FOREST AND STREAMS > 







































D&YOTED TO FIELD AND Aquatic Sports, PRaoTicat NATURAL History, 
Fis CULTURE, THE PROTECTION OF GAME, PRESRVATION OF Forests, 
AND THE INCULCATION IN MEN AND WOMEN OF A HEALTHY INTER ST 
tN Ovr-£90R RECREATION AND Srupy: 
PUBLISHED BY 
Sarest and Strean Publishing Company, 
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103 FULTON STREET, NEW YORK. 
ee 
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“ A discount of twenty percent. for five copies and upwards, 
sending us two subseriptions and Ten Dollars wil 
Hallock’s ‘‘ Fisnine Tourist,” postage free. 
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fIm regular advertising coluions, nonpareil type, 12lines to the inch, 25 
cents per line. Advertisements on outside page, 40 cents perline. Reading 
notices, 50 cents per line. 
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months, 30 per cent. 
—O—O— 
NEW YORK, THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 1874. 
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To Correspondents, 
——-_>—-—_— 
All communications whatever, whether relating to business or literary 
correspondence, must be addressed to Tur Forest anp STREAM PuB- 
LISHING COMPANY. Personal letters only, to the Manager. 
All communications intended for publication must be accompanied with 
real name, as a guaranty of good faith. Names will not be published if 
objection be made. No anonymous contributions will be regarded. 
t2 Articles relating to any topic within the scope of this paper are solicited, 
We cannot promise to return rejected manuscripts. 
Ladies are especially invited to use our columns, which will be pre- 
pared with wareful reference to their perusal and instruction. 
» Secretaries of Clubs and Associations are urged to favor us with brief 
notes of their movements and transactions, as it is the aim of this paper 
te become a medium of useful and reliable information between gentle- 
men sportsmen from one end of the country to the other ; and they will 
find our columns a desirable medium for advertising announcements. 
The Publishers of Forest anp STREAM aim to merit and secure the 
patronage and countenance of that portion of the community whose re- 
fined intelligence enables them to properly appreciate and enjoy all that 
is beautiful in Nature. It will pander to no depraved tastes, nor pervert 
the legitimate sports of land and water to those base uses which always 
vend to make them unpopular with the virtuous and good. No advertise- 
ment or business notice of an immoral character will be received on any 
terms; and nothing will be admitted to any department o the paper that 
may not be read with propriety in the home circle. 
We cannot be responsible for the dereliction of the mail service, if 
money remitted to us is lost. 
Advertisements should be sont in by Saturday of each week, if possible. 
CHARLES HALLOCK, 
Managing Editor. 

THE INTERNATIONAL 
S22 as 
LETTER FROM MR. A. B. LEECH, OF THE IRISH TEAM—THE 
IRISH CHALLENGE TO THE NATIONAL RIFLE ASSOCIATION, 
Sea 
T the annual meeting of the Amateur Rifle Club, in 
December last, the President, Col. George W. Win- 
gate, was directed to address Mr. A. B. Leech, of Dublin, 
in regard to the challenge to American riflemen, pub- 
lished in the Herald, and accordingly wrote to Mr. 
Leech, réquesting the particulars in regard to which 
the proposed match was designed to be carried out, and 
stating that it was the desire of the Amateur Club, not so 
much on behalf of themselves as on behalf of the riflemen 
of America, that acompetition of this description should 
be had sometime during the fall at Creedmoor, at which 
American riflemen using American weapons should con- 
tend against an Irish team. In reply to this communica- 
tion the following letter has been received :— 
Dvusurn, No. 110 Grarron STREET, } 
Trurspay, 16th January, 1874. 
Trish Riri Assocrarron. 
Dear Srr.—I have had the honor of receiving your let- 
ter of the 20th ult., which I have submitted to friends who 
are co-operating with me, and I am authorized to say that 
a formal programme on the basis of the challenge already 
before you of the proposed International Rifle Match will 
be shortly prepared, which I will be happy to submit for 
approval of your association. In deference to your sug- 
gestion I will, if possible, waive the 1,100 yards range, al- 
though to do so wili, I fear, detract somewhat from the 
great interest of the match. 
