DUTY AND POWER OF THE CITIZEN 185 



species, while the guns of the game-hogs are roaring 

 all around him and strings of bobolinks are coming 

 into the markets for sale! Yet that is precisely 

 what is happening in many portions of America 

 to-day; and I tell you that if the birds of North 

 America are saved, it will not be by the ornitholo- 

 gists at large. But fortunately there are a few 

 noble exceptions to this ghastly general rule. 



The people of America who have money to give 

 away to causes for the betterment of humanity 

 should consider the campaigns that are being made, 

 and that should be made, to save the remainder of 

 our wild life for the benefit of mankind at large. 

 This cause is entitled to a share of betterment 

 funds, and it should not be compelled to live on the 

 husks and crumbs that fall from the million-dollar 

 tables of other causes. The sight of scores of causes 

 and institutions struggling with undigested wealth, 

 while the wild life of the world is being swept away, 

 and its defenders are working on a starvation basis, 

 is fairly maddening. 



With a fair amount of campaign money, the wild 

 life of the world could be saved: but the giving of 

 money to that cause is not fashionable. Is it because 

 the individual glory to be derived from it is too 

 small ? There are in all the world only three endow- 

 ment funds for the benefit of wild life. One con- 

 tains $340,000, another, $51,205 and the third, 

 $5,000. Perhaps by the time the wild birds and 



