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leave off meat-eating to-morrow, were it not that they are told by medical authorities, whose dicta they have never dreamed of doubting, that abstention is only another word for suicide.
All, therefore, that they feel able to do is to interest themselves in efforts to reform the method of killing animals for food adopted in this country; this work, consequently, is finding a daily increasing number of sympathisers in all classes of society.
Now from what I have seen of the practical work of slaughtering, I should feel disposed to controvert Mr. Lecky’s statement, that the "repugnance" of butchers to their daily work has "ceased." We must take into consideration the fact that the ranks of slaughter-men are habitually made up from the dregs of the population, persons in whom one could hardly expect to find the sentiment of pity strongly developed; yet, even among these, there is a certain air of dissatisfaction with the work they are compelled to do, and a mixture of insolence and shamefacedness, of swagger and evident dislike of inspection, which makes one think they know their trade is a nasty one, only bearable from lack of other employment and from the good wages earned. But there are plenty of men engaged in this work of killing animals for food who are much too good for the business. These will tell you openly that they dislike the job, but "people will have meat," and if they were to give it up someone else would step into the work. As to the demoralisation consequent on the trade of a slaughterer, it is written
