Arizona republican., 1910-08-05
THE GAME HOG

for this peculiar animal among the great auks and other extinct creatures?
 There was time when the man who
 would make a great killing of game would have the hundreds of his car
 easses or fish strung in festoons and hung up to be photographed for the wonder and commendation of his friends.
 We do not see so many of these pie l lures as formerly and when we do see
 them they are occasionally accom- panied with the names of the hunters
 and the words game hogs" What possible need can there be to kill several hundred birds in a day?
 Two or three will make a meal. It is simply butchery. Experience-long and oft repeated eXperience-has shown that the farmer is the man who loses by the destruction of the birds. But the idea of the game hog is not to protect the farmers nor yet to eat what he kills, but to kill for the pure | lust of killing. And there is no es cape from the accusation because he
 goes right on killing long after he has | a load for man to pack. Doubtless, if it were possible for him to duplicate the veracious exploit of
 Joshua and cause the sun to stand still. twilight itself would not put an l end to the slaughter Not long ago l read of a raccoon which had made entrance into chick en house and killed thirty chickens in one night Considerable indignation
 was expressed that any coon would be guilty of doing such a nefarious thing. But where was the necessity for in dignation? Was it not the nature of
 the brute? The blood lust in it's make ! up was so strong that one or two chickens sufficient for a glut were not
 enough. Te delight was in the kill ing.
 And where, think you, is the delight of a prize fight found?-in the spar ring? oh, not so-the delight is in
 the blood letting whacks and thuds, and the disablement at the end of it. When I was boy, I went hunting with a certain deacon, a good man. of course. He must have been good to
 be deacon And in the quiet stiffness of the afternoon by pool in the quiet stiffness of the afternoon by pool in the river bottom we saw q pelican
 watching for fish. A quaint and melancholy thing he looked, standing there all oblivious of
 our presence.
 Suddenly there was a report. Bang! The deacon had fired buckshot. A
 splash, and the pelican lay in the water dead. Why? You may be sure l asked
 him why.
 '.Oh," he said. 'rhe wanted big game and had to have ii ra
 So we took the carcass along in the
 buggy for about a 5mile and then
 dumped it out on the ground, because
 the deacon came to the conclusion that
 it would taste strong
 There is a question, sometime pro-
 pounded, ought boys to be entrusted with airguns and slihgshots?"
 What think ye? Tell us then, Ought men to have guns?
 Did you ever consider the many In-
 dian wars that have been caused by
 reckless slaughtering of game? When I was in Alaska year or two ago l saw the same unhappy tragedy going on there.
 Whatever hove in sight in the way
 of game, our fellows had to shoot it.
 Moose and caribou. with young
 calves at their sides, were brought down with the unconcern of buffalo hunters.
 Why should we condemn these dead
 buffalo hunters and encourage con | temporaneous offenders of the very
 same type?
 A little story and I will be done. In that same part of the northwest I lived three young men-boys, rather of an Indian tribe.
 Sitting by the camp fire in the long
 winter night they heard the old men tell of how once, before the white men came upon the scene, and Moose steaks were for sale at every restaurant, game was far more plentiful; of how I the traps were seldom without their | furry prey. But meat and peltrics
 were getting scarce. Only the other week two white men
 had killed fifty caribou with repeat | ing rifles and left them where they fell An ardor fired the breasts of these
 boys, the impetuous, unbalanced ardor | of youth that makes heroes sometimes.
 They set out after these destroyers. i They found a trapper working over his line of traps. That trapper was never seen again. l But the mounted police found boat and a hat and some other things. The motive was not robbery. Moth | ing had been stolen. 1 Late in the Arctic night a judge sits on his bench. Without all is freezing. | Before him stand three Indian boys,
 the youngest only IA years. The judge pronounces sentence: You shall be hanged by the neck till you are dead, dead, deadi"- Two of the boys remain stolid, calm with the fortitude of their race; the | little fellow breaks down. | Poor childl British justice is with
 out compassion even for you. | They are asked if they have any re- | quest to make before they die. | One speaks up and says they have | but one request.
 What is it?" asks the judge. We want to see the sun rise again before we die"
 After some days yellow eye looked over the horizons edge. The sun looked on three gibbets and | three slender, comedy boys. | And before he set-so quickly as he seti-he saw-I will not tell you what