126 
FOREST AND STREAM 
Jan. 25, 1913 
Resorts for Sportsmen. 
North Carolina. 
HUNTER’S LODGE! 
Good Quail Shooting! 
Choice accommodations for ladies and gentlemen. 
Best Chef south of Potomac. 
Terms: $3.00 per day; $75.00 per month. 
GEN’L FRANK A. BOND - - Buies, N. C. 
Best English Snipe, Duck, Goose and Swan shooting 
at Currituck. 
JASPER B. WHITE, Waterlily, N. C. 
Where, When and How to Catch Fish 
on East Coast of Florida. 
By Wm. H. Gregg, 
Assisted by 
Capt. John Gardner, of Florida. 
With 100 engravings and 12 colored illustrations and map. 
Handsomely bound in durable cloth. 268 pages. Price, J4. 
FOREST AND STREAM PUBLISHING CO. 
Ever go squirrel shooting when you were 
a boy? If so, you know that the lad who wears 
out the shoe-leather is the one who gets the 
“bushy tails.” Moral: Advertise continually. 
There’s just the difference be¬ 
tween a raw, poorly made Cock¬ 
tail and a 
Club Cocktail 
that there is between a raw, new 
Whiskey and a soft old one. 
The best of ingredients—the most 
accurate blending cannot 
give the softness and mel¬ 
lowness that age imparts. 
Club Cocktails are aged in wood 
before bottling—and no freshly 
made Cocktail can be as good. 
Manhattan, Martini and other 
Standard blends, bottled, ready 
to serve through cracked ice. 
Refuse Substitutes 
AT ALL DEALERS 
G. F. HEUBLFIN & BRO., Sole Props. 
Hartford New York London 
ARTHUR BINNEY 
(Formerly Stewart & Binney) 
Naval Architect and Yacht Broker 
Mason Bailding, Kilby St.. BOSTON, MASS. 
Cable Address. “Desismer.” Bostem 
COX ta STEVENS 
Yacht Brokers and Naval Architects 
15 William Street - New York 
Telaphones 1375 and 1376 Broad 
The Uniform Fish and Game Law. 
New York City, Jan. 13. —Editor Forest and 
Stream: In your issue of Jan. ii there appeared 
a statement of fact and fancy. I refer to the 
attack by John D. Whish on the new game law 
of the State of New York. 
Mr. Whish’s manner of procedure in this 
polemic is to take a few facts that are readily 
accessible to all, and draw conclusions from them, 
disguised by clothing them in vague generalities. 
Thus, he says that the committee selected to 
codify the new law got a very small proportion 
of the money appropriated for that purpose, and 
because this is so, he says that the committee had 
very little to do with the codification. He admits 
that this committee, composed of John B. Burn¬ 
ham, president of the American Game Protective 
and Propagation Association; George A. Lawyer, 
president of the New York Forest, Fish and 
Game League, and the undersignod, was com¬ 
petent to do the work intrusted to it, but he 
insists that “the fish and game section was not 
drawn by the three men reasonably supposed to 
know something about the subject.” This state¬ 
ment, quoted verbatim from Mr. Whish’s letter, 
is at variance with the facts. Mr. Burnham, 
Mr. Lawyer and I drew up the fish and game 
section. 
Another allegation made is that not a single 
well-known expert considered the statute. As a 
part of its preliminary work, the committee held 
numerous public hearings both in Albany and 
New York. These hearings were attended by 
Dr. William T. Hornaday, director of the New 
York Zoological Park; Dr. T. S. Palmer, of the 
Biological Survey, of Washington; Dr. Tarleton 
H. Bean, State fishculturist, and sportsmen, gun¬ 
ners and fishermen from various parts of the 
State. During the entire time that the work of 
codification was in progress, the committee was 
in touch with the State, and its report was pre¬ 
sented to and received the approval of the State 
League at its annual meeting in November, 1911. 
