The Oregon daily journal., March 21, 1909, Page 25, Image 25

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PORTLAND, OREGON, SUNDAY' MORNING, MARCH; 21, -1909'
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The Big Natural
That has Been Set Asid
in British Columbia
O-Zf ? early spring, a
strange and beautiful stillness, jh
stiitct with the first sweet breaths
of the season's matings, has fallen upon
many miles of mountain and valley in the
East Kootenay district of British Columbia.
It is a' riezv Eden, created by man's
fiat -ail Eden for the fast-disappearing
big game of the continent. In existence
since November 15 of last year, the ani
mals' paradise has come through the Ca
nadian winter in unwonted freedom from .v
hJeeadly-Mfleskoi, thi grizzlies and' the ; -'inbuntain
goats scarcely trusting to their
'tensts "for, assurance , of their; strange im-
munity, not yet realizing the boon of hap
piness that has beeri vouchsafed them.
For ten, years to come that ndtufal
game preserve, embracing 450 square
miles, is by-law to remain inviolate from
man's wanton slaughters. For ten years
those noble denizens of the wild are to live
and bring forth their kind under the con
ditions their unknown prototypes enjoyed
even before the Indians hunted them.
To all decent sportsmen, the thought
of thai great preserve will be a source of
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Ir'ni'-''-,'--" . -fy'M -i'?jp -; V- v?
unfailing satisfaction; but to me people of
the United States generally if must be a
source of unfailing pride, (or it h jhe out
come of the unselfish, indefatigable efforts
vf two Americans, John M. Phillips, of
Pittsburg, and Dr. William T. Ifornaday,
director of the rcw York Zoological So
ciety.. - Y '
SOLELT for tlx? wlfr rf ti-.ikl.
. ing Jong anJ d fr.cult-smpitrn in a
forrijni count rj. fomrwnjr th rirboit
tbo t Amricii rsrriwl to cr'ttijilrK tjo
torr tk'ir p-nrMiw fiht t sire t"rrai nd
t be continent inclKf r "Yc llriwiton?, aoctber
Lrmlinjr'pUoe for, the game ol lu-rwise doomrd
r'tq Ieody extinction. , '
Had thir tnoli've born anytliinp !ut lo
luuly unselfish, perhaps cren if Um'.t had been
' Canadian, their generoua undertaking rnat
hare failed. ,
The Canadian people, inheriting a territory
greiter in extent than tlw United StaW. utiil
pettlina; their Yat rr-ion o pparly tliat the
tiplorer hat tig tak twfore him nd the
piower i a ' familiar figure of the eipandinj
! ririlizfltkvn, hare not rrt realized that there ran
be a limit to tboir primeval Jrilck-rnessea and
the pttr.e they shelter.
-lluuug aUurdV larih nf pvrnfii-
non in the cjt of Amerjran game cxperU ho
Lare .tndied the aetual eonditionx, inrite port
tnen. antn and alSh, to hoot, m"flh the
mhcleale modern -fapon. a -atefiill.r
thouch the Krctxh were ju-t fonrxlin Qw-brr.
- Ten year ngn Mr. Phillies oac of the
nal-portnKii thia country-boida.. rDelrtcl
into the East Kootenay diitriet and learned,
from his own obervatiori,' the abundanee of
great game permanently resident there. lie
noted that, because of the peculiar topography
of the country, many varieties remained all the
year around within an ajea comparatirojy cir
cumscribed, - their winter and aummer feeding
ground being o little ceparated that the dis
trict formed a heritable Wen. J
lie n-iumcl, agaifi and again, a the sea
hwk pJ!el. to note that mm, a truly as na
ture hnd proride.1 tb rlden, wai persistently
playiTV haroc with it. . .
TRe magnificent elk and die rplendid mule
TnrTteTT.Krrtiedf'l"unl rs of The"
iiymerou derr. family. rre all but exteminat
el. Canada had awakehod tadib to the Talue
of her flk and had more tardily pacd a law.
protecting them. But hf-ee. in the very heart ;
of lands- that were their natural breoiinff
jrla"e, .both pecHs wer r the- verge of -ex-
UoctSoa If Caoadiaaaod AsK-rkan. hunters who.
hn'd neither mercy in their hearts for the harm-l-;8
creatures nor intelligence in their brains
for fhe safeguarding of the future.
