CHAPTER IV 

 PROTECTION OF ANIMAL LIFE 



To birds man gives his woods, 

 To beasts his pastures, and to fish his floods. 

 For some his int'rest prompts him to provide, 

 For more his pleasure, yet for more his pride. 



POPE. 



IT is fitting that an account of man's destructiveness in the 

 realm of animal life should be followed by the kindlier 

 theme of his protection of the lower creatures, for the two are 

 inseparably united. In the world of living things, as in our 

 physical environment, the natural law holds, that every action 

 produces an equal and opposite reaction; and so destruction 

 of one animal as a rule entails the protection of another, 

 just as protection of one species involves the destruction of 

 its enemies. The sportsman aims at protecting his game, 

 and, as we have seen, reaches his end by destroying the 

 beasts and birds of prey; but his action is more comprehen- 

 sive than his intention, for he protects not only the objects 

 of his sport, but the myriads of smaller vermin which also 

 contribute to the food of the creatures he destroys. 



It is less my intention to discuss here, however, such 

 undesigned results of the protection of animal life than to trace 

 the more direct consequences which have followed upon a 

 deliberate policy of protection. These direct consequences, 

 it need hardly be said, are as a rule, an increase in numbers of 

 the creatures concerned, and frequently an extension of their 

 range to new areas. They may involve so great a multiplica- 

 tion of animals desirable from one point of view, say that of 

 the sportsman, that from another point of view, say that of 

 the farmer, the protected creature becomes a nuisance, and 

 protection has to give way to destruction. But in most 

 cases protection does little more than preserve its sheltered 

 favourites in numbers approximating to their natural pro- 

 portion in the fauna: it does little more than compensate 

 for the destructiveness of man. 



