JUNE 23, 1906.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
O93 

and to increase still further the supply of fish, 
fowl and game. 
For Pleasure and Recreation. 
As already suggested, any one of the three 
reasons given furnishes the most excellent 
ground for the work of the department and the 
expenditure of money by the State. If none 
of them existed, and the argument was based 
solely upon the question of pleasure and recrea- 
tion, still there would be warrant for its entire 
cost. Some idea may be obtained of the num- 
ber of people, men and women, who hunt and 
fish and camp for pure pleasure, recreation and 
diversion, because they love nature and believe 
in keeping in close touch with it—some idea 
I say may be formed when it is known that there 
are 10,000,000 shotguns in use in this country, 
and that 500,000 new ones are made and sold 
every year. Then when it is considered that at 
least a tenth of the entire population of the 
United States lives in the Empire State, and 
that the Adirondack forests may be reached 
from its remotest part in twelve hours; that the 
State abounds in ponds, lakes, creeks and rivers, 
the waters of which are inhabited by nearly 
every species of game fish; and that all over 
the State are covers for the ruffed grouse and 
woodcock—it is easily understood why so many 
of our people take advantage of the opportuni- 
ties thus offered for pleasure and recreation of 
this kind. The State preserve, or park lands of 
the State, are in the Adirondacks and Catskills, 
and furnish the great central playground for our * 
people. It is not overdrawing the picture to 
say that the Adirondack Park is one of the finest 
forest preserves in the world, richest in all the 
conditions that are desired for camping, fishing, 
hunting and health. 
In the national parks and other resorts there 
are mountains that rear their heads higher, there 
are deeper gorges and some larger lakes; but 
nowhere on the face of the globe is there a 
State or national forest preserve kept for the 
use of the people that equals the State lands 
in the Adirondack Mountains. Other preserves 
are further from the people who would frequent 
them; they are much less accessible; their alti- 
tudes are too high or too low; they lack the 
abundant spruce and pine and fir that furnish 
much of the health-giving qualities found in the 
Adirondack atmosphere. Here we have 6,000 
square miles of mountains, lakes and streams 
wherein are the sources of many large rivers 
flowing north, south, east and west. From that 
great forest covered watershed they supply 
power plants, mills and factories, and furnish 
water for the millions of people living within 
the State. Its deep forests, its land-locked lakes 
fringed with spruce and pine, its cafions, grot- 
toes and hundreds of waterways connecting one 
lake with another, make a charming picture— 
in nature unsurpassed anywhere. Here the 
handiwork of the Maker has been most skill- 
fully displayed. We find there the “forest 
primeval” with its secreted ponds and streams 
undisturbed by the habitation of man. Here 
also we find displayed hundreds of half hidden 
structures dotting the water fronts or peeping 
from the evergreens—artistic abodes, beautiful 
and comfortable. In many places, also, may be 
found a woodland Venice. The placid waters 
of the lakes, around which the half concealed 
cottages are built, are dotted in the summer 
evenings by the American gondola, each with 
its neatly dressed, healthy and happy occupants. 
They ply from shore to shore and around the 
margin of the lakes, enlivening and beautifying the 
places cast in nature’s mold, and thus made use- 
ful and enjoyable by the arts of man. Here the 
wild deer live in abundance; here the speckled 
trout enrich the streams for our use, furnishing 
healthy sport and recreation to all who seek 
this woodland paradise. Camps, cottages and 
hotels are filled each succeeding year by both 
rich and poor, all having free access to this 
recreation park, which is maintained by the 
State for the benefit of its people. 
This rich inheritance, now sought to be pre- 
served and improved by the State through this 
department, is so valuable, so necessary to the 
health, wealth and prosperity of the people that 
no man’s hand should be raised against it, Its 

PREHISTORIC MOUND, 
value cannot be calculated in dollars and .cents. 
It is priceless to us, and if preserved will be an 
inestimable boon to all succeeding generations. 
It should be cherished and enlarged with un- 
stinting hand; it should be protected with sleep- 
less watchfulness and constant care. It should 
be visited, studied and enjoyed by all until public 
sentiment is so thoroughly aroused and well de- 
fined that no man will dare to do it injury. 
Recovery from Rattlesnake Bite. 
Monawk, Fla., June 6.—Editor Forest and 
Stream: It may be of interest to the readers of 
ForEST AND STREAM to know that one of my 
guides, George Hardin, was bitten by a large 
diamondback rattlesnake about ten days ago, and 
lives to tell the tale. George was hog hunting 
with his brother-in-law. A hog ran into a 
thick bunch of palmettos, and George after it. 
The snake, which was lying there, struck him 
without warning on the bony part of the knee, 
to one side and just below the knee cap. George, 
of course, was very much frightened, but had 
presence of mind enough to kill the snake, 
which measured about six feet long. He then 
corded his leg above the knee, and examining 
the bite, found that the snake had struck him 
a glancing blow. Very likely the bone caused 
the fangs to glance. There were two wounds 
or scratches about an inch apart; one of them 
an inch or more long, the other not so long. 
George took his knife and scraped _ these 
scratches, causing the blood to flow. He then 
sent his brother in to town for whiskey, and 
began to chew and swallow tobacco juice. When 
his brother got back he was very sick (how 
much the tobacco juice had to do with it, I 
cannot .say). After a time he eased up the 
cord on his leg, when he felt prickly sensations 
all over his body and became mutch sicker 
from this time on for the next forty-eight hours; 
he drank quarts of whiskey, which, he says, he 
did not feel, thought he continued very sick, 
after which he began to feel very much better. 
Many of your readers who have hunted with 
George will be glad to know that to-day he is 
none the worse for his experience. 
This is the first actual rattlesnake bite that 
has come under my own observation in a resi- 
dence of seventeen years. I have been a close 
reader of Florida papers, and I do not believe 
that the average for the whole State would be 
two snake bites a year; and these almost in- 
variably occur in the summer months. 
I suppose that sportsmen generally know that 
(See page 988.) 
MIAMISBURG, OHIO, 
the accepted antidote to-day is a one per cent. 
solution of chromic acid injected into each fang 
wound and in the tissue surrounding the wounds 
with a hypodermic syringe, first of all cording 
the leg or arm above the wound, using a little 
whiskey, or an injection of a weak solution of 
strychnine with the hypodermic needle, to keep 
up the heart action. I always carry these things 
with me in the woods in case of necessity; but 
up to this time I have yet to see a live rattle- 
snake, GVHESSTOKES: 
“In the Lodges of the Blackfeet.” 
OAKLAND, Cal., May 26.—Editor Forest and 
Stream: Nothing finer has ever been published 
in your excellent paper than the series of articles 
by Walter B. Anderson, “In the Lodges of the 
Blackfeet.””’ I was upon the Gallatin and Madi- 
son rivers as early as 1864, when the very name 
of Blackfoot was a terror to the hunters and 
prospectors throughout all that region, and we 
were familiar with the many lively encounters 
that Carson, Bridges, Williams and other con- 
temporaries had experienced with that splendidly 
hostile foe; and with my own knowledge of the 
section and race in question, coupled with the 
fact that for thirty years the Forest AND STREAM 
has been a weekly visitor to my lodge, I think I 
can make the above assertion with a fair degree 
of confidence. The temptation to embellish and 
exaggerate in cases of this kind is usually so 
strong that it is seldom entirely resisted, even 
though men who are perfectly familiar with the 
subject can detect any deviation from the truth 
instantly; but if there is anything but the plain, 
unvarnished truth capitally handled in this series 
of articles I confess my inability to discover it. 
ForkKep DEER. 

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