XVI. Compassion upon the Domestic Beasts

We know, Tornik — and holy Scripture recounts it to us — that the Lord God, when He had created all the beasts, held a great muster: He brought all the living creatures and made them pass, rank upon rank, before Adam the king, showing him: all these have I set beneath the feet of thy dominion. As David also speaks: "Thou hast made all things subject under his feet: sheep and oxen, yea, and all things else."¹

Of these beasts one part are tamed to us, and serve us in all our labors, obeying us howsoever we will. And there is another part, free and rebellious against man; for they are ravening wild beasts, mightier than man, that dwell in the far deserts and still more in the forests — and God their Creator forgets not them either, but gives them their food: the lion's whelps roar, and ask their meat of God.² And what is their meat? The weaker creatures, which they must hunt with labor, and eat, and live. It is a natural law of this world, that the weak be food for the strong. Leave the world of the dry land: in the world of the sea too that same law reigns; you will see that the little fishes are ever food for the great fishes.

But do not think, Tornik, that those untamed and unbridled wild beasts are wholly free of man's overlordship. No: man, by his cunning ingenuity, avails to hunt those raging beasts and shut them in cages, and to school them to such a degree that they obey their schooling master like a little child.

But our household beasts are grown so tame to us that they live with us, are counted well-nigh of our own household, and are fellow-workers with us, both in all our constant labor and in all things else.

Yet we, being lord and prince over our beasts, beat them and torment them and go unpunished — though the law of the land has its appointed penalty for the tormenting of beasts. Law aside: in Europe there is, of set purpose, a society for the protection of beasts, which has its appointed officers; like constables they keep watch, and if they see a man dealing unmercifully with any beast whatsoever, he is taken on the spot and bears his punishment. If they see that some coachman, grudging his horses their keep, has kept them feeble and weak, such a one straightway bears his punishment and pays his fine; while he who has kept his draught-horse so well that it draws alone a wagon laden with monstrous bales — to such wagoners the protecting society gives reward and prize.

For us there is no such thing, neither punishment nor prize; but our prize, or our reward, is our own profit: for the better we keep our laboring beasts, sound and strong, so much the more gain comes to us from their doubled labor. And when our beasts are weak and strengthless, our plowing and sowing and all else is weak with them. That is a thing plain enough: when the workers are feeble, the work that follows will be feeble too. The example is before your eyes, Tornik: those gutans that are yoked with strong buffaloes and oxen — how much more ground they plow than the gutan whose beasts, being lean and spent of strength, scarce plow in two days one day's-plowing of ground!

If we tend our beasts with an eye to our profit only, that is no virtue; justice itself requires that we have compassion upon the beasts by nature — for the beasts too upon this earth have fellow-feeling, even as we, and stand in need of our help. "The righteous man hath mercy on his beast; but the bowels of the ungodly are without mercy," speaks holy Scripture.³ The Lord God gave the clean beasts to men, to slay and seethe and eat; but by the Law He forbids that the lamb be slain in its mother's milk.⁴ When its dam is yearning over her new-dropped lamb, how great a cruelty is it to mingle the sucking lamb's blood with the milk — whereat the poor mother, aching with her natural tenderness, laments aloud and calls for her lamb. The natural tenderness of the beasts is for a season: it lasts until the new-dropped lambs and calves are weaned of the milk; but the parental tenderness of mankind lasts even to the grave. The civilized world of Europe keeps no such reckoning: sucking lamb and sucking calf it eats together alike, giving heed neither to Moses nor to natural tenderness. Yet the wonder is that it lays down a law for its hunters, that in the season when the birds bring forth their young they shall not hunt. And that, so it seems to me, is not so much for compassion's sake as for that provident care — what shall we eat tomorrow? — lest those dainty fowl be lacking from the tables of the gentlefolk.

Compassion is so great a virtue, Tornik, that it not only makes us feel to spare and to pity our own household beasts, but stirs a man's heart even over the very beasts of prey. To fit that thought I will tell you a charming fable, which is a true pattern of the love of mercy.

