FOREWORD vii 



fur is perfect, when the mothers are not bearing young, and when 

 the young are full grown ; (2) taken by such forms of trapping as 

 do not fever the animal with needless pain ; for a fevered animal 

 turns bluish in its skin ; and a bluish skin sheds its hairs just as a 

 fevered human patient loses his hair. Hunting with dogs is dis- 

 couraged and in many fur districts prohibited by law. Poisoned 

 bait is also being prohibited ; for fear a mother with young should 

 get it. The long range gun or rifle is a less painful death than to 

 be slowly eaten by a wolf, or to have the blood sucked out alive by 

 a mink or a marten ; but the present tendency is to use only the rifle 

 for such big dangerous game as wolf or bear; and use box traps, 

 or deadfall, which kills instantly, for fox, fisher, marten. Game 

 wardens supervise the opening of the box traps. If the 

 prisoner is a lady, the tail is scissored in a ring and she is let go; 

 and if any trapper sends through the mails, or tries to sell a pelt 

 so scissored, his furs are subject to confiscation and he to a fine of 

 $500. A young fox caught is treated in the same way. So is a 

 fox whose fur would not bring a good price. He is given another 

 year to grow. If the superfluous males were not taken, they would 

 fight among themselves, as the story of blue and white Arctic fox 

 tells in full. 



It was not the fur trade exterminated the buffalo. It was 

 the barb wire fence of the settlers ; and it was the fur trade saved 

 the buffalo from total extermination and brought it back, as beaver 

 have also been brought back, and Alaska Seal. For the exter- 

 mination of the Sea Otter, I have no excuses to offer. If the fur 

 trade had had command of the Sea Otter haunts, the Sea Otter to- 

 day would be restored as the Alaska Seal is. What exterminated 

 the Sea Otter was a race of Aleutian Indians crazed with Russian 

 vodka ; and that crime was perpetrated when the fur trade was 

 in its infancy and in the hands of savage criminals. 



But the greatest triumph of the modern fur trade is in fur farm- 

 ing, as the American Government has carried it out in Alaska Seal 

 and blue fox, and Canadian ranchers in Prince Edward Island. In 



