animals wherever a civilized government has its "sphere of in- 

 fluence." We are likely to go still further in this direction and to 

 set aside parts of the national domain as permanent parks in which 

 every form of life shall be absolutely safe from man's marauding- 

 hand. Our own government has made a good beginning in the 

 Yellowstone National Park. It remains now to secure tracts of 

 available wilderness east of the Mississippi, and on the Pacific 

 Coast. These reservations may be made valuable as forestry pre- 

 serves, thus serving for all time a double purpose. Some of our 

 states have made beginnings in this work, but we need more ex- 

 tensive reservations under federal control. The movement recently 

 sanctioned by Mr. Hornaday, of New York city — the setting apart 

 of a magnificent national reserve in "southern Alaska, should be 

 consummated without delay. We shall then have a place of refuge 

 for the most superb mammals of the continent — the buffalo, musk 

 ox, various species of bear, the beaver, many of the choicest fur- 

 bearing animals, etc. It is a wise provision of Providence that has 

 placed the noblest fauna of North America in our own domain and 

 in a part of it that offers few temptations to the farmer or the 

 miner. We shall certainly be very remiss if we fail to set apart and 

 patrol this last refuge of the animals that are now hunted to the 

 death. 



Other countries are moving in this matter; even in Africa 

 the protection of wild animals is to be undertaken by the powers. 

 A convention signed by all the leading governments of- Europe 

 about three years ago, makes rigid restrictions on the hunting of 

 game in Africa, and among other agreements, binds the signatory 

 powers to encourage the domestication of the zebra, elephant, 

 ostrich, etc., to prevent the transmission of diseases from tame 

 to wild animals, to destroy the eggs of crocodiles, poisonous snakes, 

 pythons, and in many other ways to render service to the useful 

 or harmless animals that are in greater danger of extermination. 



2. The most inviting service that awaits the energies of the 

 economic zoologist is the seeking out of new species of animals 

 that shall be made useful to man in some new way. The number 

 of animals that we utilize at present is surprisingly small. The 

 total of animal species classified and named by our scholars was 

 estimated at over 71,000 in the year 1830; 50 years later, in 1881, 



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