RHINOCEROS ‘MEDICINE’

Greymouth Evening Star, 27 December 1934, Page 10

RHINOCEROS ‘MEDICINE’

DIMINISHING WILD LIFE. The announcement reported by the Bombay Correspondent of “The Daily Telegraph” that the Government of India is calling a conference to discuss the preservation of wild animal life, has aroused great interest in London. Sir Hugh Watson, of the High Commissioner’s Office, said to a representative of “The Daily Telegraph”: — “The number of licensed guns in India has increased at a tremendous rate in recent years, and the Indians are killing off the animals as fast as they can. “This is especially the case with the rhinoceros, which from time immemorial has been thought by the natives to possess high medicinal values. The carcass of a rhino is worth about £2OO to a native hunter, whose friends are always anxious to purchase the horns and blood as ‘medicine.’ “Another cause of the diminishing number of wild animals is pressure of population and the encroachment of agriculture. The wild areas become smaller every year. “The Indians have not so much excuse for killing off these animals as might be thought. My own experience of more than 30 years in the jungle is that wild animals —even tigers—are not dangerous to humans unless provoked.”