122 
FOREST AND STREAM. 



Glews from Abroad. 
He may be a growler, 

LUCKY is your -Englishman. 
terribly self opinionated, even a trifle of a bully, yet he 
He may enjoy very 
has a grand reserve of good nature. 
little of the peculiar American adaptiveness, but good, 
true, staunch and reliable is he. If he does brag and _blus- 
ter, he almost invariably proves that words are not mere 
sounds, and quickly becomes master of the situation. Your 
Englishman now hunts the prairie with our own savages, or 
tracks the jungles with the Indians. Self reliant, and cool, 
to gcod judgment he adds the force of solid thews and 
muscles. If by sheer head work he makes the laws, by 
his strong arm he inforces them. He joins in all the sports 
of the world, and the aboriginal man of every clime, pro- 
claims him as their victor. 
The fact of the eagerness, the readiness with which Eng- 
lishmen take to all athletic sports, struck us forcibly, when 
reading an article in our transatlic contemporary. This is 
the story; A party of Englishmen are at Osaka in Japan, 
and witness a native wrestling match. Commodore Wilkes 
first gave us some idea of the immense size, weight, and 
strength of these native wrestlers. The ordinary Japanese 
are generally undersized; rarely taller than five feet seven 
inches; though they are squarely built, they are light 
weights. How long it has taken the Japanese to breed this 
special speeies of wrestlers, is not known, but there can be 
no doubt but the present race of huge creatures who com- 
pete in the Japanese P. R., is the result of selection. Some- 
times these wrestlers weigh 300 pounds, and have more the 
appearance of animals than of men. Our Englishmen, ona 
holiday, saw two or three contests, when one of them, ex- 
cited by the scene, even itching for a chance to show his 
prowess, modestly suggested that he would like to try a 
throw orso. The Japanese received the strangers’ chal- 
lenge with delight. The burly representative of an Oriental 
race, with his bronzed skin, is pitted against lithe, agile pale, 
Anglo Saxon. The one is as a mountain, the other as the 
wild ash which grows on its side. They interlock, they 
twist, they wreathe together. Itis the struggle of a boa 
and a viper. At last over goes the Japanese, and the 
knack, endurance, and spirit of the Englishman, (in this 
case it was a Scotchman) wins the day. One no less pleas- 
ant feature of the contest, was the good feeling, and evident 
sympathy the Japanese had for thenew comer, Their desire 
for fair play, in this particular instance, would be worthy, 
of imitation in more civilized communities. Take ten 
thousand Americans, and find for usasingle one, who 
would have the moral courage to engage in such a contest, 
or the physical strength necessary to accomplish it? 
—Preparatory to the grand outburst of fox-hunting, 
when from late October until March, covers will be drawn, 
and the best riders in the world, mounted on the noblest of 
horses, will scour the country, just now huntsmen and whip- 
pers-in are working the hounds on cub-foxes. With infinite 
skill and patience the dogs are trained. The head hunts 
man, an artist in his way now, selects, gleans and culls his 
peck. Their education has received its finishing touch. 
Dogs may have shown great speed, may have outrun the 
pack, but it may be a true case of ‘‘ambition overleaping 
itself. Stern are the decrees of fate, custom and the chase. | 
Fox hounds must run evenly; it would never do to have two 
or three dogs in at the death of the fox and all the rest of 
the pack trailing after the leaders. There must bea certain 
uniformity about the pack, and they must all work smoothly 
together. Learned are our English brethern in dog-ology. 
They appreciate the noble animal, and pay forhim a round 
price at times. Witness the sale of a pack of otter hounds, 
(their owner was killed by a rock falling on him in the 
midst of his sport,) twenty-four otter hounds bringing the 
goodly sum, of £475. 
—The bad weather--constant rainfall—has so far interfered 
materially with partridge shooting. It seems too that the 
birds are not entirely free from the same accidents which 
rendered grouse shooting impossible. Hope is sometimes 
an admirable stimulant for a sportsman to have in quantity, 
so our English friends, in despair of grouse, not very cer- 
tain about even partridges—are falling back on the idea 
that black-cock later will give them an opportunity of 
using up their accumulated stock of cartridges. The 
scarcity of all kinds of game is apparent from the price it 
brings in the London markets. Young grouse are fetching 
12s. per brace, and are scarce, and partridges are worth six 
shillings. While examining the food supply of England, at 
this season of the year, game usually taking off the edge of 
John Bulls appetite, some facts in regard to more solid 
beef and mutton will doubtless be of interest. In 1872 the 
total supply of meat was 1,211,209 tone, or about 84 pounds, 
of meat per head. The home supply was 1,006,231 tons, 
and was made up by the slaughter of 1,750,000. cattle, 
10,640,000 sheep, and 4,846,000 pigs, worth the handsome 
amount of £73,578,015, of foreign imported meat 142,574 
tons were used. What capacious stomachs, and splendid 
digestion English men women and children must have. 
