te and devoted to such excellent purposes. In Montana there is a long
stretch of the Missouri River, with a narrow, shifting bottom, bordered
on either side by miles of bad-lands, which would serve as such a State
park. Settlers on this stretch of river are few in number, for the
bottoms are not wide enough to harbor many homes, and, being constantly
cut out by the changes of the river's course, are so unstable as to be
of little value as farming lands. On the other hand, the new bottoms
constantly formed are soon thickly covered by willow brush, while the
extensive bad-lands on either side the stream furnish an admirable
refuge for deer, antelope, mountain sheep and bear, with which the
country is already stocked, and were in old times a great haunt for elk,
which might easily be reintroduced there.

There is a tendency in this country to avoid trouble, and to do those
things which can be done most easily. From this it results that efforts
are constantly being made to introduce into regions from which game has
been exterminated various species of foreign game, which can be had,
more or less domesticated, from the preserves of Europe. Thus red deer
have been introduced in the Adirondack region, and it has been suggested
that chamois might be brought from Europe and turned loose in certain
localities in the United States, and there increase and furnish
shooting. To many men it seems less trouble to contribute money for such
a purpose as this than to buckle down and manufacture public sentiment
in behalf of the protection of native game. This is a great
mistake. From observations made in certain familiar localities, we know
definitely that, provided there is a breeding stock, our native game,
with absolute protection, will re-establish itself in an astonishingly
short period of time. It would be far better for us to concentrate our
efforts to renew the supply of our native game rather than to collect
subscriptions to bring to America foreign game, which may or may not do
well here, and may or may not furnish sport if it shall do well.

[Illustration: MULE DEER AT FORT YELLOWSTONE]

Forest Reserves of North America

In the United States something over 100,000 square miles of the public
domain has been set aside and reserved from settlement for economic
purposes. This vast area includes reservations of four different kinds:
First, National Forest Reserves, aggregating some 63,000,000 acres, for
the conservation o