Not only suffering humanity, but suffering brute creation has found in her a sympathetic chord. The Bev. H. Russell, who is well known in the county for his efforts on behalf of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, told two interesting stories of her Grace in her presence at the opening of the bazaar.
A show of cab-horses and costermongers' donkeys was being held in Nottingham, when Mr. Russell called the attention of the Duchess to an old rag-and-bone dealer, who had won no prize, but who was known to treat his donkey humanely.
"What shall I give him?" asked the Duchess.
"Half a sovereign will be enough, I should think," replied the clergyman.
She then handed the money to the man, but she had to borrow it though, "and," added Mr. Russell, "I do not know whether she ever paid it back but the result was the same."
When in Scotland once she found that a man with a cart-load of herrings had been using a piece of barbed wire to flog his horse with.
He was taxed with the barbarity, but denied it.
The Duchess thereupon walked back and found the wire. She and the Duke then bought up the horse, cart, harness, and herrings, rejecting the only worthless part of the lot—the man.
Sandy's greed and Sandy's conscience were most likely on a par in their flinty qualities, and the dour Scot would be glad to bargain with the Duchess again on similar terms, eliminating the factor of humanitarianism.
On another occasion she is presiding at the annual meeting of the local branch of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals at Grantham. "Such meetings as these," she told her audience, "are valuable because they call attention to the cruelty which exists in such forms as the decrepit horse traffic, of which the general public has little or no knowledge. To be ignorant may save trouble; but if it makes us indifferent and lethargic with regard to suffering, when we ought to be helpers in the cause of humanity, the sooner we increase our knowledge the better we shall be able to stop this great evil and rouse public opinion on the valuable work done by the officers of the Society."