Frederick Russell Burnham

“ The zebra would dot pur plains with color if we gave it the chance, though, from experience, I do not think it a valuable animal either to work or ride, and its hide does not make a leather of any value. Its flesh is good to eat, and it is one of the most beautiful of all the game animals.
These are only a few of the animals and birds that might be introduced into our own vast solitudes, where, for hundreds of miles, can only be seen a lonely raven or solitary coyote. But it can not be, although there should be nothing to prevent it. In Africa the game lives ever in dread of attack. ”

“ East Africa, broadly viewed, seems designed by nature as a vast game preserve, and should be held largely with this aim in view, for the greater part of the country is of no value for settlement. The English Government, on the strong advice of its local officials, has set aside a domain that shelters everything— the elephant with its valuable ivory, even the lion. Yet these officials, almost to a man, are skilled hunters and fond of sport. ”

“ There is in Africa a wonderfully varied range of interesting animals. Most of the desirable ones could easily be introduced into our own Southwest. They would multiply where our own domestic animals can not live. Vast tracts of our lonely deserts could be teeming with life interesting, beautiful, harmless, very useful for food and leather, displacing not a head of our cattle or other domestic stock, offering a grand hunting ground, a true pleasure land to all lovers of animal life.
Throughout all the foothill region and far south into Mexico, the bushbuck would thrive. ”

“ Furthermore, it is among the sick and weak that disease is spread, and infection there may reach a point that endangers the whole healthy herd. Always when some unnatural increase occurs, some disease sweeps them off. So even the lions and tigers, vultures and eagles, serve a merciful and proper purpose. In the countries where they are found, any animal that is born deficient in its faculties, or becomes ill or aged or wounded, is at once usefully destroyed as a means of preserving the high average of the herd. ”

“ When it was eaten level with the ground, for fear it might, with its great recuperative powers, renew itself, we have put that curse of God, the sheep, to tear it up by the roots and gnaw to death every little shrub left by the cattle. ”

“ If it were known that a herd of eland were on the Rio Grande, a thousand guns would be after them and their hides sold to the nearest est tannery; even a rare bird would surely be slaughtered. Again and again I have known of individuals trying to introduce useful birds and animals; their fate is always the same. Only a national law and a changed public opinion can make it possible to ever either save what animal life we have or introduce new and valuable additions. ”

“ It has been Known to kill a lion with its dagger-like horns. The gemsbok is a true game animal, and can live out on the desert a hundred miles from water. Its evesight is wonderfully strong, so that it is exceedingly difficult to stalk. Its meat is wefl flavored and its hide equal to the best calf. The gemsbok should have for a pal on our plains the speedy sesipe. I think most of the hunters of South Africa are well agreed that the sesipe is the fleetest antelope known. Some swift horses are bred in South Africa, but it is a rare one that can outfoot this game. ”

“ Still another class looks upon all sport and pastime, especially hunting and fishing, as so much time wasted. I remember an old farmer in Iowa saying he would be glad when the last duck was shot and the last fish caught, as then, maybe, he could get his boys to attend to the plowing. Well, he has his wish. His house now stands where it did in my boyhood. Not a duck nor a goose nor a plover ever passes by. Scarcely a bird, save the ominous raven, ever breaks the silence. The prairie chicken and quail are all killed ”

“ Camels, valuable for both flesh, milk and hair, grew wild in Arizona from a government herd until an enterprising Yankee rounded up every female, old and young, shipped them East and sold them to a circus. Otherwise we should have had good-sized herds long ago, and made use of them, as the Australians have, if we were equally enterprising. The Cape buffalo would thrive also, but might be considered too fierce for the rising generation to play with. Anyone hunting him will not complain of a dull time. Its flesh is very good eating, and its hide much better than that of an ox. ”

“ The ostrich would be quite at home in Arizona and New Mexico. It is already successfully introduced in California on fenced ranches.
In short, Africa is a wonderland of animal life to draw from. We can exclude its venomous reptiles and insects, and take the useful animals that have worked out from a hard environment a way to survive. By transportation to our land they would be delivered from their chief natural enemies. To this New World were brought the ass, the cow, the horse, sheep, goat, and hog. ”

“ This picturesque and harmless animal would thrive from the borders of Nevada to Texas, and far into Mexico. No enemy save man would touch it. A full-grown animal weighs over a ton, and must stoop his towering head to feed from your hand at the second-story window of a good-sized house. In contrast, there is that little fairy antelope, called the dick-dick, with sharp hoofe the size of a dime, and jet black horns about an inch and a half long. It weighs about 15 pounds and stands a foot high. It is easily tamed, and its flesh is of delicate flavor. ”

“ It is a beautifully marked antelope, and exceedingly agile. Often a whole herd in running will give a series of marvelous bounds several feet high, and, it may be, 30 feet span, apparently for sheer joy in the sport. A wa^on road acrossthe veldt will almostalways tempt them to show how far they can leap. The Boers on the farms now preserve them, and have a series of great hunts every year, coming with their families and wagons and making a picnic of the chase, each" farmer taking only what he needs, or what the herds can well spare, to avoid overstocking. ”

“ It is haunted by lions, leopards, hyenas, chetahs, wild dogs more savage than lions, crocodiles in every stream, eagles and vultures that prey on the young, pythons beside the trails, poisonous snakes, and other foes too numerous to mention. Yet millions survive and endure further the scourge of droughts and the hardships of the desert. ”

“ Its hair is hollow and very springy, making excellent paddings for saddles, and its flesh is delicate meat. Like the gemsbok, it would be an excellent curative for weaklings if they hunted him in his natural surroundings. ”

“ When they become intolerable they are picked off and laid in the hot dust, their belief being that if God intended the pests to live He would cool the dust; otherwise they perish at His will, not theirs. ”

“ Its flesh is of very fine flavor, and its hide makes one of the strongest leathers known. It is commonly used by the Boers to make forelashes on their immensely long ox whips and stage whips. Another possible importation is the oribe, a marvelously swift and graceful gazelle, weighing about 30 pounds, which ranges over the drier regions of Africa, especially in the north. The gemsbok, called the oryx in the north, is a much larger animal, wtiich is equally adaptable to conditions in this country. ”

“ Naturally he is against any game laws, and will poison the firat covey of quail that cross hi? cornfield. Another element that opposes every form of hunting and fishing is the super- sensitive people who are teaching the rising generation that all life is sacred and that animals should not be sacrificed to the demands of man. These people would find in India this conceitof protection to life carried out to the full. Even the vermin that infest the natives may not be killed. ”