56 THE ANGLER'S GUIDE 



land of devastation is to ruin everything of nature the 

 trees, the lawns, the flowers, the birds and the fishes. 



He dynamites and nets the fishes in the streams and 

 lakes, he cuts and burns down woodland to smooth his 

 path to the oil and coal regions, he sets brutal traps for 

 quadruped animals, he robs birds' nests, he nets song birds, 

 and he shoots and snares the farmers' valuable feathered 

 insect destroyers. 



He sees no beauty in the healthful greenery of the world ; 

 the woods, the waters, the grassy slopes and the flower 

 fields are to him no more than an ash heap and a leafless, 

 grassless back yard, and he estimates the song bird and 

 game fish solely by their comparative value to edible 

 merchandise. 



These destructive acts and mean ideas are also fostered 

 by a species of home country idiot; so, it behooves nature- 

 lovers to be diligently watchful and prompt and deter- 

 mined in their actions to save our beautiful country from 

 the utter ruination it will surely suffer if these spoilers are 

 not made to respect our natural law of preservation. 



Strive to reform, first of all, the dastardly practice of 

 polluting the rivers and lakes by the refuse of the water 

 closet, cement works, oil plant, gas tank, tan yard, acid 

 factory, paint shop, steel mill, iron foundry and dye works. 

 The angler should fight this ungodly condition for the sake 

 of his noble recreation, because the poisons of the greedy- 

 man's mill kill the fishes, and man in general should take 

 up arms agianst the draining of waste matter into public 

 streams because the dye, acid, oil, gas and sewage im- 

 pregnate the drinking-water with deadly disease germs. 



There are hundreds of thousands of fatal cases of typhoid 

 fever, scarlet fever, smallpox and other death-dealing 

 diseases in the United States every year, and all of these, 

 all, are directly and indirectly caused by the drinking of 

 poisoned water, or the eating of food that has been poi- 

 soned by the contaminated water! 



A fine regard, this, on the part of man for "the element 

 upon which the spirit of God did first move." 



"Perpetual devotion to what a man calls his business is 

 only to be sustained by perpetual neglect of other things. 

 And it is not by any means certain that a man's business 

 is the most important thing he has to do." 



ROBERT Louis STEVENSON. 



