/^ PROTECTION OF ANIMALS. BT GEORGE T. ANGELL, PRESIDENT OF THE MASS. SOCIETY FOU THE PUEVENTION OF CKUELTY- TO ANIMALa [BEAD AT THE ANNUAL MERTINO OF THE AMERICAN SOCIAL SCIENCE ASSOCIATION, 1874.] PRINTED FROiM THE PUBLICATIONS OF THE AMERICAN SOCIAL SCIENCE ASSOCIATION, By HURD and HOUGHTON, 13 Astor Place, N. Y. Wc>f. HibersiUe ^Pcess, ffiamfiritige, |Was». 1874. PROTECTION OF ANIMALS. GEORGE T. ANGELL, PEESIDENT OF THE MASS. SOCIETY FOR THE PREVENTION OF CRUELTY TO ANIMALS. [READ AT THE ANNUAL MEETING OF THE AMERICAN SOCIAL SCIENCE ASSOCIATION, 1874.] PRINTED FROM THE PUBLICATIONS OP THE AMERICAN SOCIAL SCIENCE ASSOCIATION, By HUKD and HOUGHTON, 13 Astoe Place, N. Y. E'ttz Hibecsitre '^xess, (Kamljinrge, il^sfl. 1874. THE MASSACHUSETTS SOCIETY FOB THE PREVENTION OF CRUELTY TO ANIMALS. BOARD OF GOVERNMENT, 1874-5. President. GEORGE T. ANGELL. Vice-Presidents. His Honor Thomas Talbot, Hon. William B. Washbuen, U. S. S., | Ex-Gov. A. H. Bullock, Ex-Go V. 'William Claflin, I Hon. Henry L. Pierce, And ninety-five others throughout the State. Treasurer. Greelt S. Curtis. Special Agent. Charles A. Currier. Directors. Geobge T. Angeli. RnssELL Sttirgis, Jr. W. AV. MORLANB. D. D. Slade. George Notes. Thomas Conert. William G. Weld. Mrs. William Appleton. Mrs. J. C. Johnson. Miss Ann Wigglesworth. Miss Helen Bigelow. Miss Alice M. Wellington. Mrs. C. D. Homans. Miss Florence Lyman. Secretary. Frank B. Fay. Henry S. Russeu,. Gardner Chilson. C. L. Hetwood. Samuel E. Sawyer. Henry P. Kidder. G. J. F. Bryant. W. H. Baldwin. Henry S. Washburn. Patrick Donahoe. Joseph White. Abraham Firth. John B. Taft. Greely S. Curtis. Frank B. Fay. Office, 46 Washington Street, Boston. Note. — The following paper, taken from the publications of the American Social Sci- ence Association, is reprinted bj^ the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, for general circulation. Copies can be procured at the office of that Society, 46 Washington Street, Boston. THE PROTECTION OF ANIMALS. By George T. Angell, President of the Mascachusetts Society for the Pkk- VENTION OF CeUELTY TO ANIMALS. If the time allotted to this pajier were longer, I should be glad to speak of many matters relating to animals, worthy of thought, which for lack of time I shall not be able to discuss ; as, for instance, their intel- lectual qualities, the languages by which they communicate their thoughts to each other ; well authenticated instances in which they have exhibited a high degree of reason, and a keen perception of right and wrong ; the belief of a large majority of the human race in their immortality, which belief has been advocated by many of the most eminent Christian theolo- gians and scholars, including such men as John Wesley, Jeremy Taylor, Coleridge, Lamartine, and Agassiz. The rise and progress of societies for their protection ; the kind treat- ment they generally receive in Oriental countries ; the fallacy of that doctrine that they were created solely for man, and not for their own en- joyment; all these topics of interest I should be glad to discuss, if there were not other and more important ones, sufficient to occupy the time allotted me. I should be glad to give some of my own European experiences in regard to the kinder treatment of animals there ; to speak of the hard, smooth roads which I found all over Continental Europe, even in the highest passes of the Aljis ; how over a large portion of Europe carriage horses are not only exempted from check reins, but are also permitted the same use of their eyes which we give to saddle horses, cav- alry horses, and artillery horses going into battle ; how in European armies slaughterers are attached to each ambulance corps to kill horses badly wounded in battle, instead of leaving them, as we did, to die of starvation ; how, in four months' residence at Paris, I never saw an omnibus horse unkindly treated, and only one case of overloading ; also about European hospitals for sick animals, and temporary homes for stray ones ; or, on the other hand, I might give you a picture of the wrongs inflicted on man's most useful servant, particularly in old age, which led the eloquent Raskin to exclaim : " Has any one ever looked up to Heaven, with an entire understanding of Heaven's ways about the horse ? " As illustrating these wrongs I will simply say, in passing, that the officers of the Mass. Society P. C. A. during the last year investigated nearly two thousand cases of cruelty to horses. 