“Even if the utmost be proved against the vivisectors, I am inclined to think that they ought to be dealt with as guilty of a new offence, and not of an old one. I do not at all like the notion of bringing old laws such as Martin’s Act against cruelty to animals, to bear on a class of cases never contemplated at the time of their enactment. It has a certain resemblance to enforcing the old law of blasphemy against persons who discuss Christianity in the modern philosophical spirit. Perhaps I am the more sensitive on this point since a friend elaborately demonstrated to me that I was liable to prosecution for what seemed to me a very innocent passage in a book of mine!
“Believe me, very truly yours,
“H. S. Maine.”
(Sir Henry Sumner Maine.)
“16, George Street, Hanover Square, W.,
“19th December, 1874.
“Dear Miss Cobbe,
“I have affixed my name with much satisfaction to this Memorial, and I presume that you intend that men should be in largest number on the list.
“Yours faithfully,
“W. Fergusson.”