<0 
VENIcE, Irauy, Sept. 1873. 
Epiror or Forest anp StREAM:— 
Sir: In your first issue of Forest AND STREAM,” (whose 
richly flowing current has borne full eastward, as above) 
“Carrier Pigeons” formed a topic, recalling the scene, where, 
—on the piazza of St. Mark, Venice—those little grey-robed 
messengers may still be found, fearlesly coming and going 
amongst the people. A time honored institution are they, 
tended and revered, embodying the tradition, that in those 
days when Venice was the seat and centre of the commer- 


cial world—her history bearing (as it has been said) ‘‘all the 
thrill and interest of aromance”—in the thirteenth cen- 
tury, Admiral Dandolo, while besieging Candia, received 
important intelligence from the Island by means of these 
birds, which he afterwards despatched to Venice with the 
Nesting now in the richly 
news of his eventual success. 
decorated niches of the gorgeous Byzantine cathedral of 8. 
Marks—which all radiant in its gilding and mosaic, presents 
its imposing facade on the piazza, surmounted by the noble 
horses in gilt bronze, brought from the Hippodrome at 
Constantinople,—the descendants of this old lineage multi- 
ply, and conscious, as it would seem, of this thedr Magna Char- 
ta, fly down in flocks, startling the new comer as the air be- 
comes suddenly darkened around him, and they drop, im- 
peding his footsteps, while in their gracefully nodding 
movements as they walk, they peck about the grains 
of corn which if is their prescriptive right and title to re- 
ceive, distributed by the Forestieri, into whose hands the 
little street urchins press the food for a small coin in return. 
I have the honor to be yours very truly, 
1D), JS 1e% 


Sea and River Hishing. 
FISH IN SEASON IN OCTOBER. 
Coast Fis. LAKES. 
Bluefish, Skipjack, Horse Mackerel, Black Bass, (Mic opterus nig 
(Temnodon  saltator.) and archigan.) (two species. 
Spanish Mackerel,(Cero maculatum.) Pickerel, (Hox reticulatus.) 
Weakfish, Squetaug (Trout) Ofoli- Pike perch,(Lucioperca Americana.) 
thus.) 
Bays AND EstTuartizs. 
Striped Bass, Rockfish. (Labrax lneatus.) 
Jel Gi Es 
A friend, who has just returned from the Jacquet 
river, New Brunswick, speaks of the stage of water 
as having been extremely low all through the season. 
Once, after the river was raised 4 little by a heavy rain, he 
struck a number of fine salmon, the largest of which 
weighed twenty-five pounds. One singular incident oc- 
curred while he was in camp near the principal pool. It 
.was twilight, and his canoe had been anchored for the 
night near the shore, when he was suddenly startled by a 
commotion and a threshing close at hand, and on investiga- 
ting the cause, he discovered that a large salmon had 
leaped from the water into the canoe, and was making des- 
perate efforts to get back again into its native element. 
Once it so nearly succeeded, that its body poised upon the 
gunwale, but fortunately for the angler, it flapped back 
again into the canoe, and so wascaptured. It weighed ten 
pounds. 
Here is the latest news from the Umbagog region. Our, 
informant, who left about September 20th, reports the 
streams very low, and the trout hard to find. Twenty ang= 
lers at the Middle Dam averaged, between them, only 
three or four fish per day, the largest weighing ‘seven 
pounds. One weighing three and a-half pounds was taken 
in Sturtevants’ pond by a gentleman from Boston. 
Walter Brackett, Esq., the celebrated artist, of Boston, 
was at Upton with his wife. 
The fishing in Jamaica.Bay has been very good the past 
week or so, large quantities of bass, weakfish, and kingfish 
having been taken, as well as a few sheepshead—these lat- 
ter by experts. The outside fishing is good for bluefish. 
