122 EXTRACTS FROM NOTE-BOOKS. CH. XXVII. 



subject to many diseases and causes of decay, which 

 would not affect them if they were in a state of 

 nature. 



In populous countries such as Britain, it may 

 fairly be supposed that extremely few wild animals 

 or birds reach their full period of life. Although 

 some kinds are carefully preserved here and there, 

 they are only preserved, like sheep or fowls, to be 

 the more conveniently killed when required ; and 

 where there is no restriction to shooting and destroy- 

 ing the ferae naturae of the country, the extensive 

 trade carried on throughout the kingdom in all the 

 shops where guns and powder and shot are sold, 

 proves what numbers must be destroyed. Added to 

 this, guns and rifles are now so well made as to be 

 much more destructive weapons than formerly. No 

 reasonable person would wish to be able to kill a 

 bird at a greater distance than his fowling-piece 

 now enables him to do ; and a modern rifle carries 

 correctly quite as far as a man can see clearly 

 enough to aim wdth nicety at a small object. 



In shooting with the rifle at large animals, such 

 as deer, a good-sized ball is, for several reasons, a 

 very great desideratum. In the first place, the 

 larger the ball the greater is its force. A ball 

 of 11 bore smashes through a substance which 

 would stop the ball of a pea-rifle, unless the 



