. MaRcH 24, 1906.] 
baffled the alligator by running first to right and 
then to left—escaping when I thought I had got 
him—gaining ten yards on me as though he had 
not the slightest scratch—then suddenly turning 
back and running between my legs. You would 
have said it was a wager. 
—I howled. I picked up stones and flung them 
at him; and, when I fancied myself within reach, 
I let myself fall down flat on my stomach, hop- 
ing to catch him between myself and the ground 
as under a trap. In the distance I was dimly 
conscious of the other members of the party, half 
laughing, half furious—laughing at the exercises 
I was going through, furious at the noise and 
commotion I was causing in the midst of the 
battue, which was frightening back all the hares. 
At last, after efforts unparalleled, I got hold of 
my friend by one paw, then by two, then round 
the body. He uttered cries of despair, while I, 
hugging him to my breast (as Hercules did with 
Anteus), regained my hole, taking care to pick 
up Ace the way my gun, which was lying on the 
path. 
On getting back to my retreat I was able to 
examine my hare carefully, and this examination 
explained all to me. I had put out his two eyes 
without inflicting any other wound; and now, on 
the nape of the neck, I dealt him that famous 
blow which did for him as a hare, though Arnal 
has called it the “rabbit blow.” 
Then I reloaded, my heart beating and my hand 
trembling. 
It certainly did seem to me that the charge was 
a trifle thick, but I was sure of the gun, and this 
excess of four or five lines would give me the 
chance of killing from a greater distance. Barely 
had I got back into position when I saw another 
hare coming straight to me. I was cured of the 
fancy for firing at the head; besides, this one 
promised to pass by me broadside on at twenty- 
five yards’ distance. He kept his promise, and I, 
aiming with more calmness than could have been 
expected of me, drew the trigger, convinced that 
I had my brace of hares. 
The priming burnt, but the shot did not go off! 
Here was a mishap! I tried one of those oaths 
which came so easily to M. Deviolaine, but half- 
way through I dropped it. They never did come 
well to me; I never could swear even in my mo- 
ments of greatest wrath, 
I pricked my gun, primed it, and waited. Cer- 
tainly M. Moquet had made no mistake; a third 
hare was coming on the track of his predecessors. 
Like the last, he passed full abreast of me twenty 
yards off. As with the last, I aimed; and, when 
I had covered him well, pressed my finger on the 
trigger. The priming simply burnt as before. 
I was mad, and could have cried with vexation, 
all the more so as a fourth hare was now coming 
along at a gentle trot. It was with him as with 
the others; he was as obliging as possible, and 
my gun as perverse. He passed within fifteen 
yards of me, and for the third thime the priming 
burnt, but no shot went off. 
This time I wept outright. A good shot in my 
position would have killed four hares; and I, be- 
ginner though I was, should at any rate have got 
two, 
This was the end of the battue. M. Moquet 
came to me. Placed low down as I was in a 
hollow, the others had not been able to witness 
the triple accident that had befallen me; and he 
now came down to find out—having seen all the 
hares pass and hearing no report—he came to find 
out whether I was dead or asleep. I was simply 
desperate. I showed him my gun. 
“It has missed fire three times, M. Moquet,” 
I cried, in piteous tones—‘‘three times with three 
hares!’ 
“Missed fire! What, flash in the pan, eh?” 
“Yes, missed fire. What the deuce can be the 
matter with the breech?” 
M. Moquet shook his head; then, like an old 
sportsman, who is never at a loss, he produced 
a worm-screw from his bag and fastening it to 
the end of his rod, extracted from my gun first 
the wadding, then the shot, then the second wad, 
then the powder, and then after the powder—a 
half-inch of earth which had got into the barrel 
when I flung my gun after the hare, and which 
I had pushed to the bottom of the breech when 
ramming in my first wad on the powder. 
I might have fired at a hundred hares, and my 
I did not cry out now 
FOREST AND STREAM. 

gun would have missed a hundred times, Frailty 
of human affairs! Had it not been for that half- 
inch of earth I should have killed three or four 
hares, and should have been the king of the bat- 
tue; for they had all come to me except one only, 
which had gone to M. Dumont, of Morienval, 
and which M. Dumont had killed. 
My good luck had exhausted itself in this first 
battue; there were ten others, but never a hare 
came within reach of me. I returned tired and 
weary; I had killed my hare a hundred yards 
from the farm, and M. Moquet had wanted to 
send it back to the house at once, but I did not 
choose to part with it thus, and I carried it on 
my back for eight or ten leagues. 
It goes without saying, that, of the merry jokes 
which always enliven the dinner of a shooting 
party, a large number were at my expense. The 
evolutions in which I had indulged; all the hares 
coming to me, with the intuition that my gun was 
loaded with earth; not a hare coming my way 
directly the gun was put to rights—all this, to 
say nothing of my face, which had been clawed 
over by the hare in my single combat with him— 
all this formed a capital text for jests. 
But one thing made me forget all these quips 
and gibes, and plunged me into an ecstasy of un- 
speakable delight. The series of pleasantries of 
which I was the object was ended by this utter- 
ance of M. Deviolaine: 
“Never mind; I will take you next Thursday 
to a boar hunt, and we'll see whether you catch 
hold of those gentry round the body like you do 
the hares.” 
“Do you really mean it, cousin?” 
“T do, really.” 
“No, but—honor bright?” 
“Yes, honor bright.” 