A great number have been taken, chiefly with bait, running 
from ten to sixteen pounds. 
On September 22d, one gentleman took sixty-seven, some 
of which weighed sixteen pounds. 
Off Far Rockaway, Mr. J. H. Batty took five bluefish 
that weighed seventeen pounds each by scale test, and fares 
of 100 to 150 fish per boat are, not unusual. Those who can 
avail themselves of this magnificent last run of the season, 
ought to do so. Goto Bath, Canarsie, Penny Bridge, Brook- 
lyn, or to Jersey City, and hire your yachts. 
The largest run of fish occurs in October, as 
a rule, and the fishing will undoubtedly continue 
good until the first frost, which will cut the 
season short. 
snap. 
All through Long Island Sound great sport has been en. 
joyed for three weeks past, at the estuaries and mouths of 
rivers, in catching the small bluefish or ‘‘snappers” with a 
rod and float. These fish seldom exceed a quarter of a 
poundin weight, but are so gamey that even veteran ang- 
lers hugely enjoy the sport of catching them. They run in 
“schools” or ‘‘shoals,” and bite voraciously. 
Although the season for fishing is almost at an end, it 
may be well to print a few additional notes of localities for 
future reference, for we find, from constant inquiries ad- 
dressed to this office, that there is a dearth of information 
among anglers, which we had supposed did not exist. 
Where, in the name of patience, we ask, have these eager 
inquirers been in the habit of wetting their lines, outside of 
the circumscribed limits of their own immediate neighbor- 
hood ? 
In Jefferson county, New York, which, in fact, lies upon 
the outskirts of the Adirondack region, there are the usual 
varieties of maskalonge, black bass, pike, pickerel, and 
salmon trout, and the fishing grounds are most easily 
reached from Theresa and other points on the Utica and 
Black River Railroad. Notable among these is the Indian 
river and adjoining lakes. Comfortable accommodation is 
afforded for small parties at the summer houses on the 
lakes. Trolling is almost the only mode of fishing in vogue, 
and W. D. Chapman, of Theresa, the patentee and manu- 
facturer of various kinds of spinning tackle, does a large 
business in supplying the fish with ‘spoon victuals.” Ang- 
ling has been fair the past season, and the fares have been 
divided between some four score of practitioners. Among 
Bluefish always disappear with the first cold 
‘the angler a fair cast. 
little amusement is afforded on such occasions. 
the remarkable weights taken are one maskalonge weighing 
forty pounds, a black bass of four pounds, a pike of eight: 
een pounds, and a salmon-trout of twenty-five pounds. 
In Stanley’s Creek, Smyth county, Virginia, there 1s 
good trout fishing easily accessible from Marion, which is a 
station on the East Tennessee and Virginia Railroad. Black 
bass are also found, though not abundant, and have been 
taken weighing six pounds, although the average is per- 
haps two pounds. By-the-way, we find a uniformity in 
the size of bass, wherever taken, that is not observed in 
many other species of fresh water fish. The trout in this 
section average a half pound apiece, and seldom attaina 
weight of two pounds. The number is said to have in- 
creased of late. Attention has recently been directed to 
fish culture in this section, and a breeding pond has been 
established near Marion, at which place there is also an ang- 
ling club, of which Dr. H. Stevens is president, Jacob 
Wagner, vice-president, and Dr. E. Haller, secretary. 
Within a radius of one hundred miles from East Sagi- 
naw, Michigan, there is splendid trout and grayling fishing, 
the fish in certain localities ranging from one-half to four 
pounds in weight. Four pounds is an unusual weight for 
grayling. The largest we ever saw was a little above three 
pounds, The grayling isa comparatively new addition to 
the angler’s list of game fish, and is thus described in ‘‘Hal- 
lock’s Fishing Tourist,” the only work on angling that 
gives a description of the grayling of America: 
“Tt varies in size from eight to fourteen inches in length, 
and much resembles the sisco. The back is of a dark, 
gray color, and its sidesare covered with fine, whitish, sil- 
very scales, running in well defined lateral lines, and dotted 
with shining, diminutive black spots a half inch or so apart 
—especially about the shoulders. It has a very large, 
square dorsaltin. Its second dorsal is adipose. At three 
years old it weighs a half pound, and addsa quarter of a 
pound per annum to its weight, until it attains a weight. of 
three or four pounds. It is in season from May to Octo- 
ber. It thrives best in rivers flowing with gentle current, 
whose beds are composed wholly or in part of sandy gravel 
orloam, It feeds on minnows, but takes the fly or artifi- 
cial grasshopper with avidity. In Michigan, it is caught in 
the Muskigon river, whichis as far south as they are 
caught in any stream that empties into Lake Michigan; in 
the Manistee, and all the streams to the northward as far up as 
Mackinaw; in Jordon river, a stream connecting two lakes 
and emptying into Traverse Bay; in the Au Sable and Au 
Gros rivers, on the eastern shore of the State; and.in the 
river Hersey, a tributary of the Muskigon. The latter is 
the most accessible of any of the streams—eleven hours 
from Detroit, by the Flint; and Marquette Railroad, with a 
good hotel a quarter of amile from the depot, kept by A. 
