620 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Oct. 21, 1911. 
Published Weeldy by the 
Forest and Stream Publishing Company, 
127 Franklin Street, New York. 
Edward C. Locke, President, 
Charles B. Reynolds, Secretary, 
S. J. Gibson, Treasurer. 
CORRESPONDENCE. 
The Forest and Stream is the recognized medium of 
entertainment, instruction and information between Amer¬ 
ican sportsmen. The editors invite communications on 
the subjects to which its pages are devoted. Anonymous 
communications will not be regarded. The editors are 
not responsible for the views of correspondents. 
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six months. Foreign subscriptions, $4.50 a year; $2.25 for 
six months. Subscriptions may begin at any time. 
Remit by express money-order, registered letter, money- 
order or draft, payable to the Forest and Stream Pub¬ 
lishing Company. 
The 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. 
Inside pages, 20 cents per agate line ($2.80 per inch). 
There are 14 agate lines to an inch. Preferred positions, 
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A discount of 5 per cent, is allowed on an advertise¬ 
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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. 
IVOODS SHOOTINGS. 
The record of men killed or injured by per¬ 
sons mistaking them for game is being written 
in large characters thus early in the shooting sea¬ 
son. It is to be hoped that the number will not 
increase materially as the days pass, though that 
is scarcely probable. Too many inexperienced 
persons are abroad early in the season, but with 
the approach of cooler days and nights, these 
will be replaced by more veterans, from whom 
such inexcusable actions are not to be expected, 
hence the total may not exceed the average. 
For a number of years it has been the prac¬ 
tice of careful men to wear red sweaters and 
caps while in the woods. Although such things 
are repugnant to persons who know that incon¬ 
spicuous clothing is best in approaching game, 
they cannot deny that personal safety is of more 
importance, and they further rely on the fact 
that a hunter in khaki who moves about fre¬ 
quently is more likely to frighten game than 
one who, in red sweater and cap, moves cau¬ 
tiously when he must change his position, but 
remains motionless as much of the time as pos¬ 
sible. 
That a deer hunter clad in red was killed in 
the Adirondacks last week will go far toward 
shaking the confidence of sportsmen in bright 
colors is conceded, and some of them will argue 
that to move about nervously may prove to be 
an additional measure of safety, though it 
frighten game away. The case in point proves 
nothing, however, for the man who shot the red- 
clad hunter did not, it seems, see him at all, 
but shot into the bushes on seeing them disturbed. 
It is of course impossible to determine by what 
process of reasoning a full-grown man decides 
that a movement in the undergrowth means 
game, or how he concludes that a shot fired thus 
may bag the coveted buck. Such acts cannot be 
understood by the non-hunting public, which 
takes it for granted that ail hunters are alike. 
It does not separate from the hysterical class 
of incompetents those sportsmen who have 
hunted game all their lives, and in whose hands 
a gun is no more of a menace to others than 
so much wood and metal. The odium is visited 
on all sportsmen, and one of the results is seen 
along every highway in the no-shooting-allowed 
signs. Thousands of these warnings would not 
be in evidence to-day were it not for incompe¬ 
tent gun carriers. Landowners do not object so 
much to the game sportsmen may take from 
their lands as to the damage the reckless ones 
may do to property and live stock. 
All sorts of suggestions have been made in the 
attempt to stop these reckless shootings, or at 
least to reduce their number. Special laws have 
not helped. In recent years the similarity be¬ 
tween the cases has been remarkable, and in very 
few of them have there been grounds for ex¬ 
cuse. No remedy that has been offered has saved 
lives, and it is probable that none will. Every 
shooting season finds scores of beginners abroad, 
few of whom can, if asked, describe what a wild 
deer resembles. Depending as they do on chance 
views of deer, they are in a fever of haste to 
shoot quickly ere the apparition vanishes. And 
the singular thing is that, though a buck stand¬ 
ing in full view a stone’s throw away would be 
perfectly safe under their fire, they never miss 
a hunter when they fire into a bush he pushes 
aside in passing. 
