PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 481 
The development of the continent of North America has been one of the 
wonders of the history of the world, and we on this side of the Atlantic almost 
hold our breath as we try to realise the material wealth and splendour and the 
ardent intellectual and social progress that have turned the United States into an 
imperial nation. But we know what has happened to the American bison. We 
know the danger that threatens the pronghorn, one of the most isolated and 
interesting of living creatures, the Virginian deer, the mule-deer, and the bighorn 
sheep. ven in the wide recesses of Canada, the bighorn, the caribou, the elk, 
the wapiti, the white mountain goat, and the bears are being rapidly driven back 
by advancing civilisation. In South America less immediate danger seems to 
threaten the jaguar and maned wolf, the tapirs and ant-eaters and sloths, but the 
energy of the rejuvenated Latin races points to a huge encroachment of civilisa- 
tion on wild nature at no distant date. 
You will understand that I am giving examples and not a catalogue even of 
threatened terrestrial mammals. I have said nothing of the aquatic carnivores, 
nothing of birds, or of reptiles, or of batrachians and fishes. And to us who are 
zoologists, the vast destruction of invertebrate life, the sweeping out, as forests 
are cleared and the soil tilled, of innumerable species that are not even named or 
described, is a real calamity. I do not wish to appeal to sentiment. Man is 
worth many sparrows; he is worth all the animal population of the globe, and if 
there were not room for both, the animals must go. I will pass no judgment on 
those who find the keenest pleasure of life in gratifying the primeval instinct ot 
sport. I will admit that there is no better destiny for the lovely plumes of a rare 
bird than to enhance the beauty of a beautiful woman. I will accept the plea of 
those who prefer a well-established trinomial to a moribund species. But I do 
not admit the right of the present generation to careless indifference or to-wanton 
destruction. Each generation is the guardian of the existing resources of the 
world; it has come into a great inheritance, but only as a trustee. We are learn- 
ing to preserve the relics cf early civilisations, and the rude remains of man’s 
primitive arts and crafts. Every civilised nation spends great sums on painting 
and sculpture, on libraries and museums. Living animals are of older lineage, 
more perfect craftsmanship and greater beauty than any of the creations of man. 
And although we value the work of our forefathers, we do not doubt but that the 
generations yet unborn will produce their own artists and writers, who may 
equal or surpass the artists and writers of the past. But there is no resurrection 
or recovery of an extinct species, and it is not merely that here and there one 
species out of many is threatened, but that whole genera, families and orders 
are in danger, 
Now let me turn to what is being done and what has been done for the 
preservation of fauna. I must begin by saying, and this was one of the principal 
reasons for selecting the subject of my Address, that we who are professional 
zoologists, systematists, anatomists, embryologists, and students of general bio- 
logical problems, in this country at least, have not taken a sufficiently active part 
in the preservation of the realm of nature that provides the reason for our exist- 
ence. The first and most practical step of world-wide importance was taken 
by a former President of the British Association, the late Lord Salisbury, one 
of the few in the long roll of English statesmen whose mind was attuned to 
science. In 1899 he arranged for a convention of the Great Powers interested in 
Africa to consider the preservation of what were curiously described as the ‘ Wild 
Animals, Birds and Fish’ of that continent. The convention, which did most 
important pioneer work, included amongst its members another President of this 
_Association, Sir Ray Lankester, whom we hold in high honour in this Section 
as the living zoologist who has taken the widest interest in every branch of 
zoology. But it was confined in its scope to creatures of economic or of sporting 
value, And from that time on the central authorities of the Great Powers and 
the local Administrators, particularly in the case of tropical possessions, seem to 
have been influenced in the framing of their rules and regulations chiefly by the 
idea of preserving valuable game animals. Defining the number of each kind 
of game that can be killed, charging comparatively high sums for shooting-per- 
mits, and the establishment of temporary or permanent reserved tracts in which 
the game may recuperate, have been the principal methods selected. On these 
lines, narrow although they are, much valuable work has been done, and the parts 
of the world where unrestricted shooting is still possible are rapidly being limited. 
1912. ry 
