A LITERARY, SCIENTIFIC, AND INSTRUCTIVE FAMILY PAPER, 



Conducted by WILLIAM KIDD, of Hammersmith,— 



Author of the Familiar and Popular Essays on "Natural History;" "British Song. 



Birds;" "Birds of Passage;" "Instinct and Reason;" 



" The Aviary and its Occupants," &c, 



"the OBJECT op our work is to make men WISER, WITHOUT obliging them to turn over folios and 



QUARTOS.— TO FURNISH MATTER FOR THINKING AS WELL AS READING."— EVELYN. 



No. 13.— 1852. 



SATURDAY, MARCH 27. 



Price \\d. 



Or, in Monthly Parts, Price 



PERSECUTED ANIMALS, 



An Apology for various supposed Injurious 



Creatures. — No. I. 

 By Beverley R. Morris, Esq., A.B., M.D. 



The right which man possesses, and lias 

 exercised from the earliest times, of destroy- 

 ing such animals as were injurious to him- 

 self or his works, directly or indirectly, has 

 never I think been denied him ; and will 

 not be questioned in the following remarks. 

 How far it has, in certain cases, been proved 

 that an actual injury has been committed, 

 or how far that injury may have been 

 counterbalanced, or over-balanced, by other 

 actions decidedly beneficial to man, may I 

 think fairly and usefully be a subject of in- 

 quiry; and it is in this spirit that 1 am 

 desirous of treating the matter in hand. In 

 order to do this as fairly as possible, I shall 

 endeavor to base and support my arguments 

 upon facts observed by others rather than 

 by myself. 



The subject I am entering on is one of 

 great extent ; and as it would make these 

 observations far too long were I to go fully 

 into it, I shall be compelled to make such a 

 selection from a vast mass of materials, as I 

 trust may sufficiently illustrate the object I 

 have in view, and induce those who may be 

 interested in it to carry it out more fully. 



It may be objected, that so much having 

 been already written on both sides of this 

 question, my taking it up is superfluous. 

 To this I answer, that the same argument 

 would apply to numerous authors whose 

 labors have been anything but unproductive, 

 — possibly from their putting the argu- 

 ments in a different dress, and so making 

 them more agreeable, either to readers in 

 general, or possibly only to some particular 

 class. Should my remarks excite or encour- 

 age a spirit of humanity, even in one single 

 individual, I shall consider that fact a suffi- 

 cient answer to the objection. If, on the 

 contrary, I should not be so fortunate, I can 



only regret that the subject has not fallen 

 into abler hands. 



It is not my intention to consider this 

 matter in connection with those animals 

 which are destructive to human life, as I 

 think there can be no doubt, not only of the 

 right, but also of the necessity for their 

 destruction. I rather propose to examine 

 the cases of those that are, in a minor de- 

 gree, believed to act injuriously on man's 

 comfort, or on his means of support. In 

 doing this, I shall commence with those 

 usually supposed to rank highest in the 

 scale of animated nature — I mean the mam- 

 malia — gradually descending to those which 

 occupy an inferior position in the same ex- 

 tended line. 



As I wish my observations to be some- 

 what of a practical nature, I shall confine 

 myself to animals which are indigenous to 

 Great Britain; and I regret to find that, 

 without going beyond our own shores, I shall 

 find far more than a sufficient number of 

 creatures that I believe to be persecuted, 

 not only without cause, but many of them 

 in direct opposition to our own interests. 

 Taking the usual arrangement of the mam- 

 malia, I think I may almost pass over the 

 Vesperiilio-nidm, or bat family; for, although 

 they are occasionally hunted by boys, I do not 

 think they are generally persecuted as in- 

 jurious animals ; their utility in destroying 

 numerous insects is too well known to allow 

 of a general persecution of their race. 



The first animal then which I shall 

 notice is — 



The Hedgehog (Erihaceus Europceus), 



which has suffered a long and determined 

 persecution, mostly on account of faults 

 which he never committed. We here allude 

 more especially to the fable of his sucking 

 cows. How this ever got into general cir- 

 culation, we are quite unable even to offer a 

 conjecture. That it did so, however, the 

 poor hedgehog has proved by bitter ex- 

 perience, and has left thousands .of dead but 



Vol. I.— New Series. 



