proceeding at the right moment when he was hesitating between the law and his better feelings. On this occasion the mob, brought together for the debauch of brutality. which an old-time public execution meant, became furious at being disappointed (for the reprieve only arrived at the last moment), and vented its rage by violently attacking Thomas Wright, the Quaker prison philanthropist, as he left the gaol, supposing him to have been the cause of the reprieve.

A truly horrible execution, and one that must have done much to put an end to public executions, occurred in 1856. The wretched prisoner raised himself four times in succession after he had been cast off, resting his feet on the side of the drop. The mob began to yell dangerously, the trembling sheriffs raged at the hangman, and finally the miserable Calcraft, whose life had been previously threatened, flung himself in desperation on the man, and by sheer weight strangled him, amid fierce cries of 'Murder!" from the drunken and enraged crowd.

What a public execution in old days was almost beggars description. A graphic account, drawn from Maudeville, has been given elsewhere :*

"On the morning of the execution the prisoners have all been brought up into the prison yard, and a hubbub goes on almost as bad as a Jews' market. Loud curses from angry quarrellers, shouts for the pot-boys, who scuttle about, pouring out ale and other liquids, blows of the blacksmith's hammer, as he pinions those who are going to suffer. At last all is in readiness, the prisoners have mounted the cart, the Ordinary has got up behind, and Jack Ketch in front; the soldiers press round for fear of a rescue, and the great gates of the prison are swung open.

"At last the cavalcade reaches the gallows, around which a number of hackney carriages are assembled. These vehicles have brought or contain the people's betters, who have thus come by a more convenient route, and secured the best places to see the show. The Ordinary and the hangman dispatch their duties with small ceremony and equal unconcern, and very soon half a dozen human bodies are dangling in the air."

* "The English Via Dolorosa."

Such scenes have passed away for ever. The rising wave of humanitarianism which began with the French Revolution has carried us far since then. The good old days are over. Yet we still have the hangman with us, we still sentence young mothers and boys to death; and though we have abolished those scenes of horror called public executions, we have failed so far to carry out any of the other recommendations of the Royal Commission of 1864, that last attempt made by Parliament to deal with the death penalty. The efforts of Peter Bedford; of John Thomas Barry; of William Ewart, who introduced. the first bill for the abolition of the death penalty in 1840; of Gilpin, who founded the Society for Promoting the Abolition of Capital Punishment; and of Lord John Russell, culminated in the appointment of that Commission. Many then hoped that the end of the régime of the gallows was in sight, but Alfred Dymond, who was for some years Secretary of the Abolitionist Society, and who afterwards became a member of the Canadian Parliament, apparently clearly foresaw that the end was not yet. "The Law on its Trial" appeared in 1865, while the Commission was sitting. Its final words were prophetic, and a stirring call for further work. "If," said Dymond, "we can win a successful battle in the complete overthrow of the death penalty, let us not shrink from the conflict; but if, foiled in this, an advance is gained by the limitation of the punishment, let us but use it as a stepping-stone to fresh efforts, unchecked by the secession of any who may be content with a partial triumph. If we would strengthen the hands of justice, avert the chances of irremediable error, and elevate the standard of the value of human life before our country and the world, we shall not rest till we have wiped from the book of England's laws the penalty that, framed as a terror to evil-doers, has become an abomination and a curse."

CARL HEATH.

HUMANITARIANISM AND FOOD

REFORM

I.

IN these opening years of the twentieth century the question of food reform looms large on the horizon, and attracts widespread interest and attention.

The question embodies no new principle. Far back in the remote ages of the past we hear of some attempt being made to win man to a more abstemious mode of living and a cleaner form of diet; but it is to Pythagoras, in the sixth century before our era, that we owe the formation of the first historical society in the western world enjoining upon its members the rule of abstinence from the flesh of living beings.

The aim of the School of Pythagoras was, doubtless, the moral education and purification of the community, and abstinence from flesh foods was enjoined, not primarily on humanitarian, but rather on æsthetic grounds. However this may be, we witness in the formation of this brotherhood the first historical association for the practice of a reformed diet, including abstention from all flesh foods.

From that day forward the food-reform movement has been kept alive by the adherence to its principles of a comparatively small band of devotees, who, insignificant perhaps in point of numbers, have yet ever included in their ranks some of the most distinguished men of the day. To-day we find the movement broadening its basis, and in a state of constant expansion. The question of food

reform is ventiated ʼn die press, while food-reform stores and food-sein saans mcrease and multiply in the land. Whether the present growth of the movement marks a deince advance in the humanitarian thought of the day on of the cher hand, how much of the present expension must be scouted as the result of a passing whim I ish emas to be seen. A point, however, to be noticed is that from whatever reason a man may be led to adret a more rational and reformed diet, the result cannot be make for good, seeing bow numerous are the cases on record in which the Set, adopted primarily for reasons far removed from the nature of humanitarianism, has yet so altered the whole point of view and outlook on Hie as to tend to its continance on temanitarian grounds alope.

Despite the great strides forward the food-reform movement has taken during the last few years, its influence yet touches but a fringe of the teaming population of the

country.

Flesh food in its various forms is still regarded as wellnigh a necessary of life by all classes of the community.

Few people realise the colossal dimensions to which the cattle trade has attained at the present day, or can form any conception of the constant stream of animals that pours into this country, and is continually flowing from fair and market to the slaughter-houses in order to maintain the daily "food supply" of the people.

There were imported into the United Kingdom during the year 1906, 551,215 head of cattle, and 103,359 sheep, while besides this importation from foreign countries there has also to be taken into consideration the trade within the limits of the United Kingdom. That between Ireland and Great Britain assumes large proportions, the importations into the latter country from the Emerald Isle having reached, in the year 1906, the total of 240,566 head of fat cattle, 473, 425 store cattle, and 293,174 sheep.

Consider what all this means. Remember that the

animals dealt with are highly organised, sentient beings, and then reflect on the suffering this vast traffic must entail, and the cruelty that must be, and is, perpetrated— often unconsciously and from ignorance, let us allow, but still cruelty, however unwittingly inflicted. But this does not complete the picture; for, in addition to the evils connected with the transit and marketing of the cattle, there remain to be considered the additional horrors of the slaughter-house, and especially of the private slaughterhouses, still so numerous in the country.

Have

It is not, however, the animals alone that must be taken into consideration when dealing with this subject. We have, also, to deplore the degrading and demoralising effect that employment in the trade entails on the thousands of our fellow-men engaged in its various branches. we any right to gratify our appetites at the expense of so much suffering and cruelty to the animals provided for the bloody sacrifice, and of the degradation of those human beings whose lot it is to keep the altar red with the blood of the slain? Here are large questions, and it is in the hope of bringing about some measure of realisation of their importance in the minds of at least a few that the following pages have been written. Repugnant as the subject must be to all sensitive minds, it is, nevertheless, advisable that those who indulge in the finished product should not remain in ignorance of the cruelty and suffering entailed in the production of their daily article of food.

II.

The question of pain and suffering in the animal world constitutes one of the most terrible problems of this mysterious universe.

Bad enough is it when viewed in the ordinary course of nature, as the inevitable result of a ruthless struggle for existence; but what can be said when we find cruelty and suffering inflicted on these dumb creatures at the hand of their lord and master-man?

VOL. IX.

B