Southwest-sentinel. [volume] (Silver City, N.M.) 1883-189?, 1892-11-22
NO BIG
WHAT VAST AREAS OF LAND M
ToRRlo COUNTRIES LACK.

Some Districts IN vhich There Arc No
wild Animals Of Considerable sizo.
Islands Of the West Indian ArchipeI-
ago Called a "Gameiess Country"
A Russian naturalist Professor Ma
clay, who passed several years in the in
terror Of Papua, describes the highland
district Of the great island as a region
81 remarkable for it's scenery and pro-
~inctiveness as for its salubrious crimate
"a perpetual May in the terrace lands,
with March and April plateaus here and
there in the highest mountains. The
area Of the whole island exceeds that
Of Texas, but its population hardly
aggregates a million, nine-tenths Of the
aborigines being lowland settlers, black
idlers gorged with the yam roots and
wild hog steaks OF the coast plain. The
uplands, too, abound with game and fish,
and the only conceivable reason why the
natives shonld limit their hunting
grounds to the sweltering coast jungles
is their preference for a climate that
enables them to dispense with dry goods
the year round.
In the Torres range there are SUBMITS
towering TO the height Of IL 600 feet, but
the close proximity of the equator has
covered the highlands with a luxuriant
vegetation. Snow is hardly ever seen,
but chill nights-light frost even-occur
now and then, and the frizzle haired
coast dwellers avoid the mountains as
the Indios Mansos Of the Mexican low
lands avoid the terra fria. Papua is a
paradise Of birds, but the kingdom of
mammals is represented only by a few
marsupials ground kangaroos, tree
kangaroos and opOssumsI besides the
wild hogs of the river jungles.
A much stranger country in regard to
the absence of wild animals is found in
the near neighborhood Of our own con-
tinent. The West Indian archipelago,
with its four magnificent islands and
countless islets, has been justly termed
the ''gameless country" a region of
more than a hundred thousand square
miles, m~onopolized almost entirely by
birds and insects (even reptiles being
scarce, as if the archipelago had been
somehow overlooked on the last two
days of creation, and left to be settled
by such creatures as could reach its
coasts swimming or flying. There are
forests teeming with spontaneous fruit,
but no monkeys, no wild hogs, no bears
or r%accoons. The larger carnivora are
not represented by a single species.
No pumas or jaguars Though both are
found on the coasts of the neighboring
mainland), no panthers, lynx or wildcat.
Foxes, wolves and jackals. too, are con-
spicuous by their absence. The caves
of the limestone Sierra would seem to
be admirably adapted to marmots and
w~oodchucks, but they are tenanted only
by bats. On the fine highland pastures
there are no bisons, NJ deer, no antelopes,
and, strange to say, not even rabbits.
Sheep, goats, horses, donkeys, cows,
hogs and even dogs were introduced
after the Spanish conquest, and the only
domestic mammal kept by the natives
at the time of discovery was q small
kind of wolf prairie WOLF imported
from Mexico, and a few species of SOUR
rels, which the Cubans fattened for
culinary purposes without knowing any
thing about a classic p~recedent-the
gliraria (rat kennels) of the ancient
Romans, who preferred dormouse on
toast to the best Syrian pheasant pies.
Dogs and cats were unknown, and
that lack of household pets seems to
have driven the aborigines to strange
expedients, for in "Ogilvy's Voyages
there is an account Of a San Domingo
cacique who kept a tame manatee that
made its headquarters in an artificial
pond and was so well tanned that when
called by its name, Matoom, it would
come out Of the water and 90 directly to
the cacique's house, where, being fed, il
returned to the pond, accompanied by
men and boys, who seemed to charm the
manatee by their singing, and it often
carried two children at a time on its
back. Being once, however, struck by
a pike in the hands of a Spaniard it
would e after come out of the water
if a clothed man were near.
Manatees have become rather scarce
on the coast of San Domingo, but are
often seen near the Island Of Piuos,
northwest Of Cuba, where shoals of the
strange creatures may be seen sporting
about the reef like the sea lions below
the Cliff House. OF all aquatic nam
mails the manatee, however, can claim
the championship in the art of lodging
a sudden attack; q leveled harpoon is
enough to make thehEi plunge under
with a mo yOu'uon't" snort, and then
pop up again at unexpected times and
places, waving their fiippers in derision,
and ready to disappear for good at the
first suspicious motion.
The luxury of the Dominican cacique
was therefore not apt to be shared by
many Of his subjects. Puppies and kit
tens were never seen in their cabins, and
the largest land animal of the island was
an overgrown rat, known as the hutia,
and measuring about eighteen inches
without the tail. Its caudal appendage
is acompromise between hat of the true
rat and the California gopher, whom it
resembles in its for lness for grain aud
in its burrowing mania, n pair owning
often as many as four different dens,
more or less connected by s~ubterranean
tunnels.
With the exception of that shy rodent,
Cuba, San Domingo, Jamaica and Costa
Rica have no land creatures deserving
the name Of a game animal, for even the
omnivorous appetite Of the Haytian
darkies draws the line at the musk
scented giant rats Of the coast forests
San Francisco Chronicle.