934 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Dec. io, 1910. 
We did not reach the boat house until seven 
that evening, having been on the water over 
fourteen hours. The bag on being spread out 
looked small, and ought to have been heavier. 
Eight couple of snipe, however, were shot on 
free ground, open to all who care to try their 
luck, and I always think the great charm in a 
day like this is the possibility of making a real 
good bag, for snipe are always to be seen and 
generally a variety of other fowl besides. 
W. R. Gilbert. 
A Trip for Profit. 
Personnel : Hunkey Dory, a musical fisher¬ 
man ; Bill Ackley, a hunter and trapper; Fred 
Ackley, Bill’s brother. 
Scene: The Whitefish River, Michigan. 
Time: About 1880, when the trout were plenty. 
Hunkey, Bill and Fred start with a team for 
Trout Lake, the head of the Whitefish River, 
about thirty-six miles by road, to make a stake 
out of trout. On the way they shoot a deer and 
hang it up to be taken home on the return trip. 
At the lake they camp in the log shanty and 
Bill goes out to set the bear trap, and Hunkey 
and Fred go down the lake to catch trout. Bill 
soon joins them. They catch a lot of trout and 
put them in a large live rack made of lath. At 
night they sleep in the shanty, expecting to start 
home in the morning. They play cards, listen 
to Hunkey’s mouth organ and rejoice over their 
luck in having the deer and about 175 pounds of 
fine trout. 
In the morning Bill sends Hunkey Dory down 
the lake in the boat to tow the fish rack up to 
the shanty to have the trout dressed ready to 
go home, and goes to take up the bear trap, Fred 
being left to feed the team, help clean the trout 
and get ready to start home. 
Bill finds a bear in the trap, and after killing 
him shouts unavailingly for help to get him 
down to the shanty. He finally gets the bear 
ready and has to go to the shanty, shouting for 
help occasionally. On his arrival he finds Flunkey 
and Fred playing cards, when he supposed they 
were cleaning the trout. He gets them out and 
they get the bear and put it in the wagon, and 
Bill asks for the fish. Flunkey says that in tow¬ 
ing the live rack over the shallow part of the 
lake the bottom lath came off, and when he got 
to the shanty he had only an empty rack. They 
console themselves that they have the bear and 
the deer, and start Hunkey down the road with 
the team and bear. Bill and Fred go down the 
river in the boat. The day proves warm and 
Hunkey falls asleep on the wagon. When he 
wakes up he has passed and is far beyond the 
deer, so he goes on without it, as it is getting 
late and gets the bear to town, which they sell 
to Al. Moore, an old hunter friend, for twenty 
dollars. Al. ships him to a commission merchant 
in Chicago, who sells him and remits Al. thirty 
dollars. The bear is sold to a restaurant keeper, 
and on being used is found to be tainted, the 
hot ride in the wagon having started the taint. 
The restaurant keeper sues and recovers, and 
Al. has to refund the thirty dollars, which he 
collects of the party who went on a hunting and 
fishing trip for profit. W. H. H. 
All the game laws of the United States and 
Canada, revised to date and now in force, are 
given in the Game Laws in Brief. See adu 
A Deer Hunt. 
Hendersonville, N. C., Dec. 3.— Editor Forest 
and Stream: My hoped for hunt in the great 
Smoky Mountains did not materialize, but I am 
just back from a hunt in the Gloucester Moun¬ 
tains in Transylvania county. Through the cour¬ 
tesy of a friend I received a permit to hunt up 
there and took the train on the afternoon of the 
23d ult., reaching Cherryfield Station in time for 
supper. 1 spent the night with the leading mer¬ 
chant of the neighborhood, who kindly told me 
who I could get to drive me to my destination 
near Balsam Grove postoffice, and on Thursday 
morning left Cherryfield for Balsam Grove. I 
took with me my shotgun and my .25-20 rifle. 
The ranger, whom I have known well for years 
past, and at whose house I was to stay, was on 
his rounds, so I walked out to meet hijn and re¬ 
turned in time for supper, after which we talked 
over plans for the morrow. The day had been 
cloudy, but it cleared off till late in the night, when 
the wind rose and it blew as I have seldom felt 
or heard it. With the wind fell a little rain, for 
which I was grateful, as it was very dry. We 
had in this country ice this year before white 
frost, something no. one here ever saw before, 
and it dried the leaves on the trees before they 
could color. Fire under such conditions'would 
have been fearful. The high wind and shower 
brought most of the leaves down, and by early 
morning it was clear, but still windy. 
