Forest and Stream 
Terms, $3 a Year, 10 Cts. a Copy. 
Six Months, $1.50. 
NEW YORK, SATURDAY, APRIL 24,' 1909. 
VOL. LXXIL—No. 17u 
No. 127 Franklin St., New York 
A WEEKLY JOURNAL. 
Copyright, 1909, by Forest and Stream Publishing Co. 
George Bird Grinnell, President, 
Charles B. Reynolds, Secretary. 
Louis Dean Speir^ Treasurer. 
127 Franklin Street, New York. 
THE OBJECT OF THIS JOURNAL 
will be to studiously promote a healthful interest 
in outdoor recreation, and to cultivate a refined 
taste for natural objects. 
—Forest and Stream, Aug. 14, 1873. ’ 
OPENING DAY. 
It was a happy lot of men who departed from 
inns and cottages in the hill country in the gray 
light of early morning last Friday. Many of 
them were strangers to the villagers, and but 
for the fact that the day was known by the 
mystic name, Opening day, they might readily 
enough have been mistaken for burglars, for 
they were strangely clad and equipped. But 
burglars do not stump along village streets at 
break of day in stiff brogues studded with hob¬ 
nails, and only the village dogs challenged them 
as they passed on to the country roads and by 
paths leading to the trout streams. 
Seldom on opening day has there been more 
to attract the nature lover to the woods and 
streams. There had been a long season with¬ 
out rain, but with bright skies and warm sun¬ 
light, then a two-day-downpour, and when the 
sun rose that morning, the woods showed a won¬ 
derful transformation. Buds were bursting, 
flowers peeping out among the grass and leaves, 
myriads of insects filled the air and hovered 
over the pools and shallows where the trout 
were seeking breakfast. The laurels and the 
small hemlocks along the banks of the brooks 
seemed to have been freshly varnished, so bright 
and green was their foliage, while the wild 
flowers beside the paths seemed to have sprung 
up over night and dotted the woods so thickly 
that the heavy boots, so useful in wading 
strea'ms, seemed strangely out of place on such 
a carpet. 
The larger sti'cams were swollen from the 
recent rains, but the brooks were falling and 
clearing and they babbled over boulders and 
heaps of leaves between banks freshly washed 
as if for this great annual occasion in the life 
of the angler. On such a day one’s favorite 
brook offers attractions that are ever new, 
familiar though all its surroundings may be; 
but even the favorite brook may be less attrac¬ 
tive than one that is being visited for the first 
time. The impulse to follow this one to its 
source and acquire some knowledge of its 
peculiarities is almost irresistible at such a 
time. The trout may be abundant lower down, 
but there are discoveries to be made, and every 
turn discloses a surprise. Here a limpid spring 
pours from under red sandstone and calls in¬ 
cessantly to all who are thirsty. Further on, 
where one has expected to lose the brook in a 
swamp, he stumbles through a gorge darkened 
by immense old hemlocks and finds a series of 
cascades and pools. Perhaps the stream branches 
here and the vista is so pleasing that it is not 
passed by until luncheon has been dispatched 
and an hour devoted to the pipe and the luxury 
of doing nothing. 
At such a time it is hard to compel the muscles 
to do one’s bidding. They as well as the mind 
are at rest, perhaps the first real rest in months, 
and even the call of the trout stream is insuffi¬ 
cient to rouse one from his comfortable seat 
among the dry leaves beside the spring. But 
the shadows lengthen and one passes on in time, 
to resume his explorations among the alder 
thickets and the meadows. 
So the day passes. The creel may be light 
—certainly one’s gear grows heavier -with the 
hours—but the setting of the sun rounds out 
a day of rare enjoyment, and the tired angler 
returns to his home with a lighter heart and 
pleasanter thoughts than for many a day. 
THE USE OF EYES. 
In the first chapter of his last book on Africa, 
F. C. Selous discusses a multitude of subjects 
of very high interest to the naturalist and the 
hunter. Though best known as a big-game 
hunter, Mr. Selous is much more than that. He 
is a keen observer who remembers what he has 
seen and sets it down accurately. The writings 
of such a field naturalist are of high value. 
In the first chapter of this volume when speak¬ 
ing of protective coloration, he instances a mul¬ 
titude of animals which are not protectively 
colored and gives examples such as are familiar 
to most hunters of experience, of the way in 
which wild animals of all sorts depend on their 
powers of scent rather than on those of sight. 
Many years ago, in speaking of the sight of 
the deer, we expressed the belief that the deer 
recognizes danger only in life, and life only 
in motion. The case of the antelope which 
slowly walked by Mr. Selous, within three yards, 
without noticing him, is one in point. 
The frequent statements as to the difficulty 
of seeing wild animals made by travelers who 
are not hunters do not necessarily mean much. 
The true savages such as the Bushmen of South¬ 
western Africa, who depend on their eyesight 
for a living, see so clearly that no color or 
combination of colors could conceal from their 
view any of the animals on which they prey. 
While a white hunter can never become as keen 
sighted as a Bushman, yet after a few years 
spent in hunting, his eyes will nevertheless 
greatly improve in power. 
It is certain that by practice in looking for 
game the white man will learn to know what 
to look for and will learn to distinguish wild 
animals from other natural objects. Even with¬ 
out any improvement of eyeSight, but by a more 
widely extended knowledge of the objects which 
come under his eye, the hunter recognizes that 
he is looking at an animal, and not at a rock, 
a weathered log or a shadow on the hillside. 
That the eyes of the savage are more useful 
in the open than those of the civilized man may 
be at once acknowledged, and this is because his 
eyesight is better. Since childhood he has been 
using his eyes in the open and always at vary¬ 
ing distances, and he is looking at things that 
he has seen perhaps a thousand times, and with 
whose appearance at all distances he is familiar. 
Some years ago a white man, hunting wild 
sheep in Lower California with a Cocopah, ob¬ 
served that the eyesight of the Indian seemed 
about equal to his own, supplemented by a pair 
of good field glasses. That the training of 
human vision can be improved by practice is 
quite certain, but it seems unfair to measure 
human vision by the degenerate powers of the 
civilized man, who uses his eyes only at short 
distances, and, besides, strains them by all sorts 
of excessive work at those short distances. 
If Newfoundland continues her present policy 
of disposing of the trees on vast tracts of land, 
the result can be foretold with certainty. The 
attention of papermakers has been drawn to 
this source of supply, and already an immense 
acreage of trees has been sold for pulp-wood, 
while negotiations for more timber are pending. 
Denude that island as some regions on the conti¬ 
nent have been denuded of timber, and it will 
indeed become a barren, desolate spot. New¬ 
foundland will, on the other hand, become a 
recreation ground for the two great English- 
speaking nations if her natural resources are 
conserved. With the establishment of improved 
facilities for the transportation and accommoda¬ 
tion of sportsmen and anglers, the revenue from 
these sources alone will increase steadily until 
it becomes an important item on the right side 
of the island’s ledger. Her barrens and her 
streams are free to all, and ordinary precau¬ 
tions will insure satisfactory caribou and ptar¬ 
migan hunting and salmon and trout fishing. 
The commercial fishermen will suffer no great 
hardship if prevented from jeopardizing the 
salmon and trout supply by netting river mouths. 
S» 
At Sotheby’s auction sale in London on 
March ig a copy of the first edition of Walton’s 
“Compleat Angler” was sold for $5,425. The 
purchaser was Mr. Quaritch, who, at the same 
place in 1907, paid $6,450 for the famous Van 
Antwerp copy of the same work, a record price. 
At the Heckscher sale in this city, in February 
last, $3,900 was the price paid for a first edition. 
