334 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[March 4, 1911. 
A. and B. had now evidently reached their 
position, for six or eight shots fired in quick 
succession showed that they had commenced 
operations. A loch, rather larger than the one 
we had just beaten, lay at the far end of the 
bog, and after working round its edges, our 
friends were to be posted in suitable positions 
commanding the water, for it was the custom 
of duck flushed at our end of the marsh to 
settle there after circling. Our host and myself 
with the gillies walked steadily forward. 
We obtained a few long shots at duck, but 
for the most part these rose out of range. 
Teal, however, were less wary, for this species 
is always inclined to hide at the approach of 
danger, crouching in the thickest cover, while 
their larger cousins evince a preference for the 
more open parts of the marsh, where they can 
readily mark the approach of an intruder. How¬ 
ever, the wariness of the mallards gave us little 
concern, for the continual popping of our 
friends’ weapons showed that the maneuver was 
successful. As this plan had never been tried 
before, the ducks were unsuspicious of danger 
when alighting at the far end of the marsh, 
and though the big packs of widgeon made 
straight for the sea, a few fell victims to A.’s 
No. 3 shot. 
Snipe continued to rise at intervals and a 
fair proportion were added to the bag. In 
common with many wildfowlers, I am of the 
opinion that good snipe shooting is practically 
unequaled as a sport, with, perhaps, the excep¬ 
tion of flight shooting at sunset and early dawn. 
To add to the charm of the day, we found jack- 
snipe numerous, the year in question being a 
record season for these game little longbills. 
I have never seen them in big wisps like their 
larger brethren, but on this particular morning 
three or four were often flushed within a radius 
of a hundred yards. 
My host distinguished himself by killing two 
jacks right and left near a wide ditch, and one 
of them falling on the further side, the spaniel 
was sent to retrieve it. As the dog entered the 
water he flushed a bunch of tufted duck, which 
were now beginning to appear, though few bred 
in the locality. They were within easy range, 
and three fell to our four barrels, both of us, 
unfortunately, firing at the same bird with the 
first shot. A couple of stragglers were like¬ 
wise secured. The remainder of the flock made 
a wide circle, then flew toward the loch where 
our friends were hidden. They received an un¬ 
expected welcome, four more barrels greeting 
their arrival, with what success we could not 
see. All six were stone dead, and were easily 
gathered, which was fortunate, for tufted duck 
are exceptionally strong divers and can swim 
under water for a considerable distance. 
We now had to make a detour to a wooden 
bridge which crossed the ditch, only to find 
that the planks had been carried away by a 
flood some few weeks before. There was noth¬ 
ing for it but to jump. Gillies included, we 
all jumped short, and much laughter accom¬ 
panied each successive plunge into the water. 
However, we kept the guns dry, which was the 
most important consideration, the water being 
little more than knee-deep. Then followed a 
capital bit of snipe shooting, which was but 
the prelude to an exciting stalk after some 
mallards, which, turned back from the loch by 
the shooting of our friends, settled on a small 
pond surrounded with rushes. We approached 
them on all fours from two directions, and, 
though I succeeded in killing only one bird, my 
companion, one of the best and coolest shots 
I have ever met, secured his right and left as 
usual. 
The next meadow being rather too dry for 
wildfowl, was drawn blank, but it held a few 
brown hares, which we spared, as these animals 
were scarce in the district. Our friends now 
left their posts, and we could see them picking 
up ducks in all directions. When they subse¬ 
quently joined us we all agreed that we had 
seldom a more charming morning. 
W. R. Gilbert. 
Good Stuff. 
Byron, Ill., Jan. 30 .—Editor Forest and 
Stream: Forest and Stream of the 28th day 
of the Wolf Month, 1911, is a wonderful issue 
of a great outdoor journal of sport. The wild 
man with his perfect skis and sail looks sharply 
at me as I write. 
The Winter Camp-Fires of W. J. Bignell, now 
running in Forest and Stream, rings eternally 
true. I have made'down my bed on the mountain 
top in mid-winter when the eik yet ran in bands 
of a hundred. I have followed them at the foot 
of Cloud Peak on the summit of the Big Horn 
Range and made a killing. Forty degrees below 
zero the settlers in the Big Horn vales far below 
me said it was on that day of the Wolf Month 
when the killing was made. When the last elk 
had been gralloched and cared for, and I slowly 
and painfully straightened my limbs and wrestled 
with the crook in my back, I found that my 
heavy hunting knife was frozen to my hand so 
that it hung to the palmar surface for a moment 
or two when I opened the stiffened hand. Did 
I suffer? No, sir. The air was dry; we were 
mountain hunters, properly outfitted, mounted 
and armed, and slept o’ nights in Buckskin Ed’s 
old cabin just below timber line and made one 
camp in the open air on the way up. 
