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first destroyed. The story of the disappearance of the great animals of Europe; 

 of the Bison and the Urus ; of tlie extinction of the giant birds of New Zealand; 

 of Steller's Sea Cow and the Great Auk, one each upon our eastern and western 

 coast; the most wonderful destruction of the great herds of the American Bison, 

 anil the threatened extinction of the Fur Seal in the North Pacitic, and of the 

 Zehra, Camelopard and other large animals in Africa, are notable illustrations of 

 the greater changes that have been wrought. But there are smaller ones not so 

 conspicuous but more potent in their inHuences upon human welfare. 



The Bison, the most characteristic of all the animals of America, was 

 the first to disappear from the region under consideration. Formerly it had 

 ranged east, at least as far as western New York and Pennsylvania and in 

 States farther south almost to tide water, but about 1808 it was exterminated east 

 of the Wabash River. The Elk followed it closely, disappearing from the AVhite- 

 water Valley about 1810 and from the State in 1830. The Panther followed soon 

 after. Virginia Deer, Bear, Otter, Beaver, Wolves and other forms were almost 

 exterminated. Though of some, if not all. of these latter forms a remnant yet 

 remains in some favored localities. 



Turkeys and Bobwhites; Ivory-billed Woodpeckers and Wood Ibises (Tcm- 

 talii^ loculator L. ) ; Black Vultures (Catharista atrata Bartram) and Carolina 

 Paroquets have been almost, or in a great measure, exterminated. The Paroquets 

 "which ranged to the great lakes and were so common a feature in the landscape 

 of the pioneer times, have not only disappeared from Indiana, but from almost 

 all the great range from Texas to New York over which they spread at the begin- 

 ning of this century, and are, perhaps, now only found in a restricted area in 

 Florida. The day of their extirpation is near at hand. 



The Passenger Pigeon survived the beautiful little parrot until a later day. 

 But nets and guns, a short-sighted people and inefficient laws have all but swept 

 out of existence this graceful bird. It is now on the verge of extinction. W'e 

 can no more appreciate the accounts given of the innumerable hosts of these birds 

 of passage than we can of the incalculable multitudes of the Bisons three score 

 years ago. The words of those who saw them, we are assured, do not in any way 

 convey an adequate idea of the wonderful sights and sounds during a flight of 

 Pigeons. Some of their roosts covered many miles of forest. There, as they set- 

 tled at evening, the gunners from near and far began to collect for the slaughter. 

 The loaded trees upon the borders of the wood were first fired upon. Then the 

 shooters passed into the denser forest. Three or four guns fired among the 

 branches of a tree would bring down as many two-bushel sacks of dead birds, 

 while numbers of cripples fiuttered beyond reach. After a number of shots over 

 a considerable area — several acres i)erhaps — the whole roost would rise with a 



