To the everlasting honor of the people of Jackson Hole, be it recorded that they rose like Men to the occasion that confronted them.  In 1909 they gave to the elk herds all the hay that their domestic stock could spare, not pausing to ascertain whether they ever would be reimbursed for it.  They just handed it out!  The famishing animals literally mobbed the hay-wagons.  To-day the national government has the situation in hand.

In times of peace and plenty, the people of Jackson Hole take their toll of the elk herds, but their example during starvation periods is to be commended to all men.

A SLAUGHTER OF RESTORED GAME.—­The case of the chamois in Switzerland teaches the world a valuable lesson in how not to slaughter game that has come back to its haunts through protected breeding.

A few years ago, one of the provinces of Switzerland took note of the fact that its once-abundant stock of chamois was almost extinct, and enacted a law by which the remnant was absolutely protected for a long period.  During those years of protection, the animals bred and multiplied, until finally the original number was almost restored.

Then,—­as always in such cases,—­there arose a strong demand for an open season; and eventually the government yielded to the pressure of the hunters, and fixed a date whereon an open season should begin.

[Illustration:  GULLS AND TERNS OF OUR COASTS, SAVED FROM DESTRUCTION These Birds have been Saved and Brought back to us by the Splendid Efforts of the Audubon Societies, and other Bird-Lovers.  But for the Anti-Plumage Laws, not one Gull or Tern would now Remain on our Atlantic Coast From the “American Natural History”]

During the period preceding that fatal date, the living chamois, grown half tame by years of immunity from the guns, were all carefully located and marked down by those who intended to hunt them.  At daybreak on the fatal day, the onset began.  Guns and hunters were everywhere, and the mountains resounded with the fusillade.  Hundreds of chamois were slain, by hundreds of hunters; and by the close of that fatal “open season” the species was more nearly exterminated throughout that region than ever before.  Once more those mountains were nice and barren of game.

Let that bloody and disgraceful episode serve as a warning to Americans who are tempted to demand an open season on game that has bred back from the verge of extinction.  Particularly do we commend it to the notice of the people of Colorado who even now are demanding an open season on the preserved mountain sheep of that state.  The granting of such an open season would be a brutal outrage.  Those sheep are now so tame and unsuspicious that the killing of them would be cold-blooded murder!

THE LOGICAL CONCLUSION.—­Within reasonable limits, any partly-destroyed wild species can be increased and brought back by giving absolute protection from harassment and slaughter.  When a species is struggling to recuperate, it deserves to be left entirely unmolested until it is once more on safe ground.