34 DOGS 



pleasure," which is kept in countenance, as it were, by the 

 Baconian " play-pleasure," would have no real ambiguity. 

 If this quality reaches its climax in man, one is tempted 

 to adapt the Staelian (or anonymous) epigram by saying : 

 " Plus j'entends parler des hommes, plus j'aime les 

 animaux." But, it may be asked, is pain-pleasure ever 

 found in respectable men? I answer that, according to 

 Freeman, this inhuman (or too human) defect forms part 

 of the enjoyment of the chase. The only mode of hunting 

 which he sanctioned was, as he phrased it, that of "Daddy 

 Bunting " hunting, not for sport, but for the necessaries 

 of life. And are we not warned by Wordsworth 



" Never to blend our pleasure or our pride 

 With sorrow of the meanest thing that feels "? 



In my former letter I said that Virgil represents the 

 instinct of bees as " god-sent, nay, god-like." It is right 

 to add that, probably through ignorance, he speaks of 

 them, not as killing the " idle " drones, but merely as 

 expelling them from the hive. Milton carries yet further 

 his partiality towards 



" The female bee, that feeds her husband drone 

 Deliciously " ; 



and he adds not a word about her sudden and deadly change 

 of front. It is as if Pizarro were commended for his 

 courtesy to the Peruvians and his enlightened toleration 

 of their heathenism until he ordered their massacre ! 

 Perhaps it may illustrate the difference between the sexes 

 in their estimate of tragic expedients if I record how hotly 

 dear old Miss Swanwick protested against Darwin's praise 

 of the bees for the wholesale fratricide whereby they sus- 

 tained their commonwealth. Was the great Newton of 

 biology right or wrong in thus praising them? Is their 

 unsisterly patriotism, their drastic Malthusianism, to be 

 accounted a god-send or a devil-send ? A brief answer may 



