Another appeal was addressed by me personally to the Society of Friends through the Clerks of the Monthly and Quarterly Meetings in England and Ireland.
It has proved eminently successful, and has led to the formation of a powerful “Friends’ Anti-vivisection Society,” which lately issued an appeal to other members of their body signed by 2,000 friends, many of them being among the most eminent in England. This has again formed the ground of a fresh appeal on an immense scale in Pennsylvania. Another recent appeal to the Congregationalists has, I hear, been very well received. On one occasion a special Petition to the House of Lords was signed by every Unitarian Minister in London. It was presented by the Archbishop of York, who also presented a Memorial (for Restriction) in 1876 signed by all the heads of Colleges in Oxford.
Another appeal which I ventured to make (printed as a large pamphlet) to “the Humane Jews of England,” entreating them to remonstrate with the 40 German Jews who are the worst vivisectors in Europe, was, unfortunately, a deplorable failure. Four of my own private friends, Jewesses, all expressed their sympathy warmly, and sent handsome contributions to our funds; but not one other Jew or Jewess, high or low, rallied to us, albeit I presented pamphlets to nearly 200 recommended to me as specially well disposed. I shall never be tempted to address the “Humane” Jews of England again!
One other circular I may mention as more successful. I sent to seven hundred Head Schoolmasters the following Letter, with which were enclosed the pamphlets mentioned therein:—
“Hengwrt, Dolgelly,
“September, 1886.
“Dear Sir,
“Permit me respectfully to ask your perusal of the accompanying little paper on ‘Physiology as a Branch of Education.’ I have written it under a strong sense of the necessity which at present exists for some similar caution.
“The leaflet describing a ‘Specimen of Modern Physiological Instruction,’ refers to a scene in Paris which could not be precisely paralleled in an English school, so far as concerns the actual torture of the animals used for exhibition, since the Vivisection Act of 1876 provided that anæsthetics must be used in all cases of Vivisection for Illustration of Lectures.
“It is, however, to be seriously questioned whether even painless, (and therefore not shocking), operations on living animals, performed before boys and girls, by the enthusiastic English admirers of Claude Bernard and Paul Bert, may not excite in the minds of the young witnesses a curiosity unmingled with pity, such as may subsequently prompt them to become the most merciless experimenters; or, at least, advocates and apologists of scientific cruelty.