62 NEW YORK ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY 



and his assistants captured and purchased an important series 

 of mammals, birds and reptiles for the Park. The total of these 

 shipments amounted to the following: 



Mammals 31 



Reptiles 117 



Birds 154 



Fishes 13 



Slowly, but surely, the American wild animal market is 

 adjusting itself to the new conditions created by the war, and 

 new channels for supplies are being opened. It is perfectly evi- 

 dent that the German dealers will, at the close of the war, find 

 very many of their old hunting grounds closed to them, and for 

 a long period. It is more than likely that from this time hence- 

 forth, English dealers will possess the animal trade with India, 

 the Malay Settlements outside of the Dutch East Indies, German 

 East Africa and very much more of the Dark Continent. Here- 

 after Frenchmen will control the wild animal trade of the French 

 Congo, and there will be few regions left to the German dealers 

 that are well stocked with big game. 



In view of this certainty, it is well for all Americans who 

 need, or who ever may need, wild animals, to take thought for 

 the morrow. 



One of the first results of the present situation will be the 

 establishing of direct communications with Africa. The close 

 of the war quickly will be followed by the inauguration of a 

 regular line of passenger steamers between South Africa and 

 New York. But for the war, such a line would to-day be in 

 operation ! 



It needs no effort of the imagination to picture the possibili- 

 ties in a direct line from Cape Town or Durban to New York of 

 importing animals by a short haul along the hne of least resist- 

 ance. With the co-operation that we may reasonably expect 

 from the Union Castle Line, which surely will do as well in 

 freight rates on wild animals as the Hamburg-American Line 

 has for years done by the Hagenbecks, our African animals 

 should cost us about thirty per cent, less than we have all these 

 years been paying the German dealers for animals shipped first 

 from Africa to Central Europe, and thence to America. 



Last summer we invited the Zoological Society of Philadel- 

 phia and the National Zoological Park of Washington to join us, 



