Proposed Glacier National Park.—1. 
Senator Carter's bill, establishing the Glacier 
National Park in Montana with some amend¬ 
ments, passed the Senate at its last session. It 
has encountered no opposition, and if brought 
to a vote in the House will, no doubt, be favor¬ 
ably acted on by that body, and presumably will 
be signed by the President. The condition of 
the bill warrants us therefore in giving a more 
precise description of the territories than has 
yet appeared.. 
The boundaries of the proposed park are on 
the north—the International Boundary Line— 
the 49th parallel of latitude; the Blackfeet In¬ 
dian Reservation and the Great Northern Rail¬ 
way on the east, the Great Northern Railway 
and the Flathead River on the south and the 
Flathead River on the west. These boundaries 
inclose a roughly triangular territory of about 
915,000 acres which consists almost wholly of 
rough mountain peaks, glaciers and narrow val¬ 
leys often filled by lakes. Of this 1,400 square 
miles of territory, about one-half lies on the 
east and one-half on the west of the Continental 
Divide. 
Of the many streams that flow from it, a part 
find their way into the upper waters of the Mis¬ 
souri River and so into the Gulf of Mexico, 
others by way of the St. Mary’s and Belly River 
reach the Saskatchewan and enter Hudson’s 
Bay, while those flowing down the western slope 
of the Rocky Mountains empty into the Flat- 
head River and reach the Pacific. 
Nowhere on this continent, save perhaps in 
the inlet country of British Columbia, is to be 
found mountain scenery of such grandeur and 
beauty. The mountains are very high and the 
valleys narrow. Often for many miles of their 
length these valleys are occupied by deep and 
narrow lakes, whose waters lap the feet of stu¬ 
pendous cliffs. Here everywhere is to be seen 
the work of the glaciers which in ancient times 
carved out these narrow valleys, and at the 
heads of many of the valleys still are found 
the yet active sources of the ancient glaciers 
that performed this marvelous work of erosion. 
Not less than forty glaciers still exist to be 
within the limits of this proposed park. 
The mountains—though not actually very high 
by comparison with the tallest peaks in the world 
—are yet most imposing because of their steep¬ 
ness. The tallest peak in the range, named for 
the late President Cleveland, rises to a height 
of 10,434 feet. Chief Mountain, famous for its 
striking appearance, lies in the line of the east¬ 
ern boundary, where, like a Matterhorn of the 
New World, it sends up a finger-like peak into 
the sky. Apart from its fellows, rearing it¬ 
self above the unbroken prairie, it appears much 
taller than it really is. 
In the eastern portion of the proposed park 
lie the wonderful upper St. Mary’s Lake and 
Swift Current Creek with its wealth of lakes 
and peaks and glaciers. To this country for a 
dozen or twenty years have resorted half a 
dozen hunters from the East and West who, 
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going there ostensibly for the game that once 
abounded, have really given themselves more 
to mountain climbing and to enjoying the charms 
of the scenery than to the pursuit of wild 
animals. 
On the easterly side of the mountains that 
are inclosed within the proposed park, the tim¬ 
ber is small and of little commercial value. 
Moreover, in many places it has more than once 
been burned over by fire, set from the prairie 
or through the carelessness of campers or, in 
earlier times, by Indians. So that while in many 
places the mountains from a distance appear 
softly green with their covering of lodge pole 
pine, in others they bristle with dead weathered 
timber which shines white in the westering 
sun. On the western slope, on the other hand, 
the timber is much larger and is of some eco¬ 
nomic importance. Moreover, it is so well 
grown that, the expert foresters tells us, for 
the good of the forests it should be removed. 
For this reason the bill has been so amended 
as to authorize the Secretary of Agriculture to 
permit lumbering on this west slope of the 
mountains on such terms and other conditions 
as may to him seem best. 
The main use of this great national park must 
ever be to preserve the water supply drained 
from it by the multitude of streams which have 
their origin among its peaks. Of some of its 
other uses we shall speak at another time. 
Unusual Bird Enemies. 
