452 VIVISECTION. 



admit of being easily disproved and set aside ; a practice, con- 

 sequently, that ought to be put down, if needful, by the 

 strenuous force of law. 



The Royal Humane Society some years ago offered a 

 prize for a thesis on vivisection. That prize was awarded to 

 some writer who denied the utility of vivisection in any case. 

 I am not able to concede so much, and am farther of opinion, 

 that such extreme rulings injure a good cause. 



As a nation we are strangely inconsistent in our ideas 

 of compassion to animals. Reprobating Spaniards for their 

 bull-fights, we tolerate the cruelty of bleeding a stag pre- 

 paratory to the Epping Hunt to check the power of his run- 

 ning, and in this way accommodate him to the Cockney 

 sportsman, whom, left to his native vigour, he would out- 

 race. Again, is the Royal Stag-Hunt establishment not a 

 barbarism unfitting the reign of a Christian sovereign 

 a fortiori, a female Christian sovereign? To hunt a wild 

 deer is one thing ; to hunt a tame deer, reared in a paddock, 

 and carted to the starting place, another. 



I would rather perform Calcraft's duties than be master 

 of her Majesty's stag-hounds. The first office I would accept 

 at a price ; the latter at no price. Rather let me eat work- 

 house gruel with a wooden spoon. 



