PASSAGE When man evolved a conscience, his basic relationship with the other animals began to change. Until then they were broadly divided into those which ate him when they got the chance, those which ate when he got the chance, and a third group which competed with him for food or was otherwise a nuisance to him in the business of keeping alive. In the primitive situation man was therefore, basically against nature but as the battle was progressively won, conscience crept in the awareness of responsibility and a failure to meet it produced feelings of guilt. Those who live in cities and need no other longer need do battle against nature are nowadays most actively for nature At this time, something like a thousand kinds of animals (vertebrate animals) can be said to be in danger of extinction. A few of them have been reduced to this precarious position by extensive killing but the majority are disappearing only as fast as the particular kind of country they need for existence is itself disappearing and all this at the hands of man as often as not by mistake. There are three species of turtles whose future survival is menaced by the demand for turtle soup which would hardly justify the extermination of a giant reptile whose family has existed for 200 million years. Leopards are in jeopardy because of fashion for their skins. As they get rarer, the prices rise and as leopard skin coats becomes more expensive, the demand increases. No species can long survive 60,000 which a half grown baby leopard now carries on its skin. And crocodiles the longest surviving reptiles are now dwindling alarming as a result of the fashion in crocodile skin for ladies handbags and men’s shoes. The human population explosion spreads mankind across the land surfaces of the earth at an alarming state. With ingenuity and forethought a place can be kept for them to destroy their habits is as unnecessary as it would be to pull down a great cathedral in order to grow potatoes on the site. A campaign to save what remains is the concern of a new kind of Noah’s ark the world wildlife fund it does not believe that all is lost.
