Reindeer in Labrador. 
St. John’s, N. F., April 2 .—Editor Forest and 
Stream: As many readers of Forest and 
Stream are interested in the experiment now 
being tried by Dr. Grenfell, viz.: the introduc¬ 
tion of Lapland reindeer into Labrador, I send 
you the very latest news from the north. 
His Excellency, Sir Wm. McGregor, is greatly 
interested in the experiment, and in him Dr. 
Grenfell has a firm friend and ally. Many of 
our governors take very little stock in the island 
or its betterment, but Sir William McGregor has 
proved himself to be a shining exceptiqn to the 
general rule. 
I have been privileged to peruse Dr. Gren¬ 
fell's last letter to the Governor, and to take an 
extract relating to the reindeer. I reproduce it 
here for the benefit of readers of Forest and 
Stream : 
Weatherbound at Lock’s Cove on a journey to 
Flower’s Cove.—Feb. 2.—Dear Sir William: You will be 
disappointed that we are still traveling on our rounds 
with dogs and not deer. 
• The deer have not been broken to fast driving. They 
will haul weights, and do well when led, but won't obey 
yet a driver sitting on the sleigh. 
I have driven, say, ten miles, with two stags harnessed 
to my komatic, and at times get them into galloping, 
but it is yet just as likely that when going fast down 
hill, they will turn round and look at you, and I have 
twice been incontinently hurled into my team, and we 
have floundered about in the snow in a struggling bunch, 
fortunately with no damage. 
[ have my trial man, two apprentices and the Lapps 
scouring the hills after them. As the moss is much 
buried in glitter, food is scarce, and the deer have to 
wander far; there is really any quantity of moss, and 
the deer are looking belter than when they arrived. 
It looks as if every doe in the herd would fawn, and 
that would greatly strengthen the herd, giving us a 
couple of hundred fawns. Beeton’s interpreter is with 
us, and Cole, his sub-manager, 1 presume, is on the 
return journey. 
This last sentence refers to the employes of 
Lord Harmsworth, who purchased fifty deer 
from Dr. Grenfell for use at their pulp mills at 
Grand Falls. They had to travel to the north¬ 
ernmost portion of Newfoundland for their deer 
and drive them south to Grand Falls, where 
doubtless they have already arrived. 
It is to be hoped that the introduction of rein¬ 
deer will be the first step toward the domestica¬ 
tion of our own caribou. With a quarter of a 
million caribou running wild in the interior, in¬ 
creasing at the rate of ten thousand yearly, it 
will lie seen that when Newfoundland wakes up 
to the possibilities of its caribou herds that we 
will not only be able to have thousands of deer 
for commercial purposes, but also will have 
enough to keep this island a paradise for hun¬ 
ters when hunting for big game on the conti¬ 
nent becomes a thing of the past. As an in¬ 
stance of how they increase and multiply Dr. 
Grenfell thinks his herd will be increased by 
200 fawns this spring. 
This shows how profitable they are. Ihis 
addition, which will increase the value of the 
herd by hundreds of dollars, will not entail a 
single cent increased expenditure' for food, 
stabling or attendance. The does will simply 
care for the fawms till they are able to care for 
themselves, when they in turn will contribute to 
swell the total. 
Besides the advantages that would accrue im¬ 
mediately to this island, if the caribou were 
utilized in the near future, when the American 
Government and people begin to restock the 
magnificent forest reservations that they are 
now securing for the people of the United 
States, Newfoundland will be the easiest and 
cheapest place in the whole world in which to 
obtain the needed supply. There are other bene¬ 
fits and advantages that will develop as the years 
roll on that the wisest man cannot now foresee. 
W. J. Carrot.l. 
Reason or Instinct. 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
I have never met the animal, bird or insect 
that could solve a problem of Euclid or under¬ 
stand a page of Ibsen, nor do I believe that one 
in a thousand of the so-called birds of creation 
can do these things, and it seems to me to be 
the height of absurdity for us to accept the dic¬ 
tum of the very limited class who claim perfec- 
MARSH HAWK S NEST. 
