PREFACE ix 
thought of ulterior profit, only the fortunate 
plants, animals, and birds to which financial 
interests have attached themselves are out of 
danger. 
In view, indeed, of the general indifference 
and apathy towards keeping the world’s minor 
interests in birds and beasts alive, I have often 
wished that such important groups as, say, the 
Humming Birds of South America or the Birds 
of Paradise of New Guinea were leased to great 
plumage firms in Paris, London, and New York. 
They would then be bred for profit like ostriches, 
and killed in reason and season. They would be 
as secure to the coming race as the merino in 
Australia or the Romney Marsh in our own 
Dominion; in truth, a Society to breed wild 
animals and sell them as pets or for their pelts 
or plumage, ivory or horns, would do more for 
the perpetuation of species than all the Protection 
Societies in the world. 
_ We do, in fact, begin to see examples of such 
enlightened selfishness at work in the case of 
foxes and other fur-bearing species. We have 
the grouse and partridge bred for sport, and 
therefore preserved. Why not extend the prin- 
ciple ? 
I don’t say, be it here remarked, that this is 
the ideal plan, but folk who live in the world 
as it is must adapt themselves to its imperfections, 
