anæsthetic ought to be done without it. (II.) No painful experiment is
justifiable for the mere purpose of illustrating a law or fact already
demonstrated; in other words, experimentation without the employment
of anæsthetics is not a fitting exhibition for teaching purposes.
(III.) Whenever, for the investigation of new truth, it is necessary
to make a painful experiment, every effort should be made to ensure
success, in order that the sufferings inflicted may not be wasted. For
this reason, no painful experiment ought to be performed by an
unskilled person, with insufficient instruments and assistants, or in
places not suitable to the purpose; that is to say, anywhere except in
physiological and pathological laboratories, under proper regulations.
(IV.) In the scientific preparation for veterinary practice,
operations ought not to be performed upon living animals for the mere
purpose of obtaining greater operative dexterity.”
These four Rules were countersigned by _M. A. Lawson_, _G. M. Humphry_
(now Sir George Humphry), _J. H. Balfour_, _Arthur Gamgee_, _William
Flower_, _J. Burdon-Sanderson_, and _George Rolleston_. Of course we,
who attended that celebrated Liverpool Meeting of the British
Association and had heard the President laud Dr. Brown-Séquard
enthusiastically, greatly rejoiced at this humane Ukase of autocratic
Science.
But as time passed we were surprised to find that nothing was done to
enforce these rules in any way or at any place; and that the particular
practice which they most distinctly condemn, namely, the use of
vivisections as Illustrations of recognised facts,—was flourishing more
than ever without let or hindrance. The prospectuses of _University
College_ for 1874–5, of _Guy’s Hospital Medical School 1874–5_, of _St.
Thomas’s Hospital_, of _Westminster Hospital Medical School_, etc., all
mentioned among their attractions: “Demonstrations on living animals;”
“Gentlemen will themselves perform the experiments;” &c., and quite as
if nothing whatever had been said against them.
But worse remained. One of the signatories of the above Rules (or as
perhaps we may more properly call them, these “_Pious Opinions_”?),—the
most eminent of English physiologists, Prof. Burdon-Sanderson himself,
edited and brought out in 1873, the _Handbook of the Physiological
Laboratory_, to which he, Dr. Lauder-Brunton, Dr. Klein, and Dr. Foster
were joint contributors. This celebrated work is a Manual of Exercises
in Vivisection, intended (as the _Preface_ says) “for beginners in
Physiological work.” The following are observations on this book
furnished to the Royal Commission by Mr. Colam, and printed in Appendix
iv., p. 379, of their _Report_ and _Minutes_ of Evidence:—
“That the object of the editor and his coadjutors was to induce young
persons to perform experiments on their own account and without
adequate surveillance is manifest throughout the work, by the supply
of elementary knowledge and elaborate data. Not only are the names and
quantities of necessary chemicals given, but the most careful
description is provided in letter-press and plates of implements for
holding animals during their struggles, so that a novice may learn at
home without a teacher. Besides, the editor’s preface states, that the
book is ‘intended for beginners,’ and that ‘difficult and complicated’
experiments consequently have been omitted; and that of Dr. Foster
allures the student by assurances of inexpensive as well as easy
manipulation.... Very seldom indeed is the student told to
anæsthetise, and then only during an operation. It cannot be alleged
that ‘beginners’ know when to narcotise, and when not; but if they do
then the few directions to use chloral, &c., are unnecessary. No doubt
should have been left on this point in a Handbook designed ‘for
beginners.’ Besides, where will students find cautions against the
infliction of unnecessary pain, and wanton experimentation? On the
contrary, the student is encouraged to repeat the torture ‘any number
of times.’ These facts are significant.”
In the _Minutes of Evidence_ of the Royal Commission we find that the
late Prof. Rolleston, of Oxford, being under examination, was asked by
Mr. Hutton: “Then I understand that your opinion about the _Handbook_
is, that it is a dangerous book to society, and that it has warranted to
some extent the feeling of anxiety in the public which its publication
has created?” Prof. Rolleston: “_I am sorry to have to say that I do
think it is so_” (1351). In his own examination Prof. Burdon-Sanderson
admitted that the use of anæsthetics whenever possible “ought to have
been stated much more distinctly at the beginning of his book” (2265),
and agreed to Lord Cardwell’s suggestion, “Then I may assume that in any
future communication with ‘beginners’ _greater pains will be taken to
make them distinctly understand how animals may be saved from suffering
than has been taken in this book_?” “Yes,” said Dr. B.-S., “I am quite
willing to say that” (2266).