When I addressed the challenge to the American nation, 
through the columns of the New York Herald, 1 was not 
aware that you had a National Rifle Association, which 
you will please accept as my apology for not having ad- 
[am authorized to say that 
RIFLE MATCH. 
dressed it in the first instance. 
my friends are highly gratified at the flattering terms in 
which you write. I have always considered that we can- 
not know too mueh of one another, and that whichever side 
Wins in this great trial of skill and judgment, we will have 
an agreeable opportunity of improving the acquaintance, 
if not securing the friendship, of those we may have the 
honor and pleasure of being for a time associated with in 
your great country. Pray accept my thanks for your cour- 
tesy. I have the honor to remain your very faithful 
ArtHur B. Lencu, 
Geo. W. Wingate, Esq., Secretary National Rifle Associa- 
tion of America. 5 
From reading Mr, Leech’s most courteous letier, it 
would seem that Mr: Leech speaks of the communication 
addressed to him by Col. Wingate, as if it were written’ by‘ 
him as Secretary of the National Rifle Association, This, we 
s. Any person 
receive a copy of 
Where advertisements are inserted over 1 month, a discount of 
10 per cent. will be made; over three months, 20 per cent; over six 

think, is an error. The letter, to which Mr. Leech refers, 
was written by Colone! Wingate on behalf of the Amateur 
Rifle Club, in pursuance of a resolution passed at its an- 
nual meeting in December last, (published in the Forusr 
AND Stream of November 27th,) at which meeting Colonel 
Wingate, as its President, was directed to address Mr. 
Leech in regard to his challenge to ‘American riflemen,” 
which originally appeared in the Herald, the National Rifle 
Association having taken no action in the matter. 
In taking this step the Amateur Rifle Club did not by 
any means claim that in their members were included the 
On the contrary, it is their present 
intention, as soon as a definite programme is determined 
on, to publish a request soliciting the co-operation of marks- 
men throughout America, in order to secure a “team” fit to 
construct against the ‘Irish Eight,” such ‘“‘team” to be 
selected from the best shots that can be obtained, whether 
best shots in America, 
members of the Amateur Rifle Club or not. 
It will be recollected that competitors—(under Mr. 
Leech’s challenge)—must be native born Amcricans, and 
using rifles of American manufacture, weighing not over 
ten pounds, with a trigger pull of not less than three 
pounds, any sights being allowed but telescopic, the dis- 
The original chal- 
lenge contemplated a match at 1,100 yards, also; but this 
was cbjected to, as our range at Creedmoor is limited to 
tances being 800, 900 and 1,000 yards. 
1,000 yards. 
From the great interest that has been manifested in this 
challenge throughout the whole country, there can be but 
little question but that a match can be made that will be 
Such a contest must bring to- 
gether at Creedmoor during the fall a team of representa- 
tive men who will, we trust, sustain the traditional reputa- 
National in ali respects, 
tion of America as being the home of the rifleman. 
SEVENTH REPORT OF THE COMMIS- 
SIONERSOF FISHERIES OF THESTATE 
OF MAINE. 
ie es 
TF the reports of the Commissioners of the States of Penn- 
sylvania and New Jersey, conscientiously written by 
the proper officers, give a truthful but rather desponding 
aspect of affairs, expatiating fully on the wasteful and care- 
less acts of the fishermen, and tacitly expressing a certain 
want of appreciation from the community in whose midst 
their labors are carried on, it is pleasant, when the reviewer 
concludes the examination of the Maine Report, to find 
that in this State much of the success the Commissioners 
have met with has been due to the increased interest taken 
by the people at large in the efforts of the State and Gov- 
ernment to restore the former productiveness of the streams 
and lakes of Maine. 
