724 
FOREST AND STREAM 
June 7, 1913 
Published Weekly by the 
Forest and Stream Publishing Company, 
Charles Otis, President. 
W. G. Beeoroft, Secretary. W. .T. Gallagher, Treasurer. 
127 Franklin Street, New York. 
CORRESPONDENCE — Forest and Stream is the 
recognized medium of entertainment, instruction and in¬ 
formation between American sportsmen. The editors 
invite communications on the subjects to which its pages 
are devoted, but, of course, are not responsible for the 
views of correspondents. Anonymous communications 
cannot be regarded. 
SUBSCRIPTIONS: $3 a year; $1.50 for six months; 
10 cts. a copy. Canadian, $4 a year; foreign, $4.50 a year. 
This paper may be obtained of newsdealers throughout 
the United States, Canada and Great Britain. Foreign 
Subscription and Sales Agents—London; Davies & Co., 
1 Finch Lane; Sampson, Low & Co. Paris; Brentano’s. 
ADVERTISEMENTS; Display and classified, 20 cts. 
per agate line ($2.80 per inch). There are 14 agate lines to 
the inch. Covers and special positions extra. Five, 
ten and twenty per cent, discount for 13, 26 and 52 inser¬ 
tions, respectively, within one year. Forms close Monday 
in advance of publication date. 
ARE YOU A NESSMUKf 
It is so seldom we get a subscription can¬ 
cellation that when such a thing does happen, 
it is a matter of comment from President to 
office boy, with an implication from the entire 
office force that the editor isn’t on to his job. 
With a guilty conscience the editor took up one 
of these “matters of comment” the other day 
and wrote the gentleman who was divorcing 
himself from our happy family. We asked him 
to tell us why our menu wasn't as filling and 
palatable as it used to be. In a few words he 
said it was just as filling, but not so satisfying. 
He missed Nessmuk, Rowland Robinson and 
others, all of whom, unfortunately, are in the 
land beyond. 
We print in another column the letter com¬ 
plete, and we urge every subscriber to read it. 
First of all in digesting the contents of the 
communication you will get news in the way of 
fishing and shooting territory; secondly, it pos¬ 
sibly will recall to some experience they have 
had in this and other sections, which, if put on 
paper, would develop material identical to that 
suggested by our correspondent, "native hunting 
stories,” those “that have the natural tang and 
flavor of the United States.” 
Nessmuk, Kingfisher, Rowland E. Robinson, 
Mather and the like were not discovered; they 
found themselves and wrote in their homely way 
their experience to Forest and Stream, Our 
editors encouraged and helped them over the 
rough ground of authorship, until finally they 
“arrived,” and upon their final departure left an 
unfilled void. 
No writer is “discovered”; he must find 
himself. This he does by putting on paper an 
experience or in fiction an imagination. He 
sends it to an editor who, if not too busy, reads 
it, makes suggestions and improvements, and an¬ 
nounces that he has “discovered” a great writer, 
advertising the fact in much the same way a 
prospector promotes a mine, the difference being 
that the prospector dug and the editor read a 
story and recognized a possibility. 
There are many, many Nessmuks, et ak, 
among our readers; all they need is developing. 
Probably you have a good story of an ex¬ 
perience thus far unwritten. If so, send it to 
us. Never mind your inexperience as a writer; 
our editor will chip off the corners and plane 
down the rough without taking away “the natu¬ 
ral tang” or human interest. 
So once more we say—read our correspond¬ 
ent's letter and write us your story. In 
the meantime we thank Philip C. Tucker, of 
Clearwater, Florida, for furnishing material for 
this editorial, and for coming back, as he did, 
into the great big happy Forest and Stream 
family spread all over the civilized world. 
FREDERICK A. OBER. 
Frederick Albion Ober, one of the very 
earliest writers for Forest and Stream, died 
May 31, at his home in Hackensack, N. J., after 
an illness of several weeks. 
Forty years and more ago Florida was not 
the fashionable resort that it has since become. 
The Everglades were then spoken of as a region 
of mystery, and the peninsula of Florida was 
supposed to hold a multitude of great lakes that 
were the home of beasts, birds, reptiles and 
fishes, many of which were thought to be un¬ 
known. In 1873 and 1874 Forest and Stream, 
in connection with the Smithsonian Institution, 
sent Fred Ober—who then wrote over the 
pseudonym Fred Beverley—into the Lake Okee¬ 
chobee region, and the reports of his explora¬ 
tions there were printed in the earliest volumes 
of Forest and Stream, Following that, in 1876, 
1878 and 1880, IMr. Ober collected birds in some 
of the lesser Antilles. He discovered twenty- 
two new species of birds, and the results of his 
investigations were published in the Proceedings 
of the Smithsonian Institution. In 1881, 1883 
and 1885 he traveled in Mexico, and later in 
Spain, Africa, South America and the West 
Indies. 
