Dec. 30, 1911.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
939 
made a felony in some cases and punishable with 
death. Think of it! Men were hanged for kill¬ 
ing a rabbit on private preserves. The survival 
of that system in a modified form exists in Eng¬ 
land and the' continent of Europe to-day. 
In this country the system is based upon en¬ 
tirely different principles. The sovereign here 
is the State, and game is owned in trust by the 
State for the benefit of all its people. Laws are 
enacted to protect and preserve the game for the 
benefit of all. Therefore, if we have preserves 
they should be in the nature of public preserves 
or State refuges, and the propagation of game 
should be conducted by the State for the benefit 
of all. But the claim is put forth that game 
propagated in private preserves will overflow 
the surrounding territory, and thus be of benefit 
to the public. Our answer to that proposition is, 
let the State own the preserves for all its people 
upon a basis of certain benefit and not dependent 
upon the charity of a few millionaires. Give us 
State refuges for game and State game farms 
whereon propagation may be conducted by scien¬ 
tific men in the interest of the sportsmen in 
general. 
Again, in this country the doctrine is well set¬ 
tled that the game within the State is the com¬ 
mon property of all its people. We fully recog¬ 
nize the rights of private property, but no one 
can acquire an absolute title to game at liberty. 
We also respect private property, but when one 
man, by accident or good fortune, becomes a 
millionaire, and buys up a great tract of wild 
land, and by this means attempts to reclaim and 
monopolize in wholesale fashion the common 
property of the people, we object. And he 
usually learns to his sorrow that he has made a 
serious mistake. Reflect a moment, if you please, 
and contemplate the absolute injustice of the 
private preserve theory. Suppose, for instance, 
that you live and have lived for many years in 
a fine game country. Your forebears before you 
also lived and hunted that territory from time 
out of mind. Suddenly some rich man takes a 
fancy to your game. He purchases every foot 
of the land, surrounds it with a ten-foot fence 
and posts up notices that “Hunting is prohibited; 
trespassing forbidden’’—all this on land you have 
had access to since childhood. Is that a fair 
proposition? Is it justice to seize your pre¬ 
scriptive rights in this fashion? Does it agree 
with the American idea of freedom and liberty? 
Or, rather, is it not more in accord with the 
European idea? 
This plan of private preserves has been re¬ 
peatedly attempted in this country with very un¬ 
satisfactory results. It always will be a failure 
as long as American notions of liberty and 
justice prevail. The writer is utterly opposed to 
lawlessness of all kinds, but he has always found 
it difficult to sympathize with the rich man who, 
desiring to own and monopolize all the game of 
a community, finds himself and his property at¬ 
tacked by lawless outsiders. Nothing will breed 
a spirit of unrest, lawlessness and lack of faith 
in the justice of our laws so quickly as the ex¬ 
ample of large private game preserves in a,first- 
class hunting country. I have personally known 
of good, law-abiding citizens becoming enraged 
at such injustice and setting about tearing down 
notices, wrecking fences and destroying buildings 
on private preserves. Ignorant people often 
think the State is encouraging these institutions 
and they thereby lose all respect for the game 
laws. Enforcing such laws in a community in¬ 
fested by these preserves is usually rather haz¬ 
ardous business, and wardens’ sympathies are in¬ 
variably with the outsiders who attack the pre¬ 
serves. 
Considering the subject in a general way, I 
can see but one excuse for private preserves in 
this country, and that is the one to which the 
American Game Protective and Propagation As¬ 
sociation’s pamphlet calls attention. If we do 
not enact wise, scientific laws and then enforce 
the same rigidly and consistently, the game will 
be exterminated. When it is gone, the country 
is sure to recur to the European system of game 
preserves, for the rich are as fond of the sport 
of hunting as the poor, and the former have the 
means to secure their recreation by game pre¬ 
serves. If that time arrives it wfill be the fault 
of the whole people that they did not conserve 
their supply of game. Until then, however, as 
long as there remains one bit of game in our 
wilds, private preserves are false institutions in 
this country, and will meet with strong opposi¬ 
tion from sportsmen everywhere. 
