e in when
a colony of exquisite egrets or birds of paradise is destroyed in order
that the plumes may decorate the hat of some lady of fashion, and
ultimately find their way into the rubbish heap. The people of all the
New England States are poorer when the ignorant whites, foreigners, or
negroes of our southern states destroy the robins and other song birds
of the North for a mess of pottage.

Travels through Europe, as well as over a large part of the North
American continent, have convinced me that nowhere is Nature being
destroyed so rapidly as in the United States. Except within our
conservation areas, an earthly paradise is being turned into an earthly
hades; and it is not savages nor primitive men who are doing this, but
men and women who boast of their civilization. Air and water are
polluted, rivers and streams serve as sewers and dumping grounds,
forests are swept away and fishes are driven from the streams. Many
birds are becoming extinct, and certain mammals are on the verge of
extermination. Vulgar advertisements hide the landscape, and in all
that disfigures the wonderful heritage of the beauty of Nature to-day,
we Americans are in the lead.

Fortunately the tide of destruction is ebbing, and the tide of
conservation is coming in. Americans are practical. Like all other
northern peoples, they love money and will sacrifice much for it, but
they are also full of idealism, as well as of moral and spiritual
energy. The influence of the splendid body of Americans and Canadians
who have turned their best forces of mind and language into literature
and into political power for the conservation movement, is becoming
stronger every day. Yet we are far from the point where the momentum of
conservation is strong enough to arrest and roll back the tide of
destruction; and this is especially true with regard to our fast
vanishing animal life.

The facts and figures set forth in this volume will astonish all those
lovers of Nature and friends of the animal world who are living in a
false or imaginary sense of security. The logic of these facts is
inexorable. As regards our birds and mammals, the failures of supposed
protection in America--under a system of free shooting--are so glaring
that we are confident this exposure will lead to sweeping reforms. The
author of this work is no amateur in the field of wild-life protection.
His ideas concerning methods of reform are drawn from long and
successful experience. The s