114 
ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY BULLETIN 
Bepartments : 
Mammals Aquarium 
W. T. Hornapay. C. H. Townsenp. 
Birds Reptiles 
Ler S. CRANDALL. Raymonp L. Dirmars 
Witiiam Beesk. Honorary Curator, Birds 
Published bi-monthly at the Office of the Society, 
111 Broadway, New York City. 
Yearly by Mail, $1.00. 
MAILED FREE TO MEMBERS. 
Copyright, 1921, by the New York Zoological Society. 
Each author is responsible for the scientific accuracy 
and the proof reading of his contribution. 
Etwin R. Sansorn, Editor 
Wior. XOxliVin Nok 5: SEPTEMBER, 1921 
THAT GAME SLAUGHTER IN 
NATAL 
Several months ago fragmentary bits of news 
came to America by way of England concerning 
a great slaughter of game that had taken place 
in the Transvaal, seemingly under government 
auspices. The early information received was 
brief and fragmentary, and gave no detailed 
reasons for the massacre of zebras and other 
species of game that has taken place. 
In due course of time we received from the 
British Society for the Protection of the Fauna 
of the Empire, expressions which betokened its 
strong disapproval of the whole occurrence. 
At last, however, we are in receipt of direct 
news from South Africa which uncovers the 
whole situation, and shows it in clear but hid- 
eous perspective. The ignorance, the sordidness 
and the blood-guiltiness of the whole affair is 
disgusting beyond words; and the savagery of it 
is quite unparalleled in the annals of British 
colonization. Even the casual reader can meas- 
ure the depth of the iniquity of it by the fact 
that four of the twelve much prized and long 
protected remaining white rhinoceroses of South 
Africa, now found in South Africa in the Trans- 
vaal only, and most carefully preserved through 
a period of twenty years. were slaughtered in 
the drive, and left to deeay on the veldt! 
From a thoroughly trustworthy South African 
source we have the information that the organ- 
The Natal massacre should be a warning to 
the whole world against the perpetration of any 
similar crimes against wild life-——W. T. H. 
ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY BULLETIN 
ized massacre of big game which occurred in 
Natal about nine months ago, involved the 
slaughter of about 2,000 zebras and at least 
1,000 head of other large game. About five 
hundred white men, who were called up from 
the towns by advertisements, took part in the 
slaughter, and the pretext was “‘the tsetse fly.” 
In addition to the slaughter, one result of the 
drive was to scatter the remaining big game still 
further afield, and presumably to carry the 
tsetse fly much farther than before. Inasmuch 
as a great many of the men engaged in the kill- 
ing never before had handled firearms or hunted 
big game, it is reasonably certain that in addi- 
tion to the game kilied thousands of head were 
wounded. of which many must have died of 
their wounds. 
In the first instance it was supposed that 
the game destroyed had been seriously encroach- 
ing upon the cultivated fields and gardens of 
civilization; but the facts seem to be otherwise. 
It seems that the theatre of the massacre did 
not consist of cultivated lands. It is said that 
the men who take up such lands as_ those 
occupied by the game do so for the purpose of 
exploiting the game and the timber, and when 
those are exhausted they return to the high and 
healthy parts of the country, leaving behind 
them a devastated and barren wilderness. 
This, we repeat, is the statement of a com- 
petent South African authority who is thoroughly 
familiar with the whole situation. 
We deeply regret the lapse backward into 
savagery of the perpetrators of the appalling 
slaughter described above. It is to be hoped, 
however, that the horror and aversion which it 
has caused in the minds of all fair-minded and 
humane Englishmen will go far toward prevent- 
ing such exhibitions in the future. 
We are quite familiar with the arguments 
usually brought forward in defense of the 
slaughter of big game that happens to be in 
touch with our so-called civilization. We do not 
believe in the perpetual maintenance of unbear- 
able wild animal nuisances. It is quite conceiv- 
able that under certain conditions the checking 
of the increase of big game by well regulated 
killings can, and occasionally does, become nec- 
essary, although so far as the experience of the 
world has gone, such justifiable occasions are 
few and far between. But the wholesale slaugh- 
ter perpetrated in Natal is an_ entirely 
different matter. It seems to have been con- 
ducted with blind ferocity and blood-thirstiness 
that did not stop even at the destruction of the 
most valuable wild animal asset of Natal—the 
white rhinoceros. In Rhodesia, where twenty 