4 THE PROTECTION OF ANIMALS. I should be glad to speak of the shepherd dogs of Scotland, and the Newfoundland and the St. Bernard, and the rich men's dogs that protect their masters' houses, and the poor men's dogs which are their masters' friends ; or I might read to you an hour about the birds, without which, because of the wonderful fecundity of insects, Michelet declares " that man coixld not live." I shall only have time to say in regard to them, that in the report of the Mass. State Board of Agriculture, for 1873, you will find, first, that the annual loss to crops by insects, in the United States, is estimated at about four hundred millions of dollars ; and, second, that a large proportion of this loss ' might be prevented by the proper encouragement and protection of small birds, and their nests ; and that for the want of this encouragement and protection American birds are decreasing, and insects increasing. But in the space allotted me I can only put before you some of the conditions, in this country, of animals that supply us with food ; the bearing of those conditions on public health and morals ; and the means by which those conditions may be changed. TRANSPORTATION OF ANIMALS. On the 16th of April, 1871, George E. Temple, a Brighton butcher, died, as appears from the verdict of the coroner's jury, of " blood poison, inoculated in dressing for market a dead ox, one half of the meat of which was sent into Boston for sale." On the 20th of April a joint special committee of the aldermen and common council of Boston was appointed " to ascertain whether unwholesome meats were sold in that city." Five months afterwards the report of that committee, containing the official reports and testimony of state cattle commissioners, railroad commissioners, boards of health, and physicians, was published by the city government. By this report and the various official reports and evidence therein cited and contained, as well as by other official reports and evidence more recently published, it appears, — 1st. That our Eastern markets, in both cities and towns, are largely supplied with the meats of diseased animals, and to some extent with the meats of animals that have died of disease ; 2d, that the eating of these meats produces disease in those who eat them ; and 3d, that it is impos- sible to detect these meats after they have been dressed and put into the stalls. If there were time I might read you pages of details of the manner in which animals are transported from the plains of Texas to the Atlan- tic coast, but they may be all generally summed up in the statement of Dr. Derby, Secretary of the Mass. State Board of Health, in his annual report for 1874, just published, " that the transportation of animals in this country, at present, is, in the main, barbarous and infernal." THE PROTECTION OF ANBIALS. 5 From seven to eight millions of these animals, cattle, sheep, and swine, are thus brought annually from the West, to supply, not only our cities and larger towns, but also a large portion of our smaller towns with meat. It is estimated that about six per cent, of cattle, and about nine per cent, of sheep and swine, nearly 600,000 in all, annually die on the pas- sage, and a large portion of these are sold in our markets, either as meat, or rendered into cooking lard ; while the cattle that get through alive, for the want of food and water, and by reason of the cruelty inflicted upon them, after losing on the average, in transportation, nearly a hun- dred pounds each in weight, from the most juicy and nutritious parts of the meat, come out of the cars full of fever, and many wdth bruises, sores, and ulcers ; and these, together with smaller animals, to which the loss and suifering is, in proportion, equally great, are all sold in our markets for food. These cruelties are not confined to Western cattle and long routes, but are inflicted, to a greater or less extent, on almost all animals transported to market; as. for instance, some time since, I read in the "Boston Journal," that out of 125 live lambs shipped from Vermont to Boston, in a single box car, 121 were taken out dead. EFFECTS OF CRUELTY UPON THE MEATS. What effects have these cruelties upon the meats ? The Board of Health of Chicago, in February, 1871, reported that " nearly one half the beef, pork, and mutton, offered for sale in that city, was diseased, and unfit for food." The Cattle Commissioners of New York, in their Report of 1869, say : " It became apparent to the Metropolitan Board of Health, in New York city, that the alarming increase of obstinate and fatal diarrhoea in the metropolitan district, was caused by the use of diseased meats." And they add, that " not only do Western cattle lose a hundred pounds or more per head in transportation, but the tissues of their entire systems are turned into a feeble, disordered, and feverish condition." The Massachusetts Railroad Commissioners in their Report of 1871, say that these meats endanger the health of our people. Professor Agassiz says : " Let me call your attention to the dangers arising from the ill-treatment of beef cattle before slaua^hterins: them." Medical Inspector Hamlin, in his "Notes on the Alimentation of Armies," says : " The flesh of mammalia undergoes great change, by reason of fasting, disturbance of sleep, and long continued suffering, re- sulting in its not only becoming worthless, but deleterious." In 1866 it was found in New York that hogs were killed by feeding upon the blood and entrails of animals diseased by transportation, 6 THF PROTECTION OF ANIMALS. although they will fatten on the same material taken from healthy animals ; and on the 16th of April, 1871, as I have stated, a Brighton butcher died of " blood jaoison, inoculated in dressing for market a dead ox, one half the meat