Part 3
The corroboree about me which they were obviously holding became, as I grew used to their manner of talking, increasingly audible. But it was the quail’s words that I first distinguished.
“He certainly ate me,” he said; “said I was good, too!”
“I do not believe”—this was the first hare speaking—“that he shot me for that reason; he did shoot me, and I was jugged, but he wouldn’t touch me. And the same day he shot eleven brace of partridges, didn’t he?” Twenty-two partridges assented. “And he only ate two of you all told—that proves he didn’t want us for food.”
The hare’s words had given me relief, for I somehow disliked intensely the gluttonous notion conveyed by the quail that I shot merely in order to devour the result. Any one with the faintest instincts of a sportsman will bear me out in this.
When the hare had spoken there was a murmur all round. I could not at first make out its significance, till I heard one of the cougars say: “We kill only when we want to eat”; and the bear, who, I noticed, was a lady, added: “No bear kills anything she cannot devour”; and, quite clear, I caught the quacking words of a wild duck. “We eat every worm we catch, and we’d eat more if we could get them.”
Then again from the whole throng came that shivering whisper: “Look at him! The ferocious brute! Oh, look at him!”
In spite of their numbers, they seemed afraid of me, seemed actually to hold me in a kind of horror—me, an animal lover, and without a gun! I felt it bitterly. “How is it,” I thought, “that not one of them seems to have an inkling of what it means to be a sportsman, not one of them seems to comprehend the instinct which makes one love sport just for the—er—danger of it?” The hare spoke again.
“Foxes,” it murmured, “kill for the love of killing. Man is a kind of fox.” A violent dissent at once rose from the foxes, till one of them, who seemed the eldest, said: “We certainly kill as much as we can, but we should always carry it all off and eat it if man gave us time—the ferocious brutes!” You cannot expect much of foxes, but it struck me as especially foxy that he should put the wanton character of his destructiveness off on man, especially when he must have known how carefully we preserve the fox, in the best interests of sport. A pheasant ejaculated shrilly: “He killed sixty of us one day to his own gun, and went off that same evening without eating even a wing!” And again came that shivering whisper: “Look at him! The ferocious brute! Oh, look at him!” It was too absurd! As if they could not realize that a sportsman shoots almost entirely for the mouths of others! But I checked myself, remembering that altruism is a purely human attribute. “They get a big price for us!” said a woodcock, “especially if they shoot us early. _I_ fetched several shillings.” Really, the ignorance of these birds! As if modern sportsmen knew anything of what happens after a day’s shooting! All that is left to the butler and the keeper. Beaters, of course, and cartridges must be paid for, to say nothing of the sin of waste. “I would not think them so much worse than foxes,” said a rabbit, “if they didn’t often hurt you, so that you take hours dying. I was seven hours dying in great agony, and one of my brothers was twelve. Weren’t you, brother?” A second rabbit nodded. “But perhaps that’s better than trapping,” he said. “Remember mother!” “Ah!” a partridge muttered, “foxes at all events do bite your head off clean. But men often break your wing, or your leg, and leave you!” And again that shivering whisper rose: “Look at him! The ferocious brute! Oh, look at him!”
By this time the whole thing was so getting on my nerves that if I could have risen I should have rushed at them, but a weight as of lead seemed to bind me to the ground, and all I could do was to thank God that they did not seem to know of my condition, for, though there were no man-eaters among them, I could not tell what they might do if they realized that I was helpless—the sentiments of chivalry and generosity being confined to man, as we all know.
“Yes,” said the capercailzie slowly, “I am a shy bird, and was often shot at before this one got me; and though I’m strong, my size is so against me that I always took a pellet or two away with me; and what can you do then? Those ferocious brutes take the shot out of their faces and hands when they shoot each other by mistake—I’ve seen ’em; but we have no chance to do that.” A snipe said shrilly: “What I object to is that he doesn’t eat us till he’s had too much already. I come in on toast at the fifth course; it hurts one’s feelings.”
