Jan. 5, 1907 -] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
rW 
ON THE EASTERN SIDE OF RUNDELL MOUNTAIN—BUFFALO HERD IN FOREGROUND. 
T 
RUNDELL MOUNTAIN. 
at the head of the estuary flighted to the little 
sound instead of the angry sea. Then was good 
shooting near the ark, and it lasted until after 
j;, the wind shifted to the west, and blew the storm 
inland. Sometimes for three days at a time the 
sound would be the haven of great rafts of 
storm-bound fowl, and then would Billy send 
[ word to me to come down to the ark. His 
message was usually laconic, and was left for me 
at the gun store, where Billy made his purchases 
of powder and shot and hooks and lines. Its 
usual form was a brief statement that a big 
wind was blowing and that the birds were in. 
Billy was always waiting for me when the 
evening train pulled into the sleepy little seaport 
town, and it was Billy who helped me with im-. 
pedimenta to the rickety three-plank wharf 
where his skiff lay moored. 
In the little cuddy of the ark a red-hot stove 
was ready for two fat sprigs. A generous kettle 
of razor clams were steamed and savory of 
garlic, while the oven held some huge mealy 
potatoes, done to a turn. 
It was Billy who cooked the ducks, while I 
ate the clams; it was Billy who washed the 
U dishes, while I smoked my pipe. 
Outside the wind howled, and rocked the little 
: ark till the lamp swung like a pendulum, and 
the dishes clicked in their racks. The pelting 
rain made music on the tarred and rounded 
roof, which one could touch with extended hand. 
1 When all was made shipshape, and Billy had 
(t measured the powder and seated the wads in a 
couple of hundred brass shells—no nitro for 
Billy—he lighted his pipe and smoked while he 
I shotted them. What solid comfort it was to 
lie back on the bunk, and smoke and doze and 
dream, happily conscious of a satisfied appetite, 
a good pipe, and a prospect for a rattling shoot 
in the morning! 
Everything about the 'odd craft bespoke her 
character. A motley lot of battered decoys 
were stacked in one corner, while others peeped 
from under the bunks. On an improvised bench in 
another corner were loading blocks, boxes of 
wads, drums of powder and sacks of shot. Oil¬ 
skins'hung from the walls of the little cabin, 
with odds and ends of canvas clothing, and 
weather-beaten flannels. Coils of hard-braided 
fish lines, with their many hooks embedded 
neatly in cork disks, hanks of seine twine, cork 
floats and lead weights, and a hodge-podge of 
1 other sporting gear blent in harmonious en¬ 
semble. 
Billy was deep in one of his sea yarns by the 
time we had put “the” gun together, and laid 
, out our togs .for the morning. Then would 
j' Billy suggest a game of seven up. We were 
I clad in pajamas and somewhat sleepy. 
“All right, Bill, wait till I fill my pipe again.” 
The pipe was refilled and lighted, the wind 
I shrieked and moaned louder than before, the 
! rain droned more drowsily, the waves lapped 
I 
and seethed against our craft almost as if we 
were at sea. 
“I think—we’ll have—a corking shoot—to-mor¬ 
row, Billy. All right—get the cards.” 
• * 
What, what, where are we? Why, I haven’t 
been asleep. If I had been, I wouldn’t be so 
sleepy now. Five o’clock and breakfast ready? 
Yes, for Billy has been astir for half an hour, 
and two rashers of bacon and eggs are almost 
ready, and the coffee-pot is sending forth its 
appetizing aroma from the cuddy. A hasty 
splashing and sputtering engagement with a tin 
basin on the stern deck, with a flurry of rain 
blown in by the wind, and we are ready for 
breakfast. ... . 
Then, snugly clad in oil-skins, we get into 
the skiff, with the decoys between us, and then 
over the choppy surface of the sound to a point 
that Billy knows of. 
