KAFIR CRUELTY. 53 



The Kafirs do riot appear to know that birds 

 or beasts can feel pain, or if they do know it, 

 they are horribly cruel. They always bring in 

 game for sale alive, and generally very much 

 injured, the legs and wings almost always 

 broken, and one hurries to buy, whether in 

 need of it or not, so as to put the poor thing 

 quickly out of its misery, and not allow it 

 to linger perhaps another ten minutes whilst 

 dragged through the sun to the next white 

 man's house. 



I remember once having a hare brought me 

 with all its legs broken, and the skin of one hind- 

 leg stripped off and hanging down. I was alone 

 in the house at the time, my boys being away 

 on some errand, and could not make the Kafir 

 understand my indignation at the state the poor 

 beast was in, so hastened to buy it, and told 

 him to kill it quickly. In a few minutes he 

 came and said it was dead, and that he had 

 hung it in the kitchen. Some little while after 

 I felt compelled to go and look at it, and, to my 

 horror, found it hanging to a hook still alive ! I 



