"I am glad to hear," says I, "that some old bachelor has left a lot of money to your society. It is just what I would do myself if I hadn't a hope--that is, it may be possible that all the money I have will be needed for a special occasion--as no free-born New England woman would be beholden to a foreign nation for her setting out." Here Mr. Bergh smiled. You have no idea how much younger he looked when he did smile; the benevolence that made him a Natural History Philanthropist just shone out from his eyes, and beamed all over his face, till I longed to be--well, say a duck, or something of that sort--that he might save me from oppression. "Thank you," says he; "most men want some object in life. You ladies have done so much for humanity that we are content to leave it in your hands, but the poor animals have up to this time escaped compassion." "Not compassion, but assistance," says I. "Cruelty to animals is mostly confined to men." "Not exactly," says he. "I have sometimes seen kittens and pet dogs treated more unmercifully than omnibus-horses, and by innocent children too." I did not answer. How could I? The remembrance of a trout-brook, with birch-trees hanging over it, and great red-seeded brake-leaves growing thick on the bank, made me shudder. Hadn't I held ever so many kittens under water in that very spot, and shouted and laughed to the other girls--some of you, my sisters, among them--while the poor little things kicked and struggled for life, that was just as dear to them as it is to me? Hadn't I hunted up birds' nests, and driven the pretty creatures distracted by handling their eggs, till at last the nests were broken up? Then didn't I string the cold eggs into a chain, and hang them in triumph over the looking-glass in our keeping-room? You will tell me, out of the kindness of your hearts, that these were sins of ignorance. Just so; and it is this ignorance, which is sometimes cruel as the grave, that Mr. Bergh is trying his best to enlighten. No child would do a cruel thing if it were made to understand the pain it is giving. Yet, sticking pins through flies, and spearing wasps to the wall, are about the first thing a smart baby learns to do. Did you ever see a lot of boys going home from school, when a garter-snake, or any other harmless serpent, crosses their path? They know well enough that the poor things do no harm, and are as afraid as death of them; but see the great stones they heave upon the miserable reptile; the shouts they send up, as it writhes, and coils, and fills the air with feeble hisses, trying, poor thing, to save its bruised and broken life to the last. Does anybody tell the boys that this is brutal cruelty? No, even the Christian mother, who would not do an unkind thing to save her life, forgets that God makes snakes as well as ringdoves, and that pain is just as bitter to the snake as to the cooing bird.