D. Wood, who is himself a thorough sportsman, and well 
posted. One mile from the hotel fishing begins, and ex- 
tends along a mile and a half of cleared bank, which gives 
It is a beautiful stream of clear, 
spring water, about twenty rods wide. There are no other 
fish in it but suckers. The Au Sabie isthe next most ac- 
cessible stream, and is reached from Bay City by the Mack- 
inaw Railroad. 
“The grayling is not quite equal in activity and pluck to 
the trout ; nevertheless, he is a superb game fish,-and a 
great acquisition to the angler’s somewhat limited category. 
It is quite as shy as the trout, fully as critical in his  selec- 
tion of flies, and ‘‘ contrary ” about taking hold at times, 
although the fish may b2 rising all around the vicinity.” 
The best time for fishing is said to be just after the spring 
freshets, but we notice that June is the month preferred by 
Michigan anglers. September fishing is also fine. The 
flesh of the grayling is of a rich, cream color, and most de- 
‘licious in flavor, whether it be fried, boiled or baked, 
We have the following welcome letter froma friend; who 
speaks highly of the fishing in northern Alabama: 
CortuaAnnT, ALA., September 20th. 
Epiror Forrest anp Strram:— . : 
As for fish, we have some of the finest that swim. Our game fish are 
the trout, so-called—in reality a congener of the northern bass, and al- 
most identically the same fish—the land-locked salmon, the pike, and the 
speckled perch—a fine fish, often weighing several pounds. Our “trout” 
often weigh from ten to fifteen pounds, though the average is under ten 
pounds. These fish are usually taken with the minnow for bait, though 
in Swan and Beaver Lakes, near Decatur, they are taken successfully 
with the fly, and by ‘‘bobbing.’? Swan and Beaver Lakes are the places 
most visited by anglers from a distance, being as good as any, and ate 
only one mile from Decatur, where Strangers can always find good hotel 
accommodations. Besides, these lakes are free to all, there being no re- 
strictions to bar any from fishing in them. Next to these the Mussell 
Shoals afford the best fishing. Indeed, to the enthusiastic angler, I do 
not know if the Shoals do not afford the best spore. The Shoals are 
fished not only with hook and line, but also with what -in common par- 
lance is called a “jig,” a three-pronged harpoon, fastened to a long wood- 
en handle. Armed with this weapon, and one end of his canoe filled 
with blazing pine faggots, the sportsman quietly paddles his way at night 
through the shallows and shoaly places, until he catches sight of some 
finny denizen of the water, which he soon transfixes with a dexterous 
cast of his “jig.” If a large and strong fish, there follows a long strug- 
gle to land him, and oftentimes the canoe is emptied of all its occupants 
into the river before victory rewards the fisherman’s skill. As Cuffee is 
nearly always an indispensable assistant in these midnight ventures, no 
The glare of the torch- 
light, the gleam of African ivory every now and then, when some lucky 
stroke of good fortune has safely landed a ten pounder in the bottom of 
the canoe, or the loud guffaws amid the splash and rush of water when 
“all hands” have been emptied into the stream ina tussle with some 
larger fish than usual, lend to the occasion enough of incident and gro- 
tesque variety to give a zest often denied the angler who has only the 
reel and his rod to aid him in his sport. D.R. H. 
We frequently receive letters from the Western States, 
asserting that fly-fishing for black bass is not practiced in 
that section, trolling being the only mode of taking them. 
One correspondent, an expert angler, states that he never 
heard of the fly being used, and did not know that the bass 
would take a fly. It seems singular to us that gentlemen 
living in the very ‘midst of the best black bass regions of 
