The writing of this book has taught me many things. Beyond question, we are exterminating our finest species of mammals, birds and fishes according to law!

I am appalled by the mass of evidence proving that throughout the entire United States and Canada, in every state and province, the existing legal system for the preservation of wild life is fatally defective. There is not a single state in our country from which the killable game is not being rapidly and persistently shot to death, legally or illegally, very much more rapidly than it is breeding, with extermination for the most of it close in sight. This statement is not open to argument; for millions of men know that it is literally true. We are living in a fool’s paradise.

The rage for wild-life slaughter is far more prevalent to-day throughout the world than it was in 1872, when the buffalo butchers paved the prairies of Texas and Colorado with festering carcasses. From one end of our continent to the other, there is a restless, resistless desire to “kill, kill!”

I have been shocked by the accumulation of evidence showing that all over our country and Canada fully nine-tenths of our protective laws have practically been dictated by the killers of the game, and that in all save a very few instances the hunters have been exceedingly careful to provide “open seasons” for slaughter, as long as any game remains to kill!

And yet, the game of North America does not belong wholly and exclusively to the men who kill! The other ninety-seven per cent of the People have vested rights in it, far exceeding those of the three per cent. Posterity has claims upon it that no honest man can ignore.

I am now going to ask both the true sportsman and the people who do not kill wild things to awake, and do their plain duty in protecting and preserving the game and other wild life which belongs partly to us, but chiefly to those who come after us. Can they be aroused, before it is too late?

The time to discuss tiresome academic theories regarding “bag limits” and different “open seasons” as being sufficient to preserve the game, has gone by! We have reached the point where the alternatives are long closed seasons or a gameless continent; and we must choose one or the other, speedily. A continent without wild life is like a forest with no leaves on the trees.

The great increase in the slaughter of song birds for food, by the negroes and poor whites of the South, has become an unbearable scourge to our migratory birds,—the very birds on which farmers north and south depend for protection from the insect hordes,—the very birds that are most near and dear to the people of the North. Song-bird slaughter is growing and spreading, with the decrease of the game birds! It is a matter that requires instant attention and stern repression. At the present moment it seems that the only remedy lies in federal protection for all migratory birds,—because so many states will not do their duty.

We are weary of witnessing the greed, selfishness and cruelty of “civilized” man toward the wild creatures of the earth. We are sick of tales of slaughter and pictures of carnage. It is time for a sweeping Reformation; and that is precisely what we now demand.

I have been a sportsman myself; but times have changed, and we must change also. When game was plentiful, I believed that it was right for men and boys to kill a limited amount of it for sport and for the table. But the old basis has been swept away by an Army of Destruction that now is almost beyond all control. We must awake, and arouse to the new situation, face it like men, and adjust our minds to the new conditions. The three million gunners of to-day must no longer expect or demand the same generous hunting privileges that were right for hunters fifty years ago, when game was fifty times as plentiful as it is now and there was only one killer for every fifty now in the field.

The fatalistic idea that bag-limit laws can save the game is to-day the curse of all our game birds, mammals and fishes! It is a fraud, a delusion and a snare. That miserable fetish has been worshipped much too long. Our game is being exterminated, everywhere, by blind insistence upon “open seasons,” and solemn reliance upon “legal bag-limits.” If a majority of the people of America feel that so long as there is any game alive there must be an annual two months or four months open season for its slaughter, then assuredly we soon will have a gameless continent.

The only thing that will save the game is by stopping the killing of it! In establishing and promulgating this principle, the cause of wild-life protection greatly needs three things: money, labor, and publicity. With the first, we can secure the second and third. But can we get it, and get it in time to save?

This volume is in every sense a contribution to a Cause; and as such it ever will remain. I wish the public to receive it on that basis. So much important material has drifted straight to it from other hands that this unexpected aid seems to the author like a good omen.

A

A: prefix, is privative; wanting or without.

Ab: off; away from.

Abbreviated: cut short; not of usual length.

