World Day for Animals To-DAY, October 4th, is dedicated to

Saint Francis of -I- Assisi, and throughout Europe and America meet- ings are to be held on behalf of animals. In London, the National Council for Animal's Welfare will assemble at Victoria Hall, at' 3.15 this afternoon.

And to-day, as on every day throughout the year, 270,000 wild animals are dying painfully that we may wear furs. Rabbits are being caught in steel traps which crush their legs and hold them for hours or days of torture, worn-out horses are going to their death on the Continent, canaries in cages and eagles in zoos and performing beasts in circuses are suffering to amuse us.

Last year, Mr. Bertram Mills excluded performing animals from his circus at Olympia, but throughout this summer, while the circus has been on tour, he has again allowed them to appear. And only about a month ago a young Czechoslovakian, whom Mr. Mills is reported to have described as "one of the cleverest trainers in the world," succumbed to." a terrible tragedy of brute force." Herr Adolf Cossmeyer was washing his polar bear : either he slipped and fell, or the bear put its paw on his shoulder and brought him down : at any rate, it then bit off his nose and ear, and mauled his leg, so that he died soon after- wards. The bear, however, is still in captivity. Whether it will be exhibited again or not I do not know : I should be curious to hear what is to be done with it.

An advertisement published in the Brighton Herald of September 9th, said that "animal lovers will note with relief "that Lord Lonsdale is President of Mr. Mills' circus. I wonder what he thinks of this recent tragedy ; and whether he has heard of the revolting cruelties practised by some trainers on the Continent, especially on bears? I am told that they are trained by being put into a deep copper, under which a fire. is lighted : the bear is beaten on the snout if he tries to get out, so he stays in the copper, dancing with pain, meanwhile a drum is beaten, so that eventually whenever he hears that rhythm he begins to dance. In most German States the exhibition of dancing bears has been prohibited, but not in England.

How do Lord Lonsdale and Mr. Bertram Mills know that the animals exhibited in their circus have been kindly treated ? They may have information which I have not, but it seems to me that the National Association of Head Teachers were quite right when they passed a resolution unanimously, this year, to the effect that the attendance of children at wild beast shows should be discouraged, and that the use of the school organization in connexion with them should be prohibited by.the Local Authorities.

A Bill to prohibit the exhibition of the larger carnivore (except bears, unfortunately) and performing apes, was passed by the House of Lords in March last. In the Com- mons (whose Chairman of the Kitchen Committee con- fessed that Members' lobsters were boiled alive) one Con- servative and three Socialists have blocked the passage of this Bill, which would otherwise have been placed upon the Statute Book. Perhaps this has been done to safe- guard those whose livelihood is made out of animals ; yet there are thousands of men and women unemployed in the circus business—jugglers, clowns, acrobats—who earn

their livings with their own brains and muscles. These

people are being kept out of jobs by animal trainers, who are Mostly foreigners. The public does not want to see

wild- beasts now that it knows the gross cruelties con-

nected with their exhibition in circuses. After all, 600,000 people came to Olympia last year, when there were no Animal turns ; so surely we may be spared such dangerous and degrading spectacles not only this Christmas, but for ever. Only a few weeks ago another trainer was mauled by a lioness (in Chapman's circus at Gillingham).

A number of disturbing ideas come into one's mind when one considers our relation towards animals. More than seventy _years ago Queen Victoria (with her admirable common sense) pointed out that kindness to animals is a mark of civilization. We are very far from being civil- ised: so long as the slaughtering or capture does not offen& our eyes or ears or nostrils, we are content enough that it should continue. How can anyone who read Sir Percival Phillips' article, "How Zoos Begin," in the Daily Mail of December 12th last year, reconcile his or her conscience to the brutalities there disclosed ?

"I have never seen such manifestations of anguish and hate," he wrote of the depot in Singapore, which supplies

ZOOS and menageries throughout the world. The despera-

tion of the prisoners was pitiful to witness. An orang- outang with a whimpering baby at her breast was trying to hide herself under a piece of sacking. A chained monkey attempted to climb into his pocket, a leopard lashed itself into hysteria, an eagle beat its wings against the wire netting, and other birds were so crowded in their wooden cubicles that they were unable to move. Do we remember these things when we visit Regent's Park ?

We took the lead in abolishing human slavery : we have not yet taken the same stand on behalf of animals.

Last year two London firms offered for sale between them 1,200,000 skins of wild animals. One hundred million animals a year are killed or trapped for fur. Baby seals are trodden on until they bark for their mothers, who come to see what is happening, and arc then killed, and some- times skinned alive. Worse things still are done to obtain the foetal skins known as llama and astrakhan. Nor need we flatter ourselves that we are guiltless here in England. At the National Caged Bird Show held this summer £175,000 worth of captives were exhibited, including our own skylarks, thrushes, linnets, nightingales. Of the fifty thousand pit ponies living in the perpetual darkness

of mines, 2,000 were killed in accidents last year, and 5,674 injured. In the Chemical Warfare Laboratory near Bristol, 4,908 animals have -been experimented upon, and 1,151 killed.

Statistics of rabbits caught in steel traps are hard to come by, but the Anti-Steel Toothed Trap Committee at 36 Gordon• Square, W.C. 1-, of which Sir William Beach Thomas is Chairman, has particulars of five or six humaner traps, one or other of which should be substituted for- the barbarous gins and snares.

Of course, rabbits must die. So must rats and mice and mosquitoes. And as long as we walk on shoe leather and- eat -meat, cattle must cemtinue to -furnish our needs. Out attitude towards animals is by no means an easy or simple one. But some things we can put right at once; for public opinion is ready for the change. Municipal slaughterhouses could be introduced throughout England to-morrow, thereby putting a stop to the filthy "slink " trade in condemned meat, which still goes on. Wild animal turns in circuses could be prohibited without any- body being a penny the poorer. Rabbits could be trapped humanely at very little more expense. Women Could clothe themselves more beautifully and warmly in some of the new artificial furs, instead of those which have caused the death in agony of hundreds of animals.. If even a dozen people agree with this, they will influence Others, and bring nearer the world St. Francis saw.

F. YEATS-BROWN.