“Ferocious brute, killing everything he sees.”
I felt my blood fairly boil, and longed to cry out: “You beasts! You know that we don’t kill everything we see! We leave that to cockneys, and foreigners.” But just as I had no power of movement, so I seemed to have no power of speech. And suddenly a little voice, high up over me, piped down: “They never shoot us larks.” I have always loved the lark; how grateful I felt to that little creature—till it added: “They do worse; they take and shut us up in little traps of wire till we pine away! Ferocious brutes!” In all my life I think I never was more disappointed! The second cougar spoke: “He once passed within spring of me. What do you say, friends; shall we go for him?” The shivering answer came from all: “Go for him! Ferocious brute! Oh, go for him!” And I heard the sound of hundreds of soft wings and pads ruffling and shuffling. And, knowing that I had no power to move an inch, I shut my eyes. Lying there motionless, as a beetle that shams dead, I felt them creeping, creeping, till all round me and over me was the sound of nostrils sniffing; and every second I expected to feel the nip of teeth and beaks in the fleshy parts of me. But nothing came, and with an effort I reopened my eyes. There they were, hideously close, with an expression on their faces that I could not read; a sort of wry look, every nose and beak turned a little to one side. And suddenly I heard the old fox saying: “It’s impossible, with a smell like that; we could never eat him!” From every one of them came a sort of sniff or sneeze as of disgust, and as they began to back away I distinctly heard the hyena mutter: “He’s not wholesome—not wholesome—the ferocious brute!”
The relief of that moment was swamped by my natural indignation that these impudent birds and beasts should presume to think that I, a British sportsman, would not be good to eat. Then that beastly hyena added: “If we killed him, you know, and buried him for a few days, he might be tolerable.”
An old cock grouse called out at once: “Go back! Let us hang him! _We_ are always well hung. They like us a little decayed—ferocious brutes! Go back!” And once more I felt, from the stir and shuffle, that my fate hung in the balance; and I shut my eyes again, lest they might be tempted to begin on them. Then, to my infinite relief, I heard the cougar—have we not always been told that they were the friends of man?—mutter: “Pah! It’s clear we could never eat him fresh, and what we do not eat at once we do not touch!”
All the birds cried out in chorus: “No! That would be crow’s work.” And again I felt that I was saved. Then, to my horror, that infernal loon shrieked: “Kill him and have him stuffed—specimen of Ferocious Brute! Or fix his skin on a tree, and look at it—as he did with me!”
For a full minute I could feel the currents of opinion swaying over me, at this infamous proposal; then the old black cock, the one whose tail is in my wife’s hat, said sharply: “Specimen! He’s not good enough!” And once more, for all my indignation at that gratuitous insult, I breathed freely.
“Come!” said the lady bear quietly: “Let us dribble on him a little, and go. The ferocious brute is not worth more!” And, during what seemed to me an eternity, one by one they came up, deposited on me a little saliva, looking into my eyes the while with a sort of horror and contempt, then vanished on the moor. The last to come up was the little meerkat without its head. It stood there; it could neither look at me nor drop saliva, but somehow it contrived to say: “I forgive you, ferocious brute; but I was very happy!” Then it, too, withdrew. And from all around, out of invisible presences in the air and the heather, came once more the shivering whisper: “Look at him! The ferocious brute! Oh, look at him!”
I sat up. There was a trilling sound in my ears. Above me in the blue a curlew was passing, uttering its cry. Ah! Thank Heaven!—I had been asleep! My day-dream had been caused by the potted grouse, and the pressure of the _Review_, which had lain, face downwards, on my chest, open at the page where I had been reading about the man-eating lions, and the death of those ferocious brutes. It shows what tricks of disproportion little things will play with the mind when it is not under reasonable control.
And, to get the unwholesome taste of it all out of my mouth, I at once jumped up and started for home at a round pace.