Abdomen: the third or posterior division of the insect body: consists normally of nine or ten apparent segments, but actual number is a mooted question: bears no functional legs in the adult stage.

Abdominal: belonging or pertaining to the abdomen.

Abdominal feet: see pro-legs.

Abdominal groove: the concave lobe of the inner margin of secondaries enveloping the abdomen beneath, in some butterflies.

Abdominal pouch: in female Parnassiids, a sac-like ventral cavity, formed by material secreted during copulation.

Abductor: applied to muscles that open out or extend an appendage or draw it away from the body: see adductor.

Abductor mandibulae: the muscle that opens the mandibles.

Aberrant: unusual; out of the ordinary course.

Aberration: a form that departs in some striking way from the normal type; either single or occurring rarely, at irregular intervals.

Abiogenesis: spontaneous generation.

Abnormal: outside the usual range or course; not normal.

Aborted: a structure developed so as to be unfit for its normal function obsolete or atrophied.

Abraded: scraped or rubbed.

Abrupt: suddenly or without gradation.

Abscissus: cut off squarely, with a straight margin.

Absconditus: hidden, concealed; retracted into another.

Acalyptrata: those muscid flies in which alulae are absent or rudimentary.

Acanthus: a spine, spur or prickle.

Acaudalate: without a tail.

Accessory: added, or in addition to.

Chapter 1 My Uncle Makes a Great Discovery
Chapter 2 The Mysterious Parchment
Chapter 3 An Astounding Discovery
Chapter 4 We Start on the Journey
Chapter 5 First Lessons in Climbing
Chapter 6 Our Voyage to Iceland
Chapter 7 Conversation and Discovery
Chapter 8 The Eider-Down Hunter – Off at Last
Chapter 9 Our Start – We Meet With Adventures by the Way
Chapter 10 Traveling in Iceland
Chapter 11 We Reach Mount Sneffels – the “Reykir”
Chapter 12 The Ascent of Mount Sneffels
Chapter 13 The Shadow of Scartaris
Chapter 14 The Real Journey Commences
Chapter 15 We Continue Our Descent
Chapter 16 The Eastern Tunnel
Chapter 17 Deeper and Deeper – the Coal Mine
Chapter 18 The Wrong Road!
Chapter 19 The Western Gallery – a New Route
Chapter 20 Water, Where Is It? A Bitter Disappointment
Chapter 21 Under the Ocean
Chapter 22 Sunday Below Ground
Chapter 23 Alone
Chapter 24 Lost!
Chapter 25 The Whispering Gallery
Chapter 26 A Rapid Recovery
Chapter 27 The Central Sea
Chapter 28 Launching the Raft
Chapter 29 On the Waters – a Raft Voyage
Chapter 30 Terrific Saurian Combat
Chapter 31 The Sea Monster
Chapter 32 The Battle of the Elements
Chapter 33 Our Route Reversed
Chapter 34 A Voyage of Discovery
Chapter 35 Discovery Upon Discovery
Chapter 36 What Is It?
Chapter 37 The Mysterious Dagger
Chapter 38 No Outlet – Blasting the Rock
Chapter 39 The Explosion and Its Results
Chapter 40 The Ape Gigans
Chapter 41 Hunger
Chapter 42 The Volcanic Shaft
Chapter 43 Daylight at Last
Chapter 44 The Journey Ended

You will naturally ask, where is Siam? At the extreme point of that vast continent extending from the snows of Siberia to the Equator, and terminating in the long narrow Malay peninsula, is the little island of Singapore, separated from the mainland by a narrow strait. The island is about twenty-five miles long, and about fourteen miles broad, and commands the entrance of the China sea. The English, who have ever had an eye to strategic points, and especially in the East, took possession of it in 1819, being then little more than a Malay fishing village, and a nest for pirates. The present town of Singapore, well laid out and neatly built, and situated on the southern extremity of the island commanding the anchorage, contains perhaps one hundred thousand inhabitants, whilst the principal English merchants live in palatial residences on the hills in the rear of the town. The government of the island, together with Malacca, Penang, and Province Wellesley, has lately teen transferred from the Indian Government directly to the Crown. It is a beautiful little island, with a genial climate, and I know of no place in the East where I would rather live.

