It is very desirable that we should now take an inventory of the forces
that have been, and to-day are, active in the destruction of our wild
birds, mammals, and game fishes. During the past ten years a sufficient
quantity of facts and figures has become available to enable us to
secure a reasonably full and accurate view of the whole situation. As we
pause on our hill-top, and survey the field of carnage, we find that we
are reviewing the _Army of Destruction_!

It is indeed a motley array. We see true sportsmen beside ordinary
gunners, game-hogs and meat hunters; handsome setter dogs are mixed up
with coyotes, cats, foxes and skunks; and well-gowned women and ladies'
maids are jostled by half-naked "poor-white" and black-negro "plume
hunters."

Verily, the destruction of wild life makes strange companions.

Let us briefly review the several army corps that together make up the
army of the destroyers. Space in this volume forbids an extended notice
of each. Unfortunately it is impossible to segregate some of these
classes, and number each one, for they merge together too closely for
that; but we can at least describe the several classes that form the
great mass of destroyers.

THE GENTLEMEN SPORTSMEN.--These men are the very bone and sinew of wild
life preservation. These are the men who have red blood in their veins,
who annually hear the red gods calling, who love the earth, the
mountains, the woods, the waters and the sky. These are the men to whom
"the bag" is a matter of small importance, and to whom "the bag-limit"
has only academic interest; because in nine cases out of ten they do not