tomical novice tears out the living bowels of an animal, and styles himself physician, prepares himself by familiar cruelty for that profession which he is to exercise upon the tender and the helpless, upon feeble bodies and broken minds, and by which he has opportunities to extend his arts of torture, and continue those experiments upon infancy and age which he has hitherto tried upon cats and dogs.

What is alleged in defence of these hateful practices everyone knows; but the truth is that by knives, fire, and poison, knowledge is not always sought, and is very seldom attained. The experiments that have been tried are tried again; he that burned an animal with irons yesterday will be willing to amuse himself with burning another tomorrow. I know not that by living dissections any discovery has been made by which a single malady is more easily cured. And if the knowledge of physiology has been somewhat increased, he surely buys knowledge dear who learns the use of the lacteals at the expense of his humanity. It is time that universal resentment should arise against these horrid operations, which tend to harden the heart, extinguish those sensations which give man confidence in man, and make the physician more dreadful than the gout or the stone.

Nor is this Johnson's only testimony, for when his edition of Shakspeare came out in 1765 he added a note to the well-known passage in "Cymbeline." The Queen speaks of trying the effects of poisonous drugs on

* In 1475 the Parisian surgeons gained permission to cut open the body of a prisoner condemned to death for theft from a church. This was granted, and the subject recovered and was pardoned ("Intermédiare," lvii. 216).

On this Johnson comments:

There is in this passage nothing that much requires a note, yet I cannot forbear to push it forward into observation. The thought would probably have been more amplified had our author lived to be shocked with such experiments as have been published in later times by a race of men that have practised tortures without pity, and related them without shame, and are yet suffered to erect their heads among human beings.*

Boswell records that Johnson shrank from discussing the subject of the future life of animals when that topic was brought into notice by the publication in 1767 of Richard Dean's essay. Dr. Johnson believed that Sunday should be different from other days. "People may walk," he said, "but not throw stones at birds."

There is a personal anecdote of Johnson which has escaped his biographers, and as it illustrates his sympathy for dumb creatures it is worth recalling. It was sent by a correspondent who signs "W." to the European Magazine for September, 1818 (vol. lxxiv., p. 231). It reads:

The Doctor, in his tour through North Wales (which he never published, but of which he wrote a mere itinerary never designed for publication), passed two days at the seat of Colonel Myddleton, of Gwynanog. The first day was employed in a survey of the Colonel's domain, and in contemplating a plan for the building of a principal drawing-room to be attached to the mansion, the architectural proportions and ornaments of which were devised by the Doctor.

The room was afterwards built by the Colonel in strict conformity to the plan, and after the Doctor's decease, in memorial of the visit, a cenotaph was erected by this gentleman on the spot which his learned guest had occupied at the instant in which he suggested this addi

*This is pointed out by Mr. G. W. Foote in the Humanitarian for September, 1908.

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tion to the original building. On the second day t happened that the Colonel's gardener found a bare co the form amidst some potato plants. He caught in, and brought it to his master while he was engaged in cocversation with Johnson. An order was given to carry it to the cook. As soon as the Doctor heard the sentence of death pronounced, he requested to have the animal placed in his arms, at the same time anxiously extending them to receive it. The creature was immediately transferred from the gardener's grasp to the Doctor's embrace. "Poor puss, poor puss!" exclaimed Johnson, with the accompanying action of compassionately stroking its long squatted ears, and so thou art docmed to the ignoble fate of pampering the appetite of thy fellow-animal, man. Tis a hard fate, Colonel; I must intercede for puss between sentence and execution. She is no criminal: at least, there is no evidence against her; if she be indicted for a trespass, I think the laws of hospitality will plead in her favour." While he uttered these words he gradually approached the window, which was half open, and as soon as he reached it he restored the object of his compassion to her liberty, shouting after her that she might make the best of her way. "What have you done?" cried the Colonel. "Why, Doctor, you have robbed my table of a delicacy, and perhaps deprived us of a dinner." "So much the better, sir," replied this champion of a condemned hare, "for if your table is to be supplied at the expense of the laws of hospitality, I envy not the appetite of him who eats at it. This, sir, is not a hare fere naturæ, but one which had placed itself under your protection, and savage, indeed, must be that man who does not make his hearth an asylum for the confiding stranger."

This anecdote is, at all events, credible as an illustratration of the genuine kindness of Johnson's disposition. However rough he might sometimes be in his intolerance of sentimentality, he had a ready sympathy with the real woes not only of mankind, but of the humblest creatures that live and suffer.

WILLIAM E. A. AXON.

SAVAGE SPORT AT ETON

Simul Februarius
Redit acer mensis,
It venatum lepores
Puer Etonensis :
Nec in tali prælio

Carmen hoc silebit :

"Floreat Etona!

Floreat! Florebit!"

Nonne pudet timidam

Prodam laniare?
Nonne sic venaticos

Canes cruentare?
Ipsa mores barbaros

Alma Mater flebit?

Pudeat Etonam!

Pudeat! Pudebit!

From the Carmen Etonense (new version).

IN an article in the County Gentleman of January 13, 1906, the following comment was made on the custom which still prevails at Eton of hunting hares in March:

It used to be the custom years ago for the E.C.H. to continue hunting right up to the end of the Easter half, regardless of the date, late or early, on which the School broke up. The result was that in years when Easter fell late-it happened occasionally, and sometimes often-that heavy hares were chopped, and that other

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hares were killed which had a right to expect that they should not be made to run so late in the season. This, we are convinced, is wrong; it is no sport at all, and, even from the selfish point of view of the Hunt, lessens the chances of finding hares next season. If a change in this respect has not already been effected, we think that the Master of the Eton Beagles might well consider whether he should not form a precedent by notifying that hounds will not be taken out in any year after a certain date We would suggest March 15 as the latest.

As a result of the remarks made in the County Gentleman and elsewhere, the following correspondence took place between the Hon. FitzRoy Stewart and the Head-master of Eton College, and was published in the Times of March 16, 1906:

DEAR LYTTELTON,

For some years the Eton Beagles have been the subject of much discussion in the public Press. Whatever may be thought of the advisability, in general, of encouraging boys to practise blood-sports, there can be little difference of opinion as to the cruelty of hunting hares so late in the season as the Eton boys are allowed to do, at a time when many of the does are heavy with young.

At a meeting of sportsmen held at the White Hart Hotel, Windsor, in March, 1904, some comment was made on this practice, and a sporting paper, the County Gentleman, has recently pointed out, with reference to the Eton Beagles, that such late hunting "is no sport at all, and even from the selfish point of view of the Hunt, lessens the chances of finding hares next season."

I take the liberty of drawing your attention to these facts in the hope that you will be able to arrange for the Eton hunting season to be brought to a close early in March, so as to prevent the occurrence of the unsportsmanlike incidents referred to. I propose to make this correspondence public.

Believe me, very truly yours,
FITZROY Stewart.

CARLTON Club.