74 WILD LIFE PROTECTION FUND 



Unless the men of America now take hold of this subject 

 with both hands and acquit themselves like Men, the next 

 generation of Americans will see the national forests of 

 the West, wherever hunting continues, absolutely destitute 

 of big game. This will be true of all save a few isolated 

 localities like northern Wyoming and certain wild and dif- 

 ficult regions in Idaho. 



On the other hand, if the federal government will take 

 hold of the matter with an iron hand, and seriously set to 

 work to bring back the vanished game to the national for- 

 ests, in twenty years' time there can be hundreds of thou- 

 sands of head of big game that legitimately may be shot 

 for food, representing an increment of millions of dollars 

 in total value, on a basis of about 80 per cent profit. 



It seems well worth while to set forth an outline of this 

 plan, because very soon we will be engaged in a great cam- 

 paign to induce Congress to adopt the national-forest-game- 

 preserve idea. 



The national reserve forests of the United States em- 

 brace 180,000,000 of acres of the public domain. This means 

 281,562 square miles. Sized up statewise, it means an area 

 as large as the whole State of Texas and 15,666 square 

 miles over. 



The national forests were established as such for the 

 purpose of conserving their timber, grazing grounds and 

 water for the greatest good of the greatest number. As 

 yet no western state is fit to be trusted with the sole man- 

 agement of its natural resources, because throughout all 

 the more recently settled states, territories and colonial pos- 

 sessions of our nation, the element that looks ahead, that 

 regards the rights of posterity and that resolutely and ef- 

 fectively conserves natural resources, is not yet strong 

 enough to cope with the element which is resolved to exploit 

 nature, cut, slash, shoot, destroy and impoverish for the 

 purpose of getting rich quickly. Fifty years hence the con- 

 servation spirit of the West possibly may be as strong 

 throughout the western two-thirds of the United States as 

 it now is in the eastern one-third ; but we doubt it. Today, 

 nothing but the strong federal arm stands between our 



