386 REVIEW—the: voice of humanity.” 
The arrangement of the cattle in the suburban cattle-mar¬ 
kets is a matter deserving consideration. Let us describe the 
present system, which it is to be hoped will speedily be rather a 
subject of historic record than one of actual observation. In 
Smithfield Market there is not room to tie up to the rails much 
more than half of the cattle sent there for sale ! The remainder 
are disposed of by being formed, in groups of about twenty in 
each, into ^ rings’ or ‘ off-droves,’ as such divisions are termed. 
About two o’clock in the morning the Smithfield barbarities are 
at the height, and the constables, being sent into the market in 
the daytime only, are consequently not in attendance. The 
drovers surround the unfortunate bullocks which cannot be tied 
up in the market, and commence by aiming w ith their bludgeons 
blows at their heads, to avoid which they endeavour to hide 
their heads, by keeping them towards the ground. On attempt¬ 
ing to run backwards, the bullocks are restrained by blow’S upon 
their hocks and legs, together with the application of goads ; 
whilst, if they venture to lift up the head, a dozen bludgeons 
are instantly hammering on it, until again lowered to the ground. 
This scene of barbarity is continued until every bullock, which 
had previously come either from verdant fields or from the quie¬ 
tude of the grazing-stall, has been disciplined to stand quietly 
in a ring—their heads in the centre, their bodies diverging out¬ 
wards like the radii of a circle : this is done that they may con¬ 
veniently be handled by the butchers. The barbarity of Smith- 
field is at its height during the night; but in the daytime, by 
seeing the process by which one or more bullocks, when sold, 
are driven out of a ‘ ring’ or ‘ off-drove,’—by seeing the ham- 
merino’s with bludoeons on the head : the thrusting the goads 
into the nostrils of the animals to make them move backw’ards, 
after similar instruments had been applied to urge them in the 
contrary direction; by witnessing the mode of re-forming the 
* rings’ or ‘ off-droves,’ which are constantly broken through by 
the withdrawanent of purchased animals, as w^ell as by the pass¬ 
ing and repassing of carts and drays, some faint idea may be 
formed of the amount of needless barbarity inflicted, and of the 
consequent deterioration of the meat. Perhaps the following 
evidence, which is merely a selection from a mass, may give a 
better idea of the annual public loss in Smithfield (about 
£100,000 per annum), to which w^e are continually referring :— 
‘ I have lived 14 years in Smithfield,’ said a very intelligent 
witness, Mr. W. Hickson, of the shoe-warehouse, wdio was exa¬ 
mined before the select committee of the House of Commons, on 
the state of [Smithfield-market and the slaughtering-houses in 
1828 (p. 14,15, 1C), the appointment of which committee we 
