216 SAVAGE SUDAN 



nor age respected, or thought of, ten to twenty animals 

 wounded and lost for every head that is procured. In 

 short, a brutal, wasteful, sickening, and senseless massacre. 

 I do not imply that such things are being done ; but they 

 have been done in the past, hence this warning for the 

 future is justified. 



Another grave (and strictly cognate) danger to game 

 arises from tampering with the strictly Personal right to 

 shoot game under licence. No delegation of that right 

 is legal, and on no pretext whatever should any delegation 

 be permitted. Consider how any laxity in the law would 

 operate. Every Government official, military or other, 

 is entitled for a trifling sum (I think 6) to shoot big- 

 game, including two elephants which may represent a 

 cask-value of ^100, or even much more at the present 

 value of ivory, treble or quintuple that sum ! Now an 

 official is not, ipso facto, a sportsman at all ; he is not 

 always British, some are Egyptians, some Sudanese, or 

 even foreigners of sorts. The danger of the lucre lure 

 is obvious. Any such (hypothetical) official though he 

 may not have the faintest flame of sporting instinct in 

 his breast may pay up the paltry fee and then send 

 forth a posse of his savage subordinates to secure the 

 two permitted elephants, and, incidentally, whatever else 

 they choose to, and can slaughter. The identical result 

 follows, as in the case previously foreshadowed that 

 is, wanton, wasteful wounding and loss. No game, how- 

 ever abundant, can long withstand such treatment. 



To the Sudan, its big-game counts as one of the 

 most valuable of assets. It is worth preserving, even if 

 only regarded on that low level of appreciation. The 

 functions of the Game-Superintendent should be esteemed 

 as of supreme importance, and his office count second only 

 to that of its Chancellor of the Exchequer ! 



