SOME POPULAR E R JR O R S 



tried to drive an ox into a slaughter-house? I 

 have often done so, and have been convinced that 

 the reluctance of the animal to enter arose from 

 its knowing, by some wonderful power, what would 

 happen to it therein." 



As a matter of fact, I have never tried to drive 

 an ox into a slaughter-house, but I have seen them 

 driven ; t*nd sometimes they will go in uncon- 

 cernedly, or even gladly, to escape the noise and 

 hustling outside. At other times they shrink back 

 from the entrance in such a way that a sympa- 

 thetic observer may be excused from crediting 

 them with foreknowledge of their fate. 



Once, indeed, I suggested this to a drover, who 

 was perspiring from his efforts to force a number 

 of reluctant bullocks through the gate; but his 

 opinion was that it was just as difficult to drive 

 stock into a new bullock-shed on a farm as into a 

 slaughter-house. To them, as hunted animals by 

 ancestry, the unknown is always terrible ; and they 

 dread entering where exit seems barred and every- 

 thing is strange to them. 



On the other hand, it must often happen, of 

 course, that there may be some smell of blood 

 lingering about a slaughter-house; in which case 

 no one could expect cattle to go in without great 

 compulsion. 



Wild instincts die hard in our domesticated 

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