The Sun.
London, England, 1863-08-10 00:00:00

It is very satisfactory to notice that the distin-
guished members of the French medical profession
are raising their protest against the disgraceful
practice of vivisection. The conduct of the EMPEROR
in this respect has been most praiseworthy. Some
time since a deputation from the Society for the
Prevention of Cruelty to Animals waited upon him,
and explained to him the great extent to which
this pernicious custom was carried on in France.
The EMPEROR promised to give this subject his
attention, and he has done so. If the result be that
this cruelty is out down, a great benefit will have
been conferred on the people by the prohibition.
Nothing demoralises or deteriorates the mind more
than such revolting acts of cruelty. Those who
are callous at first become downright brutes as they
proceed, and those who at first shrunk back become
hardened at the repeated efforts. The excuse given,
that such a course is necessary, is quite absurd.
The fact is that those who uphold such practices
do it for the love of the thing itself. They delight
in experiments, and it is in the cause of scientific
discovery that such tortures are inflicted, and not
for the sake of the benefit of their fellow-creatures.
The perpetrators of such acts profane the name of
the humanity they profess to serve. Nothing can
justify the infliction of such atrocious cruelty, and
the best answer to the untenable reason, that it is
done to gain knowledge, is that right cannot come
from wrong. The worst is that the same animal is
kept for fresh experiments instead of being killed
at once after the tortures inflicted. It would
be only right to render such revolting acts
impossible by the stringent exercise of the
law. It is a disgrace to any civilised
country in which such deeds are enacted. No one
possessed of right feeling in or out of the profession
but will raise his voice against the practice, and no
one has yet clearly defined or fully proved any
known benefit that has ever been gained to society
by such horrors. The ignorant are taken in by the
dogmatic assnrarca of the learned that it is neces-
sary, but those skilled torturers would find it very
difficult to make the experienced believe in the
necessity. It is not altogether an idle belief that
encourages one to hope that the worst is over in
this horrible practice, and that a stop will speedily
be put to the practice of vivisection that has so
long continued in France. When one of the chief
members of a profession sets his face against any
custom, a great step is gained in the right direction.
Insteaa of proving beneficial to the young surgeon
eenr,eysasnusdnu
unfit
such
feoh r displays,whaisn such caehrt
inioenuldtyi rtaefni
must
after-life.
rue
et o
to
renderbrutal
in
him
torture, uivrt
-life. To
deaden all sympathy with suffering, and to harden
the mind to all consideration, is not at all the way
to fit one for walking through the world amid
scenes of trouble and anguish, wherever "mankind
and misery are found." The thousand ills tha

flesh is heir to are sufficiently trying in themselves
to endure without the professor of medicine, who
issent for to minister to the afflicted, regarding all

. ... _
pain as a joke, and considering the intensest torture
a good opportunity for making observations. Such
would be the result of the continuous practice of
vivisection, and it is highly to the credit of all con-
cerned in putting down this disgraceful practice in
France. No one who atrtves to assist in this good
cause will ever regret the trouble that has been
taken, or consider that he has not conferred a
benefit on all concerned.

A POSTHUMOUS OPERA BY MARSCRSER is abon
to appear at Vienna.

CHARLOTTE CORDAY'S POLITICAL WORKS, iII
chiding all her letters, edited " par un Bibliophile Nor.
wand," is the title of a small volume just published.

TWO NEW DRAMAS are announced by Victor
Hugo : " Torquemada" and " The Twins."

GOUNOD, it is said, has finished another opera,
which is first to be performed at the beginning of the winter-
season in Paris. It is called " MireiJle ; the text by Mistral
and Carre ; the scene in Spain.

A NOVEL BY M. ALEXANDER DUMAS Will 80013
appear embodying the leading facts of Lady Hamilton's
life, and called "Emma Lyons."
A PART-SONG BY THE VETERAN METHFESSEL,
now in his eightieth year, bet, unhappily, deaf, was exe-
cuted recently at Brunswick in his presence, with every
imaginable German musical ovation.
THE prize of the French Academy for Eloquence
for the year 1861 has "L'Eloge de Chateaubliand " for its
subject.

THE RENAN-LITERATURE iS swelling up in
proportion to the demand for his work, there having ap-
peared, among commentaries upon it very recently :—" Re-
ponse a M. Renan sur la Vie de Jesus,' " par un Libre
Croyant ;;," Le Livre de AI. E. Renan sur la Vie de Jesus,"
par M. Laurentie; "Lecon preliminaire a M. Renan sur la
Vie de Jesus," par l'A.bbe M. Michon ;" " Une Echappee
sur la 'Vie de J63ue' d'Ernest Renan," par Frederic des
Granges.

Mr. WALLIS, the painter of the "Death of
Chattertcn" (lately difToEed Of at the sale of the late L. A.
Egg, E.A., for £300), has recently returned from a long
sejlurn in Italy, where he has been engaged in makiag
studies of the people and scenery of the southern half of the
Peninsula.

Mr. HERBERT'S first fresco in the Westminster
Palace is within a week of e,ompletion. The subject is
"Moses giving the Lim to the Israelites," It is said to
have been most elaborately studied, the painter having
sought to indicate even the season of the year and the hour
of the day in which this great d.livery of the law was ac-
complished.
WEBER'S ACCOUNT OF THE FIRST NIGTIT OP lIIs
ERON—In one of those delightful and pathetic
letters to his "Lim," which relate his English experiences—
" My best beloved Ottroline l" be says, "through God's grace
and assistance, I have this evening met with the most cont.
plete success. The brilliancy and affecting nature of the
triumph are indescribable. God alone be thanked for it I
When I entered the orchestra, the whole of the house,
which was filled to overflowing, rose up, and I was saluted
by huzzas, and waving of hats and handkerchiefs, which I
thought would never have done. They insisted on encor-
ing the overture. Every air was interrupted twice or
thrice with bursts of applause. . . . So much for this
night,v dear life, from your heartily tired husband, who,
er, could not sleep in peace till he had contmuniego
5-911, t -
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great part of the evil consists in delaying necessary
work, and also in disputing which party is to
undertake the necessary alterations. It would
seem that the company, in one place, had put up
a fence four and a half feet high, owing to the
representation of one who farmed the land along
the side of the railway where the accident hap-
pened. What a pity that they did not go on,
and put up barriers wherever any
likely to be grazing, and thus prevent the possi-
bility of any accident occurring ;at the same animals were
time the expense
could not be so considerab!e
as to prevent the occupiers of ground in the
immediate vicinity of railways from themselves
The fact is, that both sides
undertaking the task.
surely this terrible misfortune
awrielltrlaakethem blame,
andbitterly regret the ill-saved trouble
and expense of putting up fences. The obloquy of
the affair will rest with the neighbourhood in
which the accident happened ; but exactly the same
blame attaches itself to all parts of the country,
' wherever trains are passing to and fro, and the
same shortsightedness prevails in making the need-
ful preparations for guarding against such events.
Besides those killed, many persons have been
seriously injured, and perhaps for the remainder of
their lives will have cause to regret their ill-starred
journey on this occasion. It was to an excursion
train that the accident occurred; but there does not
appear to have been any of those mistakes and
blunders made that two years ago (sensed so much
confusion in this special kind of traffic, and created
so much trouble and suffering in so many quarters.
The sole cause of the disaster was the want of due
foresight on the line, and that indifference is shared
by so many persons residing in the neighbourhood
of railways that it is to be earnestly hoped that this
sad occurrence will serve as a warning that they
will turn to good account.