THE LEGITIMATE USE OF GAME 91 



field-weary farmers to don their beloved hunting- 

 clothes, stalk out into the haunts of nature and say, 

 "Begone! dull care!" 



There are millions of active men who are not 

 tempted to take violent exercise in the open air 

 unless there is a very definite object to pursue. On 

 the other hand, a true sportsman will cheerfully 

 expend $400 in money and $400 worth of hard labor 

 in killing one moose in New Brunswick for a head 

 that easily could be purchased for $75. 



In the summer of 1913, an eminent and very 

 expensive surgeon of my acquaintance spent $4,000 

 in money and $8,000 worth of time in hunting and 

 killing about ten head of Alaskan big game that 

 as food would have been worth in the open market 

 possibly $100, but no more. The trip saved the 

 doctor from a nervous breakdown, and the con- 

 tinued practice of his skill is of benefit to a large 

 circle of afflicted humanity. 



The right sort of a man who has had a fine day 

 in the painted woods, on the bright waters of a 

 duck-haunted bay, or in the golden stubble of Sep- 

 tember, can fill his day and his soul with six good 

 birds just as well as with sixty. The idea that in 

 order to be a sportsman and enjoy a fine day in the 

 open a man must kill a wheelbarrow-load of birds, 

 is a mistaken idea; and if persistently adhered to, 

 it becomes vicious. The outing in the open is the 

 thing, not the amount of blood-stained feathers 

 and death in the game-bag. 



