Note 5 — THE CRUELTY OF SPORT

Moreover, there is a sport which, as the Rev. J. Stratton has pointed out, might well supersede rabbit-coursing—viz., whippet-racing. “It cannot be pleaded,” he says, “that if we were to stop the coursing of captured rabbits we should be unduly depriving workmen of recreation, for ‘whippets’ could be employed just as well in races as in chasing rabbits. Of the first of these sports I can speak as an eye-witness. In whippet-racing a course is formed, which is kept free for the dogs by ropes on either side. At one end, men have in hand the whippets that are about to compete, and here stands the starter, holding his pistol. ‘Runners-up’ now come on to the course, carrying in their hands a towel or scarf, and starting from the front of the dogs, and frantically waving the article they hold, and whistling, and calling to the animals, they begin to run towards the far end of the course, where the winning-line is marked out and the judge has taken up his post. When the right moment has arrived, the pistol is fired, and the whippets are liberated, and commence to travel the course with the speed of the wind, the ‘runners-up’ always getting well beyond the winning-point before the dogs overtake them, in order that the latter may pass it at their utmost pace. It is altogether a remarkable sight, and had I never seen the thing, I could not have believed that the little dogs would enter into the contest with the ardour they do.”