the respondent. Lord Alverstone, C.J., said he thought that there must come a point at which an act of omission became one of commission for the purpose of section 2. The learned judge added “It might be taken as a principle in these cases, where the act was not a direct act of commission, that if the respondent had caused pain by a lawful act, and he alone could stop it, the justices were entitled to consider whether he had done his best to stop it."

In the next place, it is necessary to establish that the pain was inflicted cruelly. Now the leading dictionaries. agree in defining "cruelly" as "with cruelty," but they differ in the meanings which they attach to the word cruelty." Thus the New English and the Century dictionaries define it as "disposition to inflict suffering"; but the latter also adds, "specifically in law, an act inflicting severe pain and done with wilfulness and malice." According to Webster, it is (1) a disposition to give unnecessary pain or distress to others; (2) an act which causes extreme suffering without good reason. Johnson defines it as "delight in the pain or misery of others; act of intentional affliction." Judicial attempts at definitions have left the matter as obscure as the dictionaries. Many of the judges, especially those presiding over the Scotch and Irish Courts, have been inclined to regard the cruelty with which the Legislature was concerned as the intentional affliction of pain springing from moral perversion, whilst others have considered that it was the infliction of unnecessary suffering, whether intentional or otherwise, that Parliament intended to penalise. Thus Day, J., held that the "cruelty must be something which cannot be justified, and which the person who practices it knows cannot be justified" (Lewis v. Fermor, L. R. [1887], 18 Q. B. D. 532), and Wills, J., added, that "There must be something of the moral element of cruelty to bring a case within the section "-an opinion shared by Chitty, J. (in In re Foveaux, Cross v. London Anti-Vivisection

Society, L. R. [1895], 2 Ch. 507), and agreeing with that of Lord Young, who stated that "The nature of the cruelty contemplated by the statute is cruelty inflicted for the purpose of gratifying a taste for cruelty" (Anderson v. Wood, supra), whereas Hawkins, J., defined it as pain inflicted. "without necessity, or, in other words, without good reason" (Ward v. Wiley, supra). Again, according to Wightman, J., "The cruelty intended by the statute is the unnecessary abuse of the animal" (Bridge v. Parsons, supra); but Grove, J., said he would prefer to define it as "unnecessary ill-usage by which the animal substantially suffers" (Swan v. Saunders, supra). Lord Coleridge, C.J., preferred the former (in Ford v. Wiley, supra), and Morris, C.J., the latter definition (Callaghan v. S. P. C. A., [1885], 16 L. R. Ir. 325). Although these definitions disclose a very real difference of opinion, yet, on a careful perusal of all the cases, one may venture to assert that the majority of the English judges have regarded the cruelty mentioned in the statute as simply the infliction of unnecessary pain. What amounts to a necessary reason for the infliction of pain appears to be a question of fact for the magistrates, to be determined upon the particular circumstances of each case (Bowyer v. Morgan, supra). But the reasonableness and adequacy of the object (per Morris, C.J., in Callaghan v. S. P. C. A., and per Coleridge, L.C.J., in Ford v. Wiley, supra), the amount of pain caused, the intensity and duration of the suffering, and the object sought to be attained, are essential elements for consideration (per Hawkins, J. in Ford v. Wiley, supra). That the act was done for convenience and profit is not in itself a sufficient defence (per Andrews, J., in Brady v. M'Argle, [1884], 14 L. R. Ir. 174), but "That without which an animal cannot attain its full development or to be fitted for its ordinary use may fairly come within the term "necessary" (per Coleridge, L.C.J., in Ford v. Wiley, supra). It is not, however, what is

necessary for the animals themselves, but what is necessary to adapt them to the purposes for which they were placed at man's disposal (per O'Brien, C.J., in Reg v. M'Donogh, supra).

The word "wantonly" occurred in the Acts of 1822 and 1835 but is omitted from the present statute replacing them, and it has been argued that the omission is significant as showing "that the Legislature did not intend that the presence of calculation, deliberation and motive, in the minds of the perpetrators of the act should condone the cruelty of their conduct." This was the view taken by Dowse, B. (in Brady v. M'Argle, supra); but Day, J., thought that the word might have been omitted on account of its vagueness, and could not affect the meaning of the words which were used (in Lewis v. Fermor, supra); while O'Brien, J., was clearly of opinion that the word was omitted because there was no need of an addition to the word "cruelly" (in Reg. v. M'Donogh, supra). The word, apparently, has never been judicially defined, but it has reappeared in the Act of 1900, where it seems to be used in the sense of "thoughtlessly" or "heedlessly."

