MORAL RESPONSIBILITY. 199 



Man's responsibility for the results of animal insanity is 

 clear in such, cases as the artificial panic produced among 

 horses by human thieves at the fairs of Normandy, as 

 mentioned by Pierquin. These panics intentionally pro- 

 duced by irritants diffused in the air or otherwise were the 

 source of direct, immediate, and obvious danger, not only to 

 the animals affected themselves and to other animals exposed 

 at the fair, but to all mankind who constituted the crowds so 

 usual on such holiday occasions. Again, moral turpitude, 

 whether it is rightly or wrongly attached to the dog that 

 co-operates with the poacher, sheep-stealer, smuggler, brigand, 

 or thief, certainly pertains to the man who systematically 

 teaches the animal to become his accomplice in acts which 

 the man at least knows to be unlawful and punishable. The 

 poor dog is urged, enticed, bribed, instructed, compelled by 

 its master to commit or to take part in the commission of 

 illegal acts. The merciless biting and worrying of persons 

 or other animals especially sheep by collies or other dogs 

 a propensity that may be natural or morbid is only too 

 frequently the result of man's evil training or evil usage. 

 The relentlessness of the bloodhound is another effect of 

 education by man (Lewes). Incompetent masters have to 

 answer for the misinstruction of sporting dogs, as injudicious 

 trainers have for the vicious faults of character or temper 

 attributable to undue severity in breaking (Walsh) . 



Man's responsibility for the misdeeds of domestic animals 

 belonging to him is recognised in the earliest laws of the 

 ancient Hebrews. Thus we have in the twenty-first chapter 

 of Exodus ! regulations made by Moses for the punishment 

 of masters who wilfully or knowingly keep an ox that is 

 addicted to fighting or goring, while in certain events the 

 ox itself was so far held responsible that it was punished by 

 being stoned to death or otherwise. In other words, a master 

 was chargeable with murder who was possessed of an ox that 

 fatally gored a man or woman, if he was previously acquainted 

 with the animal's propensity, while the offending ox itself 

 was also punished for what was held to be murder. The 

 penal codes of various countries and ages, jurisprudence both 



1 Verses 28-36. 