A young hind, at her bearing-time in the cave where she dwelt — how it fell out I cannot say — lost her young; they died. The poor hind leaves her dead young, goes out and wanders the mountain forest, and, chancing upon a den, she sees two new-whelped wolf-cubs fallen there, faint with hunger. It may be their dam, gone out to take a sheep for food, had been throttled by the dogs, and the cubs were left motherless. The tender-hearted hind, pitying the wolf-cubs with a mother's yearning, said: what harm is it if I suckle these masterless whelps, seeing my dugs are filled with milk, until they be grown?

In that forest there dwelt hard by a hermit. You know, Tornik, hermits are prayer-loving men withdrawn from the world; but of the sweetness of parental tenderness they have not much taste. Eh, witless hind! says the hermit; I marvel at you — how come you to suckle those whelps of the wolf? Do you not know that when they are grown they will be wolves, and it may be the first blood they suck will be yours? — That thing I have not considered, answers the kind-hearted hind; I consider only the doing of a good deed. What would you have me do? I have milk, and no fawn; these poor things have no mother, and hunger for milk; I must be a mother to them, and care for them. Eh, brother hermit — and are all that are born of man born good? and when they are grown, are they not often more wicked than the wolf?

That is a fable, Tornik; now let me tell you a thing that truly happened, which I saw with my own eyes; and see how the love of mercy sometimes carries a man to the very extreme. We know that man is wont to have pity upon man, or upon his own household beasts; but we have not seen a man show mercy to the wolf, which forever tears his sheep.

When Hayrik was chosen Shepherd of the diocese of Mush,⁵ at the time of the journey from Varag to Surb Karapet⁶ I too was with him. We came to the village of Ziaret, which is a little way from the monastery of Glak. The men of that village did Hayrik great honor: cream with honey, butter with honey, roasted lamb — we ate and we ate; blessed be that day!

After the meal we saw that the stout young men of that village had taken a wolf alive: thrusting sticks between his jaws and among his legs and binding him fast, so they brought him and cast him down before Hayrik. Eh, Hayrik, they said, give us our bakhshish!⁷ At this moment that poor wolf turned his eyes toward Hayrik; and then I saw that it went very hard with Hayrik, and he was much moved. He asked, Where did you take this wolf? They said, Near by the village: he had come and hidden himself in a corner of the sheep-cote wall, that by night he might steal out a sheep and eat it. Hayrik said: What — is the sheep lawful for you, and for the wolf forbidden? God created the wolf together with the sheep, and has given him his allotted portion. You slaughter sheep freely and eat; what harm is it if you give that poor beggar of the mountains his share as well? And you bear false witness against this wolf: he was not come to steal a sheep; he had heard there was a matagh in the village — a "Cross, be our help" offering⁸ — and he was come to eat of the matagh. Who knows how many days he had gone hungry, till, fallen from strength, he scarce dragged himself to the village; and you, coming upon him, took him — and as though you had done some great feat of valor, you ask bakhshish. A great bakhshish I will give you: carry the poor wolf out of the village and let him loose; let him go about his business. When the villagers heard this, they began to mutter one with another: ho, men! this Hayrik is come to our land for a shepherd — and will he give our sheep to the wolves? We caught one wolf with a thousand pains, and he says, Let him go! Hayrik, hearing this murmuring, began his wolf-fables. Give ear, villagers, and I will tell you a fable. A wolf roamed seven days and seven nights over mountains and glens, and nothing fell to his paw; he saw that he must die of hunger, and said: let me steal soft and soft down to the near village; it may be God will give me some allotted portion. The poor wolf, faint-headed with hunger, comes in the evening dark to a village, and huddles down beneath the wall of a sheep-cote. Through a chink of that cote's wall the wolf peers in: the lamps are burning, sheep are being slaughtered, and the dogs, couched to one side with their eyes fixed, wait for their share.

