The “Cosmopolitan” calls attention to the remarkable procession daily passing through a certain slaughter-house, as follows: “Imagine a procession of 10,000 cattle marching two by two, in a line fifteen miles long; let 20,000 sheep follow them, bleating along twelve miles of road; after them drive sixteen miles of hogs, 27,000 strong; then let 30,000 fowls bring up the rear, clucking and quacking and gobbling, over a space of six miles; and in this whole caravan, stretching for nearly fifty miles and requiring two days to pass a given point, you will see the animals devoted to death in the packing houses of —— & Co. in a single day. Surely a Buddhist would think that the head of that establishment had much to answer for. Never before in the world’s history was a massacre of the innocents organised on such a stupendous scale or with such scientific system.”
People are surprisingly callous to the sufferings of those animals destined to become food. Recently some well-dressed, well-mannered men were on a train returning East from a Western visit, and the train coming to a standstill for some reason, their conversation was plainly overheard by their fellow-passengers. They were discussing a visit to the stock-yards, and one of them, quite convulsed with laughter, cried out that he really thought the most comical sight he had seen while away, in fact one of the funniest things he had seen in his whole life, was the antics of a pig “which had escaped out of the scalding pen!” The pig-sticker had evidently been as awkward that time as the man who missed the pretty heifer.
It is daily less possible to buy turkeys and chickens minus their heads. The delicate death without the use of the old-time axe (which we degraded men and women have thought a pretty symbol to place on Thanksgiving Day table cards) is brought about by hanging the fowls up by the feet, in what fright can be imagined, an incision is then made in the roof of the mouth, and after bleeding to death, which, as in the case of calves or veal, insures solid white flesh, they are served as food to dainty women who can scarcely bear to kill a fly, and alas! to some members of the societies for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals!
One crate of chickens can encase more suffering than I want endured for me. There is first the terror in capture, then the suffering of being thrust, legs often tied, in the small over-crowded crate, then the journey in the shrieking train, and the thirst-tortured hours in the sun before the final twist of the neck or the blow of the axe, given in many cases just before natural death would render the fowl unfit for sale. And such food, poisoned by fear and suffering, is considered the most delicate, and thought fit to feed to invalids!
That all chickens do not endure the same suffering before death is no excuse for eating them, for some will have to submit to it while chicken is an article of food. The modern invention of fattening fowl by the machine-stuffing method, to make what are called in England “Surrey fowls,” and in America are given various fancy names, is so revolting that it almost makes one faint to read a true account of it. We are selfishly prone to comfort ourselves when these things are brought to our notice with the thought that the lower creatures do not suffer as we would. The fact is that no two live beings suffer the same in any event, physical or mental, but the lower animal or bird or fish suffers in its fear and death all it is capable of suffering, and we have no right to make any creature do this for our pleasure.
Mr. E. Bell has written, “Dreadful are the revelations made by humane men, who, setting aside personal comfort and peace of mind, have endeavoured to sound the depths of animal agony and bloodshed. The process of flaying alive, and even of dismembering animals before the breath has left their bodies, is far from uncommon in private slaughter-houses.”
When we witness the cruelty to horses on our streets, though they are property which the most unwise would naturally seek to care for, we can only imagine what must chance to the unfortunate creatures, already condemned to death and only regarded as food, at the hands of the hardened men whose miserable lot it is to be employed by Christendom to do its most evil work.
In a pamphlet called “An Epitome of Vegetarianism” C. P. Newcombe writes: “Our opponents are quick to point out the supposed resemblance between the canine teeth of man and those of the carnivora, forgetting that they are even more prominent in the ape, the horse, and the camel. We accept the challenge and appeal for an authoritative statement of the facts to the great masters of science, among whom there is complete agreement, viz., that expressed by Baron Cuvier, the Professor of Natural History in the College of France, who wrote in ‘The Animal Kingdom,’ vol. i, page 88: ‘Fruits, roots, and the other succulent parts of vegetables appear to be the natural food of man; his hands afford him a facility for gathering them, and his short and comparatively weak jaws, his short canine teeth, not passing beyond the common line of others, and his tuberculous cheek teeth would not permit him either to feed upon herbage or devour flesh unless these aliments were previously prepared by the culinary process.’ Similar opinions are expressed by Sir Charles Bell, F. R. S., Prof. William Lawrence, F. R. S., Sir Richard Owen, K. C. B., F. R. S., and Dr. Charles Darwin, with many others.”
While interesting in stating a case, this interests me as an argument but little, for if we were carnivorously made, with our minds, our hearts, our capacity for love and charity, and that great hope we have of finally manifesting the perfection of the sons of God, we still should control our tendencies by a higher law, and no more be carnivorous than we are apes, or marauders, or any other mental or physical manifestation from which spiritual evolution has lifted us high.
But this humanitarianism does not consider alone the animals slaughtered, but the men, women, and children who do this revolting work. One packing-house in the West advertises over 18,000 employees; multiply this by thousands and one can estimate the numbers of human beings who are thus degraded and brutalised. In my own household I have made it a point of honour to demand no labour which I would not be willing to do myself; I might fail in strength, but morally I would be willing to undertake any work required by me, and from the day I realised what I required from others if I ate meat, I became an abstainer from it, for no surer ethical truth can be stated than that we have no moral right to demand from the hands of another, work we would not be willing to undertake ourselves.