10 ECONOMIC MAMMALOGY 



state ; yet the great majority, who wish only to see, not to kill game, 

 have always permitted the small minority of hunters to make and en- 

 force the game laws. Fortunately, the hunters themselves are in large 

 numbers awakening to the fact that game laws must be wisely drawn 

 and effectively administered, or there will soon be no game to hunt. 

 Therein lies the hope for the future of game mammals. With increasing 

 knowledge and experience the laws are being constantly bettered and 

 their enforcement made more certain. 



Hunting game animals with guns, as a recreation, has a bearing 

 upon the esthetic side of life, as strange as that may seem to some, but 

 there are also utilitarian phases of that subject, so it seems better to 

 treat it in a separate chapter. However, there is a growing army of 

 hunters whose only weapons are field glasses and cameras and who 

 get just as much sport out of their peaceful pursuit of mammals as do 

 those who go forth armed with rifles and shotguns. Furthermore, ob- 

 taining good photographs of wild mammals often requires much more 

 skill and patience, more accurate knowledge of mammalian habits, and 

 sometimes more courage, than does shooting them. 



