so 
HAMLYN'S MENAGERIE MAGAZINE. 
'laws are cruel from the spider that kills the 
'fly to the tiger that strikes down the stag,. 
'The pains inflicted on worms, frogs and live 
'bait impaled on barbed hooks and the play- 
'ing fish into weakness to enable one to land 
'it, is cruel. Shooting is the same; how many 
'birds get away wounded to die lingering 
'deaths from wounds and starvation; hunting 
'and racing have their cruel side. All coun- 
tries have merged from barbarism to civiliza- 
tion, thence to a state of luxury and then to 
'certain and mere effeminacy. This and 
'mock humanitarianism now disgraces Eng. 
'land.' I should say not England only, but 
all the nations. 
"With respect to wild animals in cap., 
tivity, I would draw the attention of the great 
talkers on cruelty in the zoological gardens 
upon C. J. Cornish's book, 'Animals at work 
and Play. ' He knows what he is writing 
about, and the chapter, 'Animal View of Cap- 
tivity,' is to the point. ,For the wildest crea- 
ture,' says he, 'the state of nature has its 
'evils which disappear in captivity. Every 
'class has its natural enemies, for ever seek- 
ing to kill it; of whose existence it is pain- 
' fully aware and which keeps it constantly in 
'nervous dread. For most, a change of 
'weather or of season, causes a dearth of food 
'and, for all. the inevitable time of injury and 
'sickness, though net foreseen or dreaded, 
'comes at last without the chance of aid or 
'recovery.' 
"A French writer, M. Louis Bourdeau, 
in his comprehensive work on the 'Conquest 
'of the Animal World,' concludes by the fol- 
lowing paragraph : — 
'It should be easy to prove that the 
life of animals under man's control is 
preferable to that which they lead in the 
wild state. By their subjection to an in- 
telligent and bountiful being, their fate 
improves. They have less privations to 
endure and less chances to run. Man 
taking as much care of his animals as he 
does of himself, they have the benefit of 
the comfort which he has realized by his 
own industry. He leads them to graze 
in fat pasture lands; he provides for the 
improvident; puts their food in store for 
the days of need and doesi not grudge 
their victuals at any time. He builds 
houses for their accommodation in which 
they are better sheltered than in their 
lairs and burrows. He protects them 
against their enemies more than they 
could do for themeslves. He attends to 
the sick; opens his eyes to their wants 
and provides for all their necessities. 
Between man and the brutes there is a 
permanent exchange of good offices, and 
the animals could indeed assert, like the 
goose in 'Montaigne's Essays,' that the 
whole world has been created for them 
and that the destiny of man is to work 
for their special comfort. ' 
"What is true for domestic animals which 
have been reclaimed from wild, is equally true 
for wild animals in captivity. Do we not well 
know that wild animals get so accustomed to 
their new conditions of life, that most of 
them, when released, have not the slightest 
inclination to regain their liberty, and they 
return to their cages and dens with perfect 
contentment. Nay, I have seen hawks lost 
in the field, after a long flight, if able to 
locate the bearings of their mews, resume 
their seats on the very blocks upon which 
they had been tethered by jesse and leash. 
"Have we ever seen a man,, unless in- 
vited by the police, return to the jail from 
which he had escaped, or ask of his own 
accord to be put in the stocks? It happened 
once in the 18th Century to Lord Camden 
when on a visit at Alveley in Essex. His 
lordship asked the friend, with whom he was 
walking through the village, to put him in 
to see what it was like, and the absent-minded 
friend quite forgot to take him out for a 
length of time. Some time after, Lord Cam- 
den, presiding at a trial in which a counsel 
had said that sitting in the stocks was no 
punishment at all, he leant over the bench, 
and asked the prosecutor if he had ever been 
in the stocks, because he had been and was 
of opinion that it was no such trifle as repre- 
sented." 
It was a great pity for any newspaper to have 
taken Mr. John Galsworthy seriously. His opin- 
ions were his own, and they count for nothing on 
a subject of which he is, with many others, entirely 
ignorant. There were cranks in the period of 
Moses, and these will continue even after John 
Galsworthy has passed to oblivion. 
"Punch," January 16th, has a most highly 
entertaining skit on one of the saddest sights in 
the world — page 36 — "The Buns of Exile"; this 
should be read by all. 
ANIMALS FOR SINGLE-HANDED 
COLLECTIONS. 
By Frank F'inn. 
The large attendance at the Zoo, and the 
continued demand for pets of all sorts — difficult 
as this is now to supply — augur well for the pros- 
perity of the zoological interest after the war, and 
