THE LEGITIMATE USE OF GAME 89 



perity that even the poorest industrious man is able 

 to satisfy the hunger of his family and himself 

 without recourse to wild birds and mammals. To 

 this rule even the poorest Florida cracker offers no 

 exception, and it is only the outlaw and the moon- 

 shiner who regards it as necessary to live on deer 

 and wild turkeys. In all North America there is, 

 I venture to assert, not one mining-camp that really 

 needs to subsist upon moose and deer and ptarmi- 

 gan. It is a fixed fact that no mining-camp can 

 endure without a well-established line of communi- 

 cation with the outside world, and the mere fact that 

 moose meat and caribou steaks are a little cheaper 

 than imported beef and bacon does not constitute 

 an ethical reason why a valuable fauna of big game 

 should be destroyed to increase the cash profits of 

 Alaskan miners. 



We grant that real prospectors and explorers are 

 entitled to live on wild game when it becomes abso- 

 lutely necessary; but beyond them this privilege 

 should not be extended to any man or men, either 

 white or red. The game-slaughter privileges now 

 enjoyed by the Indians of Alaska are utterly 

 wrong, and should be withdrawn. All Indians, and 

 all other natives, should be compelled to observe 

 the same game-laws as white men. They have no 

 more inherent right to the wild game of a continent 

 than they have to its mineral resources or its water- 

 power. 



It is now an undeniable fact that only a few of the 