III
THE SLAUGHTER OF ANIMALS FOR FOOD (Papers in the _Daily Mail_, 1912.)[2]
The thing is horrible, but it is necessary. Why then drag it out into the light? Why make our thoughts miserable with contemplation of horrors which must exist?
If it were true that the present methods of slaughtering animals for food in this country were necessary, if all the suffering they involve was inevitable, I should be the first to say: “Let us shut our eyes!” For, needless suffering—even to ourselves—is stupid. It is just because this particular suffering is avoidable, and easily avoidable, that one feels we must face the matter if we want to call ourselves a decent people.
I am a meat-eater—we are nearly all meat-eaters. Well! We cannot sit down at present to a single meal without complicity in methods that produce a large amount of preventable suffering to creatures for whom the least sensitive among us has at heart a certain friendly feeling. For, to those who say that they do not care for animals, or that animals, even domestic ones, have no rights except such as for our own advantage we accord them, let me at once reply: I do not agree, but for the sake of argument, granted; and then conceive, if you can, a world without cattle, sheep, and pigs, and tell me honestly whether you do not miss something friendly. No! the fact is, we, who are the descendants of countless generations to whom these animals have been literally the breath of life, cannot—even now that we have become such highly civilized townsmen—disclaim all sensibility in their regard.
Consider the magnitude of this matter. The calculations of an expert give the following approximate numbers of animals annually killed for food in England and Wales: 1,850,000 beasts, 8,500,000 sheep, and 3,200,000 pigs. These figures are hard to come at, and may be a million or so out, one way or the other, but even if they be, is there any feature of the national life which can touch this for possibilities of preventable physical suffering? And is there any department so neglected by public opinion and the law?
Save the eating of bread, have we any practice in our lives so consistent as that of eating meat, or any from which we, perhaps wrongly, consider that we derive more benefit, or any about whose conditions, sanitary or humane, we are so careless?
If a donkey is beaten to death, a dog stoned, or a cat killed with a riding-whip, the chances are that a prosecution will ensue or a question be asked in Parliament; for public opinion and the law lay it down that the infliction of unnecessary suffering on animals is an offence punishable by fine or imprisonment. But if in slaughter-houses some 8,000,000 sheep are killed yearly, _without first being stunned_, by a method which, even in the hands of an expert, produces some seconds of acute suffering (Report of the Admiralty Committee on Humane Slaughtering of Animals, 1904); if thousands of cattle require two or more blows of that primitive instrument, the pole-axe (if even only one in a hundred cattle requires a second blow it means 18,000 in a year); if pigs are driven in gangs into a small space and there killed, one by one, with the others squealing in terror round their dead bodies; if all this preventable suffering is inflicted daily in our slaughterhouses, what does public opinion know of it, and what does the law care?
There was a time in this country when men beat their donkeys, set cocks fighting, baited bears and badgers, tied tin pots to dogs’ tails, with the lightest of light hearts and no consciousness at all that they were outside the pale of decency in doing so. We, their descendants, now look on the unnecessary suffering involved in such doings with aversion; but we still allow our sheep and pigs to be killed without stunning, our pigs to be driven in gangs into the slaughtering chamber, and the uncertain pole-axe to be used for cattle—all without a qualm.
Why should this enormous field, wherein does occur such an amount of easily preventable suffering, be left so unpatrolled by the law, which has interested itself in warding off all needless suffering from cats and dogs and horses? Well! The law stands idle partly because the animals we kill for food are not so near and dear to us as those others. We should never stand the horses and dogs and cats we make such pets of being killed when their time comes in the manner in which we kill our sheep and pigs. And partly the law stands idle because in the case of horses and dogs and cats there is no large leagued interest, such as that of the meat trades, unconvinced of the need for improvement.