Two items, possessing not a little interest, ap¬ 
peared not long ago in the Boston Herald. 
One of them states that for some time past 
the ducks had been missing on a certain farm 
near Taunton, and that many of the birds that 
had disappeared had last been seen at the edge 
of a certain pond. A watch was set, and on 
one occasion while a duck was swimming along 
the edge of the pond, the head of a great turtle 
emerged from the water and seized the duck. 
The turtle is reported to have been killed and 
to have been so large that a bushel basket was 
not big enough to hold it. 
Although the item reporting this, written in 
jocular mood and disposed to make fun of the 
story, there is nothing very remarkable about it. 
On waters which they inhabit it is not in the 
least uncommon for snapping turtles to kill 
young ducks, and there is no reason why a 
large snapper should not kill a full grown duck. 
Moreover, snappers sometime grow to great size. 
We have handled one or more so large that they 
would not lie flat in an ordinary bushel basket. 
The same paper tells of a dead kingfisher in 
a Salem shop upon whose bill a mussel shell 
is tightly closed. The bird is reported tc have 
been found on the flats alongside the Beverly 
Bridge near Salem. The bird had poked its 
bill into the open shell, and the mussel had 
closed tight and kept the kingfisher a helpless 
prisoner until the tide came in and drowned it. 
This may be capped by the story of a broad¬ 
billed duck, Aythya, reported many years ago 
in Forest and Stream,. The bird was seen by 
a group of boys and young men swimming about 
on a fresh water pond of small size. They ap¬ 
proached to shoot it, when it appeared that there 
was something wrong with the bird, and it was 
presently discovered that it was unable to rise 
from the water, although it could skitter along 
fast over the surface. Finally caught in a land¬ 
ing net, it was found that the fleshy root of the 
bird’s tongue was wedged in between the two 
open valves of a mussel shell. The flesh of 
the mussel was gone, yet the bird could not free 
its tongue, although with the fingers the shell 
was readily removed. The bird was much ema¬ 
ciated. 
Blackbirds Going to Roost. 
Canal Dover, Ohio, Dec. 5 .—Editor Forest 
and Stream: One evening in April I was re¬ 
turning from a ramble into the country. Dusk 
was falling as I passed a swamp where a large 
number of red-winged blackbirds had a roost. 
I had often seen the blackbirds going to bed, 
but that evening I noted something new—at all 
events new to myself. A plowed field oh the 
ridge above the swamp was black with birds, 
all of them, so far as I could make out, being 
red-wings. At brief intervals a small flock 
would detach itself from the large assembly and 
wheel gracefully down to the swamp. Enough 
time having elapsed for them to get comfort¬ 
ably settled, another flock would dart into the 
air and swing around and down to the marsh. 
In this way brigade after brigade went to roost 
until every bird had left the field, and the whole 
company had settled into comfortable sleeping 
quarters. Of course, their “chackings” and 
“gurgilees” still came up from the flags quite 
a while after all had retired. 
The reason of this orderly manner of going 
to roost is easily deduced from the birds’ con¬ 
duct. Had the whole company attempted to go 
to roost at once there would have been confus¬ 
ion and unseemly crowding, whereas by retir¬ 
ing in small detached groups each bird could 
find a comfortable place in which to spend the 
night. One cannot help wondering whether a 
rudimentary process of reasoning was not in¬ 
volved in the blackbirds going to roost in the 
manner described, for they must have discovered 
either by a process of induction or from ex¬ 
perience that, for a large crowd to rush down 
pell mell into the swamp, would create uncom¬ 
fortable jostling. In either case they must have 
concluded that going to roost in small groups 
was a far better way, and that spells drawing a 
conclusion from a premise; in other words, a 
rudimentary process of reasoning. 
Another fact I noted was that here and there 
all over the marsh a male red-wing stationed 
himself on or near the tops of the cat-tails, as 
if he were performing sentinel duty, the while 
he called encouragingly, “Gur-gi-lee, gur-gi-lee,” 
evidently saying, “All’s well.” In this way the 
descending flocks were apprised that the way 
was clear. Leander S. Keyser. 
