Dr Drummond (rn Humanity to Animals, 179 



dog will be destroyed by a quantity of nux vomica^ which a man 

 can swallow with impunity. 



That experiments on animals may sometimes be accounted 

 necessary or desirable, I have already admitted ; and I refer 

 you to Mr Bell's most admirable book on the Natural System 

 of the Nerves *, for an example of the true principles on which 

 such experiments ought to be conducted ; — an example where 

 the end was legitimate, and where the humanity and good sense 

 of the operator were such as not to lead him either to put the 

 animal to extreme suffering, in which state little can be depend- 

 ed on, nor to any unnecessary repetition of his experiments. 



From what I have now written, you will, perhaps, account 

 me morbidly compassionate ; and, indeed, there is so Httle feel- 

 ing among mankind for the sufferings of animals, that I should 

 be rather surprised if you thought otherwise. But the true evil 

 is, that humanity is neglected to a most culpable degree. It is 

 a virtue that is inculcated neither on youth, nor age, nor sect, 

 nor party ; and, from custom, we every day see, without emo- 

 tion, acts of cruelty which, only that we have been long used to 

 them, would excite our deepest indignation. Look, for example, 

 at the treatment of the horse. That poor slave, so useful to 

 man, is subjected to hardship, pain, and suffering, to a degree 

 that would seem utterly incredible, were we not, all our hves, 

 accustomed to the sight. 



The horse's skin is remarkably sensible, and it is only after 

 the daily or hourly infliction of the whip for years, that it at 

 last becomes comparatively callous. Pampered, perhaps, in his 

 better days, he passes successively from hand to hand, every 

 new change of his condition being a change for the worse, from 

 one step of misery and hardship to another, till curtailed of more 

 than half his days, he at last gets freed from the brutal unfeel- 

 ing tyrants under whom he dragged out his weary existence. 

 The wanton infliction of pain, too, on the horse, is exercised in 

 a most shameful manner. One might suppose, to observe the 

 conduct even of many well educated men, that they thought him 

 merely intended by nature to undergo a life of flogging, buffet- 



• An Exposition of the Natural System of the Nerves of the Human 

 Body, &c By Charles BelU 



M 2 



