accounts contributed to the 
Forest and Stream are so acceptable to its thou¬ 
sands of readers. We have heard from the 
sportsmen who had hard luck, and from the 
veterans who praise the times of their youth to 
decry the present state of things; now it is in 
order to know of the Red-Letter days, when the 
birds were flushed in the corn, the wild duck’s 
flight cut short, and the deer hung up before the 
tent. Tell us of the time when you had “good 
luck.” 
CARMODY AND THE MIGRATORY BIRD 
LAW. 
Apparently legal matters in Albany are very 
dull at present, so Attorney General Thomas 
Carinody has turned his critical gaze on the 
Migratory Bird Law, signed October first by 
President Wilson. 
Mr. Carmody holds that the power to legis¬ 
late upon matters of this character is not granted 
by the Federal Constitution to the United States, 
nor is it denied by the Federal Constitution to 
the states. 
“I conclude,” says Mr. Carmody, “that this 
law is an unwarranted invasion by the Federal 
Government of a power that belongs under the 
Federal Constitution to the state exclusively. 
It is paternalistic in character and entirely in¬ 
consistent with the theory upon which is regu¬ 
lated the relative functions of state and Federal 
powers. 
“It is true that the law contains a provision 
that it shall be construed in harmony with the 
local laws of states for the protection of non- 
migratory birds. Were the principle of the law 
reconcilable with this declaration, or were the 
terms of the law placed in harmony with the 
state law, there would be no occasion for this 
opinion. The fact is, however, that, notwith¬ 
standing this declaration that the provisions of 
the Federal statute shall be harmonized with the 
local laws, the Agricultural Department has fixed 
open and closed seasons that differ from our 
own, and it is this" that makes the principle of the 
law in its application particularly vicious.” 
Mr. Carmody ventures the further opinion 
that “The same purpose is much more effectively 
accomplished by state laws.” 
North Carolina had wild fowl open seasons 
that ranged from September first in Brunswick 
and Hanover counties to December first in Stokes 
county. Now under Federal control the season 
all over the state is uniform, as it should be. 
That the Conservation Commission of New 
York State should ask the Attorney General for 
a ruling on, or show a desire to upset, the fed¬ 
eral law, seems just a bit ironical inasmuch as 
the fish and game laws in the Empire State are 
about as unstable as an ocean beach, and about as 
satisfactory upon which to build an argument 
in favor of state rights in game protection. 
The finest game and fish wardens in the 
country are given mighty poor material to work 
on, and, were they consulted on the draft of new 
laws, New York State undoubtedly would have 
better ones. 
Each year the Commission takes a try at a 
new trout law, generally waiting until the trout 
fisherman has started on his spring trip before 
changing the opening date. Hotel proprietors on 
the lakes in New York State have about any 
sort of fishing laws they want, regardless of the 
feelings of anglers. 
Wouldn’t it be well for the New York Con¬ 
servation Commission to take the mote from its 
own eye before looking for a beam in the eye of 
the, in this instance, wise legislators in Wash¬ 
ington? 
We append the opinion of Dr. W. T. Horna- 
day, director of the New York Zoological So¬ 
ciety, who did much toward the passage of the 
Migratory Bird Law. 
“The migratory law is the greatest law ever 
enacted for the protection of wild life, and any 
one who attacks it is a public enemy.” 
“About four months before the law went 
into effect,” he said, “Harry Chase of Maine 
raised the question of its constitutionality. He 
tried to prove that the Federal Government could 
not have jurisdiction over birds; that birds were 
under the jurisdiction of whatever state they 
were in. 
“More than twenty-five lawyers agreed the 
law would stand the test. A. S. Houghten, a 
prominent attorney, showed that the Federal Gov¬ 
ernment has jurisdiction over navigable waters 
and the fish in navigable waters, and paralleling 
this jurisdiction in the air the Federal Govern¬ 
ment can assume power over birds that fly from 
state to state. Congress had to be convinced 
that the law would stand and was convinced by 
lawyers who know more about the Constitution 
than does Mr. Carmody. 
“You’d think a body formed to preserve 
wild life would have sense enough not to meddle 
with something like that. If the Conservation 
Commission tries to prove the law unconstitu¬ 
tional there will be plenty of people to get after 
it. When 90,000,000 people want a law they 
probably will get it, and it will take more than 
the Conservation Commission and Attorney-Gen¬ 
eral Carmody to stop them.” 
Forest Fires in California. 
Capitola, Cal., Oct. 29.-— Editor Forest and 
Stream: During the past season Santa Cruz 
County has suffered greatly from serious forest 
fires. In the neighborhood of 35,000 acres of 
brush and timber-covered lands have been burned 
over and great damage sustained to watershed 
cover, deer, quail, rabbits, tree squirrels, and all 
kinds of wild life. The past season has been 
exceptionally dry, and once a forest fire got un¬ 
der headway it was a difficult matter to bring it 
under control. 
With best wishes for the success of Foresi 
and Stream, and kindest personal regards. 
Walter R. Welch, 
Fish, Game and Fire Warden. 
