Il6 THE EXTINCTION OF ANIMALS 



one at almost any time, the animal frequenting the mouths 

 of the rivers ; but man and the cold winds which have 

 swept the country in recent years have almost wiped them 

 out. 



There are at the present time two specimens of these 

 rare and valuable animals in the New York Aquarium, 

 and there is good reason to believe that they are nearly 

 extinct in North America, and doubtless very few are 

 known on the islands or in South America. This is true 

 of the dugong, a similar form found on the islands near 

 Malay, where it was seen by early navigators who be- 

 lieved it to be a mermaid, and it is pictured as such in 

 many of the old books. To-day it is being industriously 

 killed by collectors who have placed a price on the du- 

 gong's head. 



The places of last resort for great and notable mammals 

 appears to be Africa and Asia, and for the past fifty years 

 great inroads have been made on them. The tiger, a 

 splendid cat, is systematically hunted in India, and killed 

 wherever it is found. It is a menace to human Hfe, but is, 

 in all probabihty, holding its own. Were it not for the 

 strong arm of the government the Indian elephant would 

 long ago have been destroyed by the class of hunters who 

 strike for large game and seem to think that he is the 

 greatest sportsman who kills the most ; this is not an Ameri- 

 can idea, at least among the real sportsmen of the country, 

 who have an unwritten law that it is only permissible to 

 kill what can be used in the camp, and that only savages 

 kill merely for the sake of kilHng. 



Africa is the most remarkable field for game in the 

 world. It abounds in a great variety of antelopes alone, 



