The record-union., 1897-10-17
A GREAT GAME-PARK.
Twenty-Six Thousand Acres Fenced
in for a Preserve.

G. L. Ferris contributes an article on
wild Animals in a New England
Game Park to the Century" Mr.. Fer
ris says in describing the late Austin
Corbins New Hampshire preserve:
Blue Mountain Forest Park, as the
preserve is called, includes parts Of four
townships, and lies near the enterpris-
ing borough of Newport on the Concord
and Claremont branch of the Boston
and Maine Railroad. 1t is said to be
the biggest game park in the world,
except one owned by the Duke of Suth-
erland in Scotland, and one or two
royal demesnes on the Continent OF
course, in making comparisons one
must exclude those immense public pre-
serves, as big as provinces, where the
British Government of India seeks to
save the elephant from extinction, and
our own national parks in the West.
The name of Blue Mountain attaches
to the entire spur of hills which bisects
the park, while Croydon designates it's
highest shoulder rising to the hight of
nearly 5000 feet. The steep and dense
ly wooded nights of Croydon, curving
like a hump, break the skyline in the
shape of a camels back: near by a
skirting canyon opens a carriage route
across the mountain. In characteristics
it belongs rather to the Green Mountain
than the White Mountain Range.
though it seems disconnected from
both The verdure of an immense for
est of spruce, fir, hemlock, pine, birch,
beech and maple infolds it to the very
crest, with here ard there a brown
patch of clearing. The greater part of
the Corbin inclosure consists of aban-
dOned farms, many of them already be-
ginning to bristle with saplings; for
the woods are on the march. Dis
mantled houses with windows and
doors gaping like holes in a skull. ram
shackle barns rotten and weather.
stained, the wreck of stone fences
thick-set with brambles these meet
the eye at every turn.
The general outline of the park is
that of an ellipse with respective diam
eters of about four and a half and elev-
en- miles, and the surface is cut di
agonally by a backbone of mountain
running northeast. The lower slopes
and the meadow-levels are diversified
with brooks and swamp land while ex
tensive groves of second growth pro-
fusely dot the surface. 1t is in these
that the wild swine, the progenitors of
which clashed their tusks against the
bOar-spears of medieval Kings and
Barons, root and propagate their kind
with fecundity which is a marvel to
the keepers.
One can scarcely grasp the bigness
of the park by figures But let the
reader fancy a demesne considerably
more than double the size of Boston
and all its suburbs: thirty times the
area Of Central Park, New York; al
most ten times bigger than Fairmount
Park, Philadelphia: or fourteen times
the acreage of the whole park system
of Chicago. Roads, many of them
thoroughfares of days gone by, vari-
ously intersect the inclosure, and an
excellent carriage track crosses the
park from east to west through the
picturesque notch. On the western side
the declivity is more sloping and open,
but has the same agreeable diversity
of scene.
A wire fence. partly mesh, partly
barbed, nearly eight feet in hight and
twenty-seven miles in circuit, confines
the four-footed tenants within its steel
barrier The same posts which sup
port the IeHce until the trees winch
have been set shall have grown to take
their place, string a telephone con-
Meeting the nine sub-stations at the
different gates with the central sta
ton, the home of the Superintendent.
the Corbin villa and the town of New
port. The keepers and other employees
Of the park vary from twenty-five to
fifty, according to the season of the
year. It need scarcely be said that
the needs of attendance compel a vigi-
lance which never rests. Merely to
watch the fence lest it should have
parted somewhere by accident or wan
ton malice. requires an inspection twice
a week.