ol. XCIII 
FEBRUARY, 1923 
..■ 
THE BIG GAME OF NORTH CHINA 
SPORTSMEN OF TODAY ARE BEGINNING TO TURN TOWARD THE WIL¬ 
DERNESS OF NORTHERN CHINA FOR A PRIMITIVE BIG GAME REGION 
■ “IHE subject of the big game of 
any country is one of perennial 
- interest to all sportsmen and 
travelers, even of the arm-chair 
jt\ Every year the young men go 
! h in all the enthusiasm and vigor of 
th and perfect health to hunt. An- 
ring the call of the Red Gods, their 
turn “to the camps of known desire 
i proved delight.” Later they come 
i k laden with spoils of the chase in 
i n and hide, telling strange tales of 
' ure’s many wonders, thus bringing 
1 mbs of comfort to those whose hard 
i have held them bound to desk and 
r :e. 
n spite of the softening influences of 
civilization and its many insistent 
: ms, the “call of the wild” ever sounds 
d in the ears of a certain type of 
ng Britisher or American, and leads 
i out on the trail of the caribou or 
i moose, the bear or the mountain lion, 
I wild goat or the big-horn sheep, 
tnd what a heritage is his ! The mere 
! ing of his quarry, the final achieve- 
nt of endeavor, is the least part of 
: t glorious birthright of his. The 
ater part lies in the long day’s tramp, 
i puzzling through the rugged ranges, 
the smell of the pines on the steep 
I, pes, in the picking up of the spoor, 
studying of the quarry’s ways, in the 
1 glow of the camp-fire at night, in 
j dark, starlit sky, in the gathering 
rm, the blinding flash of the lightning, 
: rolling thunder in the mountains, the 
i ir of the torrent, and then in the still, 
all voice of God in the wilderness! 
To find these things our young men 
I! ve traversed the world from end to 
i, and little enough has escaped them 
their eager search. All countries have 
■lded their secrets; trophies of the 
ise from all lands adorn the walls of 
r homes and museums; our literature 
rich with books on Nature, 
j Vet, in Asia, and more especially in 
! it part which lies between the Yang- 
l Valley and the Great Wall of China, 
By ARTHUR DE CARLE SOWERBY 
living in wild mountainous and wooded 
areas that have scarce been trod by the 
foot of the white man, much less written 
about, various kinds of big game animals 
occur in considerable numbers. Hardly 
are they known to the scientist, almost 
not at all to the sportsman. 
A few explorers, a few local Nim- 
Typical Chinese hunter from the moun¬ 
tains of Shansi 
rods, have visited these parts, but on the 
whole it may be said that these game 
reserves—for such by nature of their in¬ 
accessibility they may be considered— 
have escaped the attention of the Euro¬ 
pean and American big game hunter to 
a remarkable degree. 
True, the game they contain is far 
from free from a somewhat devastating 
exploitation by native hunters, but on 
the whole, and in most places where the 
animals occur, their numbers have re¬ 
mained in a state of equilibrium for a 
considerable time. 
r T l O the northeast of Peking, in the 
*■ Province of Chihli, the so-called 
Wei Chang , or Imperial Hunting 
Grounds, were up till quite recently a 
hunting reserve in the truest sense of 
the word, wherein a number of kinds of 
game were strictly preserved, and none 
but specially authorized members of the 
Manchu Imperial Guard, or Bannermen, 
were allowed to hunt. 
It was here that the earlier Manchu 
Emperors and their Courts sought an¬ 
nual recreation by indulging in the chase 
of the spotted deer and the wild goat, or 
goral, the prosaic black bear, and the 
lordly woolly tiger. It is probably 
nearly two centuries since any royal 
battue was held in these well-forested 
and mountainous areas; but up till the 
Revolution of 1911, which ended in 1912 
in the overthrow of the Manchu dy¬ 
nasty, the game of a very large area 
was rigorously protected, only a certain 
number of head of deer being killed each 
winter for the Imperial cuisine. 
Unfortunately this extensive area has 
of late years been thrown open to the 
farmer and settler; the extensive forests 
of oak, spruce, and pine have been 
largely cut away; while the big game is 
rapidly being exterminated by ruthless 
Chinese hunters. 
Westward, in the Province of Shansi, 
especially in the western areas, where 
extensive mountain systems are more .or 
less covered with forest, or at least with 
thick protective vegetation, big and 
small game of all kinds is very much 
more plentiful; while further north in 
the same province, on the borders of 
Mongolia, bare and rugged mountains 
shelter wild sheep, elk or wapiti, and 
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