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JOURNAL OF MAINE ORNITHOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



could safely expect these children to 

 become gentle men and women. 

 Within fifty years, society would be 

 so transformed that parents would 

 be almost universally loved and 

 cherished, schoolhouses and church- 

 es would be filled with those that 

 were anxious to be taught and the 

 murders in Maine would almost cease. 

 Of course this state of things is 

 somewhat ideal, for children cannot 

 be perfectly protected from the cor- 

 rupting influences of heredity and 

 environment, but it suggests a most 

 potent influence which parents, 

 teachers and ministers can exert 

 towards the reformation of society. 

 Lessons of affection can be taught 

 through the young of domestic ani- 

 mals better than in any other way, for 

 they are the harmless playmates for 

 which children have naturally great 

 fondness. 



The Bishop of Truro says that Ruskin 

 believed that the pets of the child 

 were its educators and none who had 

 witnessed the relation between chil- 

 dren and animals could doubt it. The 

 Bishop further says, "A few years ago 

 I could not bear to have dogs about 

 the house but now one is my close 

 companion. Dogs teach children 

 manners and to tell the whole truth 

 they teach me." Jeremy Taylor in his 

 Holy Living saj^s: "Let your conver- 

 sation with the creatures (animals) 

 lead you unto the Creator." Again 

 give your attention to the testimony 

 of Rev. Samuel Wilberforce, when 

 Bishop of Winchester. "If children 

 are not brought up to care for the 

 brute creation, they will soon cease 

 to care for human beings." 



I will illustrate, by two notable ex- 

 amples, the sensitiveness of childhood 

 and its disinclination to cruelty to an- 

 imals. When eight years old, Theodore 

 Parker was playing about his father's 

 house and seeing a small turtle he 

 took up a stick to strike. Suddenly 

 dropping the stick he ran into the 

 house saying,"Mother, 1 was about to 

 strike a turtle when a voice spoke to 

 me." His mother said, "My son, it 

 was the voice of conscience." When 

 ten years old,Turgenieff, the celebrat- 

 ed Russian novelist, went bird-hunt- 

 ing with his father. As they were 

 passing through a stubble a golden 

 pheasant rose in front of the boy and 

 he raised his gun and fired. The bird 

 fell and fluttered to its nest where its 



young were huddled. While the son 

 was looking on, the little head of the 

 mother dropped and only her dead 

 body was left to shield her nestlings. 

 The horror-stricken son cried, "Fa- 

 ther, father, what have 1 done?" "Well 

 done, ray son," the father said, "you 

 will soon be a fine sportsman." "Nev- 

 er, father; never, never again shall I 

 destroy any living creature." It is 

 said that this incident awakened sen- 

 timents in Turgenieff that tinged all 

 his writings. In passing I might add 

 that the greatest of the Russian novel- 

 ists, Tolstoi, holds advanced views on 

 this subject. He says "I talk to my 

 horses; I do not beat them." I am 

 sure that all present believe that the 

 lower animals have rights that we are 

 bound to respect and that cruelty to 

 them dulls the moral sensibilities and 

 brutalizes individuals and nations. 



At this point certain problems arise, 

 some of them difficult to solve. 



1st. Is the domestication of animals 

 an infringement upon their rights? I 

 am sure that it is not. Animals in the 

 wild state have, fat times, a struggle 

 for existence. They suffer from hun- 

 ger and cold. When domesticated, if 

 properly cared for, they enjoy to a 

 fuller extent the blessings of life. 

 We cannot see how man could have 

 risen from savagery to the civilized 

 state without domesticated animals. 



When our forefathers landed at 

 Plymouth they found the natives of 

 New England four thousand years 

 behind Europeans in civilization. 

 They had advanced hardly beyond 

 the stone age. This backwardness is 

 attributable in a great degree to the 

 fact that the natives possessed no 

 animals except the dog, while the 

 Europeans possessed, besides the dog, 

 six animals of first-rate economic 

 importance, the ox, horse, ass, sheep, 

 goat and hog. At this time all North 

 and South America held in domesti- 

 cation only three quadrupeds, the 

 dog, llama and Peruvian Guinea pig. 

 Perhaps in all the New World, these 

 were the only animals, except the 

 wild turkey, capable of domestication. 

 At any rate, since the Europeans 

 settled this country they have not 

 succeeded in domesticating any other 

 of our native animals. It is a signifi- 

 cant; fact that the ox, horse, ass, 

 camel, sheep and goat are natives of 

 Asia and at least four of them, the ox, 

 horse, sheep and goat, are natives of 



