295. The other instance relates to a HOUSE-MARTEN. It is well known that these birds build their nests under the eaves of inhabited houses, and sometimes under those of door porches; but we had one that built its nest _in the house_, and upon the top of a common doorcase, the door of which opened into a room out of the main passage into the house. Perceiving the marten had begun to build its nest here, we kept the front-door open in the daytime; but were obliged to fasten it at night. It went on, had eggs, young ones, and the young ones flew. I used to open the door in the morning early, and then the birds carried on their affairs till night. The next _year_ the MARTEN came again, and had _another brood in the same place_. It found its _old nest_; and having repaired it, and put it in order, went on again in the former way; and it would, I dare say, have continued to come to the end of its life, if we had remained there so long, notwithstanding there were six healthy children in the house, making just as much noise as they pleased.
296. Now, what _sagacity_ in these birds, to discover that those were places of safety! And how happy must it have made us, the parents, to be _sure_ that our children had thus deeply imbibed habits the contrary of cruelty! For, be it engraven on your heart, YOUNG MAN, that, whatever appearances may say to the contrary, _cruelty_ is always accompanied with _cowardice_, and also with _perfidy_, when that is called for by the circumstances of the case; and that _habitual_ acts of cruelty to other creatures, will, nine times out of ten, produce, when the power is possessed, cruelty to human beings. The ill-usage of _horses_, and particularly _asses_, is a grave and a just charge against this nation. No other nation on earth is guilty of it to the same extent. Not only by _blows_, but by privation, are we cruel towards these useful, docile, and patient creatures; and especially towards the last, which is the most docile and patient and laborious of the two, while the food that satisfies it, is of the coarsest and least costly kind, and in quantity so small! In the habitual ill-treatment of this animal, which, in addition to all its labours, has the milk taken from its young ones to administer a remedy for our ailments, there is something that bespeaks _ingratitude_ hardly to be described. In a REGISTER that I wrote from Long Island, I said, that amongst all the things of which I had been bereft, I regretted no one so much as a very diminutive _mare_, on which my children had all, in succession, learned to ride. She was become useless for them, and, indeed, for any other purpose; but the recollection of her was so entwined with so many past circumstances, which, at that distance, my mind conjured up, that I really was very uneasy, lest she should fall into cruel hands. By good luck, she was, after a while, turned out on the wide world to shift for herself; and when we got back, and had a place for her to _stand_ in, from her native forest we brought her to Kensington, and she is now at Barn-Elm, about twenty-six years old, and I dare say, as fat as a mole. Now, not only have I no moral _right_ (considering my ability to pay for keep) to deprive her of life; but it would be _unjust_ and _ungrateful_, in me to withhold from her sufficient food and lodging to make life as pleasant as possible while that life last.