THE SHOOTING OF THE 

 FUTURE 



A LOOK BACKWARD 



When the white men came to America they found 

 wild birds and animals very abundant. The repro- 

 ductive energy of indigenous species more than made 

 up for their destruction by natural enemies. Human 

 beings were not numerous in proportion to the area of 

 the land, and took only what they needed. The balance 

 of nature was preserved. 



It was rudely disturbed by the arrival of civilized 

 man with his firearms, though for a time he made little 

 impression on the life of the great continent to which 

 he had come. Birds and animals continued abundant, 

 though close to the settlements they were soon driven 

 away or destroyed. Thus Josselyn, writing in 1671. 

 tells, as already said, how thirty years before turkeys 

 were very abundant at Black Point, now Scarborough, 

 Maine, where many broods of young might be seen in 

 a morning, but that the English and the Indians have 

 destroyed them, "so that 'tis very rare to meet with a 

 wild Turkie in the Woods." This was only about fifty 

 years after the landing of the Pilgrim Fathers. 



5" 



