The
Fresh Breakage Of A Branch, The Barking Of A Tree-Stem, The
Lately Nibbled Grass, With The Sap Still Oozing From The Delicate
Blade, The Disturbed Surface Of A Pool; Everything Is Noted, Even
To The Alarmed Chatter Of A Bird :
Nothing is passed unheeded by
an experienced hunter.
To quiet, steady-going people in England there is an idea of
cruelty inseparable from the pursuit of large game; people talk
of "unoffending elephants," "poor buffaloes," "pretty deer," and
a variety of nonsense about things which they cannot possibly
understand. Besides, the very person who abuses wild sports on
the plea of cruelty indulges personally in conventional
cruelties which are positive tortures. His appetite is not
destroyed by the knowledge that his cook his skinned the eels
alive, or that the lobsters were plunged into boiling water to be
cooked. He should remember that a small animal has the same
feeling as the largest and if he condemns any sport as cruel, he
must condemn all.
There is no doubt whatever that a certain amount of cruelty
pervades all sports. But in "wild sports" the animals are for
the most part large, dangerous and mischievous, and they are
pursued and killed in the most speedy, and therefore in the most
merciful, manner.
The government reward for the destruction of elephants in Ceylon
was formerly ten shillings per tail; it is now reduced to seven
shillings in some districts, and is altogether abolished in
others, as the number killed was so great that the government
imagined they could not afford the annual outlay.
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