The only part of the law which was not 
essentially changed was that dealing with marine 
fisheries. A new part was drafted, but oppo¬ 
sition developed powerful enough to defeat the 
amendment and leave the section in its origi¬ 
nal form. Mr. Whish’s denunciation of this law 
as it now stands is the only really intelligent 
thing in his letter. He did not, however, place 
the responsibility for it where it belongs. 
When we try to discover what are the de¬ 
ficiencies in the law, with which Mr. Whish says 
there is such general dissatisfaction, we must 
take them on trust from the following indefinite 
remarks. He speaks of the law “which the 
meanest tyro in such matters could readily see 
was based neither on scientific knowledge nor 
actual conditions.” 
“Attempts to secure important amendments 
were futile,” he informs us, “although during 
the past season the Conservation Commission 
has been compelled to admit serious imperfec¬ 
tions in the law and to modify it to correct them 
in order to meet an outraged public sentiment 
for the real conservation of fish life.” Again 
he speaks of “several of the strange things now 
known to exist” in the law, but he wisely re¬ 
frains from attempting to expose them. 
In answer to some of these unfounded gen¬ 
eralities, let me point out that the present law 
is based on the scientific knowledge and experi¬ 
ence of actual conditions, which Mr. Whish 
kindly credits the codification committee with 
possessing. When ]\Ir. Whish alludes to futile 
attempts to secure important amendments, to 
the commission’s being compelled to admit seri¬ 
ous imperfections in the law and to modify it, 
etc., he speaks more definitely, but still fails to 
point out specific instances. The commission has 
not admitted that there are serious imperfec¬ 
tions in the law, nor has it been forced to modify 
it so far as the codification committee is aware. 
Those who have followed closely the various 
questions which have arisen under the new law 
will readily distinguish the slender thread of 
fact from the perversions which Mr. Whish has 
strung upon it. But unfortunately such people 
form a very small minority, and for the benefit 
of the majority which might otherwise be mis¬ 
led, it may be well to outline these questions. 
In the first place, the new law is uniform 
for the entire State with the exception of Long 
Island. The advantages of a uniform law over 
the old code, which was crammed full of special 
provisions for certain localities, are manifest. 
Some of the special provisions which existed 
before were necessary and proper. Others were 
created to bestow privileges upon a few people 
whose political influence was strong enough to 
secure them. These special provisions, good and 
bad, were abolished alike, and if this abolition 
had really nullified the good ones, its wisdom 
would have been questionalile. But that was not 
the case. The new law confers power on the 
Conservation Commission to shorten seasons and 
give increased protection in other ways, locally, 
whenever this seems advisable for the conserva¬ 
tion of the fish and game. The commission is 
the logical agency to act in matters of this kind. 
It is its duty to keep informed as to conditions 
in all parts of the State. It has the facilities for 
so doing. The Legislature has not. Under the 
old system the Legislature was deluged at every 
session with bills to grant special laws for dif¬ 
ferent localities. It was impossible for the legis¬ 
lators to know the merits of the questions in¬ 
volved, and it was easy for men with political 
influence who wished to hunt and fish without 
restriction, to secure that privilege through 
legislation on territory which they controlled. 
Probably the case which caused Mr. Whish 
and his friends dissatisfaction under the new 
law concerned the repeal of the section giving 
special protection to black bass in Lake George. 
There was a great deal of protest against this 
before it was understood that the commission 
could and would use its discretionary power in 
that matter and grant the special protection 
which was needed under Section 152. This the 
ci'inmission did and there has been no dissatis¬ 
faction since. 
With respect to the merit of the present 
game law, others than Mr. M’hish have ex¬ 
pressed their opinion. Commenting on the New 
York law. Dr. William T. Hornaday says, in 
his forthcoming book, “Our Vanishing Wild 
Life” : “In 1912 a new codification of the State 
game laws went into effect, through the initiative 
of Governor Dix and Conservation Commission¬ 
ers Van Kennen, Moore and Fleming, assisted 
(as special counsel) by Marshall McLean, George 
A. Lawyer and John B. Burnham. This code 
contains many important new provisions, one of 
the most valuable of which is a clause giving 
the Conservation Commission power at its dis- 