Messrs. E. M. Stilwell and Henry O- Stanley, the Fish- 
ery Commissioners of Maine, possess, it is true, certain ad- 
In the first place they are not only admirable as 
vantages. 
to the theory of pisciculture, combining with it a sound 
knowledge of ichthyology, but what is a great desideratum, 
these gentlemen, being thoroughly acquainted with the use 
of all the devices employed for the capture of the trout and 
salmon, in a-word consummate anglers, have evidently 
Something, in introducing 
brought their skill into play. 
novel measures into a community, depends more or less 
upon the personnel of the functionaries, and in the present 
instance, there is no doubt but that Messrs. Stillwell and 
Stanley have, by their preseuce and eloquence, done a 
great deal to teach people not only the usefulness but 
the necessity of their calling, and have thus gained the aid 
and confideuce of the people in the State. We have fre- 
quently thought that it would be a great adjunct to the 
success of State measures tending to the preservation of 
fish if a series of simple monographs of the most element- 
ary character were published and distributed gratuitously, 
describing fish with an illustration or so, and explaining 
the objects of the Fish Commissioners, and giving the 
figures, showing how the country was getting impoverished 
through want of the simplest care, and how it‘might be en- 
riched by the slightest modicum of common sense. We 
believe that some thousands of loose sheets of this char- 
acter, written in a popular and lively style, would reach 
home, and prepare the ground most thoroughly for the 
future works of the Commissioners. In Maine there appears 
a disposition on the part of mill owners, using water from 
streams capable of producing and rearing fish, not to throw 
unnecessary impediments in the way of the Commissioners, 
but rather to aid them. We note then, with pleasure, that 
owing to the prompt energy of the Cabot Manufacturing 
Company, a substantial stone fish way has been erected on 
the Kennebec, near Brunswick, and that other manufactur- 
ing companies have agreed to do the same work. In fact, 
from all the sites on the noble Kennebec and Penobscot, 
similar aid is promised, and already, in a great many cases, 
such fish ways been constructed, so that not only 
salmon, but the shad and alewives now have a chance of 
centering the rivers of Maine. Of course the refuse from 
cotton and paper mills is aserious detriment, as it pollutes 
the streams, but the Commissioners hope that some mea- 
sures may be provided to keep this poison out of the rivers 
during the breeding season or that of the migration of fish. 
The information given to us in the report in regard to 
salmon is more than satisfactory. In Maine salmon have 
made their appearance in localities where they lad been 
long considered as extinct. Salmon have been seen and 
captured last year as far up the Penobscot as Pleasant 
River. At Vanceboro’, Mr. Stanley himself caught a 
salmon, and the Commissioners’ are ‘well satisfied that a° 
large number of salmon have succeeded in reaching the 
sources of the Penobscot and have spawned there. As far up 
even as Chesuncook Lake—and even beyond it, smolt were 
taken in the second year. In the East Branch, last sum- 
mer, as far as Grand Falls, yearling salmon were found, 
specimens of which were sent to Professor Baird, of the 
Smithsonian Institution. Now just here would come in 
most usefully the informaticn in the way of easy instruc- 
tion which we have advanced—the distribution of some 
primary lessons about fish adapted to the use of ignorant 
people. About Grand Falls, the people were catching the 
young salmon and calling them trout. Perhaps the term 
ignorant is rather too strong a one, for it is not every in- 
dividual, though he be educated, who can nicely discrimi- 
nate between the various forms of that protean fish the 
salmon, whether he be as a parr, a smolt or a grilse. 
The advent of the salmon go far inland, the Commission- 
ers think, is due to the fact of there being good efficient 
wardens on the rivers, and quite as much because of the 
friendly sympathy and co operation of mill owners, who 
have aided in keeping the fish-ways clear, and mostly be- 
cause of an improved state of public opinion and an éncreased 
interest the people generally have taken in these subjects. 