of which was sent into Boston for sale." CAN THESE MEATS BE DETECTED IN THE AIARKETS ? Professor Cameron of Dublin says that " the flesh of oxen in the congestive stage of pleuro-pneumonia cannot be distinguished from that of healthy oxen." The Board of Health of Chicago, in their Report published in 1871, speaking of the Texas cattle fever, say : " As a general rule, it was found impossible to decide by the appearance of the carcass, after the viscera had been removed, whether it was fit for market or not." Dr. Derby, of the Massachusetts State Board of Health, says : " There can be no approach to certainty in the recognition of the meat of animals which had been sick at the time of killing, or which have been brought to the slaughter-house dead." Horace W. Jordan, member of the Brighton Board of Health, also one of the Massachusetts State Cattle Commissioners, testifies before the Boston committee that " when the meat is examined here, it is almost impossible to tell whether the animal was diseased." And Professor Gamgee states in the Edinburgh '' Veterinary Review " of May, 1863, that he has known diseased cattle slaughtered, the beef of which had the appearance of being the best beef that a butcher can show ; and yet pigs, dogs, and ferrets died from eating it, and horses died from drinking water into which the blood of one of these animals had run. From these facts it appears that cruelty to animals avenges itself upon the consumer, and that we shall never be secure against disease from eating poisonous meats until animals are transported without cruelty ; as they can be with little loss of weight, greater profit to rail- roads and everybody concerned, and complete jjrotection to public health. It was estimated at the Social Science Convention at Albany in 1869, that Texas cattle which then sold in New York market for about $100, could, with proper transportation, be sold there for about $40. SLAUGHTERING OF ANIMALS. Another subject. It is estimated that from sixty to one hundred millions of cattle, sheep, and swine, are killed in this country every year for food ; probably more than t'vo hundred thousand a day. How do they die ? As in that mercitul European slaughter-house described by Sir THE PROTECTION OF ANIMALS. 7 Francis Head, and others ; full fed and rested, under the inspection of government officers ; in a place kept clean by the constant flow of water, without foreknowledge and without pain ; or are they dragged, lialf-starved and frantic with terror, by a rope, or rope and windlass, into bloody slaughter-houses full of the signs of butchery ? In the light of medical science it makes a dilBference to the consumer how they die. Dr. D. D. Slade, Professor of Zoology of Harvard University, in a recent lecture before the Massachusetts State Board of Agriculture, says, " the animal to be slaughtered should be conducted to the spot se- lected, quietly, without the use of goad or club, and everything calcu- lated to alarm should be removed. All slaughtering premises should be kept cleansed from blood, and no carcasses be allowed to hang in view. No animal should be permitted to witness the death of another. Tri- fling as these measures may appear to the professional butcher, they are of vast importance, not only in view of avoiding cruelty, but as affect- ing the wholesomeness of meat ; there being no question as to the effects of torture, cruelty, and fear upon the secretions, and if upon the secretions, necessarily upon the flesh." Now please accompany me for a moment, not to one of the more brutal slaughter-houses where the cattle are driven in by men armed with spike poles, where our officers have seen them struck seven blows with the axe before they were knocked down, and where the eyes of cattle are sometimes pricked out that they may be driven in more easUy. I will not ask you to go there ; but go with me to one of. the very best, and kindest, and least offensive, that you may see how these dumb creatures, under the most favorable circumstances, are prepared for your tables. I will simply read you the report of a respectable and reliable gentleman well known to me, and which has been widely published. " On the 12th of July, 1872," he says, " I went to the slaughter-house of Mr. C. A. Thomas, at Peabody, — it being one of the best in New England, — to witness the mode and conditions of slaughtering. " The animals were all forcibly drawn by a rope into the room, the floor of which was reeking and slippery with blood and offal, and in full sight of the heads, hearts, livers, and still quivering carcasses of those which had preceded them, which were hanging on the walls, and lying upon the floor around them. The cattle, of course, were wild with fear, and in a condition bordering on frenzy, were knocked down and dressed ; and in this state of excitement and heat, growing out of their fears and struggles, were converted into beef. " The establishment of Mr» Thomas may be regarded as a model one compared with any others in this region. I saw six oxen killed and dressed there, five of which were so badly bruised that to make them 8 THE PROTECTION OF