1032 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[JUNE 30, 1900. 

neither of us saw the animal until she started 
to run. Then I had her in full view for forty 
yards of her course, but the man behind the gun 
was not in the right place. Clate was carrying 
my rifle. Now all that saved the deer from an 
early and sudden death, was the fact that I did 
not have the gun “meb-be.” We were so close 
to camp, that we could hear the ax being wielded 
by someone who had evidently lost his nerve and 
gone to work. Selecting a soft looking granite 
ledge, we sat down and reviewed the hunt; and 
after discussing it thoroughly, we decided that 
it was a good game and fairly well played. Two 
bucks came into camp that night; one had the 
left antler shot off, although the Major con- 
tended that the one still on the head was the left. 
Some of the fellows had got the limit; some had 
not, and like the little boy and the jam, “I ain’t 
goin’ to tell.” 
Frank shot a beauty of a buck as it came up 
a runway, nosing a doe track; the first shot 
struck near the base of the horn, dazed it and set 
it crazy. It leaped straight up in the air and 
turned somersaults, tore up the ground and cut 
up such antics that it was quite difficult to place 
a second shot to put it down and out. 
The fourteenth was the last day for hunting, 
as we were going out on the 15th. We had all the 
game we wanted, and the law is out on the 15th. 
Sam had a trip to make over to the south side to 
get his hand ax left sticking in a log the day before. 
I went along to shoot partridges. I had seen birds 
a plenty when hunting deer, but when I carried 
a shotgun with malice aforethought, they were 
as scarce as hen teeth. Oh well, I got enough. 
That night we sang the doxology and closed the 
season, packed our guns, and game and made 
final arrangements for the start home on the 
morrow. Every time anyone mentioned home, 
it sounded all right to me. 
The fifteenth was blustering and freezing. We 
cached our stove, all the lumber and a lot of 
heavy stuff and got the rest of the outfit boxed 
or sacked, and carried down to the shore by eight 
o’clock, and waited for the scow to come along. 
Nine o’clock no scow; ten o’clock same thing. 
We loaded the two boats and two canoes with all 
the dunnage we could pile on, and rowed and 
paddled down to the portage, keeping well to the 
south shore to avoid the rough water that a 
heavy wind was kicking up. When we got near 
the landing in the quiet bay at the end of the 
lake, we saw the scow frozen in, about one 
hundred yards from the staging. We pounded 
the shore ice until we made a landing, and pulled, 
carried and dragged dunnage, game and ourselves 
up to the wagon road. William and Charlie took 
a boat and a canoe and went back for the rest 
of the stuff. By the magnetic influence of a 
kindly eye, a persuasive tongue, some balsam of 
birch and a heavenly smile, the Major got the 
driver to hop around on his wooden leg, and we 
were carried over to the Sturgeon Bay end of 
the portage and in sight of the Owen Sound 
camp. The steamer was to meet us there. We 
arrived, but the steamer did not. It rained, and 
rained real rain, too. The Owen Sound camp 
opened its arms and took us in, warmed us, fed 
us, ate us, drank us and slept us that night; 
and in the morning, when the steamer did come, 
and our troubles were over, we dared them to 
come to Pittsburg, dared them to a man. I am 
going to like any man that ever lived in Owen 
Sound, and if his name even is Owen, it will 
sound all right to me. The Captain, Milligan, 
Creighton, Barney, Harrison, Campbell, Johnny 
and Alexander and the whole dang kit an’ bilin 
uv ye; it’s a foine bunch of hearty lads ye are, 
an’ here’s hopin’ success will carry ye on the 
top uv its shoulders. And finally, they came 
down to the shore to give us God speed. Halloos 
were shouted from boat and shore; caps were 
waved, and we steamed out of Sturgeon Bay and 
on to Parry Sound. We put up at the Kipling 
Hotel, shipped our baggage and game. The next 
morning, early, we bid farewell to the guides and 
took the train fer the States, arriving at Pitts- 
burg Saturday morning, November 18, at home. 
There is more similarity about home and hap- 
piness than the initial letter. One of the most 
pleasant features about a trip of any duration 
or extent, is the home coming. I enjoy the hunt- 
ing to the full, but were it not for the ties, that 
bring me out of the woods and home, a large 
part of the pleasure would be lost. 
MIKE. 

Postscript—William Annis, one of the tried 
and trusted guides referred to in the early part 
of this account, died from freezing, about the 
last of January of this year. From all the evi- 
dence obtained, he had been drawing wood with 
a team of horses, working by himself, and had 
been struck on the head “by a piece of timber, 
knocked off from the load into the road and 
rendered unconscious. The day was cold even 
for that country and he was frozen to death be- 
fore he regained consciousness. 
He was true’to his friends, honest, sober and 
industrious. I trust that his guide in the Un- 
known Land has brought him safely Het 
JE Age eile 
In the Good Old Days. 
WHEN I say that our best game birds have be- 
come scarce of late years, I do not claim to have 
made an original remark. We all know that even 
the most stringent of game laws, and the most 
earnest endeavors of sportsmen have not mater- 
ially changed the conditions. 
Many of us, however, can remember the time 
when partridges were neither so scarce nor so 
wild as they are in these times, and we have 
noted this change with deep regrets. Nowadays 
whenever I hear a sportsman remark as to the 
scarcity of partridges, I am reminded of an ex- 
perience. Doubtless others could relate similar 
experiences, and enjoy a hearty laugh over the 
recollection. 
Three or four of us had been beating the 
covers around Exeter, New Hampshire, for about 
two weeks one autumn some years ago—and we 
found it pretty dry work. 