Esoteric Vivisection it will be observed, as revealed in _Handbooks_ for
“Beginners,” is a very different thing from Exoteric Vivisection,
described for the benefit of the outside public as if regulated by the
_Four Rules_ above quoted!
The following year, 1874, certain experiments were performed before a
Medical Congress at Norwich. They consisted in the injection of alcohol
and of absinthe into the veins of dogs; and were done by M. Magnan, an
eminent French physiologist, who has in recent years described sympathy
for animals as a special form of insanity. Mr. Colam, on behalf of the
R.S.P.C.A., very properly instituted a prosecution against M. Magnan,
under the Act 12 and 13 Vict., c. 92; and brought Sir William Fergusson,
and Dr. Tufnell (the President of the Irish College of Surgeons) to
swear that his experiments were useless. M. Magnan withdrew speedily to
his own country or a conviction would certainly have been obtained
against him. But it was not merely on proof of the _infliction of
torture_ that Mr. Colam’s Society relied to obtain such conviction, but
on the high scientific authority which they were able to bring to prove
that the torture was _scientifically useless_. Failing such testimony,
which would generally be unattainable, it was recognised that the
application of the Act in question (Martin’s Act amended) to
_scientific_ cruelties, which it had not been framed to meet, would
always be beset with difficulties. It became thenceforth apparent to the
friends of animals that some new legislation, calculated to reach
offenders pleading scientific purpose for barbarous experiments was
urgently needed; and the existence of the _Handbook_, with minute
directions for performing hundreds of operations,—many of them of
extreme severity,—proved that the danger was not remote or theoretical;
but already present and at our doors.
A few weeks after this trial at Norwich had taken place, and had justly
gained great applause for Mr. Colam and the R.S.P.C.A., Mrs. Luther
Holden, wife of the eminent surgeon, then Senior Surgeon of St.
Bartholomew’s Hospital, called on me in Hereford Square to talk over the
matter and take counsel as to what could be done to strengthen the law
in the desired direction. The great and wealthy R.S.P.C.A. was obviously
the body with which it properly lay to promote the needed legislation;
and it only seemed necessary to give the Committee of that Society proof
that public opinion would strongly support them in calling for it, to
induce them to bring a suitable Bill, into Parliament backed by their
abundant influence. I agreed to draft a _Memorial_ to the Committee of
the R.S.P.C.A. praying it to undertake this task; after learning from
Mr. Colam that such an appeal would be altogether welcome; and I may add
that I received cordial assistance from him in arranging for its
presentation.
It was a difficult task for me to draw up that Memorial, but, such as it
was, it acted as a spark to tinder, showing how much latent feeling
existed on the subject. Many ladies and gentlemen: notably the Countess
of Camperdown, the Countess of Portsmouth (now the Dowager Countess),
General Colin Mackenzie, Col. Wood (now Sir Evelyn) and others, exerted
themselves most earnestly to obtain influential signatures in their
circles, and distributed in all directions copies of the _Memorial_ and
of two pamphlets I wrote to accompany it—“_Reasons for Interference_”
and “_Need of a Bill_.” With their help in the course of about six
weeks, (without advertisements or paid agency of any kind), we obtained
600 signatures; every one of which represented a man or woman of some
social importance. The first to sign it was my neighbour and friend,
Rev. Gerald Blunt, rector of Chelsea. After him came Mr. Carlyle,
Tennyson, Browning, Mr. Lecky, Sir Arthur Helps, Sir W. Fergusson, John
Bright, Mr. Jowett, the Archbishop of York (Dr. Thomson), Sir Edwin
Arnold, the Primate of Ireland (Marcus Beresford), Cardinal Manning
(then Archbishop of Westminster), the Duke and Duchess of
Northumberland, John Ruskin, James Martineau, the Duke of Rutland, the
Duke of Wellington, Lord Coleridge, Lord Selborne, Sir Fitzroy Kelly,
the Bishops of Winchester, Exeter, Salisbury, Manchester, Bath and
Wells, Hereford, St. Asaph, and Derry, Lord Russell, and many other
peers and M.P.’s, and no less than 78 medical men, several of whom were
eminent in the profession.
