24 SEPTEMBER 1927, Page 14

[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR,—I read with enthusiastic

approval your statement that you are bringing to England for trial one of those humane pig-killers which hold the pig satisfactorily in position.

In the United States they have a humane killer for men, but it seems that a condemned man may be held in position for six years. Your Massachusetts correspondents are mainly of the opinion that this is " quite all right " provided that the condemned man and his friends keep asking that the fatal stroke be delayed. Yet I suspect that a desire to delay the fatal-stroke is common to pigs and men.

I hope that your apparatus will not hold the pig in position too long.—I am, Sir, &c., THYRZA.