no THE NATURE-STUDY IDEA 



thoughtlessness. The satisfaction in hunting is 

 often the joy of skill in marksmanship, the pleasure 

 of woodcraft, the enthusiasm of being out-of-doors, 

 the keen delight in discovering the haunts and ways 

 of the nature-folk. Many a hunter finds more 

 pleasure in all these things than in the game that 

 he bags. The great majority of hunters are gentle 

 and large-hearted men. They are the first to 

 discourage mere wantonness and brutality. Under 

 their hand, certain animals are likely to increase, 

 because they eliminate the rapacious species. To 

 the true sportsman hunting is not synonymous with 

 killing. It is primarily a means of enjoying the free 

 world of the Out-of-doors. This nature-spirit is 

 growing, and there are many ways of knowing the 

 fields and woods. The camera is competing with 

 the trap and gun. 



I must not be understood as opposed to 

 hunting with the gun or the rod. Every man has 

 a right to decide these questions for himself. I 

 wish only to suggest that there are other ideals. 

 I wish to point out the tendency to know things 

 as they live and for what they are. There was a 

 time when animals were known mostly in museums, 

 or in books that smelled of museums. We now 

 know them in woods and fields. We know what 

 they do, as well as what they are. Making pictures 

 from stuffed specimens will soon be a thing of the 

 past. Read any book of natural history of fifty 

 years ago; then read one of to-day. Note the road 

 by which we have come : this may color your own 

 attitude toward the nature-world. 



