VICTIMS OF FASHION.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume V, Issue 1525, 5 April 1887, Page 3

VICTIMS OF FASHION.

It is stated (observes ths " Speotator ") that the qu&gga, the beautiful wild etripeu asa of South Africa, has suddenly coined to exiat. The bootmakers of London and New York wanted hia ekfn for a particular kind of sport aman'a boot, and he consequently passed away out of zoology. 'Jhora may boa few left on tho highest and wildest platon.ua, bnt tho Boera, tempted by th» high prices, have extirpated the herds, which only ten yeirs ago existed m South Africa That will be the fate of the elephant too, and posiibly of the orocodile. It takes whole provinces to supply ivory for one advertising firm id Oxford atreot, the price is fourfold tho price of a quarter of a cen ury ago, and the beasts are hunted with a persistency wh'ch m no long time mast be fatal. The Indian Government la making efforts to protect the -Asiatic breed ; but they will all be futile. Animals whioh when dead are exoeedingly valuable contract a habit of dying, and laws establishing close-time are powerless when it la worth while to run the risk of tr>aking them The crocodile's Bkin i« used by emokers and puroemakora, and no he will disappear. Whatever Europe wants Europe will have ; and if the fashion of turning timer's olaws into brooohaa had developed and spread to Am rca, tigers would have perished out. There will soon not be a bird of paradise on earth, and tha ostrich has only been saved 'y private breeders. Man will not w*it for the end of the world to oon Bume everything on it, from teak trees to humming birds aud a century or two hence will find himself perplexed by a planet m which there is nothing except what he makes. He is a poor sort of creator.