74 



Henry Bergh. 



forced them fearlessly, never shrinking from 

 encounters involving personal danger in 

 pursuit of his self-imposed duty. 



Since its organization the society has 

 prosecuted over ten thousand cases, and the 

 law is now so generally known that little 

 attempt is made to evade it openly. Pub- 

 lic sentiment on the subject has been so 

 thoroughly aroused during the past twenty- 

 five years, that it requires some stretch of 

 the imagination to realize the vast change 

 that has been wrought by the movement 

 inaugurated by the subject of our sketch. 



When Henry Bergh began his crusade 

 there was not a State in the Union which 

 had any law making cruelty to animals an 

 offense. Now all, or nearly all, have stat- 

 utes bearing upon the subject. It may be 

 urged, perhaps, with some show of reason, 

 that poor men and women too are com- 

 pelled to toil while they are sick and sore, 

 and that a truehumanitarianism would have 

 begun with them, rather than with the 

 beasts, but as a simple matter of fact the 

 greater difficulty of fixing the responsi- 

 bility in the case of suffering humanity 

 is the chief obstacle in the way of provid- 

 ing remedial means, and perhaps the first 

 best practical step in the direction of re- 

 dress of human wrongs is the rigid enforce- 

 ment of the law against injustice to the 

 brute creation. 



Societies for the prevention of cruelty 

 to children are the natural and inevitable 

 outcome of Henry Bergh's reform move- 

 ment, for no community that made it an 

 offense to ill-treat the dumb beasts, would 

 long tolerate the pleas of cruel parents that 

 they have the right to do as they like with 

 their own children. 



As might be inferred of a man who had 

 worked out so distinctive a career for him- 

 self, Henry Bergh's personal appearance 

 was decidedly characteristic. The well 

 rounded dome of his head rose above a 

 face of extreme length, expressive of an 

 unusual admixture of lugubriousness, mirth, 



gentleness and firmness, but although he 

 was sometimes irreverently styled "the 

 knight of the rueful countenance," his 

 face was both a pleasant and an intellectual 

 one; he had a tall slight figure, and was 

 fastidious in the matter of dress, but the 

 characteristic individuality of his person 

 appeared to extend to his dress also. 



He died at his residence. No. 429 Fifth 

 avenue, on the morning of the 12th of 

 March. He had been suffering for a long 

 time from chronic bronchitis and enlarge- 

 ment of the heart, but although he had been 

 out of the house only a week before his 

 death, the event had been long anticipated. 

 He left no children, but his nephew and 

 namesake Henry, the son of his brother 

 Edwin, has long been associated with him 

 in the conduct of the affairs of the Society, 

 and by the terms of his will it appears that 

 he looked forward with hope that his nephew 

 would succeed him as its president. 



The post is no longer one of unusual dif- 

 ficulty, nor one calling for exceptional 

 powers. The humanitarian sentiment of 

 the age has been aroused into activity and 

 organized, and with the whole weight of 

 the law on the side of the organization, its 

 power is practically despotic. Matters 

 were very different in 1866, when Henry 

 Bergh entered the lists single handed 

 against all the combined ruffianism of the 

 country, and called on all good men to 

 rally to his support. Purity of motive, de- 

 votion to his sense of right and duty, in- 

 domitable energy, courage, perseverance, 

 tact, persuasive eloquence, all these were 

 eminently characteristics of Henry Bergh. 

 In a word he was a leader of men, a man 

 who impressed himself forcibly upon his 

 generation, who exerted a marked influence 

 upon its sentiments and conduct, a man of 

 whom in fact it may justly be said that he 

 has made the conditions of life for man and 

 beast more tolerable; that the world, and 

 especially his own country, is the better for 

 his having lived. 



