IN?
You may hope and believe, but how can you tell that during a prolonged
and terrible experiment, the animal suffers no pain?" The only reply
that the experimenter could give was a reiteration of faith in the
working of the apparatus.

And here, for the present, the problem must be left. Its only answer
is a guess. Yet it should be capable of a definite solution. Every
year, in our great cities, it becomes necessary to put homeless dogs
out of existence in some merciful way. It should be possible, by use
of chloroform, to determine which theory is true. If, under proper
circumstances, a dozen animals were made absolutely unconscious by the
use of chloroform, as insensible as human being are made before a
capital operation, so that the corneal reflex is abolished, could this
degree of unconsciousness be maintained "as long as any experimenter
desired"? Would it even be possible as a rule to keep them alive a
week, yet completely anaesthetized? Or, on the contrary, would such
animals be peculiarly liable to sudden death from the effects of the
chloroform? One cannot doubt the possibility of laboratory anaesthesia
being maintained indefinitely; but how is it with complex and full
surgical anaesthesia? Until such appeal to science shall have been
made in the presence of those who doubt, and are able to judge, the
question cannot be regarded as settled. There are those who will
believe that the older investigators were right; that the perfect
insensibility to pain is not invariably attained in these cases; and
that both in English and American laboratories the most hideous
torments are sometimes inflicted upon man's most faithful servant and
friend. Even Dr. Thane, the Government inspector, admitted that in
making reports the inspector "never could determine which experiments
were painless and which were painful."

The evidence given by experimenters was frequently very curious, and
sometimes suggestive. Professor Starling, for example, testified that
dogs exhibited no fright or fear at entering a vivisection chamber;
there are no signs "that they have ANY IDEA OF WHAT THEY ARE GOING TO
SUFFER," said the physiologist; "that is a great consolation in
dealing with animals, as compared with dealing with a man."[1]
"GOING TO SUFFER" is a somewhat significant admission. He is asked
whether the experimentation of to-day is more or less humanely
conducted than it was before the Act of 1876; and instead of replying
he