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APRIL, 1990
137
only personally secure from all possible harm, but have all comforts and luxuries provided for them, and for their sport the poor beast is beaten out of his retreat, goaded into a temper, and is fired at from a safe distance and it is then that the killers find a pleasure in watching the death agonies of the unfortunate animal, and exhibit its stuffed skin as a trophy or memento of their bravery.
Shooting of thousands of birds by parties of pleasure-seekers, even during the Christmas week, and on a Sabbath, is also called sport ; and records are made and preserved of the thousands bagged by members of the party. This can hardly be differentiated from the sinful pleasure experienced by boys who stone to death a crawling serpent or a scorpion seeking for a hole to creep in, who enjoy the tearing up of a mouse by a cat, or who steal the eggs or young ones of a bird.
If there be any pleasure experienced in such killing, it can only be likened to the morbid feeling of satisfaction which Nadir Shah is said to have enjoyed when hordes of persons used to be brought in his presence bound all over and beheaded one after another. When asked who he was that he should enjoy such a general massacre of the innocents—for if he was a god, he should protect his creatures, if he was a god's messenger, or a founder of religion he should protect his followers, and if he was a king he should protect his subjects, he said he was 'God's Wrath' which had visited the people.
Killing for Trade in Bone and Leather
The shooting of elephants for the sake of their tusks has assumed so serious proportions that it is predicted that the elephant will be extinct in Africa within 50 years. Ivory is so valuable that people who have nothing else to do, turn to the game of elephant shooting and amass a fortune in a short time. Carried by greed, a group of aviators dropped several bombs from the sky on a herd of elephants. A number of them were killed outright, and many lay wounded. But most of the ivory was blown to bits by bombs, and the greedy aviators got much disappointment as a result of the cruel killing. Elephant must also command a high price in the local markets.
Plucking feathers of life birds and the skinning of living animals, for the sake of their feathers and skins, are facts which can not be denied. These are some of the worst forms of cruelty which can be imagined.
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