The woodcock season had not arrived, and the 
few partridges we found hardly paid for the time 
we used. 
We got together one evening and talked the 
situation over, and while thus engaged, one of 
the villagers dropped in; he was a friend of ours 
but made no pretensions to being a sportsman. 
He listened to our story of failure, then he 
said, “The trouble with you boys is this, you 
know that the ground about here is hunted to 
death. You ought to go over and try Epping’”— 
a town some ten miles back. “Nobody hunts 
there, and you can get more partridges there in 
one day than you can find here in a month. 
know all about Epping. I was born there and I 
would be glad to go over there with you.” 
It was at once agreed that we procure teams, 
and make the trip to Epping the next day. So 
we went taking our friend Dow along: 
Upon our arrival he showed us his old home, 
and then started out to pilot us to the “promised 
land.” After a couple of rough miles; we came 
to a large piece of dense woodland—mostly heavy 
pines and hemlocks, and here and there he set 
us at work. 
I remarked that we usually find more partridges 
among the smaller growth, and that they do not 
as a rule frequent heavy timber. Dow said, “This 
place is simply alive with partridges. I know 
what I am talking about.” 
We left him sitting on an old log, and we 
spent two good hours in that piece of woods with- 
out seeing a feather. Finally Dow joined us. 
‘It was a hot day, and as he came up mopping 
his face, he said, “It’s deuced queer—I can’t un- 
derstand this at all—I never came into this place 
without starting at least fifty partridges.” 
Then it occurred to me to ask him a question 
that had been overlooked. I said, “When was it 
Mr. Dow, that you last saw those birds here?” 
“Why,” said he, 1t was when I was a boy! The 
woods were not so heavy then; as you said before 
perhaps partridges don’t like to stay in heavy 
timber !” 
I asked, “How old are you, Mr. Dow?” He 
replied, “Well, I’m about seventy!’ 
JoHN FOotTTLer, Jr. 
An Open Letter to Congressman Lacey 
PHILADELPHIA, June 21.—Hon. John F. Lacey, 
House of Representatives, Washington, D. C.— 
My dear Sir: Your well-known interest and suc- 
cess in game protection, and your recent inter- 
esting article in ‘Outing,’ encourage me to 
write to you about the possibilities of securing 
an amendment to the Constitution of the United 
States, giving Congress the power to protect 
the migratory wild fowl and possibly other game 
all over the country in the same manner as it 
now has power to protect the game in the Terri- 
tories and in special national districts like the 
Yellowstone Park or the District of Columbia. 
This may seem at first like too large a sugges- 
tion in the interest of nature lovers and sports- 
men. But, with increasing education, the nature 
lovers are likely to include the whole people; 
and, as we have amended the Constitution to 
give an alien colored race the right to vote, and 
possibly in the future the right to put us out of 
political power in eleven States in the Union, 
I do not see why we should’not amend the Con- 
stitution in order to save the wild fowl, which 
will be forever a source of beauty, pleasure and 
food supply to us, and never do us any harm. 
In no other way can the wild fowl be pre- 
served. They are rapidly approaching extinction. 
They were fewer this past winter than ever be- 
fore, and never before were the State laws for 
their protection so openly set at defiance. They 
were netted, night hunted and sold by thousands 
in States which forbid those methods. On the 
Virginia coast, where I belong to a club, these 
practices were notorious; and a so-called game 
warden told the treasurer of the club that he 
knew all about it, but could not stop it. 
Freely translated, his words mean that he does 
not intend to try to stop it. Anyone acquainted 
with State politics and State feeling, knows that 
no State laws for the protection of wild fowl . 
can ever be enforced. They will remain a farce 
as they always have been. No man who earns 
a living by wholesale or any kind of destruction 
of wild fowl will ever be restrained from exter- 
minating them and destroying his own source 
of livelihood as well as the profit, pleasure and 
health of the rest of the community. 
If, however, there was an act of Congress on 
the subject which could be enforced by a United 
States Marshal, and the uniform and fearless 
power of the National Government, we should 
be in a different atmosphere and have a differ- 
ent story to tell. We could then have one uni- 
form act for the whole country. As it is now, 
we could not have a uniform law without obtain- 
ing united action by fifteen or twenty State 
legislatures, which would be more difficult than 
obtaining an amendment to the Constitution. 
Without a uniform law among fifteen or twenty. 
States, no one State will punish its own people 
by heavy fines and imprisonment in order to 
save ducks which the next day may fly to a 
neighboring State where the people are free to 
exterminate them. 
Bills have been introduced in Congress pro- 
fessing to protect migratory game; but every 
lawyer knows that they are useless. They are 
merely advisory or recommendatory. No one 
could be fined or imprisoned under them, be- 
cause, without an amendment to the Constitu- 
tion, Congress has no power to pass a game law 
which can be enforced by fine and imprison- 
ment. Every man arrested under such an at- 
tempted law could be discharged, and only by 
fine and imprisonment, rigorously administered, 
can any game law be enforced, especially when 
the game has such a money value as wild fowl. 
To protect the ducks by a game law rigor- 
ously enforced in one State would be useless 
when all other States were allowing free extermi- 
nation. Nothing will save the ducks but uni- 
form protection at the bayonet and pistol point 
along the whole Atlantic seaboard from New 
England to Florida, round to Texas in the Gulf 
of Mexico, and up the Mississippi and Missouri 
valleys to the Great Lakes, Minnesota, the Da- 
kotas and Nebraska. That seems like a vast 
undertaking; but unless we accept it and grapple 
with as such, we have seen the last of the wild 
fowl in America, and our children will ‘have 