Then the wolf's heart grew bitter, and he began to say within himself: Eh, unrighteous men! if the wolf did this thing, what an outcry you would raise! you and your shepherds would be hunting him with dogs and cudgels; and here am I, wronged and famished, watching with my eyes these doings of yours. It is the wolf's name that is cried abroad — and it is you who eat the sheep! Of a truth you are men in countenance, but in your ways you are man-wolves. Do you not see those neighbor man-wolves of ours, who fall upon you in troops and sweep your flocks of sheep away wholesale? Your own valor, and your dogs', you try only upon us poor wolves — who want but very little, and have more conscience than you.

This complaint and judgment of the wolf is very just, beloved villagers: the wolves too must live upon this earth. You would have their seed cut off; but you should know that the wolves are very profitable to you: were there no dread of the wolves, you would never guard your sheep at all.

Hayrik's fable and these words touched the villagers' hearts not a little. The young men said: Hayrik, as it appears, you have great pity upon this bound wolf; for your sake we will loose him and let him go free — give us our bakhshish. They took the bakhshish, and they cheated Hayrik: they carried the poor bound wolf out of the village, slipped the dogs upon him, and throttled him, and stripped off the wolf's little pelt. Well done, villagers! — Hayrik gets up and reads the sermon of pardon over the village's sheep-eating wolf!

This history I have told you, Tornik — but be wary: it is not an example to take for a plain lesson. I told it you only that you may well understand how far the love of mercy can master a man's heart, that he would spare even the ravening beast.

Then our own household laboring beasts — how much the more are they worthy of our compassion! Hard-hearted and merciless are those husbandmen who win their bread by tormenting and torturing their beasts; and it is for this that such men never eat their bread in fullness. Do you think the cry and the groaning of the beasts does not reach heaven? Do not imagine that the beasts are summed as nothing and naught before God. Have you not read the book of Jonah the prophet? The Lord God, when He spared the ungodly Ninevites, spared the beasts also, even as He spared those children that knew not their right hand from their left.⁹

My heart is sore wrung, Tornik, and my pity stirs, when I see how our village laboring folk deals, conscienceless and unsparing, with its own household yoke-beasts — forever tormenting them under the drover's whip, so that on the backs of the uncomplaining beasts the weals of the blows show strip upon strip. If God by miracle should open the beasts' mouths, as He did the mouth of Balaam's speaking ass,¹⁰ what a cry and complaint would they lift up against the cruelty of men! And yet — is their dumb groaning and lowing not itself a cry? The reaping laborer's protest against his wrongs reaches heaven; shall the protest of the laborer's fellow-worker, the wronged and beaten beast, not reach heaven?

Sometimes I see a poor beast, spent of strength, the yoke on its neck, go down and wallow in the very furrow; see then how much whip it must eat! Unable to bear the blows, at its last shift it staggers to its feet, goes a little way, and goes down again. The unmerciful plow-driver never thinks: let me leave this poor beast a while; let it go graze and take its rest, and then I will bring it and yoke it again. There are pitiless men too, who in place of the drover's whip or a green switch use dry wood; and then not the hide and the flesh alone, but the very bones of the speechless beasts are shattered.

The horse-drivers and ass-drivers likewise deal grievously with those carrying beasts, loading upon them at times heavy burdens beyond their strength. And if it chance that the poor beast, brought to its last shift beneath the burden, sinks down, or falls by mishap — what do they do, do you know? They beat it unmercifully beneath its burden, that the beast, crushed under the weight, may rise of itself; and by this cause the wretched beast comes to harm, either in its back or in its leg.

Do you see, Tornik, how heavy men's unmercifulness lies upon the poor beasts? Protector or advocate they have none: conscience and the love of mercy alone are the beasts' protectors — and even that is rare enough in the hearts of men.

My father used to tell me, Tornik, that once in time past there was a governor in Van; and that man had by nature a great compassion upon beasts: if he saw a man that dealt cruelly with a beast, he would punish him on the spot, and gave out punishments to fit the fault — and merry ones.