I shall insert here a few of the replies, favourable and otherwise,
which I received to my invitations to sign the Memorial.
“Bishopthorpe, York,
“Dec. 28th, 1874.
“The Archbishop of York presents his compliments to Miss Cobbe and
begs to enclose the Memorial signed by him.
“‘Exception to suggestion 3rd,’ on the prohibition of publishing,
which he thinks unworkable, and therefore (illegible) to the Memorial.
If however it is too late to alter it, he will not stand out even on
that point.
“He thinks the practices in question detestable. The Norwich case was
a disgrace to the country.
“The Archbishop thanks Miss Cobbe for inviting him to sign.”
“A. B. Beresford-Hope to Miss F. P. C.
“Bedgebury Park, Cranbrook,
“Jan. 26th, 1875.
“Dear Madam,
“Lady Mildred and myself trust that it is not too late to enclose to
you the accompanying signatures to the Memorial against Vivisection,
although the day fixed for its return has unfortunately been allowed
to elapse. We can assure you of our very hearty sympathy in the cause;
the delay has wholly come of oversight.
“In regard to the details of the suggestions, I must be allowed to
express my doubt as to the feasibility of the 3rd suggestion. Its
stringency would I fear defeat its own object. I sympathise too much
with the question in itself to decline signing on account of this
proposal, but I must request to be considered as a dissentient on that
head.
“Believe me, dear Madam, yours very faithfully,
“A. B. BERESFORD-HOPE.”
“B. Jowett to Miss F. P. C.
“Dear Miss Cobbe,
“I have much pleasure in signing the paper which you kindly sent me.
“Yours very sincerely,
“B. JOWETT.
“Jan. 15th, Oxford.”
“5, Gordon Street, London, W.C.,
“January 5th, 1875.
“My dear Miss Cobbe,
“I should have been very sorry not to join in the Protest against this
hideous offence, and am truly obliged to you for furnishing me with
the opportunity. The simultaneous loss, from the Morals of our
‘advanced’ scientific men, of all reverent sentiment towards beings
_above_ them and towards beings _below_, is a curious and instructive
phenomenon, highly significant of the process which their nature is
undergoing at both ends.
“With truest wishes for many a happy and beneficent year
“Ever faithfully yours,
“JAMES MARTINEAU.”
“Manchester,
“December 26th, 1874.
“The Bishop of Manchester” [Dr. Fraser] “presents his compliments to
Miss Cobbe, and thanks her for giving him the opportunity of appending
his name to this Memorial, which has his most hearty concurrence.”
“Palace, Salisbury,
“11th January, 1875.
“The Bishop of Salisbury’s compliments to Miss Cobbe. He cannot
withhold his signature to her Paper after reading the ‘reasons which
she has kindly sent him.’”
“Addington Park, Croydon,
“January 2nd, 1875.
“Madam,
“I have received your letter of the 31st ult. on the subject of the
Memorial to the Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals with
regard to Vivisection.
“I hardly think I should be right, considering my imperfect
acquaintance with the subject, in adding my name thereto at present.
“Believe me to be, yours faithfully,
“A. C. CANTUAR.”
(Archbishop Tait.)
“Deanery, Carlisle,
“January 20th, 1875.
“Dear Madam,
“If I had a hundred signatures you should have them all!
“My heart has long burned with indignation against these murderers and
torturers of innocent animals.
“Was it for _this_ that the great God made man the Lord of the
creation?
“It is incredible hypocrisy and folly to pretend that such wholesale
torture is necessary to enlighten these stupid doctors!
“It seems to me peculiarly ungrateful in man, to break forth in this
wholesale _Animal Inquisition_ when Providence has so recently
revealed to us several new natural powers whereby human suffering is
so much diminished.
“But I must restrain my feelings, and _you_ must pardon me. I did not
know that this good work was begun.
“Only get some thoroughgoing and able friend of the animal world to
tell the tale to a British House of Parliament, and these philosophic
torturers will be stayed in their detestable course.
“Yours,
“F. CLOSE.”
(Dean of Carlisle.)
“27, Cornwall Gardens, S.W.,
“December 30th, 1874.
“My dear Miss Cobbe,
“I have an impression that the subject of Vivisection is to be brought
before the Senate of the University of London, which consists mainly
of great physicians and surgeons, but of which I am a member. Hence I
think I hardly ought to sign the paper you have sent me.
