THE PROBLEM OF DOMESTICATION 261 



of the natural order, true wildernesses, where the native life 

 would find a fit place of abode and where it would be pro- 

 tected from the ravages of man or from accident, a certain 

 gain would be made ; at least the masses of our city people, 

 who have now come to control legislation in the great states, 

 would be brought to see the beauties of the primitive con- 

 ditions which they now rarely have a chance to behold. Yet 

 more might be accomplished if men of wealth could be in- 

 duced to turn their generous spirit towards this object. There 

 are many parts of this country where reservations are most 

 desirable and where the price of land is so low that an area of 

 thirty thousand acres could be acquired for that number of 

 dollars. A capital of one hundred thousand dollars would, 

 at the present rates of interest, afford the revenue necessary for 

 the pay of a keeper and half a dozen guards, a sufficient force 

 to maintain a due watchfulness against depredations. More- 

 over, the use of such land as an asylum would not prevent a 

 careful exploitation of its timber resources, which in many 

 cases would give a sufficient return to provide for the polic- 

 ing expenses, as well as for incidental costs incurred in bring- 

 ing upon the land species from the neighboring country which 

 it might be desirable to introduce. At a cost of not more 

 than a million dollars it would be possible to secure and 

 maintain a well-chosen system of guarded wildernesses which 

 would preserve the characteristics of the original plant and 

 animal life in all the region of this country lying to the east 

 of the Rocky Mountains. 



It would be essential in any such privately founded system 

 of wilderness reservations to have the control of the establish- 

 ments in the hands of some authorities which were of an 

 enduring nature. In our American experience it has become 



