The Harrison Times

RUSSIANS FOND OF ANIMALS.
All Classes of the People Teach Children to Be Kind to All Species of Beasts.

No one can be in Russia for any length of time without noticing the kindness that the people show to animals, writes Curtis Guild in the Youth's Companion.
The beautiful Russian folktales, which are just beginning to be translated into English, teach children to be kind to all animals.
The vary name of the most terrible animal in Europe, the bear, shows the sympathetic, affectionate attitude of the Russian toward animals. In every other European language with which I am familiar the name of the bear, with the "r" rolled as it is universally except in English, suggests a fierce, growling wild beast. In Italian it is orso; in French, ours; in German, baer; in Scandinavian, bjorn. But the Russians think of the bear in a friendly, rather jocular way, and call him miedvied-"the fellow who likes honey."
As a matter of fact, however, the peasants seldom use that word. They call the bear mishka, which means Little Michael, or Micky.
Because the Russian is kind to animals and to his fellow man you must not think that he is a coward. The Russian is, I think, the only hunter who kills the biggest bears single handed with a spear: and so we find a naturally gentle race displaying in war the most dauntless bravery, not only in the excitement of a bayonet charge, but in the stubborn endurance of defense.
The Russian is very fond of pets. I have seen that embodiment of unbending and wooden faced dignity, the conventional butler, forgetting his thin silk stockings and pumps, dash out into the snow when the mercury was far below zero, to rescue a starving kitten, which he thenceforth kept in his own room. I have never seen a Russian boy throw a stone at a dog or a cat. Russian boys do not catapult pigeons.