Views and Opinions

by Ouida

‘Well, the moment had come to slay one of the bullocks. A circle of sailors was formed round the iron ring to which it was to be fastened for execution. Of the pair they choose the weaker, one which was almost dying and which allowed itself to be led away without resistance.

‘Then the other one turned its head to follow its companion with its melancholy eyes, and seeing that its friend was led to the fatal corner where all the others had fallen, it understood; a gleam of comprehension came into the poor bowed head, and it lowed loudly in its sore distress. Oh, that moan of this poor, solitary creature! It was one of the most grievous sounds that I have ever heard, and at the same time one of the most mysterious. There were in it such deep reproach to us, to men, and yet a sort of heart-broken resignation, I know not what, of restrained and stifled grief, as if he, mourning, knew that his lament was useless and that his appeal would be heard by none. “Ah, yes,” it said, “the inevitable hour has come for him who was my last remaining brother, who came with me from our home far away, there where we used to run together through the grass. And my turn will come soon, and not a living thing in the world will have any pity either for him or me.”

‘But I who heard had pity.

‘I was even beside myself with pity, and a mad impulse came over me to go and take his big, sickly, mangy head to rest it on my heart, since that is our instinctive caress by which to offer the illusion of protection to those who suffer or who perish. But truly indeed he could look for no succour from anyone, for even I, whose soul had thrilled with pain at the intense anguish of his cry, even I remained motionless and impassive in my place, only turning away my eyes. For the despair of a mere animal should one change the direction of a vessel and prevent three hundred men from eating their share of fresh meat? One would be considered a lunatic if one only thought of such a thing for a moment.

‘However, a little cabin boy, who, perhaps, was also himself alone in the world, and had found none to pity him, had heard the cry—had heard it and been moved by it like myself to the depths of his soul. He went up to the bullock and very softly stroked its muzzle. He might have said to it, had he thought to do so,—

‘“They will all die too, those who are waiting to eat your flesh to-morrow. Yes, all of them, even the youngest and strongest, and maybe their last hour will be more terrible than yours, and with longer pain. Perhaps it would be better for them if they too had a blow of the pole-axe on their foreheads.”

‘The animal returned affectionately the boy’s caress, gazing at him with grateful, kind eyes, and licking his hand.’

The cynic will demur that this compassion for cattle will not prevent the human eater from consuming his bœuf à la mode, or his slice from the sirloin, with appetite. But even if cattle must be slaughtered, how much might their torture be alleviated were men not wholly indifferent to it. The frightful infamies of the cattle trade on sea would be ended were none bought after a voyage. The hideous deaths by drought and by cold, all over the plains of South America, would be no more. No longer would a single living bullock endure thirty agonising operations on his quivering body, when fastened down to the demonstrating or experimenting table of veterinary students. It is not so much death itself, when swift, sure, almost painless, which is terrible, as it is the agony, protracted, infinite, frightful, incalculable, which is inflicted for the passions, the pleasure, or the profit of men.

Were such sympathy as breathes through the Book of Pity and of Death largely felt, all the needless cruelty inflicted by the human race, that mere carelessness and indifference of which the world is so full, would gradually be reduced until it might in time cease entirely. The cruelty of the rich to horses from mere want of thought alone is appalling. Few know or care how their stables are managed, what is the maximum of work which should be demanded of a horse, and what the torture inflicted by certain methods of breaking-in and harnessing and driving. Frequently are to be seen the advertisements by carriage-makers of ‘one-horse broughams, warranted for hill work and to carry four persons, with, if desired, a basket on roof for railway luggage.’ That these abominable loads are given to one horse continually there can be no doubt, as these announcements are frequent in all the newspapers, and never seem to elicit any wonder or censure. A shabby and vicious economy constantly gives, in this extravagant and spendthrift generation, a load to one poor horse which would certainly, in a generation earlier, and undoubtedly in a century ago, only have been given to a pair of horses or even to two pairs with postillions. Speed, also, being insisted on, no matter what load is dragged, the race of carriage-horses grows weaker and weaker in build and stamina. What woman, either, in any capital of the world, thinks for a moment of keeping her horses out in rain and snow, motionless for hours, whilst she is chattering in some warm and fragrant drawing-room, or dancing and flirting in some cotillon? No attention is ever given to the preferences, tastes and affections of animals, which yet are undoubtedly of great strength and tenacity in them, not only towards their owners, but often, also, towards their own kind. I am, at the present moment, driving a mare who was always driven with her sister, who died eighteen months ago. She does not forget her sister, and the stable companion given her instead she hates, and endeavours, with all her might, to kick and bite across the pole and in the stalls. I owned also a pony so attached to his comrade that they could live in the same loose-box together, and when the companion died, this pony was miserable, whinnied and neighed perpetually, lost health, and in a few months died also. In life he was the humble and devoted slave of his brother, would fondle him, clean him, follow him about in all directions, and show to him every testimony of affection possible in one creature to another. Yet such feelings as these, although very common in animals, are never remembered or considered for an instant, and animals of all kinds are sold from owner to owner, and hustled from place to place, with no more regard than if they were chairs and tables. What they suffer from strange voices, new homes, and unfamiliar treatment no one inquires, for no one cares. Convenience and profit are all which are considered. There is little or no remembrance of the idiosyncrasy of each creature. The ecstatic, ardent, nervous temperament of the dog; the timid, imaginative, impulsive mind of the horse; the shrinking shyness of the sheep, the attachment to place and people of the wildest or silliest creature when once kindly treated and long domesticated—all these things are never recollected or considered in dealing with them. Hard and fast rules are laid down for them, by which they, in their various ways, are forced to abide. Their natural instincts and desires are treated as crimes, and their longings and preferences are unnoticed or thwarted. Who ever thinks of or cares for the injustice and cruelty concentrated in that single phrase, ‘The hounds were whipped off,’ or its pendant, ‘The fox was broken up,’ etc., etc.? They are sentences so common, and so often used, that the horrible cruelty involved in them has altogether passed out of notice. Men and women grow up amidst cruelty, and are so accustomed to it, that they no more perceive it than they do the living organisms in the air they breathe or in the water they drink. Were it otherwise they could not walk down Ludgate Hill or up Montmartre without unbearable pain.

The grief of the ox driven from his pastures, of the cow divided from her calf, of the dog sent away from his master, of the lion torn from his desert or jungle, of the ape brought to die of nostalgia in cold climes, of the eagle chained down in inaction and gloom, of all the innumerable creatures taken from their natural life or their early associations, because the whim, the appetite, the caprice, the pleasure or the avarice of men is gratified or tempted by their pain, never moves anyone to pity. They are ‘subject-creatures’ in the human code, and what they may suffer, or may not suffer, is of no import; of less import even than the dying out of the Maoris, or the dwindling away of the Red Indian tribes, or the death of African porters on the caravan routes.