Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1905-11-09
NO HUNTING IN JAPAN.
Game Is Very Plentiful There, But
the Natives Care Nothing for
the Sport.

NnCA OAtCA mt Lht spun w
tainable in Japan, and so with respect
to this it may not come amiss If | here
explain. Hunting, such as the people
of England and Ireland understand
by that term, is absolutely n~on-existent
in the land of the mikado. Foxes, deer
and hares are plentiful enough, but jap
ans natural features and the methods
of agriculture followed by its farming
classes are all, and most uncompromis-
ingly. too, against it, says a Toxic cor
respondent of the London Field. 4
OF candidates for the rifle Japan pos
sesses quite a respectable number.
among them three species of bears, the
wolf, a species of stag. another of ante
lope, and, If it is permissible for an old
Anglo-Indian to place him in the same
category, the wild boar. All are, how
ever, scarce, and getting scarcer yearly,
and it certainly would not pay anyone
to make extensive preparations for go
ing in search of any of them, for,
though the Aino, that extremely hairy
aboriginal of Japan, hunts them all as
siduously, he will render no assistance
to a stranger to do likewise, and as for
the japanese hunter, he is the most pit
iful of shikaris.
And then again, the slightest devia-
ton of a foreigner off the beaten tracks
of foreign travel in Japan is more likely
than not to lead to unpleasantness for
him, for suspicion of foreigners and
their motives is one of the leading and
worst traits in the Japanese chs racter.
Not being sportsmen or travellers in the
same sense and from the same motives
as the English-speaking people are.
they cannot understand why anyone
should spend his time in pursuit of OBJ
jects which-to them, at l~east-bring
no tangible results. To travel they have
no objection, but only do so to see places
Of interest and with some very definite
object in view, such as for the spying
out of q foreign land or for the gaining
Of knowledge upon a special subject.
To revert, however, to the wild game
of Japan, it is a pity indeed that matters
are as described, for the bears of the
land are unique, as well from the
point of view of the enormous size,
strength and fierceness of one species as
from the diminutivness Of another.
The first Is a great ca%rnivorous brute, a
sort of grizzly, who makes nothing Of
killing and carrying off a fourteen-hand
pony. Next to him comes a black beast
very much like the sloth bear of India,
and last of all a diminutive little brute
scarcely larger than a good-sized span
lei, exceedingly shy and seldom seen.
The wolves of Japan are scarce, cow
ardly and of little account, and found nov
only in the extreme northern parts of
the empire. The stag is about the size
Of and in make and shape and habits,
too, like the fallow deer of England and
Scotland. The little Japanese antelope
must be a very neal relative indeed of
the jungle bakri of India, possessing,
as he does, the same general appear
ance and shy habits.
The wild pig of Japan appears to be a
uomeotie plS iuH Win, luueeu, 1 udVo
seen herds of Manchurian and Mon--
golian swine, great black, hairy beasts,
driven through the streets of Picking, of
a far wilder and iercer breed than any
wild pig l have come across in Japan.
The bears there are, however, of a fair
size, but never SO tall on the legs nor
with such fine tusks as the jungly sooar
of India. To ride one Of them down,
as we do his brother of indie, would be
an impossibility, for, as it would be the
case in hunting, so, too, in this sport,
the nature of the country would be all
against anyone attempting to do SO.