The daily morning journal and courier., 1900-01-06

1 long dash its members will be no more 1 tired than when they started. Failure
 to recognize the phenomenal fight of the
 wild goose is largely responsible for thu
 theory of open water at the north pole
 Explorers of the Arctic have said-somt
 of them-that even at the farthest point
 north they saw. geese flying southward 1 therefore there must have been oper 1 water above them. There may have 1 been, yet it is just as possible that the
 geese they saw came from point a thousand miles beyond the pole anG
 had simply flown over the top of the
 world. Robert Lee Briggs of Corpus Cristi had a similar experience tive years ago when on the Staked Plains
 The party had camped without water and Briggs, feeling thirsty in the morn- ing, started out to find some. He knew
 there was a spring or pond near, be- cause mile away on the prairie he saw
 a band of antelope. His companions or l horseback rescued him in a semi-crazed
 condition about sunset. Briggs had
 forgotten that distance means nothing
 to an antelope and that the band which l he saw, when it felt little dry, would lope thirty or forty miles to water 1 hole take a drink and come back.
 The wild goose adopts the V-shaped formation in flight, as do other wild | fowl, because it offers less resistance to
 the air It travels at great height be- cause the higher it gets the more coun- | try 1t can see. Its power of suspension l is such that the additional thinness of l the atmosphere does not weary it. The individuals of the flock understand | signals as well as do the members Of a highly efficient football eleven. A man
 lying upon his back on the prairie and observing a flock of geese flying two miles away, making probably for some feeding ground which the leader re-
 members as of peculiar succulence in the previous year, will come to under
 stand this At the slightest deviation
 by some younger goose, or the slightest
 irregularity in the mathematical cor rectness of the V, a single warning honl1 will come from the captain and instant ly the offending traveller curves into it's proper place. If it be necessary to de-
 viate to the right or the left, another honk of slightly different tone will be sounded and the swing or half wheel,
 
 tions. A crack drill corps could do no better. Similarly signals are given to ascend, to descend, to alght or to arise In addition there is a distinct alarm note, consisting of five honks given so rapidly that they have broken, or staccato, accent There is note of distrust, one of doubt and one of in quiry. When any of these three is sounded it may be taken for granted that every pair of eyes in the gang of fifteen or twenty is strained to the ut- termost in the endeavor to detect hid den danger. The absolute dependence of wild geese upon their leader is al ways shown strongly and pitifully when the old governor is killed. For while the flock does not know what to do and will often fly around and around, conn ing repeatedly within gunshot until third of the number has been slain How the loss of the director is made good is not known, but probably the next oldest gander takes his place. It is not thought that a male from another flock is ever admitted to leadership.
 With tens of thousands of wild geese upon the southwestern Texas prairies all winter long, the slaughter among them would be terrific but for the meas ures the fowl takes for it's protection. It roosts beyond gunshot from the shore, as said, and there is no such thing as approaching it in boat. It will not flush in the dark, if it can help It. but will swim away at rate no oarsman could hope to equal. When feeding it is in enormous bands, and all of the hundreds or thousands of eyes are watching. The country is a rolling veldt or sward, offering no concealment at all to the hunter Market shooters | approaching feeding geese have time l and again thrown themselves flat on | their bellies a half mile away and l snaked painfully along for an hour, | only to hear the mighty beating of the | wings and see the air filled with the | great bodies when they had approached | within three hundred yards. Every band on the prairie has from dozen to .wenty sentinels chosen from among | he older males, and the watch they xeey could not be surpassed by human beings. When they have discovered an 'bject of suspicious appearance they ut- r CT the low note of warning, but never lnder any circumstances give the signal o rise until satisfied that danger is at land. Once this cry is sounded, how yer, every individual of the huge flock l caves the ground practically in uni on. The disappointed men can only sit ID and swear and trudge back to the wagon.
 Of all the market hunters in this sec ion, there mas been but one who was uccessful in stalking geese feeding. He vas Mexican named Gregorio, and his orse had more to do with it than he. his horse was an undersized dun, of romeo breed, twelve years old. and as ngainly as he was useful All of the | ountry hereabouts is cut up into pas lres The fences are of three-strand | arbed wire, the bottom wire coming l rithin two feet of the ground. The ob sct is merely to keep the cattle con- ned, and the fences, Of course, are not | roof against coyotes, wolves or other mall animals For the matter of that, le top strand is not more than five i eet above the earth, and deer vault it l f ith ease, going from pasture to pas { Ire as they will. All of the pastures ' re posted d'-that is az frequent inter ' als thzre are signs erected warning ( lnters to keep out. The general for. i ula is: No shouting allowed in this asture under penalty of the law" The t exas law against trespass is severe. i he gates between the pastures are t
 g