I am told that the meat trades constitute the strongest body in the kingdom. And well they may, considering the vast proportions of their business. The meat trades are controlled by men like ourselves—as humane, and undesirous of inflicting unnecessary suffering. Surely they will reconsider their convictions and accept such simple, elementary safeguards against unnecessary suffering as were outlined by the Admiralty Committee on Humane Slaughtering, of 1904. There is nothing really prejudicial to their interest in these suggestions. Nothing extravagant, or experimental. The case has been proved up to the hilt. What is the good of appointing a governmental committee of first-rate men[3] to examine into facts if their Report is to be paid about as much attention to as one would pay to the suggestions of seven lunatics? Why set going a laborious inquiry, for negligible or puny results? It can no longer be pretended that humane-killers are not effective, in the face of so much evidence from abroad; in the face of numerous testimonials from butchers in this country; in the face of the fact that Mr. Christopher Cash (for whose consistent advocacy of humane slaughtering the thanks of us all are due) in the year 1910 had 4,000 animals, the property of thirty butchers, killed by “humane” methods, and though he was in every case willing to pay full compensation for any injury he might do to a carcase, had not one single claim made on him. (From a pamphlet entitled “The Humane Slaughtering of Animals for Food,” by Christopher Cash. Issued by the R.S.P.C.A.).
Butchers and slaughtermen perform a necessary task from which most of us would shrink, and it is both unbecoming and nonsensical to suggest intentional cruelty on their part. _I do not for a moment._ But I do say that it is the business of the law so to control the methods of slaughter as to obviate to the utmost all needless suffering, however unintentionally it may be inflicted.
In the following brief summary of our want of system I am not dealing at all with the Jewish method of killing, for not being a Jew, I cannot pretend to be qualified to discuss a custom which appears to have been necessary hitherto to the peace of the Jewish mind. I only urge a people in some respects more humane than ourselves to search their consciences, and see if they can still endure this method. Neither am I speaking as to Scotland, which is ahead of us, having provided by the Burgh Police Act, of 1892, that where there are public there shall be no private slaughter-houses; and where—at all events in Edinburgh—they have abattoirs that compare, I am told, with the best on the Continent.
The following is a rough outline of what at present seems good to a nation which prides itself on being at once the most practical and the most humane in the whole world:—
A mixed system of private and public slaughter-houses—thousands of private slaughter-houses (some of them highly insanitary) alongside of a few municipally controlled abattoirs.
No regulation that where there are public abattoirs there shall be no private ones; _hence_ great difficulty in making these public slaughterhouses pay their way.
Inspection of private slaughter-houses, in spite of all the good intentions of local authorities and medical officers, admitted to be very inefficient in so far as condition of meat and method of slaughter are concerned.
Supervision of public slaughter-houses much hampered by the present widespread custom of allowing butchers to send in their beasts with their own slaughtermen.
No general statutory regulations as to method of slaughter. Model by-laws have been drawn up by the Local Government Board and recommended to local authorities—but they are not compulsory and have been as yet but sparsely adopted.
Slaughtermen not licensed; nor—except in slaughterhouses directly controlled by a Government Department (such as the Admiralty)—required by law to be proficient before they commence slaughtering.
These are the methods of slaughter we adopt at present:—
CATTLE are almost universally stunned before their throats are cut. So far—good! But they are still, for the most part, stunned with the pole-axe. This weapon produces complete unconsciousness at the first blow, _if well wielded_. _If not well wielded_——! I have been assured that the cases of misfire amount to a very small percentage. But I can only say, on the first two beasts slaughtered before my eyes the first blow of the pole-axe—wielded in each case by an experienced slaughterman—descended without effect. The animals moaned, and waited for the second and successful blow. Thanks to the efforts of the Royal Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, the Council of Justice to Animals, the Humanitarian League, of Mr. Christopher Cash, and others, there are now a considerable number of improved instruments for stunning cattle in use—the Greener and Behr pistols; the Royal Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals humane-killer and large captive-bolt pistol; the Swedish Cattle-killer (used throughout Scandinavia), and others. But the number of these improved instruments in use at present is only a fringe to the mass of time-hallowed and uncertain pole-axes.