What Mr. Bignell says of the caribou on the 
wind-swept mid-winter ranges of the Shickshock 
Mountains of the Gaspe Peninsula of Quebec I 
personally know—in the main—to be true of the 
elk bands of the Big Horn Range in the latter 
part of the last century in mid-winter. The 
parallel is most striking. 
Incidentally, a band of one hundred traveling 
elk pack down the snow as if a train of Gov¬ 
ernment wagons had been along, so hard and 
smooth is it. In it you are all right; out of it 
your horse may flounder mid-flank deep. He 
will not get out of it of his own free will and 
accord—not he. 
Again, with Mr. Bignell, I know that the su¬ 
preme joy of the wild is not for the guided, and 
that there are summer guides, winter guides, 
who are invariably “chasseurs de pelleteries”— 
good guides, poor guides and downright bad 
ones. I never followed a guide a rod in my 
life, but I thoroughly believe in the value of 
a good one. It has always been my fortune to 
have what the men of the old West called a 
“partner,” “pardner” or “podner.” Here is to 
them, one and all. Albert J. Woodcock. 
[The elk have long been extinct in the Big 
Horn Mountains, but recently the State of Wyo¬ 
ming has introduced there about fifty young 
ones, which, if guarded, may restock those rough 
hills.— Editor.] 
Taking Food in China. 
To the North China Daily News, H. T. Wade, 
of Shanghai, contributes an interesting letter de¬ 
scribing sights witnessed up the country which, 
if novel to him as an old resident in Shanghai, 
will be still more so to most of our readers. 
In his interesting volume, “Shooting in China, 
and before that was published, in Forest and 
Stream, T. R. Jernigan gave an interesting ac¬ 
count of Chinese sportsmen and weapons. He 
described two or three methods of capturing 
ducks, and gave illustrations of these methods 
from Chinese drawings, one of which we re¬ 
produce here, as well as an illustration of one 
of the guns used. One of these methods is re¬ 
ferred to in Mr. Wade’s letter, the essential 
parts of which read as follows: 
“During the recent Christmas holidays it hap¬ 
pened that we passed through the townlet of 
Hukou on the Nadoo Creek. A crowd was on 
the bank watching the maneuvers of two fisher¬ 
men who were reaping a harvest of mussels and 
winkles. Many have read how the natives col¬ 
lect wildfowl by going into the water after them 
and dragging the birds under by their legs, but 
possibly no one has witnessed the operation. 
Now, these fishermen were dressed in fowling 
costume; a cow skin coat and stockings all in 
one piece, with the hair turned inside. The only 
apertures in the garment into which the wearers 
worked their way feet foremost were at the 
neck and the cuffs, which were securely tied 
before entering the water, into which the men 
waded up to their necks. As soon as their feet 
came in contact with any of the shell fish, which 
seemed to lie in beds, the fishermen loosened 
them as well as they could from the muddy bot¬ 
tom of the creek and then brought up the ‘take’ 
in a grasp net, which at other times possibly 
did duty for collecting the slime for a top dress¬ 
ing for the fields. The men were eminently suc¬ 
cessful during the short time we stopped to 
watch them and piled up a ‘big catch’ on the 
foreshore. 
“Another sight which interested us was a novel 
way of fishing. Two small boats were moving 
parallel with one another about thirty feet apart. 
The ends of a line about sixty feet long to 
which small, unbaited hooks were attached about 
four inches apart to two sticks, were held respec¬ 
tively by a man in each boat. As the boats moved 
slowly along, first one man and then the other 
would give his stick a jerk. Immediately that 
the hooks struck anything, the line was grad¬ 
ually hauled in and invariably with success. We 
certainly saw fish struck four out of five times, 
many of them running apparently from half a 
pound to two or more pounds. It may be that 
China is the only place in the world where fish 
are caught with unbaited hooks. 
“The third incident we witnessed occurred at 
the well known Shapa, or lower barrier. 
“A native shooter had his gingal with him— 
a most uncanny looking weapon. That there 
should be no question as to its length, it was 
placed upright alongside myself and towered 
above my head two feet two inches (measured) 
which would make the piece of ordnance over 
eight feet in length. It weighed eighteen catties. 
We foreigners sometimes growl at the 6 l / 2 or 
714 pounds our guns usually weigh. Fancy hav¬ 
ing to carry a 24-pounder which was what this 
man did all day long and for every day in the 
