THE APPARENT CRUELTY OF NATURE. 267 
result of any mental process. The shake annihilated fear, 
and allowed no sense of horror in looking round at the beast. 
This peculiar state is probably produced in all animals killed 
by the carnivora; and, if so, is a merciful provision by our 
benevolent Creator for lessening the pain of death.” 
In referring to this same passage, my late father mentions 
a very similar experience undergone by a German nobleman 
in Bengal. In this case a tiger was the assailant, and its 
intended victim describes his mental condition while in its 
power in terms almost identical with those employed by 
the great African traveller. “The chief sensation,” he 
remarks, “ was that of a pleasant drowsiness, rather admixed 
with curiosity as to the manner in which the brute was 
going to eat me.” “Only by his reasoning powers, which 
remained unshaken, could he feel that his position was one of 
almost hopeless danger, and that he ought to attempt 
escape.” 
I believe that I am right, also, in attmbuting to Sir 
Edward Bradford, the present Chief Commissioner of the 
Metropolitan Police, an even more remarkable adventure 
with a bear, in which the flesh of his left arm was literally 
torn away by the infuriated animal. Even this rough treat- 
ment, however, under the peculiar fascination induced by 
the act of seizure, appears to have caused no pain at the 
time, and Sir Edward remarks that his chief sensation was 
one of extreme disgust at the evident enjoyment with which 
the brute smacked its lips over its meal! 
In a recent issue, too, of a popular serial appeared an 
article from the pen of a well-known Indian traveller, who 
therein narrates his own experience of capture by an 
_elephant. The animal, quite a young one, apparently did 
not know how to kill him, and contented itself with kicking 
him backwards and forwards from foot to foot, and then 
leaving him lying upon the ground. Although very severely 
bruised and shaken, the writer declares that he felt no pain 
whatever until after the animal had left him—a fact the 
more interesting inasmuch as his injuries were not inflicted 
by any of the ordinary beasts of prey. 
When we remember, indeed, how very powerfully the 
susceptibility of the nervous system is affected by mental 
emotions, we can well understand that the sudden and 
violent shock due to seizure by a beast of prey may well 
influence the nerves in such a manner as to render the 
sensation of pain for the time imappreciable. Probably the 
