during the open season therefor, the taking of such species of fish or game.  Such prohibition or regulation may be made general throughout the state or confined to a particular part or district thereof.

4.  Notice of prohibition or regulation.  Any order made by the commission under the provisions of this section shall be signed by it, and entered in its minute book.  At least thirty days before such prohibition or regulation shall take effect, copies of the same shall be filed in the office of the clerk issuing hunting and trapping licenses for the district to which the prohibition or regulation applies.  It shall be the duty of said clerks to issue a copy of said prohibition or regulation to each person to whom a hunting or trapping license is issued by them; to mail a copy of such prohibition or regulation to each holder of a hunting and trapping license theretofore issued by them and at that time in effect, and to post a copy thereof in a conspicuous place in their office.  At least thirty days before such prohibition or regulation shall take effect the commission shall cause a notice thereof to be advertised in a newspaper published in the county wherein such prohibition or regulation shall take effect.

5.  Penalties.  Any person violating the provisions of such prohibition, rule or regulation shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and shall, upon conviction, be subject to a fine of not to exceed one hundred dollars, or shall be imprisoned for not more than thirty days, or both, for each offense, in addition to the penalties hereinafter provided for taking fish, birds or quadrupeds in the close season.

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I want all sensible, honest sportsmen to stop citing the killing of game birds by severe winters as a reason why long close seasons are not necessary, and why automatic guns “don’t matter.”  And I want sportsmen to consider their duty, and not go out hunting any game species that has been slaughtered by a hard winter, until it has had at least five years in which to recover.  Any other course is cruel, selfish, and shortsighted; and a word to the humane should be sufficient.

The worst exhibitions ever made of the wolfish instinct to slay that springs eternal in some human (!) breasts are those brought about through the distress or errors of wild animals.  By way of illustration, consider the slaughter of half-starved elk that took place in the edge of Idaho in the winter of 1909 and 1910, when about seven hundred elk that were driven out of the Yellowstone Park at its northwestern corner by the deep snow, fled into Idaho in the hope of finding food.  The inhabitants met the starving herds with repeating rifles, and as the unfortunate animals struggled westward through the snow and storm, they were slaughtered without mercy.  Bulls and cows, old and young, all of the seven hundred, went down; and Stoney Indians could not have acted any worse than did those “settlers.”