FIGHTING CRUELTY.

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 2013, 21 March 1914, Page 14

FIGHTING CRUELTY.

PROTECTION SOCIETY'S WORK, | MR.. F. SEED INTERVIEWED. ■ Hs_~_—, Mr. F. -Seed, who for 15 years lias been trying witli all his might to induce owners ana users -of animals to treat them humanely, in order that they might get the best out of thorn, has announced , his intention of retiring from tho inspectorship of the Society for tho Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, at nil early date, which fact was taken as aa excuse for a reporter to induce him to speak on tho work that lies sa near his heart. Tho Bad pto Uays. . "My first connection with t-he eaciety was made some fifteen years ago, when", as a citizen, I had occasion to report a case of cruelty to a horse on the part of a fisherman hailing from Makara, I then only found out that there was a society, and laid the ease before the secretary, Mr. J. S Jameson, who asked me if I was prepared to give evidence. I ■ jeadily agreed to do so, so w<j went to JSthe police and an information was'kid, . and I think tho maji was convicted ana fiiied. In chatting with Mr. Jameson, I ascertained that tile society had no inspector, but was about to advertise for one. I inquired what the dirties, ivere, mado an application for the- position, and was duly appointed. When I tooS up the work things were in a shocking state in Wellington. In the first year I took no fewer than 03 horses oS the street that should never have, taea allowed on in the condition they were, and for some time had an average of seven or eight cases a day brought under my notice. Indeed, the work became so strenuous, and the prospect of checking the wanton cruelty that was going oat so remote that I thought of retiring from the,position the first years Those were the days when it was a oomnw>i\ practice for men to buy up old decrepit and maimed horses for flavor 10s. each nt the Saturday afternoon horse sales, and work them till they dropped dead in theshafts. I was kept pretty busy for a long time condemning these poor brutes, and getting them' turned out or shcatin?, them. At first 1 did not take proceed" ings.against tho owners, but after a hit I had to do so in order to punish them where they felt it most--l'n their pocket. "You do not get sufch exhibitions about the streets now as you did then, though it is still bad onftOgli—worse, perhaps, in the country, where there is no fear of an inspector coming along. But I am ashamed: to say that I think it is only tho fear of the law that keeps a certain class of people in line. As soon as there is;any laxity eases crop up again, as if cruelty wc-re the .natural thing, and kiudness something' quite abnormal. . ' The Overloading Curse. "Overloading ' has always- been a trouble, and 1 have- very much' regret 'in saying that tho support I had every right to expect was fiot farthcoiiiiMg in this regard. Some time age- 1 bftfe'ght a series of cases under' the . Motieo of the City Council for adjustment, and I am sorry to say that iho council has given me very little- help ill carrying out. niy work oven- when it immediately concerns breaches of its own by-laws t governing ■ overloading. The Harbour Board helped mo all they could, and gave me the- right to get tho weights of loads passing over tho weigh-bridge, so that I might have tho official weight of loads* The by-law provides that a one-horse two-wheeled dray shall not carry more than two tonSj in addition to tho 15civt. allowed for the weight of the vehicle. In two days I. secured 17 breaches of tits by-la*. The two-ton loads ranged up to 3 tons 7 cwt., and I had the board figures to go upon. I look the list along to Mr, Doyle. Four only were prosecuted, much to the dissatisfaction of the society, and in those .eases the City Inspector asked that no penalty be imposed, as thero were iratigat-ing circumstances. I knew of no mitigating eir* cumstances. On another occasion I took four cases to the City Solicitor, who* after laying tho charges,, t-old'sne they were going to be withdrawn. Why, I never knew. Anyhow, I told binr that if ho withdrew them I would lay the informations again myself, and on seeing that I was in earnest the cases wero allowed to go on, and a conviction was'recorded in each ease. But the City Council has • never been put to assist tho society in its unselfish work to provent cruelty to animals, Later, the society moved to have the amount of the load • for a; one-horse 1 .dray reduced because of tho awful 'grades, in Wellington. Mr._ Morton thought that 35cwt. a fair enough load, far a singlo horse to pull in Wellington; The council was sympathetic on this occasion, and the thing was about to eonto to pass into law when tho coal-sw-chants interviewed flic council, told them tho adjustment would paralyse, tho coal trade of the city, ■ whidl ; had the effect of causing the council to back right down. '

