-^ The Survivors 



seem to attach to him. Obviously he must kill a certain 

 number of animals, that are often quite unknown till then, 

 and in almost every case have been hardly studied at all, 

 in order that he may add them to the collections belonging 

 to his native country. He gains the gratitude of science 

 and of the learned, but he has to encounter the prejudices 

 of others. People think that they are justified in throwing 

 upon him, the scientific collector, the reproach of being an 

 exterminator. 



Those who speak thus completely forget that it was 

 through the material thus placed before their eyes that 

 they themselves obtained their very first knowledge of 

 these beautiful creatures ; that till then they hardly 

 took any interest in such things ; and that it is only by 

 means of knowledge secured in this way that regulations 

 for the preservation of these beauties of nature can be 

 devised. 



Let us suppose that every museum and scientific 

 collection in the world were provided with a series of 

 specimens of all the varieties of the animal world that are 

 now most seriously threatened with extinction ; let us 

 further suppose that each of these institutions secured, 

 besides, duplicate series of the hides and skeletons of each 

 species. To make a striking comparison, all this, beside 

 the wholesale destruction of the animal world of which we 

 have to complain, would be like a week-end sportsman 

 perhaps killing one hare during his whole life compared to 

 the millions of hares killed every year in Germany. 



If a species is already reduced to such a state that the 

 taking of a few hundred, or even a few thousand, specimens 



145 10 