Photographed by Edw. Brooks, Jr. 
tion in such things as to the quality of the men¬ 
tal powers of fish, flesh or fowl, for if we allow 
them to set the standard at this height where 
in the name of reason are we at? Where, then, 
shall we set the mark? Whom shall we appo nt 
to straighten this? What manner of man shall 
we select to draw the line and say here instinct 
ends and here reason begins? 
I do not believe that animal, bird or insect is 
endowed with human intelligence or reasoning 
faculties in the broad sense in which we inter¬ 
pret these powers, but I do believe that the all¬ 
wise creator implants in the breast of every¬ 
thing endowed with life faculties analogous to 
what we call reason and intelligence. 
I have witnessed so many remarkable instances 
demonstrating this that I cannot believe other¬ 
wise. Man. as a rule, we place in the most 
exalted rank, for we belong in the class and this 
is perfectly natural, but I have yet to meet the 
metaphysician who is capable of analyzing and 
placing, each in its proper rank, the mental powers 
of what we are pleased to call the lower order. 
S. T. Hammond. 
Purple Martin House. 
Lockport, N. Y., April 6.— Editor Forest and 
Stream: In your last week’s issue Dr. Edmund 
DeWitt complains that he has not been able to 
satisfy the purple martins’ tastes as to nesting 
places he has provided for them. I surmise that 
this may not be the fault of the houses, but that 
perhaps the English sparrows had taken posses¬ 
sion of them before Progne subis came, and they 
could not agree as to who should occupy certain 
apartments, as I suppose it was divided into 
rooms for each entrance. 
A few years ago I watched a bird house that 
was mounted on top of a twenty foot pole that 
was planted directly in the center of the main 
street in front of the principal hotel. I had a 
good view of the bird house and its occupants— 
purple martins, barn and cave swallow, and also 
the English sparrow. As the time was late m 
July or the first of August, and about time for 
the martins and swallows to take their jdeparturc, 
there were many birds flying about, sitting on 
the telegraph wires and the bird house. There 
were at least two hundred swallows and mar¬ 
tins, and many English sparrows going in and 
out the bird houses. I think the house was about 
three by four feet in size, three stories high, 
with between eighty and one hundred entrances 
and elaborately made. 
The whole thing struck my fancy, so that the 
next winter I made one which I intended to put 
on the building that contains my “museum.” 
But when finished 1 found it was so much larger 
and heavier than I had thought that I decided 
not to put it on the building. The foundation was 
a hardwood table top thirty by forty-two inches. 
It was four stories high besides the attic. There 
were eighty entrances to as many rooms of about 
five by eight inches in the four stories for the 
purple martins, swallows and sparrows, and in 
the gables twelve entrances of one inch in 
diameter for house wrens if they cared to occupy 
them. I find that a one inch round hole will not 
admit an English sparrow and they cannot dis¬ 
turb the wrens. 
Finding that 1 had an elephant on my hands 
in the bird house I gave it to a lady who had 
a fine place for it near the city limits, and had 
it erected on a twenty-five foot telephone pole. 
But I am sorry that I have to report that as 
a purple martin house it has been a failure 
and I do not think there has ever been one 
near it. 
A few pairs of martins breed on two or three 
buildings on Main street of this city, but I sel¬ 
dom see them Ijving as far away as my place, 
which is not over a quarter of a mile from their 
breeding place, and of late years I see but few 
swallows in the city. L T p to thirty years ago 
the tree swallow, better known as the white- 
bellied swallow, Tachyeineta bicolor, always bred 
in boxes on the chimneys of the building that 
now contains my museum, but the English spar¬ 
row destroyed their nest and eggs and drove 
them away, and I seldom see them now. 
J. L. Davison. 