ANIMALS. look " all right " tlie butchers pared off great clots of swollen tissue, iu- fdsed with blood and serum, weighing from a half to several pounds each, and threw them among the offal. Old sores were so neatly cut out, that the unskilled eye would never suspect they had existed. Some of these sore bruises were more than a foot in diameter. " Cattle at all the slaughter-houses I have visited — at Peabody, Port- land, Brighton, New York, and other places — show the same bruised and battered condition." In confirmation of this permit me to say, that a Fall River butcher told a friend of mine that he was sometimes compelled to cut out of his beef from fifty to seventy-five pounds, diseased by sores caused by trans- portation ; and a Lynn butcher, speakiog of animals that die on the cars, said : " We cannot afford to lose them, so we dress them all, and what is not too far gone we put into the stalls." These are the meats, which without any inspection whatever, are poured into our markets to supply us with food. MILCH cows. Another subject, and next in importance to the public health, is the proper treatment of the animals that sujiply us with milk. It is well known to physicians and others who have investigated this subject, that not only the quantity, but also the quality of milk, depends on the man- ner in which cows are treated. If starved, frozen, or kept without sun- shine, exercise, or companions, or worried by dogs, or frightened by boys, or improperly fed, or permitted to drink impure water, or water poisoned with lead, or kept in the foul air of unclean or improperly ventilated sta- bles, or otherwise cruelly treated, their milk and its jDroducts are liable to produce sickness, and may produce death ; in other words, that the milk of an improperly fed, or otherwise cruelly treated animal, may be as dangerous to the consumer as the milk of an improperly fed, or cruelly treated nurse. Medical books abound with cases showing this danger, — "a chUd dying m a few minutes after being nursed by its mother while m a state of great excitement," — "a young dog thrown into epileptic con- vulsions from a similar cause," — '■ pigs killed by being fed on the milk of diseased cows." These are some of the cases cited in the medical books and elsewhere. Dr. Brown-Sequard, in a recent lecture, says : " Mothers who give way to anger, or other emotions, often injure the infant's health for life, if it be not killed outright." See also on this subject the 1873 Report of the Mass. State Board of Health ; under the heads of " Infant Mortality," and the " Adulteration of Milk ; " see also Carpenter's " Physiology," Cooper on " Diseases of the Breast," and other medical works on the subject. THE PROTECTION OF ANIMALS. 9 Now thousands of cows giving milk which is used in our cities and towns, are uniformly, or at times, kept in improper localities, improp- erly fed, or otherwise cruelly treated ; resulting in adult sickness and in- fant mortality. To those who have read the official evidence on tliis sub- ject, there can be no doubt that if the causes of sudden and early deaths were truly written in our cemeteries, they would read in many instances, " Died because somebody violated God's merciful laws, established for the protection of his lower creatures." CALVES. " Our calves," say the Boston Committee, in their Report before referred to, " are brought mostly from Western Massachusetts, Maine, Vermont, and Canada ; they are kept two or three days without nourishment after being taken from the cow, while the car load is being made up ; they are then shipped, from 90 to 100 of them in each car, and if one falls, it is pretty sure to be trampled to death ; they are slaughtered from one to three days after their arrival ; they are too young to eat hay, and nothing else is given them to eat during four to six days that they are kept after being taken from the cow, and during this time they are bled, to make their flesh look whiter," Sometimes, I may add, they are bled several times before they are killed, to make the flesh look whiter ; a practice, which as our best physicians say, makes the meat indigestible and un- wholesome. Very different these practices from what I found in Paris, where calves were carried to market in good condition, were fed regularly with a preparation of eggs, meal, and warm water, up to the time of kill- ing, and where a butcher would have no more thought of bleeding a calf before killing it, than of bleeding an ox, cow, lamb, or any other crea- ture. SHEEP AND FOWLS. Another matter of common occurrence here is the shearing of sheep in cold weather, before they are sent to market, which compels them to shiver and freeze sometimes several days before they are killed. " There are more or less dead sheep on every train," say the Boston Committee, " and those that are sheared get badly bruised." Also pluck- ing fowls alive ; also packing live poultry so closely in crates that many of them die of suffocation ; all of which things are not only cruel to the animals, but also injure the meat, and to a greater or less extent endanger the public health. CRUELTY ALWAYS