MANNERS AND MORALS 145 



a constant cause of pain to persons of a humane dis- 

 position. What to me makes it peculiarly painful is 

 the knowledge that the man I have witnessed horribly 

 ill-treating some patient dumb beast, and hated and 

 wished that I had had the power to annihilate him 

 this very man, his fit of fury over, would prove him- 

 self a genuine Cornishman, a very pleasant fellow, 

 temperate, religious, hospitable, a good husband, 

 devoted to his children. 



Celtic cruelty, Tennyson said, was due to want 

 of imagination. He was speaking of the Irish, who 

 are not supposed to be without that faculty. Whether 

 or not the Cornish have it is another question, but it 

 may be that Celtic cruelty, like the Spanish, is due 

 rather to a drop of black blood in the heart an ancient 

 latent ferocity which comes out in moments of passion. 



The fact that prosecutions for cruelty to animals 

 are so rare one case, I should say, in about every 

 five thousand getting into court reminds me here 

 of another charge brought against the Cornish by 

 the strangers within their gates. If Cornwall, the 

 critics say, is able to show the cleanest record in 

 England it is because the law-breakers are not treated 

 as in other counties. Offences are winked at or over- 

 looked by the police in many instances, and when a 

 prosecution takes place magistrates will not convict 

 if they can possibly help it. Not only are they too 

 tolerant and hate to hurt one of their own people, 

 but they think of themselves, of their own material 

 interests, and are anxious above all things that their 

 county should maintain its nice reputation. 