Mr. Ober was a great traveler. Pie was a 
member of the Explorers’ Club, New York 
.\cademy of Sciences and American Antiquarian 
Society. He served as United States Commis¬ 
sioner for the Columbian Exposition at Chicago 
in 1893, having charge of exhibits of birds. 
Mr. Ober was the author of about forty 
books dealing with the countries in which he 
had traveled. Most of these are boys’ books, 
which had a good popularity. 
Mr. Ober was born in Eebruary, 1849. He 
is survived by a widow and two children. 
THE TRAP, PRESENT AND FUTURE. 
The present extraordinary activity in the 
sport of clay target shooting throughout the 
United States has a felicitous significance for 
its permanency and broader growth. It is a 
situation specially gratifying to two classes in 
a manner distinct from each other, namely, 
those who are interested in trapshooting as a 
matter of sport, and those who are interested 
in it as a matter of business. On the one side 
are all the target shooters; on the other side 
are all the manufacturers, while a third indeter¬ 
minate class, by no means small, may be said 
to be related to both classes. 
This general activity augurs well for this 
form of competition, as it pertains to the future. 
Therefore, it must possess all the essentials of 
a true and beneficent sport for the public, else 
if would not evoke such general enthusiasm or 
so firmly hold the constant interest and partici¬ 
pation of its devotees. 
It is doubtful whether target shooting has 
ever been so general in the United States, con¬ 
sidering the activity of the clubs of the small 
towns as well as those of the great cities, and 
the unusually great number of tournaments held 
and to be held in every section. New trap- 
shooters, especially among yacht and country 
clubs, are engaging in the sport in great num¬ 
bers, and but few are retiring from it. Thus 
sport and business are both flourishing in a 
sound, broad manner. 
Another decidedly encouraging sign is the 
number of women taking part in this whole¬ 
some sport. Hardly a club event is found now¬ 
adays without at least one woman entrant. To 
us, this is a sure sign of increasing popularity 
of the sport. It now begins to interest the whole 
family—a wholesome state of affairs, surely. 
THE VAGRANT DOG IN THE GAME FIELD 
A factor in the maintenance of the game 
supply of a region is the vagrant dog which is 
permitted to run at large in the cover in close 
season. It makes no difference whether the ani¬ 
mal is well bred or cur. A dog, when permitted 
to wander about at will, exercises many of his 
wild traits of a predatory nature. He has no 
perception whatever of property rights. He will 
chase rabbits with unbounded enjoyment. He 
will rob the nests of game birds, kill and eat 
the young quail and partridges, and betimes he 
will harry and kill sheep. Hounds in particular 
are conspicuous offenders. They have an in¬ 
satiable appetite, are eminently vagrant and pred¬ 
atory in their habits, and from their keen sense 
of smell, great endurance and skill in pack work, 
have superlative powers of predatory destruc¬ 
tiveness. If they fail in their efforts to secure 
rabbits, the eggs of quail, partridges, hens, etc., 
they do not hesitate to invade cornfields when 
the corn is in the milk, tear it down and feed 
on it much after the manner of hogs. In the 
south the vagrant cur is particularly and offen¬ 
sively destructive. No owner has any right to 
permit his dog or dogs to run at large, and the 
more offensive or destructive vagrant dogs be¬ 
come, the less value will dogs have in the eye 
of the law. The vagrant dog is one of the chief 
problems which game preserve owners have to 
meet, but there is no doubt that when it becomes 
serious enough it will be fully settled, and not 
at all to the advantage of the dog. 
BASS IN NEW JERSEY. 
Elsewhere in this issue we print a synopsis 
of the fish and game laws of New Jersey 
adopted at the 1913 session of the State Legis¬ 
lature. Its principal features are the opening 
of the bass season from June 15 instead of- 
May 30, and the open season for rabbits, squir¬ 
rels and upland game birds from Nov. 10 to 
Dec. IS, instead of Nov. i to Dec. 31, and change 
in date of the open season on woodcock from 
Oct. 15 to Dec. 31 to Oct. 10 to Dec. 15. 
Chapter 303 permits killing of European 
starlings under proper authorization. This last 
paragraph was incorporated to give relief to 
Montclair and other villages where the starling, 
has become a pest. 
