when he was a boy he saw a dog coming toward him and carelessly threw a
stone at him. The stone broke the dog's leg. The poor creature had
strength to crawl up to him and lick his feet. This incident, he
afterward said, had given him the bitterest remorse. He never forgot it.
From that moment he resolved never to be unkind to any animal. We know
that he kept that resolution, for he wrote many of his novels with his
faithful dogs Maida, Nimrod, and Bran near him. When Maida died he had
a sculptured monument of her set up before his door.

We all know boys who throw stones at animals from pure thoughtlessness
and love of fun. But no boy with a really affectionate nature can bear
to make an animal or a human being suffer pain. A boy who begins by
being cruel to animals usually ends by being cruel to women and
children. A girl who habitually forgets to feed her kitten or her
canary birds, will be apt to forget her child later in life.

Half a century ago there lived in the state of Massachusetts a very
remarkable man named Thoreau. This man became so deeply interested in
the animal world that he built a little hut for himself near Walden
pond, and he there lived in the closest sympathy with the birds and
animals for more than two years. It is said that even the snakes loved
him, and would wind round his legs; and on taking a squirrel from a tree
the little creature would hide its head in his waistcoat. The fish in
the river knew him and would let him lift them out of the water, and the
little wood-mice came and nibbled at the cheese he held in his hand. It
was Thoreau's love for the little wild creatures which drew them to him,
for animals are as responsive to love as are human beings.

John Howard gave his life to the work of improving the condition of
prisons all over the world, and finally he died alone in Russia of jail