And so great was my exultation at this promise, 
that I left the table and went off into the yard to 
tease a magnificen bull, who was not thinking of 
me in the least, and who, tired of my provoca- 
tions, would have disemboweled me, had I not 
made my way back into the kitchen by jumping 
over one of those little gates in the wall, such 
as are found in most farmyards. The bull fol- 
lowed me so close that he put his head over the 
gate, and gave forth a bellow which made the 
whole house shake. But Madame Moquet coolly 
took a burning firebrand from the hearth, and 
went and put it under the bull’s nose, whereat 
he jumped back five or six paces, and then, with 
seus or five gigantic bounds, disappeared into his 
stall. 
I was not in the habit of boasting of such deeds 
of prowess as this. On the contrary, when any- 
thing of the sort occurred to me, I would resume 
my tranquillity as quickly as possible, and re- 
enter the place whence I had come, with my 
hands behind my back, like Napoleon, and hum- 
ming the “Fleuwve du Tage’ or “Partant pour la 
Syrie’—ballads very much in fashion at that 
period—in a voice almost as false as that of the 
great King Louis XV. But, unfortunately, Mas 
—M. Deviolaine’s servant—had seen me, with the 
result that my agility in leaping barriers was, for 
the next fortnight, the object of ironical con- 
ie on the part of Cécile, Augustine and 
“elix, 
[The story of the boar hunt will be given next 
week. | 
Preservation vs. the Market. 
Boston, Mass., March 17.—Editor Forest and 
Stream: By request of certain Boston dealers in 
game a delegation from members of the legislative 
committee of the Massachusetts Fish and Game 
Protective Association met a committee from the 
Fruit and Produce Exchange in the office of the 
Association for a conference upon House bills 851 
and 853 Monday morning, March 12. Inasmuch 
as this meeting had been arranged upon the re- 
quest of the dealers, it was incumbent upon them 
to define their position on the questions involved 
and explain what they hoped to accomplish by 
an interchange of views. 
From statements made by Messrs. Mead and 
Hosmer it appeared that the sale of prairie chick- 
ens in the Boston market has dwindled down to 
very small proportions, and the dealers would not 
regard its discontinuance as a great loss. In fact, 
on that point they were not disposed to make a 
fight for its continuance. The sale of ducks they 
desire to be allowed to continue up to March 1 
for the reason that during the winter months 
there were many dinner parties of clubs and 
societies which want game of some kind on the 
menu, They have had the privilege of selling 
both pinnated grouse and ducks throughout the 
year. 
The principle on which the Association bills 
were drawn makes the sale season identical with 
that for taking or killing, which underlies the 
Massachusetts law on shore birds.. But the com- 
mittee of the Association did express a willing- 
nes to allow some leeway for the dealers to close 
out whatever birds they might have on hand at 
the end of the open season. It was thought the 
contention for the winter months on sale of 
ducks which may be legally shipped from some 
of the Southern States, was not wholly incon- 
sistent with legitimate protection, and a disposi- 
tion was shown to give due consideration to the 
arguments put forward by the dealers. 
But when we came to a discussion of the quail 
situation, Mr. Mead for the dealers, said he un- 
derstood an effort was to be made to change the 
law of the State of Illinois which now allows the 
_ shipping of game as late as Feb. 1, and he asked 
that the present law allowing the sale of quail to 
May I remain without change for the present, 
and if a change was made in the law of Illinois 
so they could not make shipments from Chicago 
the dealers would be willing to see the law 
changed to suit the Association. 
This was practically saying they would not op- 
pose a change if the time should come when they 
could not get birds to sell. Mr. Mead declared 
that the sportsmen were not willing to give up 
anything and while they might carry their point 
now, the dealers would put in bills next year for 
a five years’ close season and a hunters’ license 
and a bag limit whenever shooting should again 
be permitted. Mr. Mead was reminded of the 
reduction in the shooting season on upland birds 
in 1900 of not less than forty per cent., and the 
further reduction on the quail season in 1905 of 
fifty per cent., making a total reduction of the 
quail season of seventy per cent. in five years. 
When the conference ended after two hours of 
debate, it was without coming to any agreement 
as to the sale of quail, but at the State House be- 
fore the hearing opened in the afternoon the 
dealers came forward with a proposal to accept 
the terms of bill 853, provided they were allowed 
the month of December in addition to the open 
season (November). They were also willing that 
cold storage game should be placed under seal by 
the commissioners at the close of the sale season 
and so remain until the seals should be removed 
by the commission. The terms of compromise 
were stated to the committee, and while the bills 
as changed have not yet been reported upon, it 1s 
expected that they will be acted upon early next 
week and prove a great advance upon our laws 
as they stand to-day. 
President Brewster declares that if the bills 
are passed as agreed upon it will be a great vic- 
tory. I expect to be able to give your readers 
the outcome before long. eee : 
George M. Poland, of the legislative committee, 
has just returned from a trip with two friends 
into New Hampshire, where they shot upward of 
thirty white hares. A member of the Associa- 
tion, Mr. H. P. Andrews, of Hudson, tells me 
that a young man of his town found the leg ofa 
partridge in the stomach of a fox that he killed 
last Monday. ee 
Applications for quail continue to come in in 
. large numbers and far in excess of our ability to 
secure birds. The winter has been unusually 
favorable and it is believed that what quail we 
had left last fall have come through in good con- 
dition, H. H. KIMBALL. 

Vermont.—I believe that I am one of the old- 
est living contributors of your valuable journal, 
and it certainly gives me pleasure to see it 1n its 
new form and dress. The world moves and the 
Forest AND STREAM is keeping abreast with the 
foremost magazines of the day. We love it, for 
it is one of the family. STANSTEAD. 
