PUBLIC PARKS OF IOWA 30.7 



ers, symbolic of that nation's perversion and subserviance of everything 

 living to the demon of conquest. The hearse is followed by a Dachs- 

 hund, a monstrosity and travesty on animal life, fatefully significant of 

 the lack of symmetry in German philosophy. 



Tihat picture should be framed and hung before us as a perpetual 

 warning. We should also be reminded of China and India, their vision 

 shrouded in philosophy and dogma, ignoring for centuries the wonderful 

 possibilities and inspirations of the almost tropical life around them. 

 We should study history and note the permanency and progress of those 

 races that have developed livestock industries. We should study statis- 

 tics and note that livestock and illiteracy never go together. We should 

 study the lives of the great, men of history those that have acquired dis- 

 tinction in special fields, especially those whose achievements have been 

 in the path of world progress ; to find that, they lhave been lovers of 

 nature, students of her mysteries and charms; that their philosophies 

 have been the expressions of the organization and development that they 

 have seen in the life around them. And when we have done this we can 

 but realize that the many and varied manifestations of life are an in- 

 tegral and essential part of the natural environment of the 'human race. 

 That this environment has developed the highest type of thought and 

 the [highest motives, and that if we as a race wish to go forward in the 

 path of progress and keep pace with the highest and best development 

 of this world's destiny, we must furnish to the generations to come, the 

 possibility and opportunity of coming into contact with the varied and 

 almost miraculous manifestations of the life of the wood, of the water 

 and the plain. 



Hunting and fishing are the natural expressions of this universal in- 

 stinct unconscious expressions of a desire for contact with nature. This 

 may be classified as tfae primitive and fundamental instinct. Hunting 

 and fishing were its "highest expressions in primitive man, gradually de- 

 veloping with the race, to the love of animals, of birds and nature's 

 forces, and culminating in the scientist whose passion finds expression 

 in unending exploration into the mysteries of nature and whose re- 

 searches have contributed so tremendously to the material welfare, the 

 higher development, the health and happiness of the race. 



With primitive peoples and in new regions surrounded by vast wood? 

 and limitless plains, no provision need be made for the stimulation of this 

 instinct, but as populations increase they have encroached upon the 

 woods and plains until they are so restricted in Iowa today that fishing 

 is a memory and hunting a luxury. If we as a commonwealth, are to de- 

 velop to our higher possibilities, are to hold within our borders those 

 progressive spirits whose love of nature is a dominant passion, if we are 

 going to give to our descendants the opportunities for contact with 

 the nature that our forefathers possessed we must come to an immediate 

 realization that our wild places are fast disappearing and that it is only 

 by prompt and vigorous action that we can save the few remnants and 

 conserve them to future good of all. 



This is neither the time nor place for a detailed discussion of the 

 animal life that should be preserved. It should serve at this time, to lay 

 down the principles that we should maintain and perpetuate the original 



