ADDRESS 



BY HENRY BEROH, ESQ., OP NEW YORK, PRESIDENT OF THE SOCIETY FOR THE 

 PREVENTION OF CRUELTY TO ANIMALS. 



Mr. President, and Oentlemen : 



It is an undeniable fact, which, doubtless, each one of you recognizes, that 

 domestic animals are the indispensable population of the farm, and form its 

 principal riches. Without these creatures agriculture would be impossible. It 

 follows, therefore, that it is the duty and policy of agricultual societies to im- 

 press upon the minds of cultivators of the soil, the necessity of employing the 

 best means in their power for the improvement of their stock, their care and 

 their humane and intelligent utilization. Every living creature has assigned to 

 it a limit of endurance and power, and whoever attempts to exceed it commits 

 a blunder and a sin which is certain to avenge itself, at a cost vastly dispropor- 

 tionate to the advantage contemplated. There is a perfectly natural accord be- 

 tween this admirable society of yours, gentlemen, and the one which I have 

 the honor to represent. You seek to make the world profit by the labors of 

 the toiling animal ; we, to protect and preserve its powers from that cruel dete- 

 rioration consequent on unreasonable treatment. That agriculture may reap 

 the full benefit of the labor of the brute creation, it is essential to estimate care- 

 fully the distance to be travelled, the weight to be carried, and the number of 

 hours in the day, and the days in the week to which their strength may be prof- 

 itably applied. There is a universal law affecting the material interests of liv- 

 ing and inanimate things, and that is, Economy. Transgress this law in any 

 of its relations to this world's affairs, and it speedily avenges itself by wasted 

 physical power, deteiioration of the elements of production, sterility and death. 

 It is a stupid delusion to suppose that any of the laws of the Creator of all 

 things can be subverted or disobeyed by mankind with impunity. You may 

 over-work, over-drive, over load your patient and submissive animal, but you 

 abstract so much wealth from your possession by so doing. The laws of vital 

 economy are aptly illustrated by a little story which I remember to have read 

 somewhere, in substance as follows : A youth and an old man start off togeth- 

 er on a long journey, the former on a jet black fiery charger ; the latter on a 

 quiet, undemonstrative grey nag. At the start the black steed was soon out of 



