"If the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals intends to give effect to the memorial presented to it on Monday, and do its utmost to put down the monstrous abuses which have sprung up of late years in the practice of vivisection, it will probably find that the greatest obstacle to success lies IN THE SECRECY WITH WHICH SUCH EXPERIMENTS ARE CONDUCTED, AND IT IS TO THE DESTRUCTION OF THAT SECRECY that its best efforts should be directed. So long as the present privacy be maintained, it will be found impossible to convict, for want of evidence. No student can be expected to come forward as a witness when he knows that he would be hooted from among his fellows for doing so, and any rising medical man would only achieve professional ruin by following a similar course. The result is that, although hundreds of such abuses are being constantly perpetrated among us, the public knows no more about them than what the distant echo reflected from some handbook of the laboratory affords. I venture to record a little of my own experience in the matter, part of which was gained as an assistant in the laboratory of one of the greatest living experimental physiologists.
"In that laboratory we sacrificed daily from one to three dogs, besides rabbits and other animals, and after four months' experience I am of opinion that not one of those experiments on animals was justified or necessary. The idea of the good of Humanity was simply out of the question, and would have been laughed at; THE GREAT AIM BEING TO KEEP UP WITH, OR GET AHEAD OF, ONE'S CONTEMPORARIES IN SCIENCE, even at the price of incalculable amount of torture needlessly and iniquitously inflicted on the poor animals. During three campaigns I have witnessed many harsh sights, but I think the saddest sight I ever witnessed was when the dogs were brought up from the cellar to the laboratory for sacrifice. Instead of appearing pleased with the change from darkness to light, they seemed seized with horror as soon as they smelt the air of the place, divining, apparently, their approaching fate. They would make friendly advances to each of three or four persons present, and as far as eyes, ears, and tail could make a mute appeal for mercy eloquent, they tried it in vain. Even when roughly grasped and thrown on the torture-trough, a low complaining whine at such treatment would be all the protest made, and they would continue to lick the hand which bound them, till their mouths were fixed in the gag, and they could only flap their tails in the trough as the last means of exciting compassion. Often when convulsed by the pain of their torture this would be renewed, and they would be soothed instantly on receiving a few gentle pats. It was all the aid and comfort I could give them, and I gave it often. They seemed to take it as an earnest of fellow-feeling that would cause their torture to come to an end—an end only brought by death.
"Were the feelings of experimental physiologists not blunted, they could not long continue the practice of vivisection. They are always ready to repudiate any implied want of tender feeling, but I must say that they seldom show much pity; on the contrary, in practice they frequently show the reverse. Hundreds of times I have seen, when an animal writhed with pain and thereby deranged the tissues during a delicate dissection, instead of being soothed, it would receive a slap and an angry order to be quiet and behave itself. At other times, when an animal had endured great pain for hours without struggling or giving more than an occasional whine, instead of letting the poor mangled wretch loose to crawl about the place in reserve for another day's torture, it would receive pity so far that it would be said to have behaved well enough to merit death, and as a reward would be killed at once by breaking up the medulla with a needle, or `pithing,' as this operation is called. I have often heard the professor say, when one side of an animal had been so mangled and the tissues so obscured by clotted blood that it was difficult to find the part searched for, `Why don't you begin on the other side?' or `WHY DON'T YOU TAKE ANOTHER DOG? WHAT IS THE USE OF BEING SO ECONOMICAL?' One of the most revolting features in the laboratory was the custom of giving an animal, on which the professor had completed his experiment, and which had still some life left, to the assistants to practise the finding of arteries, nerves, etc., in the living animal, or for performing what are called `fundamental experiments' upon it—in other words, repeating those which are recommended in the laboratory handbooks.
"I am inclined to look upon anaesthetics as the greatest curse to vivisectible animals. They alter too much the normal conditions of life to give accurate results, and they are therefore little depended upon. THEY, INDEED, PROVE FAR MORE EFFICACIOUS IN LULLING PUBLIC FEELING TOWARDS THE VIVISECTORS THAN PAIN IN THE VIVISECTED. Connected with this there is a horrible proceeding that the public probably knows little about. An animal is sometimes kept quiet by the administration of a poison called `curare,' which paralyzes voluntary motion while it heightens sensation, the animal being kept alive by means of artificial respiration.
"I hope that we shall soon have a Government inquiry into the subject, in which experimental physiologists shall be only witnesses, not judges. LET ALL PRIVATE VIVISECTION BE MADE CRIMINAL, AND ALL EXPERIMENTS BE PLACED UNDER GOVERNMENT INSPECTION, and we may have the same clearing away of abuses that the Anatomy Act caused in similar circumstances.
"I am, sir, your obedient servant,
"George Hoggan, M.B. and C.M.
"13, Granville Place, Portman Square, W."
One of the oldest members of the medical profession in Massachusetts has also written of his experience in Be'rnard's laboratory, and his account of the cruelty there practised entirely accords with that of the English physician:
"When I was studying medicine in Paris, it was the custom of a distinguished physiologist to illustrate his lectures by operations on dogs. Some of his dissections were not very painful, but others were attended with excruciating, long-continued agony; and when the piteous cries of these poor brutes would interrupt his remarks, with a look of suppressed indignation he would artistically slit their windpipes, and thus prevent their howling! Curiousity prompted me to inquire of the janitor whether, after this period of torment, these creatures were mercifully put out of misery; and I ascertained that such animals as did not succumb to the immediate effects of their mutilations were consigned to a cellar, to be kept, unattended and unfed, until wanted for the following lectures, which occurred on alternate days. I never noticed the slightest demonstration of sympathy on their behalf, except on the part of a few American students. These dogs were subjected to needless torture, for the mere purpose of illustrating well-known facts, capable of being taught satisfactorily by drawings, charts, and models; and hence this cruelty, being unattended by any possible benefit to either students or mankind, was illegitimate and unjustifiable. But when it is considered that these same experiments might have been conducted under the influence of an anaesthetic, so as to minimize, if not remove, this needless suffering, this cold-blooded, heartless torture can only be characterized as contemptible and monstrous.
"From detailed accounts communicated to me by eye-witnesses of the incidents related, I entertain no doubt that barbarous cruelty was practised at that time in all the Parisian laboratories, though it is probable that, for novel and horrible experiments, none could rival the infernal ingenuity in this business of that master-demon, Claude Be'rnard."[1]