“This, you see is an official answer, but I am glad to be able to make
it, for the truth is I have neither thought nor enquired sufficiently
about Vivisection to be ready with a clear opinion.
“Even if the utmost be proved against the vivisectors, I am inclined
to think that they ought to be dealt with as guilty of a _new_
offence, and not of an old one. I do not at all like the notion of
bringing old laws such as Martin’s Act against cruelty to animals, to
bear on a class of cases never contemplated at the time of their
enactment. It has a certain resemblance to enforcing the old law of
blasphemy against persons who discuss Christianity in the modern
philosophical spirit. Perhaps I am the more sensitive on this point
since a friend elaborately demonstrated to me that I was liable to
prosecution for what seemed to me a very innocent passage in a book of
mine!
“Believe me, very truly yours,
“H. S. MAINE.”
(Sir Henry Sumner Maine.)
“16, George Street, Hanover Square, W.,
“19th December, 1874.
“Dear Miss Cobbe,
“I have affixed my name with much satisfaction to this Memorial, and I
presume that you intend that men should be in largest number on the
list.
“Yours faithfully,
“W. FERGUSSON.”
(Sir William Fergusson, F.R.S.,
Serjeant-Surgeon to the Queen.)
* * * * *
This Memorial having a certain importance in the history of our
movement, I quote the principal paragraphs here:
“The practice of Vivisection has received of recent years enormous
extension. Instead of an occasional experiment, made by a man of high
scientific attainment, to determine some important problem of
physiology, or to test the feasibility of a new surgical operation, it
has now become the everyday exercise of hundreds of physiologists and
young students of physiology throughout Europe and America. In the
latter country, lecturers in most of the schools employ living animals
instead of dead for ordinary illustrations, and in Italy one
physiologist alone has for some years past experimented on more than
800 dogs annually. A recent correspondence in the _Spectator_ shows
that many English physiologists contemplate the indefinite
multiplication of such vivisections; some (as Dr. Pye-Smith) defending
them as illustrations of lectures, and some (as Mr. Ray-Lankester)
frankly avowing that one experiment must lead to another _ad
infinitum_. Every real or supposed discovery of one physiologist
immediately causes the repetition of his experiments by scores of
students. The most numerous and important of these researches being
connected with the nervous system, the use of complete anæsthetics is
practically prohibited. Even when employed during an operation, the
effect of the anæsthetic of course shortly ceases, and, for the
completion of the experiment, the animal is left to suffer the pain of
the laceration to which it has been subjected. Another class of
experiments consists in superinducing some special disease; such as
alcoholism (tried by M. Magnan on dogs at Norwich), and the peculiar
malady arising from eating diseased pork (Trichiniasis), superinduced
on a number of rabbits in Germany by Dr. Virchow. How far public
opinion is becoming deadened to these practices is proved by the
frequent recurrence in the newspapers of paragraphs simply alluding to
them as matters of scientific interest involving no moral question
whatever. One such recently appeared in a highly respectable Review,
detailing a French physiologist’s efforts, first to drench the veins
of dogs with alcohol, and then to produce spontaneous combustion. Such
experiments as these, it is needless to remark, cannot be justified as
endeavours to mitigate the sufferings of humanity, and are rather to
be characterised as gratifications of the ‘dilettantism of discovery.’
“The recent trial at Norwich has established the fact that, in a
public Medical Congress, and sanctioned by a majority of the members,
an experiment was tried which has since been formally pronounced by
two of the most eminent surgeons in the kingdom to have been ‘cruel
and unnecessary.’ We have, therefore, too much reason to fear that in
laboratories less exposed to public view, and among inconsiderate
young students, very much greater abuses take place which call for
repression.
“It is earnestly urged by your Memorialists that the great and
influential Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals may
see fit to undertake the task (which appears strictly to fall within
its province) of placing suitable restrictions on this rapidly
increasing evil. The vast benefit to the cause of humanity which the
Society has in the past half century effected, would, in our humble
estimation, remain altogether one-sided and incomplete; if, while
brutal carters and ignorant costermongers are brought to punishment
for maltreating the animals under their charge, learned and refined
gentlemen should be left unquestioned to inflict far more exquisite
pain upon still more sensitive creatures; as if the mere allegation of
a scientific purpose removed them above all legal or moral
responsibility.
