2 MOSTLY MAMMALS 



yet whether, sufficient specimens of such species are 

 being preserved for our successors may be an open 

 question. 



It is not my intention in this article to allude to the 

 hosts of animals whose numbers have been reduced in 

 such a wholesale manner during the century as to render 

 them in more or less immediate danger of impending 

 extermination, but to confine our attention in the main to 

 those on whom this fate has already fallen. And here it 

 may be mentioned with satisfaction that India enjoys a 

 remarkably good record in this respect, for, so far as we 

 are aware, it has not lost a single species of mammal, 

 bird, or reptile, either during the nineteenth century or 

 within the period of definite history. It is true that the 

 numbers and range of the Indian lion have been sadly 

 curtailed during the last fifty years, and that if steps are 

 not promptly taken for its protection that animal may ere 

 long disappear from the Indian fauna. But, at any rate, 

 it has not done so at present ; and even were it ex- 

 terminated in that country, this would not mean the 

 extinction of a species, and possibly not even of a local 

 race, since it is not improbable that the Persian represen- 

 tative of the lion (which is still abundant) may not be 

 distinguishable from the Indian animal. Of large animals 

 peculiar to India, perhaps the great Indian rhinoceros is the 

 one that requires most careful watching in order that its 

 numbers and its range may not be unduly reduced before 

 it is too late to take adequate measures for its protection. 



We have said that the century is responsible for the 

 extinction of no inconsiderable number of the world's 

 animals. But it must not for one moment be supposed 

 that, within the historic period, no such exterminations by 

 human agency had taken place in previous centuries. We 