INJURES THE MEAT. So universal is the law that cruelty to the animal injures the meat, that an eminent English physician. Dr. Carpenter, in a recent letter to 10 THE PROTECTION OF ANIMALS. the " London Times," assures us that the meats of animals wnicli have been made fat by overfeeding, will sometimes produce gastric diseases in those who eat them. In England it has been found that the flesh of hares chased and worried by dogs, becomes diseased, and soon putrifies. Old hunters tell us they do not like to eat the meat of deer which have been run and worried by dogs, and that they sometimes, when hunting, shoot dogs to prevent their worrying the deer, and so spoiling the meat. The same doctrine applies to game caught and tortured in steel traps. In an essay which took the prize at the New England Agricul- tural Fair of 1872, I find that the flesh of animals killed when in a state of great excitement, soon putrifies ; and that the flesh of animals killed instantly without pain, is found to contain elements indispensable to the easy and complete digestion of the meat (amongst which is one named " Glycogene "), and which elements are almost, or entirely want- ing in animals that have suffered before dying. EFFECTS OF CRUELTY TO FISH. Fishermen, in some parts of Europe, and, I may add, some parts of this country, kill fish with a knife or bludgeon as soon as they are taken from the water, because fish thus killed are found to be better than those which have long gasped and struggled before dying. Professor Slade, in his lecture before the Massachusetts State Board of Agriculture, before referred to, says on this subject, " Various modes of killing fish are practiced. The Dutch, for example, destroy life by making a slight longitudinal incision under the tail with a sharp instrument." " On the Rhine, they kill salmon by thrusting a steel needle into their heads." " Fish may be easily killed by striking them a quick, sharp blow, with a small stick on the back of the head, just behind the eyes, or by taking them by the tail and striking the head quickly against any hard substance." And the professor continues : " It has been observed that fish which are instantly killed on being taken from the water, are vastly superior in taste and solidity to those which are allowed to die, as is the imiver- sal custom with us. Aaid why," he continues, " should this not be the case ? Whj should we make a distinction between animals that swim, and those that fly or run ? No one of us would think of eating beast or bird that died a natural death." OUR SALT WATER FISH. Perhaps, in the light of these authorities, it is well to inquire how the fish brought to our markets are obtained, and how they die. At the present time nearly all our salt water fish are caught on what are called " trawls," or long ropes, with ten hundred to twelve hundred hooks and lines attached, sunk by stones or heavy weights at either end THE PROTECTION OF ANIMALS. 11 to the bottom ; the fish are caught, of course, near the bottom, and str\ig- gle there a considerable time until they die, and then lie dead in the water. Usually the trawls are taken up the same day they are put down, but frequently not until the next day ; and sometimes, in bad weather, not for several days. In the mean time they lie dead in the water. 1 am told by Swampscott fishermen that they sometimes pick over a hun- dred, and sometimes even a thousand of these fish before they find one they are willing to take home to their families. The rest are sold in our markets, and I may add that hundreds of thousands of young fish of no value are caught and killed on these trawls, having no time to grow ; and because of this, fish are becoming so scarce on our coast that a fisherman cannot now take, on the average, on a trawl, with a thousand or iwelve hundred hooks, so many pounds of dead fish, as he used to catch of live ones with a single hook and line. Other cruelties are inflicted on fish caught alive, in trying to keep them alive. Also on lobsters, in the boiling of which, sometimes while the lower lobsters in the kettle are boiled, the top ones are trying to escape. For the public health, if for no other reason, these things should be investigated and stopped. CATTLE IN WINTER. A vast deal of cruelty is inflicted upon many domestic animals before they reach the cattle markets, particularly during our long winters, through the want of food and shelter. One of the first cases which enlisted my sympathies in this subject, was, when passing many years ago, in early spring, the house of a wealthy, but miserly woman in a town near Boston, I saw driven from her yard* a cow that was simply a skeleton ; nothing but skin and bones ; she was hardly able to stagger through the street. On inquiry, I found it was the custom of this wealthy woman to keep that poor animal during the entire winter just at the point of starvation, to save the cost of hay. MERCIFUL KILLING OF DOMESTIC ANIMALS. There is great need of information in regard to the most merciful methods of killing our domestic animals. In a case recently reported to me, a nominally Christian, and for aught I