The more numerous the preserves become, the 
greater will be the opposition, until finally the 
warfare between the conflicting interests will be 
so acute as to cause bloodshed and fierce destruc¬ 
tion of private property. This warfare and 
bloodshed has already occurred in some sections, 
and in each instance the preserve owners have 
lost the battle in the end. Should this not be 
sufficient warning to those who are now devot¬ 
ing so much time and talent to advocating an 
obnoxious institution? 
The private preserve is a strictly selfish affair 
at its best and fosters class prejudice. Surely, 
we now have ample class hatred in this country 
without adding to it a new incentive. Did you 
ever hear of a rich man establishing a private 
game preserve for the benefit of the public? 
The Big One. 
Muskogee, Okla., Dec. 13. —Editor Forest and 
Stream: I am just in receipt of the inclosed 
letter from my friend Le Roy Nabers, of Pryor, 
Okla. Roy, as a rule, is not given to verbosity 
or story telling, but this letter struck me as 
being interesting stuff, and if you think the same 
way about it, you are privileged to use it. I 
really cannot give the weight of the fish, be¬ 
cause I do not know it, but shall write the 
sequel next week, as I have invited him down 
to go with me Sunday to Maynard Bayou for 
another try at the small-mouths. 
Since the big blizzards, ideal weather has pre¬ 
vailed, and the boys who are at liberty to hunt 
and fish during the week have had great sport. 
Nabers is one of the best shotgun and rifle 
shots in the State and has his limit of quail, 
ducks and geese. Three members of the Wau- 
hillau Club, on Barren Fork, got seven wild 
turkeys last week, finding them not more than 
two miles from the club. In addition one mem¬ 
ber fished and got several big-mouth bass, rang-' 
ing in weight from three to five pounds. A 
What does he wish a preserve for, anyway? Be¬ 
cause, he desires a place where he and his friends 
may hunt and shoot without restriction. If our 
wealthy sportsmen are public-spirited, why do 
they not contribute to game protection for the 
benefit of all the people? 
It may be that some time in the future private 
preserves will be a national institution in this 
country, but before they are successfully estab¬ 
lished there will be such a class struggle as was 
never witnessed in America before. 
Henry Chase. 
A New Game Region. 
Linville Falls, N. C., Dec. 21. — Editor Forest 
and Stream: I have just learned, through a 
party of bear hunters returned from the Unaka 
Mountains, that most excellent pheasant shoot¬ 
ing is to be had in certain localities there. The 
ruffed grouse is known here exclusively as a 
pheasant. The Unakas are not as rough as the 
mountains in this immediate neighborhood, and 
are but very little hunted for any game. There 
are no such precipitous, unclimbable cliffs or 
“leg-breaks” as the mountaineers call rough, 
rocky mountain sides. The country is smoother, 
more open, grown up to laurel and brush, afford¬ 
ing excellent cover for birds. The natives hunt 
birds very little, scarcely any of them having a 
bird dog. With good dogs this place ought to 
be very attractive to any northern sportsman 
looking for a few days’ good shooting. My in¬ 
formant tells me that he knows a place where 
hunters may stop, right in the game country, 
with a mountaineer. If anyone is interested, I 
shall be glad to put him in communication with 
a reliable guide who knows the country well and 
could meet the visitor at the railway station 
nearest the hunting ground. F. W. Bicknell. 
party went into the Jack Fork Mountains, south¬ 
east of Muskogee, and each member got a legal 
deer and plenty of big bass. 
Paul IT. Byrd. 
Pryor, Okla., Dec. 10 .—Dear Paul: * * * I 
must tell you about catching a big bass in Sul¬ 
phur Creek not long ago. You know the fact 
that one can get the biggest ones at this time of 
the year. The boys up here have been telling 
me about a very big bass they have hooked in 
a certain hole in Sulphur Creek year after year, 
and he would always get away, either by break¬ 
ing their tackle or tearing loose. Often have 
they seen him as he would leap from the water 
on being hooked, and shaking his head with 
jaws distended attempt to free himself. Well, 
you know the feeling that comes over a veteran 
fisherman or hunter either when he, time after 
time, hears the story from this person and that 
about a certain big one or some old buck that 
has often been hooked and never landed, or in 
the case of the buck has often been seen and 
shot at. but never caught. It fires your ambi¬ 
tion to have a try for yourself at this same big 