CHAPTER I. – THE FIRST KINGS OF SIAM.

Eastern despotism, which casts a blight on the soul and quenches public spirit, is the primary cause of all revolutions by which the people seek to ameliorate their condition by the overthrow of their tyrants.

Every State in which there is One against All, has a defective constitution, which causes it to pass in succession from greatness to humiliation, from strength to weakness, and which, in its suicidal policy, awaits but a foreign invasion which will restore to the People, the enjoyment of their Rights.

The unstable and tottering thrones of Asia at last crumble away, and the ambitious, arrogating to themselves the privileges of attempting all things, are overwhelmed by their fall, and, reduce the weak to violate everything in their despair.

The right of the strong is that of a footpad who plunders unarmed travellers, and who, having enjoyed a period of immunity, dies under the axe of the headsman. The Ruler who has the greater share in the benefits of the Law does not recognise his advantages, and when unwilling to extend them prefers to see himself surrounded by trembling slaves who murmur in secret, and only await a leader to become rebels. The crude legislation of Siam has been the cause of all the public ills of the nation. It knows neither the extent of authority nor the limits of obedience. This nation, indifferent regarding the choice of its masters, has received fetters from the hands of ambitious men who spurned the nation while coercing it. Invariably unfortunate, the people have no hope save in a future revolution, which will enslave them to a new tyrant insolently bedecked with the imposing title of “Deliverer”.

The “lex non scripta,” or unwritten law of Freemasonry is derived from the traditions, usages and customs of the fraternity as they have existed from the remotest antiquity, and as they are universally admitted by the general consent of the members of the Order. In fact, we may apply to these unwritten laws of Masonry the definition given by Blackstone of the “leges non scriptæ” of the English constitution—that “their original institution and authority are not set down in writing, as acts of parliament are, but they receive their binding power, and the force of laws, by long and immemorial usage and by their universal reception throughout the kingdom.” When, in the course of this work, I refer to these unwritten laws as authority upon any point, I shall do so under the appropriate designation of “ancient usage.”

Here you will find a collection of her short stories gathered from numerous sources and presented in chronological publishing order:

• Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901
• Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1902 to 1903
• Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1904
• Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1905 to 1906
• Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1907 to 1908
• Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1909 to 1922

To use our language effectively it is necessary to have an understanding of its elements. Thus the author has very wisely devoted much space to word-study and English grammar. This is a field commonly neglected in books on the subject. The people engaged in business are, on the whole, woefully weak in the grammar of our language. It is believed that the treatment herein will be a great aid in correcting this deficiency. If we have ideas, we must express them in words, and our words should be so chosen and arranged as not to offend, but to please and interest. This result can be secured by a systematic study of Part I.

Part II deals with oral and written composition. Here the author has arranged her subjects in such a way as to give the whole a cumulative effect. The method throughout is inductive, and sufficient examples are always given to warrant the conclusions drawn. Most textbooks on Business English neglect the subject of oral English. This book regards the spoken word as important as the written word.

If there be any one feature in this textbook more to be commended than another, it is the exposition in Part III. The situations arising in many different kinds of business are here analyzed. The author believes that the way to become a good business correspondent is, first, to learn what the situation demands and, second, to practice meeting the demands. We must know before we write. Given a knowledge of the subject, we must have much practice in expressing ourselves in such a way as to make our composition effective. The author meets this need by supplying many and varied exercises for practice. These exercises are live, practical, and up-to-date. The problems to be solved are real, not imaginary. Thus the power to be gained in meeting these situations and solving these problems will prove a real asset to those who contemplate a business career. It is confidently hoped that both teachers and pupils will find in this work material which will help them to prepare themselves to meet the many problems and demands of our growing commercial needs.