the peculiar natural and physical adaptability of this Bush-veld of the Sabi for a big-game Sanctuary-and it is useless for any other purpose. A vast, low-lying and fever-drenched wilderness, 12,000 square miles in extent, the Sabi Bush-veld is uninhabited and uninhabitable by man, black or white, save only during the four dry months of winter. It is, moreover, definitely enclosed by mountain-barriers and big rivers that facilitate supervision and control. A concrete scheme to that effect, and setting forth the above advantages in detail, I drew up and, with my friend J. C. Ingle of Bushbuck Ridge, laid before the Colonial Office (Mr Joseph Chamberlain being then Colonial Secretary) in December 1900-a copy of which document is given in the Appendix to the present work. So favourably did my plan impress the Authorities at Whitehall that, upon the conclusion of the South-African War, it was at once adopted in full. Nothing more, however, than the credit of its initiation falls to my share. It is due to the masterly administration of the Sabi Sanctuary during five-andtwenty years (often in face of fierce local opposition and prejudice), by Lt.-Col. J. Stevenson-Hamilton, that the poor decimated Bush-veld of 1899 to-day boasts a wealth of animallife hardly to be surpassed in the entire African Continentperhaps in the world. Another powerful auxiliary in the initial work was Sir Alfred E. Pease, Bart., the lion-hunter and a cousin of my own, who was administrator of the Eastern Transvaal (including the Sabi Sanctuary) from 1903 to 1905, and who writes me:-" Abel Chapman planted, A. E. P. watered, and Stevenson-Hamilton produced the crop." The full history of this great Sabi Sanctuary forms a literal Romance in Wild-Life.1 From the "shambles" of 1899, and It will be found related in graphic detail in Col. StevensonHamilton's periodical Reports to the Journal of the "Fauna Society." Specially striking it is to read in the earlier Reports-say in 1903-what wretched remnants of the big-game then survived, and to compare those paltry totals with its present abundance. The whole story is a speaking testimony to the value of "Sanctuary." the above small beginnings, it has now developed into a valued National asset, recently adopted by the Union Government of South Africa and renamed The Kruger National Park. To-day the Sanctuary is a vast natural "Zoo," teeming with big-game, including elephants, rhino, buffalo, and eland-(these four practically extinct in 1899) as well as antelopes, from such noble forms as the sable and roan, koodoo, waterbuck, and brindled gnu; down to the tiny duikers and grass-antelopes, as well as with zebras, giraffe, warthog, ostrich, and smaller game, and, of course, the lion. Another special charm is that many of these big wild-beasts, living thus in absolute security, have learnt largely to abandon their deep-rooted distrust of manalmost as much as the wood-pigeons and wildfowl of London Parks! Amazing indeed is it to read that animals which we formerly counted among the wildest of the wild-such, for example, as the gnu and sassaby-now allow tourists to stand by and photograph them! It should be emphasised that the predatory carnivora—from lion, leopard, and hunting-dog (Lycaon), down to the smaller felines, genets and mongoose-are held severely in check. Hence bird-life (especially game) has benefited in equal degree and multiplied in the same proportion as its fourfooted neighbours. Finally, the entire cost to the South-African Government of maintaining this Sanctuary of 12,000 square miles-(more than double the extent of the Yellowstone Park in the United States) is less than £5000 a year, not much more, it is probable, than is sometimes spent upon a single deer-forest in the Scottish Highlands. In the Rocky Mountains, Canada has set aside seven great "Reserves" as National Sanctuaries for wild-life. Of these, the largest is Jasper Park in the Northern Rockies, which extends to 4400 square miles; while the area of the whole seven approaches 10,000 square miles, my authority for these figures being the Times-“Canada Number"—of 1st July 1927. It is indeed a magnificent effort. Still, neither Canada in the Rockies, nor the United States in their Yellowstone Park, |