CALVES.—“The usual practice in this country appears to be to run the animal up first (by a tackle fastened to its hind legs) and then to stun it, previous to bleeding.” (Report of the Admiralty Committee.) On this method the Committee thus commented: “This order of procedure is not so humane, and appears to be unnecessary.” . . . “Calves should first be stunned by a blow on the head with a club”—_i.e._, before being run up. _When this Committee conducted its investigation in 1904, the best humane-killers had not been invented, or were not known here._
SHEEP, with few exceptions, are not stunned before they are bled. The method of killing them and the amount of suffering they undergo are thus summed up in the Report of the Admiralty Committee:
“The usual method in this country is to lay the sheep on a wooden ‘crutch’ and then to thrust a knife through the neck below the ears, and with a second motion to insert the point from within between the joints of the vertebrae, thus severing the spinal cord. In the hands of an expert this method is fairly rapid but somewhat uncertain, the time which _elapses between the first thrust of the knife and complete loss of sensibility varying, according to Professor Starling’s observations, from five to thirty seconds. In the hands of an inexpert operator it may be some time before death supervenes, and there can be little doubt that this method must be very painful to the sheep as long as consciousness remains_.
“At the best it is a somewhat difficult operation and yet in practice is often entrusted to the younger and less experienced hands in the slaughter-house, the probable reason being that sheep are easy to handle, and do not struggle or give trouble when stuck. . . .”
In other words, the more helpless the creature the less need for humanity!
“In Denmark and many parts of Germany and Switzerland the law requires that sheep shall always be stunned previous to being stuck, and the Committee have satisfied themselves, by practical experiments and observation, that this can be done expeditiously and without difficulty. A small club with a heavy head should be used, and the sheep should be struck on the top of the head between the ears. This point is important, as it is almost impossible to stun a sheep by striking it on the forehead. . . . It was also clearly demonstrated that the stunning caused no injury to the sheep’s head or to the ‘scrag of mutton’ which could in any way depreciate their market value.”
Notwithstanding this recommendation, the Local Government Board had (up to 1915) omitted from their model by-laws (which, as before said, are not obligatory) a regulation requiring the stunning of sheep. In 1915, however, they added the following alternative clause:
“9 (_b_). A person shall not in a slaughter-house proceed to slaughter _any animal_ until the same shall have been effectually stunned with a mechanically operated instrument suitable and sufficient for the purpose.”
And in their memorandum they say:
“At the present time the Board understand that a ‘humane-killer’ can be got which is adapted for stunning _any kind of animal_, reasonable in cost, and effective and simple in operation. It appears, too, that the use of the improved instruments can readily be learnt, so that no prolonged training is needed for their proper manipulation.”
One can only hope that every Local Authority will now adopt this clause, and insist on the stunning of sheep as well as of all other animals.
PIGS.—“The Committee ascertained that it is the usual practice in _large establishments_ in England to stun pigs by a blow on the forehead previous to sticking them, and there is no difficulty in carrying this out, as the pig’s head is soft as compared with that of the sheep. The Committee are of opinion that the preliminary stunning should be enforced in all cases, the evidence tending to show that this operation is often limited to pigs which are so large or strong as to give trouble, or to cases where, owing to the location of the slaughter-house, the squeals of the stuck pigs cause annoyance to the neighbourhood. _The Committee feel that considerations of humanity are at least as important as those above mentioned._”
A sentiment with which most of us will presumably agree. Note, however, that the Admiralty Committee refer above only to _large_ establishments. Pigs still appear to be killed in ways that the following quotation describes:
“I, with another witness, saw five pigs killed—three small ones and two large ones. The pigs were ‘knifed’ one at a time and allowed to wander round the slaughter-house bleeding and in a drunken, reeling, rolling state, and at the same time uttering most plaintive cries.” (From a letter to a daily journal.)