xii PREFACE 



servers of all kinds, may direct their efforts along new lines 

 of investigation and toward a more complete understanding 

 of the life-histories of the various species. 



In dealing with the systematic side of the work the 

 authors have kept in mind the desirability of keeping the 

 recognition of races well within the powers of discrimina- 

 tion possessed by the average non-scientific outdoors man, 

 whether sportsman, explorer, or nature lover. Some de- 

 scriptive naturahsts have recently proposed distinctive 

 names for new races of game mammals based upon very 

 slight characters in color or form, differences which can 

 scarcely be detected by an expert, much less by a layman. 

 In still another and even more numerous class of cases, the 

 supposedly distinct species or races are based upon indi- 

 vidual differences in specimens, or upon immaturity. The 

 described races of elephant, giraffe, and buffalo are chiefly 

 of this character. The preserved specimens of these great 

 mammals are so few that it has been possible to describe 

 races only from the study of individual specimens taken 

 usually in widely remote localities and often of very different 

 ages and even of different sexes. The comparison of mate- 

 rial of such diverse character has in many cases led to the 

 description of individual differences as racial. At present 

 all the museums combined do not contain sufficient speci- 

 mens representing these great mammals to make possible 

 the exact determination of the subspecific characters of the 

 geographical races. The difficulty of studying the largest 

 species applies in a general way to the bulk of the big-game 

 animals. Besides the limited number of specimens avail- 

 able, there are physical difficulties which often lead the 

 species-maker astray. The mere size of the great specimens 