One day, going out of the city toward the town of Artamet,¹¹ he sees two horse-drivers sitting at their ease at a spring-head eating bread, while their horses stood even so beneath their loads. Straightway he commands that the loads be brought down off the horses — and the loads, as it fell out, were barley. Filling the horses' nose-bags well, he has them hung from the horses' heads; and the loads themselves he has set, one pack apiece, upon the men's backs, and says: until the horses have eaten their barley, you likewise shall stand upon your feet even so.

Another day, at the time of his going out of the city gate, he sees two men riding upon one horse toward Aygestan;¹² the thing shows monstrous in the governor's eye; he gives command that one of the two come down from the horse, and sends him forthwith to prison; to the other he says: you are old, and I have spared you; go, bear word of your fellow, that they have carried him to prison, and ten days he shall serve his punishment.

Yet another day, walking abroad outside the city, he sees a man going along with a sack slung over his arm; but he marvels much when out of that sack he hears the voices of cats. Drawing near, he asks: what is there in that sack? The man is at a loss to deny it, since the cats' voices are heard: Agha, he says, they are thieving cats; I am going to carry them and cast them loose in the city. You worthless fellow! says the governor; I chase thieves out of the city, and you carry cats into it! He gives command: they draw the poor cats out of the sack, and the sack he has pulled down over the man's head; a constable, taking him by the hand, leads him toward the prison. The men passing to and fro behold this public disgrace — only, thanks to the sack on his head, they cannot tell who he is. As for the delivered cats, they turn straight for home, and carry word to the household that their master has been taken to prison.

But do you ask, Tornik, whether that mercy-loving man had compassion only upon the tormented beasts, and dealt his impartial judgment there alone — did he not put in practice the same pity and even-handed judgment for wronged men as well?

Yes, Tornik: when a man has compassion upon the beasts, it is most natural that toward his fellow of his own kind he should feel it the more, and be stirred to the love of mercy. And yet, who knows — it is the world; perhaps there are also men of the sort who, feigning kind hearts outwardly, hold court for a cat, to make show that they are lovers of justice, while the cause of the wronged man who cries out they let lie. As in Christ's time the hypocrite Pharisees swallowed the camel, and strained the gnats out from the face of the wine¹³ — that is, they passed over the justice of God's law, and counted the small, trifling things for righteousness.

Let not men think, Tornik, that God the Judge is avenger for wronged men only. No: I have heard, and have read in books besides, that the protest of the speechless beasts also comes up before God; and God, holding judgment, takes vengeance. The Syrian Saint Ephrem, that holy elder, himself confesses the fault of his boyhood, which is set down in the history of his life.¹⁴

He says: In the days of my youth I was a wayward, restless, mischievous stripling. One day in the field I saw a cow in calf, that had lain down, being near her time. Pelting her with stones, I chased the poor cow and gave her no peace to bear her calf; so hard I pressed upon her heels that I drove her into the forest. The cow cast her calf, and fell to the ground spent of breath, and there she was left; in the night the wild beasts ate both the cow and the calf. Now that cow was a poor man's cow. The thing stayed not hidden; it became known, and they took me and put me in prison. In that prison there were other offenders too, who told over their sins to one another. One would say, I killed an innocent man; another would say, I robbed a great merchant and slew him; and so on. Me too they asked: boy, what is your sin? I told the passage of the cow. Oh! said they — is that a sin too? At the last the judgment of the murderers was held; they were taken and hanged. But me they did not condemn to death, sparing my boyhood; only, beating me soundly, they let me out of the prison. And in truth for some months I suffered sore in that prison. I had no sleep at all: always the image of the hunted cow came before my eyes.

I considered that for the poor man's cow I must do penance everlastingly; wherefore I left home, father, mother, and all, and said: let me go to the mountain and become a hermit, and expiate my sins of cruelty and wrong. And by this trial I came to soberness, and grew wise to the judgment of God — who is avenger for the beasts also, when we deal in cruelty with the speechless creatures.

Let this history be a lesson to you, Tornik; never put it out of your mind, but remember always Saint Ephrem's history and the judgment of the hunted cow — knowing and believing that the righteous God is judge alike, as of man, so also of the wronged beast.