CRUELTY TO ANIMALS.

Waikato Times, Volume XXI, Issue 1766, 30 October 1883, Page 2

CRUELTY TO ANIMALS.

out shoes, without feed, and with badly galled backs, have boan ridden with both whip and spur until they fell almost dend from the cruel treatment they had received. Such scones as thib are of everyday occurrence, and why, therefore, should we not combine and strike against their continuance? Wo sincerly hope that befoie long some steps will be taken in Waikato to organise a branch of the humane institution referred to.

Again we feel called upon to refer to this important matter. We hope that, now Auckland has given us a lead, the remarks which we have fiom time to time made on this important subject will be effectual in urging our readers, or at leaat jjhqae of them \yh.q aYe int,ci.qbtqd; Vfake, qepisive steps towfU'ds establishing a br-anoh of the society for the prevention ot cruelty to ammalh. Nothing can possibly be more grating to one's feelings than to see a horse brutally treated by its. rider or driver, when the unfortunate animal, conscious of doing its, be»t, is punished, and cruelly so, for not doing more. Flagrant cruelty of this kind is often witnessed in Waikato, though we , beklou» od never tiea.v' of a,ny pVisScution for an offence under this hoad. Who has not seen the everyday occurrence of people riding a broken - down horse, halfstarved and falling through over-work, urging him on with spur and whip, when there is no occasion for an application of either? And then there is the overdriven, over-aged, gall-shouldered, shouldersprnftfa<f fcralvhopse, looked. ™c,n by its owner aa a piooe of automatical machinery, and trudging along incessantly with a load which he is barely able to move. But can anything, possibly be more revolting than the'treatmen't which horses receive' at the hands of natives, particularly during their sojourn in 1 oto' border r t6wnships. ,We have oftj&ta&W fttetfjßflM wh^ro Howes, witty