The rich folk round about this great Babylon of Misery, where cruel Want sits on the Seven Hills--make a cartoon of that!--the rich folk who receive hundreds on the turn of a stock, who go to the Bank of England on dividend days--how easily the well-oiled doors swing open for them!--who dwell in ease and luxury at Sydenham, at Norwood, at Surbiton, at Streatham, at Brighton, at Seven-oaks, wherever there is pure air, have distinguished themselves lately in the giving of alms, ordained by the Lord whom they kneel before each Sunday, clad in silk, scarlet, and fine linen, in their cushioned pews. They have established Homes for Lost Dogs and Homes for Lost Cats, neither of which are such nuisances as human beings. In the dog institution they have set up an apparatus specially designed by one of the leading scientific men of the age. The dogs that are not claimed in a certain time, or that have become diseased--like the human nuisances--are put into this apparatus, into a comfortable sort of chamber, to gnaw their last bone. By-and-by, a scientific vapour enters the chamber, and breathing this, the animal falls calmly to death, painlessly poisoned in peace. Seven thousand dogs were thus happily chloroformed "into eternity" in one season. Jubilant congratulations were exchanged at the success of the apparatus. Better than shooting, drowning, hanging, vivisection, or starvation! Let a dog die in peace. Is not this an age of humanity indeed? To sell all you have and give to the poor was nothing compared to this. We have progressed since Anno Domini I. We know better how to do it now. Alere did not seem to trouble himself much about the dogs; he saw so much of the human nuisances. What a capital idea it would be to set up an apparatus like this in the workhouses and in conjunction with the hospitals! Do you know, thoughtless, happy maiden, singing all the day, that one out of every five people who die in London, die in the workhouse or the hospital? Eighty-two thousand people died in London in 1882, and of these, fourteen thousand expired in the workhouses, and six thousand in hospitals! Are not these ghastly figures? By just setting up a few Apparatuses, see what an immense amount of suffering would be saved, and consider what a multitude of human nuisances would he "moved on!" The poor have a saying that none live long after they have been in a certain hospital. "He's been in that hospital--he won't live long." They carry out such wonderful operations there--human vivisections, but strictly painless, of course, under chloroform--true Christian chopping-up--still the folk do not live long when they come out. Why not set up the Apparatus? But a man must not die in peace. Starvation is for human nuisances.