We left the house after an early breakfast, 
Jesse McCall, the ranger, with his .32 rifle and 
I with my .25-20. Let me say right here some¬ 
thing of my rifle sights. I had removed those 
that were on the rifle when I bought it, and put 
in their place an ivory hunter’s front sight, and 
a folding rear sight. This folding rear sight 
is very simple. One a deep notch, or turning 
this down, a perfectly straight top sight without 
any notch, but with a bit of ivory, triangular in 
shape, one point almost flush with the flat top 
of the sight. With this one can shoot almost as 
fast, if not quite so, as with a shotgun. 
We began the gradual climb toward Pilot 
Mountain, going carefully with a sharp lookout 
on the sunny side of the ridges especially, as we 
felt sure the deer would be if possible out of 
the reach of the wind. 
We had not been out over three-quarters of 
an hour when I saw the ranger, who was a little 
distance in advance of me, stop suddenly, and at 
once I saw the cause. A large buck was stand¬ 
ing watching its about sixty yards away. My 
rifle was up and I fired and the deer down be¬ 
fore the rafiger thought I could be “on to it.” 
But he did not stay down. Wheeling about he 
went down the mountain in a zig-zag run that 
plainly told the result. The ranger tried a shot, 
but missed, and I simply watched him as he went 
over a little ridge. 
We walked over to the spot he stood on to 
look for blood, but I told McCall there would 
be none, because of the buck’s position when I 
fired. A half turn as he looked at us, so that 
when he straightened out to his natural position, 
the little hole made by a .25-20 was at once 
closed. It proved so. 
We followed and he had fallen a little more 
than two hundred yards from where shot. Mc¬ 
Call saw him moving his head back and forth 
and shot at it, the ball barely scratching the side 
of his head. 
This brought him up, and away he started 
down the mountain again. This time I fired 
twice, and each time gave a vital shot. He went 
aboht forty yards and came down for keeps. I 
had a strong but small rope, and with it we tied 
securely the legs together high up, and then the 
horns — and they were large ones — to the fore¬ 
legs. McCall then found a strong stiff locust 
pole. Running this pole between the legs of the 
deer and putting one end on a high log, he 
came and helped me to raise the other end on 
to my shoulder, which I first reinforced with 
many folds of my woolen sweater. My shoulder 
feels sore yet, although we made three “totes” to 
carry him a quarter of a mile. We then untied 
the rope and snaked him down to the edge of 
an old field and then McCall went home for 
horse and wagon. Then I got two stout fence 
rails from a pile not far away. 
The wagon was driven below the deer, the 
rails put against him and on to the wagon, and 
we rolled him up and in. McCall placed his 
weight at close about 300 pounds. This buck 
had five well developed spikes to each horn and 
a couple of little “bumps” near the base. 
One of the spikes nearest the head had been 
broken off, I suppose in a fight with another, as 
the rut was on. We found that the first shot 
fired was a fatal one, and had we left him alone 
half an hour, no further shot would have been 
required. This deer was rolling in fat. In open¬ 
ing him quite a quantity of whole Spanish oak 
acorns, with the hulls on them just as they fell 
from the trees, dropped out, a thing I never saw 
before, and McCa’l tells me he never did, and 
he is an old deer hunter. 
The deer open season closes Dec. 15 and I 
am not sure that I shall have another chance at 
them. But the memory of this little hunt will 
remain with me. That old buck made its im¬ 
pression when I was under one end of that locust 
pole. Ernest L. Ewbank.- 
Many Cripples. 
A sample of the ammunition which is being 
used in hunting the deer reached the commission 
recently, says the Boston Transcript in com¬ 
menting on the deer season in that State. Its 
external appearance is similar 'to the ordinary 
cartridge for a shotgun, but in the end there is 
a large piece of lead which to all intents and 
purposes practically transforms the shotgun into 
a rifle. The only distinction is that it will not 
carry so straight, and is therefore ready more 
dangerous than the rifle which is prohibited by 
law. 
The criticism of the new law has taken the 
form of an attack on the shotgun, which is the 
only weapon which may be used legally in shoot¬ 
ing deer during the six days of the open season. 
It was claimed by game wardens in the western 
part of the State that several , deer had been 
painfully wounded by the hunters with shotguns 
without being killed. On the other hand it was 
common talk that it v r as lucky for many a hun¬ 
ter that rifles were not in the hands of the 
hundreds of men and women who thronged the 
five counties where the open season was on. If 
rifles had been in use instead of the shorter 
ranged shotgun, it is probable that several per¬ 
sons would have been severely wounded if not 
killed, so numerous were the hunters. 
