422 



Monthly Review of Literature, 



[[APRIL, 



torn of all the superstition, and of nil the seeming 

 marvel ; and yet, if the cat had not derived from 

 nature this degree of resemblance to ourselves, 

 and this sympathy with human wants and feel- 

 ings, how should she ever have become the in- 

 mate of our houses, and (as I may finish the sen- 

 tence by saying) the nestling of our bosoms? It 

 fg only when we deny the natural qualifications of 

 the cat, that we can be milled into the ascription 

 of supernatural. But depend upon it, that all 

 those animals which readily live in our society 

 (and the number of species might even be multi- 

 plied at our pleasure) have more or less natural 

 resemblance to ourselves. It is true that they 

 cannot speak that is, that they cannot articulate 

 our words; but we understand their cries and 

 voices without the aid of words, and they, on 

 their part, understand our words, not as words, 

 but as cries, and as sounds of our voice, and, 

 therefore, as expressions of our feelings. To 

 understand our feelings, however, they must feel 

 like us ; for there can be no understanding where 

 there is no sympathy, or sameness of feeling. 

 If animals feel like ourselves, their feelings, 

 therefore, are to be treated in the same manner 

 as our own. For my part, after the remark 

 that I have made, I hardly know how to call ani- 

 mals " dumb ;" but if dumb they are, I must con- 

 sider them as no other than our dumb friends. 

 They live with us ; they sympathize with us ; they 

 attach themselves to us ; they weep (it may al- 

 most be said) with us ; they rejoice with us ; they 

 understand much of what concerns us ; they feel 

 hot and cold, and soft and rough, and (what is 

 more uniting still) kind and unkind, like our- 

 selves ; and I cannot think (knowing these truths 

 as intimately as we do) that we should permit 

 ourselves to act as if those truths were not such, 

 only because the animals cannot tell us of them 

 in words. 



We may give another specimen of the 

 writer's turn of thought 



Your remark upon the cat's sitting or lying 

 upon a woollen or other cloth, reminds me of a 

 habit which is shared both by cat and dog ; I 

 mean that of placing themselves upon even the 

 smallest piece of paper, rather than upon no bed 

 fct all ; for it is evidently a bed that they seek, 

 and that for the sake of warmth beneath them, 

 willingly (while in a robust and healthy state) 

 leaving their backs to brave the atmosphere. 

 And the pertinacity with which animals always 

 avail themselves of the nearest approach to what 

 they want, is highly worthy of remark. Exposed 

 in a neld, the horse, or ox, or sheep, will place it- 

 elf on the sheltered side of a tree or post. The 

 shelter obtained may be next to none ; but if it 

 be the best within reach, it is sure to be clung to. 

 In like manner, a dog or cat possesses itself of the 

 smallest scrap of paper for a bed, in preference 

 to no bed whatever; and especially so if it is to 

 lie upon a cold horse-hair chair or sofa. It takes 

 to the stuffed horse-hair in preference to the floor; 

 but it obstinately avails itself of even a scrap of 

 paper, in the way of protection from the glossy 

 and cold horse-hair. Paper is doubtless a kind of 

 linen or cloth ; and the dog and cat accept it in 

 that quality. 



' A cottager had been kind to Keeper 

 when maltreated by some mischievous boys, 



and one of the children of the Lady Boun- 

 tiful of the village proposes some reward 

 which gives occasion to the following very 

 obvious, perhaps, but also very sound dis- 

 tinction and one that is apt to be forgot- 

 ten where it is most wanted 

 The peculiar reward of goodness is not worldly 

 gain ; and we do but mislead and corrupt people 

 of humble condition, when we pay them, literally 

 speaking, for every mere act of moral duty. The 

 reward of virtue is not bread, but something bet-r 

 ter ; that is, it is a pleasure of the heart, an in- 

 ward satisfaction, which the world, nor its gold, 

 can neither give nor take away. You shall carry 

 little Jemmy a play-thing and yet I almost think 

 that even that will be better at another opportu- 

 nity I would have no one in this village taught 

 to do a good deed, as the forerunner of some 

 worldly gain from those a little richer than them* 

 selves. Our visit, and our expressions of feelings 

 like her own, will be Nelly's best reward ; and I 

 am sure that she is a young woman of such right 

 ideas, and so well brought up, that she will think 

 them so. We do well when we pay the poor foe 

 their labour, and for their services; but when 

 they do only what goodness of heart or justice of 

 principle requires of them, there is an indelicacy 

 upon the one hand, and a mischief upon the other, 

 both of which we should equally shun. We ought 

 to learn them the true, and more honourable, and 

 more useful belief, that such things merit more than 

 atiy of their superiors have it in their power to 

 bestow ; and that they are to be practised alike 

 by rich and poor, not for worldly gain, but for 

 something far above it. 



But the great point of interest with the 

 author is the defence oT hunting and shoot- 

 ing, as chargeable with cruelty towards 

 animals. The subject is largely (occupying 

 almost half the volume) though loosely dis- 

 cussed we mean in a rambling style and 

 the best defence that a man, evidently of no 

 common intellects, can make we know 

 not that a better can be made is, that 

 hunting and sporting is a natural passion 

 implanted in our frame, because the earth 

 produces animals destructive to the com- 

 forts and labours of men, and must be kept 

 down by the exertions of men ; that if the 

 passion were repressed and tamed down to 

 apathy, the consequences would soon be 

 sorely visited upon us, and we should be 

 overrun with violence and vermin ; that 

 town sports and field sports are essentially 

 different the town sports being justly 

 chargeable with cruelty, because neither ne- 

 cessity nor utility can be pleaded for to 

 worry a cat, or bait a badger or a bull, or 

 to set dogs a fighting, the animals must be 

 already in possession, and the parties be 

 prompted by wantonness, or a worse mo- 

 tive 



It is not the rural sportsman that baits or wot. 

 ries the animals he chaces ; but it is specifically 

 the townsman, who, at a ring, or in a pit, or in 

 an amphitheatre, unites himself with lazy crowd*, 

 to sit, or stand, and look upon the efforts and suf- 

 ferings of so many brute prisoners, and to gamble 

 upon the chances of their strength, and misei y< 