An Interesting latter.. "Another phaso of_ the overloading; curso is to be found in the business of I carting sand and gravel. The triable ! is best described in a letter I received ■ last year from a man who knows alt about'the business, andjttst, where tlw shoo pinches. This man wrote:--' ■ 'I hear that the'society . . .is going to put a stop to carters carrying, twoyards of gravel on their drays. 1 think it is time it was pat a stop Jfa, and I think myself, as well a$ a good many more that know anything about carting gravel, that it will bo olie of too best things the society has done towards putting down cruelty to the horse. ... Do you know, sir, that two yards of gravel weighs about 3 tons and sometimes over, which I am sure is too much for ■ any one horse to «a.fry and shaft down a hill. 1 am speaking of something I know, as I Weighed? a couple of two-yards loads at different times out of curiosity. On© load went 3 tons 7cwt. rough- gravel, and tko other, which was fine, gravel, 2 tons 18Jcwt. without the dray, and yet you will seo men carting over . . . hills 'with these loads sometimes with only,two horses. 1 have -driven horses all my life, and it is only to out.the prices of carting that theso enormous loads are carried. I da not say that two yards of gravel is too much for throe horses to pull, for it is only about a ton a Jiorso, but it is the poor shatter that has to suffer. Just fancy the poor horse getting bumped about coining along tho road with this great load, and then perhaps having to shaft it down a hill or back it into some awkward placo when the poor brute is almost lit to drop. Then, jf two yards is the right load for one horse to -shaftabout, how is it tho City Council put a stop to the coal drays carrying more than two tons of coal along what- are mostly flat, wood-blocked roads, and yet you will see:the gravel oari-5 . . . every day With the leaders on tfoe.bacfc, not that the loader does mu«h good on tho flat, as the shafter generally does the lot. But what does it matter to the horse whether the load is coal &c gravel—all that concerns him (uiitl iiofc the council) is the weight. "That man puts tji-e case for tho poor old shafter very well," said Mr. Seed, "and gives a good idsa of the glorious inconsistency of our by-laws in allowing tho present stale of things to continue. Pestilential Water Troughs. "Ono subject I would like to touch upon'concerns our horse waicr-troaglts. , Thoso now in tho city arc all of the oldest stylo. They are out of date, and want scrapping. These troughs ait the disease-carriers of tho horse world. Why,

I saw that one- outside the Queen's] Chambers only yesterday morning with.; a thick film of saliva covering fciif i'.tnj' surface- of the water. That is what the next horse had to drink. Think of 'it! | That is precisely the manner itt -iliioh strangles aiid other diseases are 'propa- j gated. What is wanted, in Wellington J and in every city is the up-to-'J.ate troughs now' being used in America and 'feiglaml, where inside the- general trough are six or more, metal cups, large enough for a horse to g«t hit-: mouth into. These uro each fed from below with a constant stream of fresh water, so that every horse has- a clean cup of bright clean water. I have shown the pictures- of these troughs to Mr, Morton, and he thinks they are splendid, but rather cestly, "Can You Sfioe this Horse of Mine?" | "It is the greatest pity in tho world that the Bill promoted a couple of years I ago, providing that horse-shoers sliould ! pass an examination in the anatomy of the hoof before thoy were allowed to i>ai.l a shoo on, was not passed. You know tho old saying—"No foot, no horse." It's a. true one, and y«t blacksmiths are being -allowed to lame them, every day, as ofteft as not through sheer ignorance. Some of them do not even pare down the. corns unless am paid extra, and clap the -shoo on, little caring whether the shoe is pressing on a 'corn or Hot. And then the owner wonders why his horse goes lame. The blacksmith is ; not always to blame. FrcijueHily it is the- owner, who waits until a shoe falls off before ho thinks of'tho smith, and thai wants the job done in a big hurry. He little thinks t-hat hv is doing the worst ha can for himself, as by leaving the job of shoeing until the shoes dre'p off ho is frequently allowing thp wall of tho hoof to wear down, until there conies the time wh<m there is nothing for the. smith to nail the? shoe on to, and the horse is knocked out for an indefinite period. Then lie blame? tile smith as ._-often as not. Another neglect is the failure of owners to have their horses' hoofs cleaned out after a day's werk. The reason for this is to seo if it has by chtthee picked up a nail or a stone, and then, it iofreshes a horse to have his feet hosed or washed just as much as it does a human'being. Only the other day I stopped a carrier whoso horse was limping, and took out of its. hoof a 14 inch nail that had penetrated' to the quiUThis brings mo _ to the ." folly of the council allowing shopkeepers to open cases on tho road and footpaths without clearing away all the- iiaiis. Br. Newman was going to tto something in this matter, but lirs tern) © foffi.ee as Mayor lapsed before anything was aeeoinpitshed, It- seeiiis so difficult to get people to do what is obviously right and proper and hutnaue.-' The Dog Nuisance. "Bogs give a good deal of trouble in Wellington, and I' hare -known eases where stray dogs, unclean and diseased, have/made u practice of prowling round butch-era' shops and playing' in the streets with children. '• The city should he- purged of all such The City Council's rne.t.hod is wrong. How can one man with a hoop of wire he es-pec-ted to clear the Streets .of .• ■Welling-ton-of all the unregistered eurs With which the streets are infested? No single. man could do it. ' If ho gets hold .of a dog at Newtown or Kitbirnie, hfl has to walk ail the way into Clyde Quay with it. With.a cov«ed-in van or. a litt-te motor yohiclfl, a couple of men working two days .a week could stop this nuisance, and cleanse the town. This is a' work that should he iloiio Jay the society, but the counciJ does not think so. ■ Still, I am always being .called upon to .inspect dogs, .and ■put an end -to the misery, of the 'increasing numbers that are run ever by Biot'or-oars and iiioter-cycfcs, .The..Society has lately ~ \ ten. watertroughs for dogs, These are to be stamped with the letters S.P.C.A., and supplied to shopkeepers. thirsty Clilrjkens, "Another matter that has recently been before the public is tho praet-i.ee of carrying fowls and ducks frunj tho country oi- from other ports by steamer without seeing that- they aro properly fed and watered. They are, as a rule, huddled eloao together in coops, and as often as not are never given arty water from tho time they lea-vo the farm Until they, aro sold in the markets. Bach ooo.p should h»vo a tin receptacle, by means of which the sailors or attendants could water tho birds."