The following acts have been held to come within the section-Setting on cocks to fight one another (Allen v. Small [1904], L. R., 2 Ir. 705, and Bridge v. Parsons, supra); cutting their combs for the same purpose or with the object of winning prizes at exhibitions (Murphy v. Manning [1877], 2 Ex. D. 307); keeping a horse in such a manner that it is inevitably put to intense pain in its effort to graze in order to support its life (Everitt v. Davies, supra); hacking at a pig with a carpenter's axe, intending to kill it, and inflicting four wounds on its head and nose, the pig remaining from Saturday to Monday in this condition (Adcock v. Murrell [1890], 54 J. P. 776); and continuing a performance during which a lion severely injures a horse, having previously evinced a savage disposition towards it (Thielbar v. Craigen, supra). But to keep parrots

in September without water for about ten hours (Swan v. Saunders, supra), or to perform on a sow the operation called "spaying," which is done bonâ fide for the purpose of benefiting the owner by increasing the value of the animal (Lewis v. Fermor, supra), are cases outside the Act. Where the defendant shot at a dog that was trespassing without intending to kill it, but with the intention of injuring it, if necessary, to frighten it away, and the dog suffered considerable pain, the Court held that each case was a question of degree for the justices, and that such an act did not of necessity amount to cruelly ill-treating (Armstrong v. Mitchell [1903], 19 T. L. R. 525). So, where a farmer was summoned for cruelty to a sheep and evidence was given (1) That it had died from exhaustion through being eaten by maggots and must have suffered great pain; (2) that no signs were apparent of the wounds having been dressed; (3) that the farmer had stated that he knew that some of his sheep were affected with fly (which come very quickly in hot weather), and that he had on one occasion sent a man to dress the wounds-the justices dismissed the summons on the ground that there was not sufficient evidence, and the Court held that it was open to the justices to arrive at this decision (Potter v. Challans [1910], 74 J. P. 114). The Court also refused to interfere with the decision of the magistrates in Bowyer v. Morgan (supra), who had found as a fact that the practice of branding lambs by drawing a hot iron across the nostrils three or four times was reasonably necessary for purposes of identification, there being some evidence to support their finding.

But the most important case that has come before the judges of the High Court is that of Ford v. Wiley (supra). There a farmer in Norfolk had caused the horns of a number of oxen to be sawn off. The justices were of opinion that the appellant had proved that the dishorning of the cattle in these cases had caused considerable pain and

suffering to the animals, but were satisfied that the respondent had exercised ordinary care in the performance of the operation, and they considered it as proved that the practice of dishorning cattle had been carried on in a part of the county of Norfolk to a considerable extent during the previous three or four years; also that the results attained by dishorning could not be attained by merely tipping the horns as suggested by some of the witnesses called by the appellant. The justices did not believe that the respondent had any cruel intention in performing the operation, but that he acted under the honest belief that it was for the benefit of the animals themselves, and as well for the benefit of himself as a grazier, and that the object he had in view could not be attained by any other known method; they accordingly dismissed the information laid against him without costs. The question for the opinion of the Court was, “Is the operation of dishorning cattle as proved in this case, justifiable?" The Court held that the operation of dishorning caused extreme pain without adequate and reasonable object, and was unnecessary abuse of the animal, and, therefore, unjustifiable, and that the respondent ought to have been convicted. This appears to be the only case of dishorning cattle that has come before the High Court in this country, but there have been three cases in Ireland (Brady v. M'Argle; Callaghan v. S. P. C. A. and Reg. v. M'Donogh, supra) and two in Scotland (Renton v. Wilson [1888], 15 Just. Cas. 84; and Todrick v. Wilson [1891], 2 White, Just. Cas. 636), in which the facts, although not precisely the same, were very similar to those in the English case. The weight of judicial authority, however, is against the decision in Ford v. Wiley, sixteen judges having considered dishorning as outside the Act, while only four have regarded it as cruel within the meaning of sect. 2. The decision in Ford v. Wiley is, of course,