know, kind hearted man, led h is old horse through the snow into the woods, and beat him on the head with a club, and left him for dead. Three days after, the old horse came crawling back into his master's door-yard. At the request of the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of 12 THE PROTECTION OF ANIMALS. Cruelty to Animals, the professor of zoology of Harvard University has recently piepared a small pamphlet, illustrated by cuts, showing how to kill each domestic animal in the most merciful manner. KILLING OF ANIMALS BY BOYS. Our smaller domestic pet animals, such as dogs, cats, and the like, are, in probably a great majority of cases, killed cruelly, when it would be easy to have some one in every town, as we now have in Boston, to kill them mercifully, with a little chlorofoi'm, or otherwise. And this killing, not unfrequently, is intrusted to boys. If there were more time, I could give you many instances within my knowledge, which are but samples of thousands of cases constantly oc- curring, illustrating the cruelty thus inflicted upon the animals, and its pernicious influence on the boys. Dr. Ellicott, Lord Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol, one of the best thinkers in England, says, " "Wantonness in the child, if unchecked, is sure to deepen into cruelty, or indifference to it in the man." I could give you pages of similar opinions. REMEDIES. For all these wrongs which I have enumerated, what is the remedy ? First, better transportation. The Jewish Rabbi goes to our markets and selects what seems a healthy animal. He stands at the slaughter-house while it is slaughtered and dressed. During the ^jrocess, he carefully examines its internal organs, and if he finds the slightest trace of dis- ease, passes it over to the Christian. When public opinion shall demand the same inspection of animals, both before and after they are killed, now practiced in Continental Eu- ropean cities, and by the Jews, so far as I am informed, everywhere, and the Christian inspector shall stand at our cattle markets, side by side with the Jewish Rabbi, to condemn, and cause to be destroyed the meat of every diseased animal, then animals will be brought to our markets without cruelty, and the Christian will eat as good meat as the Jew. Cattle cars have already been invented and tried with entire success, in which cattle can be carried thousands of miles with food, water, and 'est, and arrive in good condition. When these cars come into general use, railroads will make more money, because one third to one half more cars will be required to trans- port the same number of cattle ; dealers will make more money, because (saying nothing of animals that die on the passage) an enormous waste of the best parts of the meat will be saved, and this saving will not only pay the increased charges of transportation, but also leave an immense THE PROTECTION OF ANIMALS. 13 margin of gain ; and consumers getting wholesome meats at one half to three fourths the prices they now pay for diseased meats, will buy larger quantities, and so increase the trade. I will also further state what I should be glad to prove, if there were more time : 1st. That it is perfectly practicable to supply all animals in transporta- tion with food and water. 2d. That the keeping of calves several days without nourishment is entirely inexcusable, for they will readily drink flour mixed with water ; and 3d. That all animals can be transported on cars properly constructed, with the same speed as men, and the saving in their value will more than pay for their rapid transportation. BRIGHTON ABATTOIR. How prevent the starving of animals before they are slaughtered, and secure merciful methods of slaughtering them ? We have now at Brighton, Mass., one of the best abattoirs in the world, where every animal can be killed in the most merciful manner ; though for want of proper inspection (for which the legislature has been peti- tioned) animals are killed there with much cruelty. This abattoir is so constructed that each of the larger animals, after being slaughtered and dressed, may be carried immediately by machinery to another room ; all the refuse matter passed through the floor into small metallic wagons, in which it is carried to the rendering house, and every trace of blood washed off before the next animal is brought in — and calves, sheep, and swine can be killed there without cruelty, by having each brought singly to the slaughter room, by some one having no blood on his clothing, and stunning it with a single blow of a mallet or hammer, just before, or at the moment it is brought in. In several of the smaller slaughter-houses of Massachusetts, they now have, for killing cattle, just outside the slaughter house, box-pens, like a horse's stall, with a door at each end ; the animal is driven in and in- stantly stunned and kdled by a single bullet in the head, from a rifle, thrust through an open slide in the front door ; the animal is at once hauled into the slaughter room, leaving no blood in the pen to terrify the succeeding animal, and injure its meat. By this process it has been found that much time is saved, which, imder the systems now generally practiced, is lost in hauling or driving animals into bloody slaughter-houses. All that is needed is a public opinion which shall require these forms of slaughtering to be generally practiced ; and that faithful inspectors shall be stationed at the larger slaughter-houses to see that they are prop erly carried out, and all animals properly fed and watered up to the time of killing ; then the sixty millions, or more, of dumb creatures that are now killed annually in this country for food,' will die without pain to themselves, or danger to the consumer. 