Between Bangor and Oldtown, last year, a number of 
fine salmon were captured; whole number up to July 28d, 
1,984, with an average weight of 16 pounds. Total weight, 
33,198, worth $5,504. About the biggest fish weighed 32 
pounds. On the Kennebec the accounts of the salmon are 
quite as reassuring, an increase in quantity and quality of © 
fish having been noted. Barring some slight accidents to 
the salmon spawn, the hatching has been fairly good at the 
Bucksport Salmon Works, and some 300,000 salmon fry 
were divided between the waters of the Penobscot and 
Androscoggin Rivers. It is again pleasant to notice that 
railroad corporations have given the Commissioners their 
aid in distributing the small fish. Nothing can be more to 
the interests of railroads than to encourage in every way 
the movements of the Fish Commissioners. A good ang- 
ling ground induces travel, and with care from small begin- 
nings the salmon fisheries may undoubtedly in time assume 
a commercial aspect. Another incident worth recording 
is, that the Honorable W. H. Venning, Inspector of Fish- 
eries of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, and Mr. Deputy 
Curran, have given material aid to the labors of our Maine 
Commissioners, 
The Commissioners, quite wisely, we think, have 
been chary of the indiscriminate permission to be allowed. 
to all parties to take the spawn of landlocked salmon, and 
while desirous of aiding other States and the public all 
they can, they cannot entertain, for a moment, the idea 
that the fisheries are to be destroyed by unprincipled or 
ignoraut people. A proposition was made to the United 
States Commissioners of Fisheries, and to the Commis- 
sioners of the New England States, to found an establish- 
ment for the propagation of fish at Sebec Lake similar to 
the one at Bucksport, and in August last it was decided, 
after a careful examination, that one should be made at 
Sebec, and everything is now in order for future work. 
Of course Maine, from her noble rivers and lakes, having 
within herself all the most choice places for salmon 
nurseries in the United States,must be the most conspicuous 
of the fish-raising States, and from thence fish-stock, we 
trust, will be had in plenty. 
Consignments of the ova of California salmon have been 
received through Mr. Stone, a gift from Prof. Baird, and 
the fish will be placed in some lake or stream running inte 
the Penobscot. 
In the supplimentary report of Mr Charles G. Atkins, 
who has in charge the Bucksport Salmon Breeding Works, 
a most practical and simple exhibit is made how the salmon 
are stripped and the ova are treated, and in the paper can 
be found how the cost of ova has been reduced from $44 
per thousand in 1869 to not more than $3.40 this last year. 
This establishment now ranks in its appointments, as in its 
productions, among the first inthe world, Last December 
two millions and a quarter of eggs laid in the hatching 
troughs, and when put to their capacity they will ccntaim 
over 4,000,060. f 
Tt is only this year that a thorough series of experiments. 
in shad hatching were inaugurated, 100,000 young shad: 
having been produced, and it is hoped that their introduc- 
tion into the Kennebec, and about the same quantity into 
the Penobscot, will be attended with the best results. 
The Commissioners write in the most sensible way in re- 
gard to the question of fish as food,as capable of provisioning 
a large portion of the State, and refer to the waste of ani- 
mal life in Maine as a sufficient lesson of how improvident 
man is, and they state that ‘‘no good law, however popular, 
can ever be enforced without the sympathy and aid and 
interest of the whole people, and that the masses must assist 
or our laws will never be obeyed.” They believe in the 
necessity of protection for both fur and fin, and ask the 
legislature to constitute Commissioners of Fisheries and 
Game. A most scathing rebuke can be foundin the report, 
directed not to the lazy vagabonds, who, too indolent to 
work, exist by catching fish at improper times and when 
half grown, but written for the edification of those un- 
sportsmanlike people, far worse than pot hunters, who, 
when in a trout stream, keep on fishing until they have left 
not a fish in the stream. ‘‘Sir,” said a guide, describing 
the soulless conduct of one of these parties, ‘‘at one time 
‘we’ buried more than 200 Ibs.-of trout that they had killed; 
they would have killed the last trout in the river if they 
had known where to find it.” Of course no legislation can 
meet offences of this -character, called by the indignant 
‘ Commissioners ‘‘a shameless abuse of -the hospitality of. 
the State.” The remedy lies in newspapers publishing the . 
names of all such vulgar people capable of such malfeasance _ - a 

