GENERAL TREATMENT. 319 



s traction of c game ' animals during the pairing or breeding 

 seasons, and his artificial creation in them of ferocity or 

 mania. 



6. The training of certain animals as decoys, involving 

 the use of darkness, starvation, and putting out the eyes. 



It should not require to be pointed ont and insisted upon 

 that, for man's own sake, the kind and amount of work 

 imposed upon domestic animals ought to be carefully suited 

 to their age, natural aptitudes, and varying mental, as well 

 as physical, character or constitution. It needs, however, to 

 be borne in mind, that what is suitable for one animal may 

 be quite the reverse for another, and that there is great 

 danger, either to the animal's own life or to human safety, 

 in efforts at compulsion where it is unwilling, though able- 

 bodied, or willing but feeble-bodied. The combination of 

 too willing a spirit with too weak flesh or strength when 

 stimulated injudiciously, suddenly or severely, is apt, as so 

 often happens in the case of poor cab or dray horses, to lead 

 to a signal breakdown, both physical and mental. 



Over-work, combined frequently as it is with hunger and 

 thirst, and involving great bodily fatigue, induces, if con- 

 tinued, a general loss of power, a general debility both 

 mental and bodily. Thus in the dog, and certain other 

 animals, this mental debility is marked by delirium, and by 

 a stupidity which leads the poor animal to knock against, 

 instead of avoiding, obstacles (Houzeau). 



Beasts of burden such as the llama, camel, horse and ass, 

 when they have a sense, mental, moral or physical, of 

 being over-burdened, frequently resent and protest against it 

 in a very practical and effectual way. They lay themselves 

 down and refuse to proceed on their journey, showing perhaps 

 an utterly incorrigible obstinacy, in and for which all kinds 

 of punishment fail. The obvious, common-sense treatment 

 is to lighten the load, showing kindness and consideration 

 as to its size or weight and position. No doubt some of 

 these animals have a natural or acquired dislike to laborious 

 occupations and are given to rebellion against any attempt 

 to render them subservient, as bearers of burdens, to man's 

 uses. They may rebel under a load that is not in itself 



