Our most important task is now to obtain an accurate knowledge of the fauna of foreign lands. For this purpose we must collect materials which will render the study of this wild life of other lands possible to our scientific institutions; which will place them in a position to give to a wide public an idea of all these rich treasures, and thus awaken an intelligent love for them in the hearts of the pioneers of civilisation.
And then we must devise practicable measures of protection. This is a wide field of labour. The hunter himself must take in hand the intelligent preservation of the wild animals. The measures of protection must be suited to the varying conditions of the wide hunting grounds of foreign lands, and must not be considered only from the stay-at-home point of view.
This is not to be done by mere laments over the extermination of wild life, or even by merely putting limitations on the enjoyment of the chase by the individual hunter. On the contrary, a beneficial result can be obtained only by all European travellers in those countries interchanging their experiences, collecting material, and exerting themselves to the utmost and in concert to devise measures that will, as far as may be, put a stop to the threatened extermination.
This is a great and noble task.
YOUNG GRANT’S GAZELLES ON A BLACK-BURNED STRETCH OF VELT. IV
The Survivors
To learn to know anything with precision, to devote oneself to it and master it in its smallest details, one must generally make its study a labour of love. So the spread of more exact knowledge of the manifestations of nature around us must go hand in hand with the awakening of love for them and for the splendours they present to our view. And with this increasing impulse towards research and knowledge must come the desire to prevent as far as possible the rapid destruction of fauna and flora. Public opinion, in truth, has begun to range itself on the side of these much menaced glories of nature.
We have to observe and investigate. We have to get together some small portion of the vast material that is often so uselessly squandered, in order to employ it in the service of special branches of science, and to make some closer knowledge of these things accessible to every one. We have to establish great collections formed on a definite plan, and everywhere to save as much material as possible for scientific and educational purposes, so long as it can still be done. “If these ideas could be brought home to the right quarters, millions would be made available for this object,” writes one of the most learned specialists in these matters. Our zoological gardens and museums are already doing their best, but they are hampered by the want of pecuniary resources. Whilst the largest sums are freely provided for the purchase of antiquities, there is a dearth of means for doing what is necessary to save the treasures of our vanishing fauna while there is still time!
