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220 METHODS OF SOCIAL REFORM.
every day, and yet, bectrnse it is done in a familiar form, the
hpectors of the Society pass it over, and indeed the kws take
no cognisance of it. Sportsmen and ratcatchers ruthlesely
leave wounded animals to die slowly and in torture. Bat if
men tie crackers to the tails of pigeons, the fact of their
conviction is telegraphed to every daily newspaper in the
OottntVJ and appears under the sensational heading, ‘‘ A% New
Phase of Cmelty.”
By far the most irrational of moral sensations, however, is
that axcited by the revolations of vivisection. It is not too
much to say that the public have almost unanimously been
shocked by the details of experiments which the Society for
the Abolition of Viviscction have taken care t.o make widely
known. Tlmt a number of medical men should have met at
Norwich, and coolly stood by to witness 31, &guan cut open
the thighs of two dogs, and inject r~lcohol and absinthe therein,
drove many pcople nlmost mild with indignation. When, in
1873, the authors of the “Handbook of the Physiological
Laboratory” published their unlucky volume, and disclosed
the secrets of the vivisection table, LL part of the public
seemed to become almost inarticulate with rage, that such
things should be allowed in a Christian and an English
country.
Words of sufficient strcngth soern to bo wanting to express
tho foeliugs of anti-vivisectionists. Hellish, nonstrous, abomjnabls,
horrid, horrible, devilish, diabolical, dcmoniacal, ghastly,
sinful,micked, dctcstulle,villnuous,ntrocious,nameless, infamous
“Such Rro a few of tho adjectives most commonly applied to the
practice ; and it seems difficult to suggest stronger ones. Pet,
from the way in which the writers pile up the agony, they
evidently think their language inadequate to the occasion. I
noticed one letter, occupying half a column of small print, in 8
London evening paper, which might be described as one
continuous yell of indignation from beginning to end. Mr.
George Duckett, of the Society for the Abolition of Vivisection,
probably gave n forrn to tho suppressed feelings of many,
when he described vivisection as hellish, horrid, and monstrous,