Our Vanishing Wild Life: Its Extermination and PreservationHornaday, William T. (William Temple)
History
Our Vanishing Wild Life: Its Extermination and Preservation
Hornaday, William T. (William Temple)
Game-laws -- United States; Wildlife conservation -- United States
During the period when Mr. C.J. Jones ("Buffalo" Jones) was
superintendent of the wild animals of the Park, the indignities
inflicted upon tourist campers by certain grizzly bears quite abraded
his nerves. He obtained from Major Pitcher authority to punish and
reform a certain grizzly, and went about the matter in a thoroughly
Buffalo-Jonesian manner. He procured a strong lariat and a bean-pole
seven feet long and repaired to the camp that was troubled by too much
grizzly.
The particular offender was a full-grown male grizzly who had become a
notorious raider. At the psychological moment Jones lassoed him in short
order, getting a firm hold on the bear's left hind leg. Quickly the end
of the rope was thrown over a limb of the nearest tree, and in a trice
Ephraim found himself swinging head downward between the heavens and the
earth. And then his punishment began.
Buffalo Jones thrashed him soundly with the bean-pole! The outraged bear
swung to and fro, whirled round and round, clawing and snapping at the
empty air, roaring and bawling with rage, scourged in flesh and insulted
in spirit. As he swung, the bean-pole searched out the different parts
of his anatomy with a wonderful degree of neatness and precision.
Between rage and indignation the grizzly nearly exploded. A
moving-picture camera was there, and since that day that truly moving
scene has amazed and thrilled countless thousands of people.
When it was over, Mr. Jones boldly turned the bear loose! Although its
rage was as boundless as the glories of the Yellowstone Park, it paused
not to rend any of those present, but headed for the tall timber, and
with many an indignant "Woof! Woof!" it plunged in and disappeared. It
was two or three years before that locality was again troubled by
impudent grizzly bears.
And what is the mental attitude of _every_ Rocky Mountain black or
grizzly bear _outside_ of the Yellowstone Park? It is colossal suspicion
of man, perpetual fear, and a clean pair of heels the moment man-scent
or man-sight proclaims the proximity of the Arch Enemy of Wild
Creatures. And yet there are one or two men who tell the American public
that wild animals do not think, that they do not reason, and are
governed only by "instinct"!
"A little knowledge is a dangerous thing!"
TAMING WILD BIRDS.--As incontestable proof of the receptive faculties of
birds, I will cite the taming of wild birds in the open, by friendly
advances. There are hundreds, aye, thousands, of men, women, boys and
girls who could give interesting and valuable personal testimony on this
point.
My friend J. Alden Loring (one of the naturalists of the Roosevelt
African Expedition), is an ardent lover of wild birds and mammals. The
taming of wild creatures in the open is one of his pastimes, and his
results serve well to illustrate the marvelous readiness of our wild
neighbors to become close friends with man _when protected_. I will
quote from one of Mr. Loring's letters on this subject:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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