354 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXVI. No. 925 



herd having been killed by poachers. A 

 larger number, over three hundred, still 

 survive near the Great Slave Lake, and 

 there are probably nearly two thousand in 

 captivity, in various zoological gardens, 

 private domains and state parks. It is only 

 by the deliberate and conscious interfer- 

 ence of man that the evil wrought by man 

 has been arrested. 



A second example that I may select is 

 also taken from the continent of North 

 America, but it is specially notable be- 

 cause it is sometimes urged, as in India, 

 that migratory birds require no protection. 

 Audubon relates that just a century ago 

 passenger pigeons existed in countless mil- 

 lions, and that for four days at a time the 

 sky was black with the stream of migra- 

 tion. The final extinction of this species 

 has taken place since the last meeting of 

 the association in Dundee. In 1906 there 

 were actually five single birds living, all 

 of which had been bred in captivity, and 

 I understand that these last survivors of a 

 prolific species are now dead, although the 

 birds ranged in countless numbers over a 

 great continent. 



It would be futile to discuss in detail 

 the precise agencies by which the destruc- 

 tion of animal life is wrought, or the pre- 

 texts or excuses for them. The most po- 

 tent factors are the perfection of the mod- 

 ern firearm and the enormous increase in 

 its use by civilized and barbarous man. 

 Sometimes the pretext is sport, sometimes 

 wanton destructiveness rules. The exterm- 

 ination of beasts-of-prey, the clearing of 

 soil for stock or crops, the securing of meat, 

 the commercial pursuit of hides and horns 

 and of furs and feathers, all play their 

 part. Farmers and settlers on the outskirts 

 of civilization accuse the natives, and 

 allege that the problem would be solved 

 were no firearms allowed to any but them- 

 selves. Sportsmen accuse other sportsmen, 



whom they declare to be no real sportsmen, 

 and every person whose object is not sport. 

 The great museums, in the name of science, 

 and the rich amateur collectors press for- 

 ward to secure the last specimens of mori- 

 bund species. 



But even apart from such deliberate and 

 conscious agencies, the near presence of 

 man is inhospitable to wild life. As he 

 spreads over the earth, animals wither be- 

 fore him, driven from their haunts, de- 

 prived of their food, perishing from new 

 diseases. It is part of a general biological 

 process. From time to time, in the past 

 history of the world, a species favored by 

 some happy kink of structure or fortunate 

 accident of adaptability, has become domi- 

 nant. It has increased greatly in numbers, 

 outrunning its natal bounds, and has radi- 

 ated in every possible direction, conquer- 

 ing woodland and prairies, the hills and 

 the plains, transcending barriers that had 

 seemed impassable, and perhaps itself 

 breaking up into new local races and vari- 

 eties. It must be long since such a 

 triumphant progress was unattended by 

 death and destruction. "When the first ter- 

 restrial animals crept out of their marshes 

 into the clean air of the dry land, they had 

 only plants and the avenging pressure of 

 physical forces to overcome. But when the 

 amphibians were beaten by the reptiles, 

 and when from amongst the reptiles some 

 insignificant species acquired the prodigious 

 possibility of transformation to mammals, 

 and still more when amongst the mammals 

 eutherian succeeded marsupial, carnivore 

 the creodont and man the ape, it could have 

 been only after a fatal contest that the new- 

 comers triumphed. The struggle, we must 

 suppose, was at first most acute between 

 animals and their nearest inferior allies, as 

 similarity of needs brings about the keen- 

 est competition, but it must afterwards. 