“We therefore beg respectfully to urge on the Committee the immediate
adoption of such measures as may approve themselves to their judgment
as most suitable to promote the end in view, namely, the Restriction
of Vivisection; and we trust that it may not be left to others, who
possess neither the wealth or organization of the Royal Society for
the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, to make such efforts in the same
direction as might prove to be in their power.”
It was arranged that the Memorial should be presented in Jermyn Street
in a formal manner on the 25th January, 1875, by a deputation introduced
by my cousin’s husband, Mr. John Locke, M.P., Q.C., and consisting of
Sir Frederick Elliot, Lord Jocelyn Percy, General G. Lawrence, Mr. R. H.
Hutton, Mr. Leslie Stephen, Dr. Walker, Col. Wood (now Sir Evelyn) and
several ladies.
Prince Lucian Bonaparte, who always warmly befriended the cause, took
the chair at first, and was succeeded by Lord Harrowby, President of the
R.S.P.C.A., supported by Lady Burdett Coutts, Lord Mount-Temple (then
Mr. Cowper-Temple) and others.
After some friendly discussion it was agreed that the Committee of the
R.S.P.C.A. would give the subject their most zealous attention; and a
sub-Committee to deal with the matter was accordingly appointed
immediately afterwards.
When I drove home to Hereford Square from Jermyn Street that day, I
rejoiced to think that I had accomplished a step towards obtaining the
protection of the law for the victims of science; and I fully believed
that I was free to return to my own literary pursuits and to the
journalism which then occupied most of my time. A few days later I was
requested to attend (for the occasion only) the first Meeting of the
sub-Committee for Vivisection of the R.S.P.C.A. On entering the room my
spirits sank, for I saw round the table a number of worthy gentlemen,
mostly elderly, but not one of the more distinguished members of their
Committee or, (I think), a single Peer or Member of Parliament. In
short, they were not the men to take the lead in such a movement and
make a bold stand against the claims of science. After a few minutes the
Chairman himself asked me: “Whether _I_ could not undertake to get a
Bill into Parliament for the object we desired?” As if all my labour
with the Memorial had not been spent to make _them_ do this very thing!
It was obviously felt by others present that this suggestion was out of
place, and I soon retired, leaving the sub-Committee to send Mr. Colam
round to make enquiries among the physiologists—a mission which might,
perhaps, be represented as a friendly request to be told frankly
“whether they were really cruel?” I understood, later, that he was shown
a painless vivisection on a cat and offered a glass of sherry; and there
(so far as I know or ever heard) the labours of that sub-Committee
ended. Mr. Colam afterwards took immense pains to collect evidence from
the published works of Vivisectors of the extent and severity of their
operations; and this very valuable mass of materials was presented by
him some months later to the Royal Commission, and is published in the
Blue Book as an Appendix to their Minutes.
I was, of course, miserably disappointed at this stage of affairs, but
on the 2nd February, 1875, there appeared in the _Morning Post_ the
celebrated letter from Dr. George Hoggan, in which (without naming
Claude Bernard) he described what he had himself witnessed in his
laboratory when recently working there for several months. This letter
was absolutely invaluable to our cause, giving, as it did, reality and
firsthand testimony to all we had asserted from books and reports. In
the course of it Dr. Hoggan said:—
“I venture to record a little of my own experience in the matter, part
of which was gained as an assistant in the laboratory of one of the
greatest living experimental physiologists. In that laboratory we
sacrificed daily from one to three dogs, besides rabbits and other
animals, and after four months’ experience I am of opinion that not
one of those experiments on animals was justified or necessary. The
idea of the good of humanity was simply out of the question, and would
be laughed at, the great aim being to keep up with, or get ahead of,
one’s contemporaries in science, even at the price of an incalculable
amount of torture needlessly and iniquitously inflicted on the poor
animals. During three campaigns I have witnessed many harsh sights,
but I think the saddest sight I ever witnessed was when the dogs were
brought up from the cellar to the laboratory for sacrifice. Instead of
appearing pleased with the change from darkness to light, they seemed
seized with horror as soon as they smelt the air of the place,
divining, apparently, their approaching fate. They would make friendly
advances to each of the three or four persons present, and as far as
eyes, ears, and tail could make a mute appeal for mercy eloquent, they
tried it in vain.