pfl them to travel after daylight in vt'hicles iloiitr 

 l>ublic highways. 



■I'ilK ilU.ST rsKFL-L .AlAilMAL.S. 



Farmers and sportsmen, in fact people in general, 

 siieak ill of Skunks, and althoiigli they are probably the 

 most useful of all our mammals in destroying nuxiout; 

 insects and troublesome mice, farmers and horticul- 

 turists will encourage their desti uition. 



Skunks are easily domesticated and become as gentle 

 as kittens, and they can, a writer afflmis, be handled 

 with impunity if care is taken to use the tail as a 

 handle. 



Skunks are prolific animals, and they are abundant 

 in this Commonwealth where many thousands are 

 every year captured and their pelts shipped mostly to 

 New York and Philadelphia markets. 



THEY DO GOOD SERVICE. 



Notwithstanding the untold services which these 

 animals do in the farming districts, farmers as a rule 

 allow hunters and trappers to employ all devices which 

 their ingenuity can invent to slay these four-footed 

 protiH-tors of cultivated crops. Strange, is it not, how 

 prejudice and ignorance, like love and confidence 

 wrongfully placed, will often lead one to do that which 

 sooner or later does him serious injury? 



It would be a wise expenditure of public money if 

 the State officials who have full power would direct 

 subordinates who are entirely competent to do such 

 woi'k to prepare and have published for the widest 

 possible circulation to school children and farmers, 

 books and bulletins which would fully explain the 