14 THE PROTECTION OF ANIMALS. HUMANE EDUCATION. How improve the treatment of animals that supply us with milk ? and how protect birds and their nests ? and how check every form of cruelty inflicted on dumb creatures ? 1. By circulating information. 2. By humane education, through facts in natural history, pictures, stories, songs, sentences on the blackboard and in copy books, prizes for compositions, instruction by teachers, talks to and with the children in our schools, Sunday-schools, and in every home. Realizing the importance of this, the French Minister of Public In- struction ordered the publications of the French Society for the pre- vention of cruelty to animals to be circulated in the French schools, and called the attention of all the teachers of France to the importance of educating the children humanely. The Ladies' Humane Education Committee of the Royal Society of England, sent at one time a humane publication to about twenty-five thousand school-masters in Great Britain, with an addz'ess, asking their aid in the schools. The Royal Society of England, and several societies in the United States, have adopted the plan of giving prizes to pupils in the schools who write the best compositions on the subject. The French society, instead of prizes, gives medals of gold, silver, and bronze to those who have shown the greatest kindness to animals. The Archbishop of Bordeaux, Monseigneur Dounet, in a recent address, states that in a number of the dioceses of France, it is the custom of the pastors of the churches, when preparing children for their first com- munion, to require from them a promise never to ill-treat any dumb creature. In many of the schools at Portsmouth, N. H., they have adopted the practice of having humane stories or other humane selections read daily to the pupils in each school. The Hon. J. C. Dore, former President of the Board of Education, also of the Board of Trade, of Chicago, and who has perhaps done as much for dumb animals as any man in the West, assured me that he attributed all his interest in the subject to verses which his teacher handed him when a child. EASY TO INTEREST CHILDREN. It is very easy to enlist the sympathies of children in the animal world. Take, for instance, the history and habits of birds : show how wonder- fully they are created ; how kind to their young ; how useful to agricul- ture; what power they have in flight. The swallow that flies sixty THE PROTECTION OF ANIMALS. 15 miles an hour, or the frigate bird which, in the words of Audubon, *' flies with the velocity of a meteor," and according to Michelet can float at an elevation of ten thousand feet, and cross the tropical Atlantic ocean in a single night ; or those birds of beauty and of song, the oriole, the linnet, the lark, and sweetest of all, the nightingale, whose voice caused one of old to exclaim, " Lord, what music hast thou pro- vided for saints in heaven, when thou hast afforded such music for men on earth." Or, take that wonderful beast of the desert, the camel, which, nour- ished by its own humps of fat, and carrying its own reservoirs of water, pursues its toilsome way across pathless deserts for the comfort and con- venience of man. Is it not easy to carry up the minds and hearts of children by thoughts like these from the creature to the infinitely wise, good, and powerful Creator ? I believe there is a great defect in our systems of education. I believe that in our public schools it is quite as possible to develop the heart as the intellect, and that when this is required and done, we shall not only have higher protection for dumb creatures, and so increased length of human life, but also human life better developed and better worth living. I believe that the future student of Ameiican history will wonder, that in the public schools of a free government, whose very existence depended upon public integrity and morals, so much attention should have been paid to the cultivation of the intellect, and so little to the cultivation of the heart. Only a few weeks since, the educated sub- master of a high school in one of our cities, was fined forty dollars and costs, for throwing a dog which had followed some of his pupils to school, from the third story window of his school-house to the pave- ment, where it lay mangled and bleeding until a humane gentleman passing, put it out of pain. Let us study the experiences of the Quakers, Moravians, and teachers of the Kindergarten. " Ever after I introduced the teaching of kind- ness to animals into