DESTRUCTIVENESS OF MAN. 36 
tribe of animals or of vegetables is secured against being smoth- 
ered by the encroachments of another; and the reproductive 
powers of species, which serve as the food of others, are always 
proportioned to the demand they are destined to supply. Man 
pursues his victims with reckless destructiveness ; and, while the 
sacrifice of life by the lower animals is limited by the cravings 
of appetite, he unsparingly persecutes, even to extirpation, 
thousands of organic forms which he cannot consume.* 
* The terrible destructiveness of man is remarkably exemplified in the chase 
of large mammalia and birds for single products, attended with the entire 
waste of enormous quantities of flesh, and of other parts of the ‘animal 
which are capable of valuable uses. The wild cattle of South America are 
slaughtered by millions for their hides and horns; the buffalo of North 
America for his skin or his tongue; the elephant, the walrus, and the nar- 
whal for their tusks; the cetacea, and some other marine animals, for their 
whalebone and oil; the ostrich and other large birds, for their plumage. 
Within a few years, sheep have been killed in New England, by whole flocks, 
for their pelts and suet alone, the flesh being thrown away ; and it is even said 
that the bodies of the same quadrupeds have been used in Australia as fuel for 
limekilns. What avast amount of human nutriment, of bone, and of other 
animal products valuable in the arts, is thus recklessly squandered! In nearly 
all these cases, the part which constitutes the motive for this wholesale de- 
struction, and is alone saved, is essentially of insignificant value as compared 
with what is thrown away. The horns and hide of an ox are not economically 
worth a tenth part as much as the entire carcass. During the present year, 
large quantities of Indian corn have been used as domestic fuel, and even for 
burning lime, in Iowa and other Western States. Corn at from fifteen to 
eighteen cents per bushel is found cheaper than wood at from five to seven 
dollars per cord, or coal at six or seven dollars per ton.—Mep. Agric. Dept., 
Noy. and Dec., 1872, p. 487. 
One of the greatest benefits to be expected from the improvements of civi- 
lization is, that increased facilities of communication will render it possible to 
transport to places of consumption much valuable material that is now wasted 
because the price at the nearest market will not pay freight. The cattle 
slaughtered in South America for their hides would feed millions of the stary- 
ing population of the Old World, if their flesh could be economically preserved 
and transported across the ocean. This, indeed, is already done, but ona 
scale which, though absolutely considerable, is relatively insignificant. South 
America sends to Europe a certain quantity of nutriment in the form of meat 
extracts, Liebig’s and others; and preserved flesh from Australia is beginning 
to figure in the English market. 
We are beginning to learn a better economy in dealing with the inorganic 
