INTRODUCTION XV11. 



the sole purpose of making profit out of the game on 

 the Johannesburg and Kimberley markets. We know of 

 one case in a certain village in the Free State where 

 a man and his sons had the shooting rights on a farm 

 teeming with game, and, although fairly well-to-do 

 people, this family party sent up to the Johannesburg 

 market hundreds of head of game every month, until the 

 constant inroad upon the supply caused a total destruc- 

 tion of all game on that particular farm ! 



I am, of course, not against the legitimate sportsman 

 who is naturalist and sportsman enough to recognize the 

 facts aforementioned and who is often quite willing to pay 

 for a few days' shooting. I sincerely hope farmers and 

 landowners will realize the important fact that the game 

 is not merely their property, but that it is an asset to the 

 country and belongs quite as much to their heirs and 

 successors. 



I have given a good deal of thought to this vexed 

 question, and the only practical solution of the problem 

 I can think of, without waiting until most of the Antelope 

 have to be totally protected, by being proclaimed Royal 

 Game, is the prohibition of the sale of game-meat on the 

 markets, or by wholesale butchers, except in certain 

 instances, such as Springbuck and similar cases where 

 the animal is plentiful, when a special permit from the 

 Administrator should be allowed for sportsmen to shoot 

 or remove game in certain quantities from one Province 

 to another, or to his home, upon a certificate from the 

 Resident Magistrate of the district in which he has been 

 shooting. At any rate, something drastic will soon have 

 to be done. There are in South Africa a number of 

 people chiefly Boers to whom the " sport " of shooting 

 does not appeal. They only shoot for the pot, and to 

 them such ideas as not shooting a Partridge on the 