Billy rows, of. course, while we try to keep 
our hands warm. Likewise Billy puts out the 
decoys, after making us comfortable in the 
blind. Later Billy joins us, and good shooting 
follows. Billy praises our good shots, finds 
excuses for our bad ones, and kills the birds we 
miss. Ah, dear old Billy! He was a character! 
Here’s luck to him, wherever he is to-day! 
Los Angeles, Cal. ROBERT ErSKINE ROSS. 
The Game Preserve Idea. 
New York, Dec. 25 .—Editor Forest and 
Stream: I was much interested in your recent 
editorial on the Game Preserve Idea, in which 
you pointed out that in primitive America cer¬ 
tain persons and their families possessed the sole 
rights to fish and hunt over particular areas of 
land and water. This fact, though familiar to 
some ethnologists, seems to have been generally 
unknown until you pointed it out. 
That it was a law that obtained over much of 
North America cannot be doubted, though it is 
probable that it did not exist in regions where 
the food animals and their pursuers were con¬ 
stantly moving about, as for example on the buf¬ 
falo plains. That it existed in certain fishing 
waters in the sea as well as on fresh water 
streams is shown by Swanton’s recent paper on 
the Haidas of Queen- Charlotte’s Island, B. C., in 
which it is stated that “the halibut fishing grounds 
were all named and were . owned by certain 
families.” This is not surprising since you have 
already announced a similar state of things on 
the Frazer River to the south and among the 
Aleuts to the north of the Haidas. 
I am glad, however, to be able to add a further 
reference to this private ownership of the right 
to take food in certain districts to the ones which 
you have already instanced. 
The reference I have cited may be found in 
Haida Texts and Myths, recorded by John R. 
Swanton, Washington, 1905, p. 31 - 
Ethnologist. 
Over Old-Time Trails.—HI. 
(Concluded from page 1020.) 
On the day following the departure from 
Banff, while we were, talking over the buffalo 
that we had seen, one of our party related a 
story told by the Blood Indians to account 
for the existence of the constellation of the 
Pleiades—the seven stars. The tale runs some¬ 
what like this: , 
Once there were seven little boys who wanted 
new robes, and who begged their fathers when 
they went buffalo hunting to bring them little 
yellow calf skins for their robes. No one of 
the fathers remembered the request, and the 
season for the yellow calves went by without 
any one of the boys receiving the robe that he 
desired. . 
So the little boys felt that they were being 
badly treated and they became very unhappy, 
so much so that they no longer wished to live. 
They told each other their troubles, and the un¬ 
happiness of each became known to the others, 
until all the seven knew that all were being 
treated alike. They got together and consulted 
and at last resolved that they would go away. 
“Then,” they said, “perhaps our fathers will be 
sorry that they treated us so badly.” But the 
boys could not decide what to do or where to 
go. 
One boy said, “Let us change ourselves into 
the grass.” , 
“No,” said another, “the buffalo eat the grass, 
and if we do that we shall be utterly destroyed. 
Another said, “Let us change ourselves into 
water.” . 
“No, that will not do,” said another; the 
buffalo drink water. They might drink us up. 
At length they decided to change themselves 
into stars. They did so and became the Pleiades. 
When the buffalo calves come and while they 
are yeilow the Pleiades cannot be seen, but as 
soon as the calves change their color, the 
Pleiades appear and continue in the sky all the 
year until the yellow calves come, when they 
again disappear. 
The pleasant party broke up soon after leav¬ 
ing Banff and its members went in different 
directions. Some of them came east to Winni¬ 
peg, that great city which not so long ago was 
merely a Hudson Bay trading post, Fort Garry. 
At Winnipeg it was our great good fortune 
to meet Mr. C. N. Bell, a gentleman deeply 
learned in the history of the northwest. In the 
old days, away back in 1870, he had done 
sentry duty before the walls of Ft. Garry- He 
was kind enough to go with us out to the old 
fort where now only the back gate is standing. 
About the rectangle of the old fort are holes 
and hollows where formerly were piers of the 
walls and the cellars of old warehouses. The 
fort faced the Assinaboine River, and the axis 
of its length was at an angle with the streets 
