Endangered Sales

The sale of lizard, anteater, ostrich and elephant-hide shoes on Boston’s posh Newbury Street obviously impressed writer Jennifer Merin (March 30), but I wonder how many other Travel Section readers were angered by her virtual advertisement for these items. Elephants, for instance, pay a higher price than those shelling out $570 for shoes--they pay with their lives in agonizing, often slow death at the hands of poachers. These shoe sales may be legal, but that hardly makes them moral, and I urge readers to boycott any shops selling animal products from dwindling or brutalized species.

STEPHANY HURTIK

San Diego