my school," says M. De Sailly, an eminent French school-master, " I found the children not only more kind to animals, but also more kind to each other." "I am sure children cannot be taught humanity to animals, without at the same time being taught a higher humanity," says the superintendent of the Boston public schools. " The great need of our country," said Hiram Powers to me at Florence, "in more education of the heart." CONCLUSION. In conclusion, then, the remedy for all the wrongs which I have en- deavored to portray, consists, first, in the enactment and faithful enforce- 16 THE PROTECTION OF ANIMALS. ment of laws ; second, in faithful inspection at cattle markets and slaughter-houses ; and third, in general humane education, particularly of the young. How are these things to be obtained ? I know of no other practicable method, in this country, except through the agency of organized societies for the prevention of cruelty to animals, which shall strive to circulate information, and promote humane education ; and when other means fail, shall have power to enforce the laws. In the better time coming, I am sure many of these wrongs must cease, and that doctrine which Christ taught in his Sermon on the Mount, " Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy," will come to be more earnestly preached in our churches, and more generally taught in our schools. In the mean time it is my duty to work ; and in pursuance of that duty, I have come before this meeting of American scholars held in the interests of social science, to speak for those who cannot speak for them- selves, and in their behalf to ask you to encourage and aid this work. MASSACHUSETTS SOCIETY PREVENTION OF CRUELTY TO ANIMALS. RATES OF MEMBERSHIP. Active Life Membership ...... $100.00 Associate Life Membership ..... 50.00 Active Annual Membership ...... 10.00 Associate Annual Membership . . . . . 5.00 Children's Membership . . . . . . . 1.00 Branch Membership ....... 1.00 Bubsoription to "Our Dumb Animals" (Monthly Paper) , . 1.00 AU members receive our paper and all publications of the Society FREE. FKANK B. FAY, SECEETAay. s^ AMERICAN SOCIAL SCIENCE ASSOCIATION. The American Social Science Association was organized in the fall of 1865, after the model of the British Association for the Promo- tion of Social Science. The objects of the Association are : — To aid the development of Social Science, and to guide the public mind to the best practical means of promoting the Amendment of Laws, the Advancement of Education, the Prevention and Repression of Crime, the Reformation of Criminals, the Furtherance of Public Morality, the Adop- tion of Sanitary Regulations, and the DifiFusion of Sound Principles on Questions of Economy, Trade, and Finance. To bring together the various societies and individuals now interested in these objects, for the purpose of Obtaining, by discussion, the real ele- ments of Truth, by which doubts are removed, conflicting opinions har- monized, and a common ground afforded for treating wisely the social problems of our times. The labors of the Association are carried on in four Departments : — I. Education. II. Public Health. III. Economy, Trade, and Finance. IV. Jurisprudence and the Amendment of Laws. Each Department is under the direction of professionally qualified members. General Meetings, at which papers, bearing upon all Departments, will oe read, as well as Special Meetings, relating to the separate Departments; are held regularly in different parts of the country. The information elicited at these meetings is published, and acted upon, as far as practi- cable, by intervention with Executive, Legislative, and Municipal Au- thorities, Boards of Education, Health, and Charity, etc., etc. The Science- of Society stands, from its very nature, more than any other, in need of associated labor. Its aim being the promotion of human welfare by ascertaining the natural laws, whose application will insure the greatest human happiness, reflecting men and women must be brought together for a regular exchange of thought and information. In order to facilitate this commerce of minds, a Central Bureau has been opened in Boston, and a salaried officer placed in charge of it, who is giving his whole time and attention to the work of the Association. The experience of five years has fully convinced the members of the Association that it was not instituted a moment too soon in this preemi- nently progressive country, whose very intense vitality and rapid develop- ment call for safe guidance by Right andvTruth. It is this firm convic- tion that leads us to ask anew the cooperation of all engaged in Law, Medicine, Education, Commerce, and Finance, and of the friends of human progress in general. The Annual Subscription is Five Dollars. All the publications of the Association, including the " .Journal of Social Science," are furnished gra- tuitously to members. Letters should be addressed to the Ofiice of the Association, 5 Pem- bei-ton Square, Boston. F. B. SANBORN, Secretary. GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS, President COKE WEB, CENTER tlQ, WSTORICAU COUECTION