THE HUMANE SLAUGHTER OF ANIMALS. [To THE EDITOR OF THE
" SPECTATOR."] Sin, I have read the Spectator with great pleasure and prcfit for some thirty years, and I have often wondered why, with its well-known love of animals, this journal has never taken a decided stand in the cause of the humane slaughter of animals for food. I hope and believe that the next generation will look back on our days as we look back on the days of bu:1- baiting and cock-fighting, and wonder how a civilized Christian people could have tolerated the antiquated methods of the slaughter-house now in vogue; and it seems to me and to an increasing number of thinking people that so long as millions of sheep, calves, and pigs are killed annually without being stunned we are, as a nation, tolerating a crime against humanity. Other countries have prohibited such cruelty, while the British Government and the British public have never moved. There is, I believe, no practical difficulty whatever in the way of more merciful methods, and our laws against cruelty to animals are little more than a farce while this scandal of the slaughter-house remains.—I am, Sir, &c.,
H. M. MAYNARD
(Vioar of St. Stephen's, Ealing).
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