The wonderful mountain goats and sheep,
the East Kootenay bright their native refuge,
Mill survived in large numbers; but already it
was the fashion with wealthy sportsmen to de
mand of their guides a shot at a pair of horns
to grace library or hall, purely because they
were suppotied to be hard to get as tbey were,
elsewhere. , t ,
Mr. Phillip, equipped with hi hunting
license and hi high-powered rifle, conld do 1fij
fhare to decimate that Eden and leave it baxreh
of game for all time to come. But,.jts time went
oiuand 1 saw with hi own even how thoe high
hill and plateaus were so rapidly becoming the
lat haven of the persecuted beasts of wood and
field, he realized lhat. as a decent sportsman,.,
loth hi aensibijity and his prescience laid upon
him a duty whkh it would be' shameful to
"btg hTtrr - -
; Ifis expeditions mto the East Kootenay dis
trict asfttxxned snore and more the character of
explorations; arid, with the mountain goats and
fcheep all around, him. hi license in his po let
and his rifle in hit hand, be Jimited himself to
thrre-fiftha of the game allowed bim in One aea
toe, acd to only a tingle griizly ia anolber. He
was practicing: the moderation he was preparing
himself to urge.
.. It became -obvious, as he learned his subject
more thoroughly, that mere moderation, even in
that generously stocked natural preserve, must
prove ineffectual, so long as the Canadian laws
remained so lax and so loug as any shooting at
all was permitted where it was most easy to find
game. ...
, In thri United States, with its. thousands of
men of means looking to the wilderness for
either health or trophies but usually for both
there was already a potential multitude pre
paring for the work of complete extermination,
the numbers of those joining in it being steadily
on the increase. v : - - ;
In Canada there was not only lie sporting
class, frequently recruited by Englishmen who
. deemed their lives misspent unless they had
done big game shooting at least once before they;,
died, but the local population, in whom the feel
ing that they were the heirs of the-wikl and all
that it contained was almost . as strong as the
sentiment ofiquatter sovereignty which recent
ly turned into a battleground Reelfoot Lake, in
Tenrielsee: , .' :y'-
WAS BEING "SHOT OUT' '
Above all, the country round about was be
ing "shot out," leaving only the great, central,
natural zoo as the source of any future supply
of big game for the entire province of British
Columbia. ' . . - )
Mr. Phillipa realized that the sole way to save
it was through tha prompt creation of a publio
opinion, amply enlightened as to existing condi
tions and thoroughly warned as to the disas
trous future. '
He disclosed what he had learned to Will
iam T. Ilornaday. director of '-thef-New -York
Zoological Park, whose record in the past had
made him the natural ally of all the wild ani
mals in the world. ' ,; (
Dr.-Hornaday has hunted in . practically
every field, from Canada to India, with the on
exception of Africa. He is president 'of "tho ;
American Bison Society, vice president of. the
League of American Sportsmen and other
bodies, and an honorary member of the Brit
ish Society for the Preservation of the Wild ;
Fauna of the Empire. , , '
It was Dr. Hornaday who founded the Na
tional Zoo at Washington, the National Collec- .
tion of Heads and Horns, the Wichita and Mon
lana National Bison Ranges, and the Campfire
Club of New York, of which he is president.
In him Air. Phillips found a tower ' of
strength. He was the war horse of game preser- "
vation, and the first 'sniff of the glorious battle
against "The Spoilers," as Dr. Hornaday calls
nil heedless sportsmen, as well as "game hogs,
was the breath of new life to him. ' ' i
East Kootenay didn't appeal to them then,-
in the light of an Eden. It was rather an ark. of
safety amid the increasing deluge of shot. Now, ' -instead
of one Noah, it had. two. ;
ENLISTED SPORTSMEN'S AID , ;v'
Dr. Hornaday, author of a number of book
and known to all decent sportsmen and many,
statesmen the world over, charged himself chief-.
' Iy with the literary campaign. 31r. Phillips, -veteran
hunter and local expert, undertook 'a '
comprehensive survey which should provide data
absolutely impregnable. Together they mad -the
formal suggestion to the government " of .
British Columbia in 11KH5, after a joint stud'
of the conditions on the ground.
They enlisted the active support of such
well known sportsmen of Victoria . as Warbur
ton Pike and Clive Phillipps-Wolley. Soma of v
the leading citizens. of Eernie. the town nearest .
Goat Mountain Park.-as they designated the
area for convenient reference, caroe-totheir aid,
among the local allies being the Havor, W. W.
. Tuttle: Hon. W- K. Mos, il- P, and . B. Tnr
ney. Things looked very promising. , 'V
But tle modern Xoahs had to leara for
themselves the lesson that if a new pfopl t wera
to arise with a snre plan. for the millennium,
his plan might bo absolutely flaw-, but th
jealouMea and envies of humanity would try
to make it inoperative. Before long there au .
an opposition party vtheinent in ita declaration
that. while the reserve ought to be created. mi
of the important. land. Dear Ferric, should
-itM4 a4 the nf,rhn Woun lwri tr-n-t- -----Then.
too. the publicity ewriiil to tr-
movement instantly fiie-1 f"n this prfTi"u!y
nnknom n shooting ground the attention f msr '
".poiVrs" who saw a hr.c u ? !
lUi:htr brfore the gam eouJJ ! yrrSt- t-1 yt
tt slow eoure f Irgi.lation. No f-r t'ua
rOO.VTl.TLED OS I.V.'irC TAOEi