We are a long-suffering people, slow to arouse 
to action, but some day there will be a universal 
demand that no person be allowed to purchase 
a shooting license until he produces documentary 
evidence of his ability to differentiate between 
the barrel and the stock of a gun, and to pos¬ 
sess sufficient skill to hit the proverbial barn 
door—when he aims at it. There are rifle ranges 
and trap grounds near all the cities and many 
of the towns, hence there is no excuse for pos¬ 
session of firearms, but lack of at least some 
small knowledge of them. 
LOOPHOLES IN THE LAW. 
Among the crowds of pedestrians on the 
streets of New York city, and particularly at the 
railway terminals, it is rare that a guncase is 
seen; that is, since the dangerous weapons law 
became effective. Before Sept. 1 such articles 
of baggage were common, and indeed there is 
no valid reason for the scarcity now, since the 
possession by a citizen of a gun or a rifle is not 
illegal, the law applying only to firearms small 
enough to be concealed, or which are carried 
with intent to use unlawfully. Still, the law is 
not understood, and anyway, there are many per¬ 
sons who would feel very badly if asked by a 
peace officer as to the contents of any package 
carried by them. Perhaps the express compa¬ 
nies carry more guns in cases now than formerly. 
Perhaps the guns are left at home, and vacations 
devoted to some other sport than shooting. 
The situation is not without its humorous side, 
as one will frequently observe. Occasionally a 
man is seen carrying a package neatly tied up 
in paper. Its length and form proclaim it a gun 
in a victoria or leg-of-mutton case, and every 
officer passed chuckles at the self-conscious ex¬ 
pression on the owner’s face, knowing, as he 
does, that the harmless deception is patent to all. 
Anon a woman passes, accompanied by a boy 
under the age of sixteen, and consequently be¬ 
low the legal gun-owning age, according to the 
Sullivan law. She carries a very small rifle 
wrapped in paper, a suitcase or bag, and a pack¬ 
age or two. Obviously it is the boy’s duty to 
carry the rifle. Legally its present possession is 
beyond question, so on the ferryboat or the train 
the new firearm passes into the hands of its 
rightful owner, the boy, but in another State, 
where the old-time admonition to “take the boy 
along’’ on woods rambles is not as yet outlawed. 
In this way is the law- satisfied, while the parent 
has passed victoriously through one of its many 
loopholes without disarranging a feather, and the 
boy has come into his own. 
All of the important department stores deliver 
goods to customers living in nearby Connecticut 
and New Jersey towns. A resident of one of 
these towns cannot legally purchase and carry 
a revolver in New York city no matter how 
large his financial interests there; that is, unless 
he pays ten dollars to the city for the possession 
of a license entitling him to do so. But he can 
select one and order it delivered at his home; 
or he can purchase it in the name of the depart¬ 
ment store from his regular dealer, and it will 
reqch him through the same channels. Other¬ 
wise, there is the handy express company. An¬ 
other large loophole. And a third is found in 
the mail-order purchase direct from the factory. 
The usual objections to rifle ranges are being 
raised against the new State range at Blauvelt. 
Some of the nearby residents claim that the 
“whine” of wild bullets annoys them, others 
point to holes in their barns, said to have been 
made by these missiles. How many of them 
desire to purchase a little more land cheaply is 
a question, but a controversy has been started, 
and opinions vary with the individuals. Among 
these are statements that the bullet stops are in¬ 
efficient, that the direction of fire is all wrong, 
and that the site should be abandoned, anyway, 
before it is completed. The city has not de¬ 
cided what to do with a couple of the river tun¬ 
nels. Perhaps they might be utilized meanwhile 
as rifle ranges. But even so, there is no assur¬ 
ance that complaints of wild shooting would not 
be raised. 
*» 
The Chamber of Commerce of Auckland, New 
Zealand, has decided to hold an International ex¬ 
hibition in that city in 1915, probably in Decem¬ 
ber, to commemorate the opening of the Panama 
canal. Outdoor sports, fishing and shooting, will 
occupy considerable space in the buildings to be 
devoted to the exhibition. 
* 
There should be a material reduction next 
year in the forest fires of the Northwestern 
States and Canada. At least one of the great 
railways is transforming all of its locomotives 
from coal to oil burners. 
